The Castlevania Lords of Shadow Trilogy Part 2: An Awkward Return to Form

With the first Lords of Shadow being a big success, it was only natural that sequel would be made. It didn’t matter what issues the fans might have had with it, being the highest selling game in the series meant the new continuity was going to be the direction the series would take for the foreseeable future. The fans were just going to have to deal with it.

But I guess Mercury Steam and Konami were worried about alienating the fans too much. I say that because the next game in the series, Castlevania Lords of Shadow: Mirror of Fate (fuck that name is long), feels like a transparent attempt to win back fans that were put off by the reboot. Bringing in classic series characters and returning to the Search Action formula that made the series famous.

Mirror of Fate was a smaller scale release. A spin-off title meant to tide over people waiting for the sequel, while also setting up plot elements for the next game at the same time. Putting important plot elements in a spin-off game? What is this, Kingdom Hearts.

The game was originally released as a 3DS title in 2013 before having an HD port to home consoles a few months later. Apparently, the game was originally in development as an HD game but was later made into 3DS game mid-development before making its way back to HD. There, that’s not confusing at all.

To give credit where it’s due, at least they made it available on HD consoles relatively quickly. While the idea of putting important plot elements in a spin-off is very dumb, if you’re going to do it at least make them available on the same console as the main-line games. Kingdom Hearts wouldn’t learn that lesson until a few years after their initial releases.

Mirror of Fates reception was, decent. A bit more mixed than its predecessors but still mostly positive. And its reception among the fans was noticeably more positive this time. I remember liking it when I first played it but going back to it, I don’t know if I like it nearly as much as I did.

But I'll get into that more later. First let’s cover the story. The game starts with a flashback to before the events of the first game where it’s revealed that Gabriel and Marie had a child, Trevor Belmont, before she was murdered. However, the Brotherhood of Light learned that the child would be the only one to stand against Gabriel when he became Dracula, so he was taken away and raised in secret by the Brotherhood.

How did they know this? Through the Mirror of Fate, a magic artifact that shows the fates of anyone that looks into it. The game then cuts to 57 years later and follows Trevor’s son, Simon Belmont. Trevor went to face Dracula years earlier and never returned. Shortly after Dracula attacked the Brotherhood stronghold Simon was staying in and his mother was killed trying to protect him.

Now Simons a grown man raised by barbarians and is out for revenge. The game then follows Simon as he travels Dracula’s castle to face the dark lord. But Simon isn’t the only character the game focuses on. It also features Alucard who awakens from a deep slumber within Dracula’s castle and sets out to defeat him, periodically running into Simon as their paths interconnect.

And yes, Alucard is exactly who you think he is. If you know anything about Castlevania lore you will figure out exactly what the big twist with Alucard is from the opening cutscene. Even if you don’t it isn’t hard to figure out, so the “twist” just ends up falling flat.

The story this time around is way simpler. It is the typical Castlevania story of a dude with a whip going to fight Dracula. The only difference being this game is told from 3 different perspectives. Technically 4 given the opening has you play as Gabriel, but that’s just a tutorial chapter. The first chapter follows Simon, the second follows Alucard, and the third follows Trevor’s first attempt to kill Dracula.

However, despite having 3 different characters the story never evolves beyond the tried-and-true Castlevania plot. The first game could be argued as being that too, but it had a lot more going on under the hood. It had interesting characters, a plot that developed as it went on and an interesting theme of the struggle against one’s own fate. Mirror of Fate is bare bones by comparison.

Mirror of Fate does at least continue the theme of the series well. The introduction of the titular mirror and the revelation that the Brotherhood of Light were in on the whole thing add an interesting wrinkle to things and give us a better perspective on why Dracula would be so hell bent on getting revenge.

The problem is that the story is so simple that it doesn’t amount to much in the grand scheme of things. Aside from introducing elements like the Mirror of Fate, Alucard and the Toy Maker who all become important in the sequel, the actual events of the story are ultimately inconsequential.

There are also some elements introduced here that end up being changed for the sequel anyway. The Mirror of Fate in this game is a living entity that helps guide the characters throughout the castle, but that part gets dropped for Lords of Shadow 2.

The story here reminds me a lot of Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories in that it’s both important and unimportant at the same time. At least the story is more comprehendible than Chain of Memories and not overly complicated. It's overly simple, but I'll take that over the needlessly convoluted bullshit that is Kingdom Hearts.

I think the big issue with the story is that it has too many characters. The story should have only focused on Trevor/Alucard since he’s the only one who is important to the main story of the series. I like Simon, he’s my favourite Belmont, but he adds nothing to the narrative and feels like he’s here purely for fan service. You could cut him out and lose nothing of value.

I can’t even say the story telling is good here. The idea of putting Trevor after Alucard was a mistake in my opinion. I know the big twist is that Trevor is Alucard, but you can figure that out way too easily, so it isn’t worth it being a twist anyway. I think it should have started with Trevor, then go onto Simon then end on Alucard. This isn’t Pulp Fiction, there’s no benefit from telling the stories out of order.

