Castlevania; or how I learned to stop worrying and throw my NES Classic through a window
Ages ago, I found myself fawning over a pretty neat retro games magazine I stumbled upon at a yard sale. I couldn’t say exactly what drew me to it, but it started a now multi-year endeavor to own nearly every classic gaming console I had as a child. This particular magazine had a rather in depth article on one of the most famed and classic Nintendo Entertainment System cartridges ever created, Konami’s Castlevania.
Now I’m no super scholar when it comes to video game lore, especially when said lore stretches over three decades at this point and has upwards of ten different entries. It has something to do with Dracula or Alucard or some shit, and a family of people who I assume hate him, and love whips, the Belmonts. I’ve gathered this knowledge from various podcasts, internet articles, and discussions with power nerds who can recite the Belmont family creed in their sleep. A simple concept, Castlevania finds you scrolling side to side, dodging various baddies and whipping all those who stand in your way.
Let’s time warp to oh…2008. I’m pretty sure that’s when I got my Wii, and seeing this particular title on the e-shop I thought “What the hell, it’s gotta be pretty good right? This is from the golden era of retro gaming on the most badass home console to ever rock the 80’s.” Punching the start button on my sideways Wii-mote, and I was off. I’m pretty sure my first attempt lasted a grand total of three minutes. I got confused by the controls (I know, there’s only two buttons, sue me), and instantly thought to myself “damn, I forgot NES games don’t screw around.”
After about a week or so, playing periodically, I had made it over halfway through the game, with little to no score to my name as I had died an obscene number of times and restarted just as many. I found myself going back to this one game time after time, always getting stuck, always getting frustrated. So I put it away, I let it sit on the menu of my Wii, soon to be forgotten as I realized I had better things to play and other stories to experience.
Let’s fast forward to nearly a month ago, at a small, snowy Wal-Mart in a nondescript mountain town in the middle of the country. Fueled by three McDonald’s breakfast sandwiches and at least two Redbulls, I sat chain smoking outside the store, waiting patiently for it to open up, in the hopes that they might have gotten one of the elusive NES Classic home consoles. At the risk of making this story stupidly suspenseful, I’ll just let you know now I managed to get one.
I got home in record time, and proceeded to plug in my new nostalgia machine. I’m a huge Nintendo purist, so of course I had to play a few levels of Mario, and smash the first dungeon in Zelda right out of the box. I then decided to browse the catalog, and see what else the box had in store for me. Lo and behold, my arch nemesis, Castlevania. I jokingly told myself that I should try it, see just how bad I am at it still. I load it up, and instantly get hit with a wave of nostalgia. For a game that I had never beaten, and played in the twilight years of high school nearly ten years past, it had completely sucked me back in.
Boss after boss, dank dungeons and flying gargoyles, I made my way through the castle. The entire time, I know I’ve got the biggest shit eating grin plastered across my face. About two hours pass, and I’ve found myself with no score, and resetting time and time again. I refuse to use the save state function built into the box, because I want to beat this thing the way I should’ve eight years previous. I play for a while longer, and realize the futility of my progress. I haven’t gotten anywhere in the game, and I’m continuing to die repeatedly. I think the term “tilted” applies gloriously here. So I set it down again. An hour later, I’m full of peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and screaming at stupid people over my PC headset in Overwatch to “get back on the point you stupid asshole!”
I haven’t made it back to Castlevania yet. I will in my own time, but for me I think the continuing challenge of being pretty good, just not good enough has bested me. Few games have ever captured my attention and demanded perfection from me. I have the oddest feeling that when I finally do finish it, I’ll have a cathartic moment only those few games have ever given me. Dark Souls, Majora’s Mask, and Bioshock Infinite all did it to me. They gave me a sense of completion, and a source of pride, and also the instant thought that I’ll never replay any of them, because it’s simply not worth it. Castlevania will do it too, this I’m sure. Oh well, when I do finish it, I could always try Battletoads next right?
