Toziuha Night: Dracula's Revenge is basically romhack Castlevania. Not Symphony of the Night and later games, but the classic ones on the NES. Everything you remember from those games is present here as well: Long distance knockbacks that can send you into a pit immediately, replicating the pain of constantly spawning medusa heads, being overly difficult, game overs sending you to the start of a long stage, and the controls being imprecise.

For a one man project, I am very impressed with the quality of the final product. There are some aspects that could have been way better (e.g. the music) but overall, they have achieved what they have set out to do and created a game that is short, yet well-made. There's just one thing I do not like and that's how the casual mode is presented.

If you have problems with the game's Castlevania-inspired difficulty, you'll be blown away by how much better the gameplay feels after you activate the casual mode. This mode drastically decreases the knockback distance, significantly reduces flying enemy spam, tightens the controls and also removes some frankly gimmicky stage hazards (e.g. character sliding off the carriage in 2nd level). It also adds some new moves in the form of a double jump and 8-direction attacks, but I really don't think they were necessary and the experience feels good even without using them. The game's casual mode feels like a modernized version of the original Castlevania experience, tailored towards those with less time on their hands, or the lesser experienced to progress in it however they want to.

That's why in my opinion, locking all of these behind inputting "I'mNoob" as the profile name is a very wrong decision. Because it feels like the game is antagonizing the player, instead of actually trying to make them feel comfortable. Remember, noob is not a word with a positive meaning and conveys serious lack of skills. Thus, many would think it makes the game a cakewalk and will not even try using it. If it wasn't for my curiosity to try inputting that as the profile name, I would have just stopped playing this game as I am no longer into brutal games and thought selecting this mode is going to really butcher the difficulty and suck the fun out of it. But I did try it and I did love this game in the end. So, using a different word and method to describe this mode can help people identify its purpose better.

So how can this be done? I suggest branding the game modes as "Classic" and "Modern". Classic would be the intended difficulty having the same ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ as the original Castlevania games, with Modern tweaking that difficulty for a better experience and training the players for the real deal. I'm not talking about lowering the difficulty by making the game easier, but giving the player more modern options to have a better time. Then, at the end of the modern mode, encourage the players to select the classic mode and see how they're going to perform there as well. Of course, I'm just sharing my thoughts for others who might be reading this. The development on this game is clearly finished and I do not expect the dev to make a drastic change in it.

With all that said, I'm looking forward to whatever the dev releases in the future. Starting with their next game.

Toziuha Night: Dracula's Revenge is basically romhack Castlevania. Not Symphony of the Night and later games, but the classic ones on the NES. Everything you remember from those games is present here as well: Long distance knockbacks that can send you into a pit immediately, replicating the pain of constantly spawning medusa heads, being overly difficult, game overs sending you to the start of a long stage, and the controls being imprecise. For a one man project, I am very impressed with the quality of the final product. There are some aspects that could have been way better (e.g. the music) but overall, they have achieved what they have set out to do and created a game that is short, yet well-made. There's just one thing I do not like and that's how the casual mode is presented. If you have problems with the game's Castlevania-inspired difficulty, you'll be blown away by how much better the gameplay feels after you activate the casual mode. This mode drastically decreases the knockback distance, significantly reduces flying enemy spam, tightens the controls and also removes some frankly gimmicky stage hazards (e.g. character sliding off the carriage in 2nd level). It also adds some new moves in the form of a double jump and 8-direction attacks, but I really don't think they were necessary and the experience feels good even without using them. The game's casual mode feels like a modernized version of the original Castlevania experience, tailored towards those with less time on their hands, or the lesser experienced to progress in it however they want to. That's why in my opinion, locking all of these behind inputting "I'mNoob" as the profile name is a very wrong decision. Because it feels like the game is antagonizing the player, instead of actually trying to make them feel comfortable. Remember, noob is not a word with a positive meaning and conveys serious lack of skills. Thus, many would think it makes the game a cakewalk and will not even try using it. If it wasn't for my curiosity to try inputting that as the profile name, I would have just stopped playing this game as I am no longer into brutal games and thought selecting this mode is going to really butcher the difficulty and suck the fun out of it. But I did try it and I did love this game in the end. So, using a different word and method to describe this mode can help people identify its purpose better. So how can this be done? I suggest branding the game modes as "Classic" and "Modern". Classic would be the intended difficulty having the same bullshit as the original Castlevania games, with Modern tweaking that difficulty for a better experience and training the players for the real deal. I'm not talking about lowering the difficulty by making the game easier, but giving the player more modern options to have a better time. Then, at the end of the modern mode, encourage the players to select the classic mode and see how they're going to perform there as well. Of course, I'm just sharing my thoughts for others who might be reading this. The development on this game is clearly finished and I do not expect the dev to make a drastic change in it. With all that said, I'm looking forward to whatever the dev releases in the future. Starting with their next game.