At least the voice acting is still good. Robert Carlyle returns as Gabriel, or Dracula this time, and he once again does a good job. I’ll get more into his performance as Dracula next time since he isn’t given as big a role here, but he steals the show when he does appear.

The other actors do a great job too. Richard Madden of Game of Thrones fame does Alucard/Trevor, adding a somber tone to his voice that fits the character well. Alec Newman does the voice of Simon and while he isn’t given much to work with, I think he does a good job of elevating the material by making Simon sound like the rough barbarian he’s portrayed as.

The voice acting was a strong point of the original so I'm glad it’s the same way here. There isn’t as much of it this time around, but I'm glad they didn’t skimp out on this given the games smaller scope.

The cutscenes though, they aren’t great. They aren’t bad by any means, in fact I remember them looking really good on 3DS, but in HD they don’t look nearly as good. They're more stylized which is fine, but the models are lacking in detail and the animations are stiff. The lip syncing also doesn’t look right. They match the timing well enough, but the movements of the mouths don’t line up at all. It looks weird.

On a handheld these problems aren’t very noticeable. In fact, they’re understandable given the limited hardware, but on an HD console that was able to run its predecessor, it’s a lot harder to buy. Which is odd considering the HD version was developed first and then was ported to a handheld later.

I think the game was always meant to be a 3DS game first and foremost. There's a few cutscenes here that were very clearly designed to take advantage of the 3DS’ 3D capabilities. Even the opening company logo. So it was likely always meant to be a 3DS game, but they developed it in HD so they could later port it to other platforms.

And as an HD port of a 3DS game, it looks alright. It isn’t anything spectacular, but it looks decent enough with nice, detailed backgrounds and good animations. That said there isn’t a whole lot of visual variety in the levels. I know it all takes place in Dracula’s castle, but so did the older games and those were better at making each level visually distinct.

I think the issue is the game is too dark. I know that’s a weird complaint for a game set in Dracula’s castle but bear with me here. Older Castlevania’s had a dark look, but they still had plenty of colour. Some parts were darker, others were brighter, which helped make each area feel distinct.

Here everything is so dark the areas blend together. It all just feels like dark caves or hallways. There's no visual distinction between places like the library or the dungeons, it all ends up feeling the same. The only areas that visually stood out were the Toy Maker’s stage, the Succubus boss arena and the workshop, mainly because those areas had some colour. So while the game doesn’t look bad on a technical level, it’s also pretty boring to look at.

The characters fare a bit better. Up close you can see it was a handheld game given how muddy the textures look. Thankfully the game keeps the camera distant enough to where this is rarely noticeable. The animation is good, especially some in game cutscenes which can be great visual set-pieces, and I like a lot of the enemy designs.

So as an HD port of a 3DS title, it looks ok. On a technical level anyway. On an artistic level I find the game a bit too dull. Too many boring locations and not enough visual flair to make area’s distinct. It isn’t a bad looking game, just a drab looking one.

The music is also pretty boring. Like last time it goes more for atmosphere, only it’s more muted this time and doesn’t have many moments where it’s allowed to go big. I think it would have helped if they went more for the style of the classic games this go around.

Speaking of which, going back to the classic style is exactly what they did for the gameplay. Mirror of Fate attempts to mix the combat of the first Lords of Shadow with the formula of a Search Action title from the series past.

The combat works as it did in Lords of Shadow. You still have a direct and area attack, sub-weapons, guarding, parrying, dodging and even the magic system. It’s all of what you would expect only now it’s in 2D.

The 3 characters all play mostly the same. They share the same combo’s and normal attack options. This is admittedly disappointing given the whole point of introducing new characters is to bring in new ways to play the game.

However, there is a reason for this. As you battle you gain levels which give you access to new moves and combos. This level is then carried over to the next character, giving you a sense of progression despite swapping between characters. To its credit this actually ties into the story since each of the characters is supposed to be stronger than the one before it. it’s a clever way to tell the story through gameplay.

But while every character shares the same fighting styles, there are some things that do separate them. Namely the sub-weapon and magic system. Each of the 3 characters has 2 unique sub-weapons and a different way they use magic.

Simon has a throwing axe, an oil flask (which is just the holy water under another name) and his magic involves summoning 2 spirits to aid him in battle. Alucard can summon bats and freeze time for his sub-weapons while his magic gives him access to his mist and wolf forms. And finally, Trevor has the boomerang and a lightning grenade while retaining the magic system from the previous game.

This helps make each character feel a little different, but I have issues with how they implemented this. The sub-weapons are fine, I like that they brought back some of the classic ones and they keep the same system of enemies being weak to certain weapons.

Only this time you need to find enemy cards to find out what they’re weak to, which encourages experimentation. They also are much more well balanced. There isn’t one that’s clearly overpowered so you have a reason to swap between them.

It’s the magic system I have an issue with. I like the idea of giving each character a different way they use magic, but they do very little with it. Take Alucard for instance. His light magic gives him his mist form, but aside from having a longer dodge move that goes through enemies it offers no benefits at all. No healing, no invincibility, nothing. And his Shadow magic is just a power boost, it doesn’t take advantage of his werewolf form at all. I mean he’s a frigging werewolf for god’s sake, you couldn’t think of anything cool to do with that.

The game never takes full advantage of the different magic. Compounded by the fact that they removed features from the previous game. Sub-weapons no longer have different modes dependent on the magic used, they have charged attacks instead which isn’t nearly as interesting, and there are no unique magic attacks either.

This means the magic has no uses outside of its primary function. Use light magic for defence and shadow for offence. That was like that in the last game to an extent, but the different magic attacks meant you had another reason to use each magic even if you didn’t need it.

It also doesn’t help that you have one magic meter for both types of magic now. Because of this I only ever focused on shadow magic because of the damage. Trevor was the only time I used light magic in combat because of its healing, for Simon and Alucard though it was just a drain on a limited resource.

The first games system worked as well as it did because it incentivized you to swap between styles. You needed light magic to heal, and shadow magic for damage, here you don’t. So you end up with a magic system that’s much worse than before.

In fact, a lot of the combat feels worse than it did before. You have a lot of the same moves and combos, but they aren’t as satisfying to use. The combat was made faster compared to the original, which is fine, but hits don’t feel nearly as weighty as they did before. And while combat is faster, the overall design still leans more heavily into the slower more methodical approach. The combat system never really knows what it wants to be.

It doesn’t help that the number of enemies you’ll fight at any given point is very low. At maximum you’ll fight 3 enemies at a time, but this is rare and most of the time it’ll be only 2 enemies at a time. That’s pitiful for a hack and slash game like this. This wouldn’t be so bad if the enemies were challenging but they aren’t. The only difficult part is when they block your attacks, which becomes a non-issue once you unlock the tremor punch move.

Most combat encounters can be dealt with the same way. Wail on them, they block, break block with punch, repeat. The enemy variety is decent enough, but what does that matter when every encounter ends up feeling the same.

But I think the biggest problem with the combat is that it doesn’t even fit with the kind of game Mirror of Fate is. When you look at the combat of other Castlevania Search Action games 2 things become apparent.

1: combat encounters are quick and snappy

2: enemies are frequent and often mixed in with platforming challenges.

In a classic Search Action game like Aria of Sorrow most combat encounters are over in less than a few seconds. This allows you to keep moving through the game at a decent pace. But enemies are also frequent enough that there’s always something to fight. The action never lets up.

In Mirror of Fate combat encounters are locked to certain arenas or sections of the map and can take a little bit to finish. The combat feels more like a pace breaker, and their diminished presence means there’s constant lulls in the action.

The game as a result gets very boring, very fast. The only bright spot being the boss fights, which are admittedly a lot of fun and provide a decent challenge. I especially liked the final Dracula boss fight since it acts as a preview of his powers in Lords of Shadow 2.

But aside from the bosses, the combat is dull, repetitive, and boring. Which is a major issue considering combat is a major factor of the game. And it would be a lot more tolerable if the level design picked up the slack.

Now if I may say something positive for a second, the platforming is a big improvement over last time. It still involves a lot of climbing, but now there’s actual platforming challenges where you need to avoid obstacles and actually put some effort into it. it isn’t great, the control is still a little too stiff, but it’s still far better than it was before.

And it isn’t like the level design is awful. The levels are fine enough with some decent platforming and set pieces. It's not spectacular but it's decent enough. The problem is the level design is far too linear.

Instead of one big map with interconnected areas, Mirror of Fates maps are smaller, more segmented with a clear linear path through. And that is maps plural, because each of the 3 main characters go through their own levels with only a few areas shared between them. The game is more like 3 mini campaigns rather than one big one.

So the game is more linear, not necessarily a problem. You can make a Search Action game that’s more linear and make it work. Look at the Shantae series for example, but the way Mirror of Fate handles itself just doesn’t lend itself well to the formula.

Why? Well because it screws a very important part of the Search-Action formula, the search part. Search-Action games, including linear ones like Shantae, always have a larger emphasis on exploration. Part of the fun of these games is making your way through it and trying to figure out where to go next. It’s built into the very DNA of the genre.

Mirror of Fate is so linear that there’s very little reason to explore it. You know those moments where you run into an area you can’t pass because you don’t have the right power yet? Well Mirror of Fate doesn’t have that.

Don’t get me wrong, you do gain power ups that let you reach areas you couldn’t before, but all they amount to is a collectable like a health or magic upgrade. Useful yes, but entirely optional and given the de-emphasis on exploration, somethings you may not find since you’re never incentivized to look for them.

I remember when I played Aria of Sorrow and there were numerous optional areas with hidden equipment, treasure or upgrade which made exploring the levels fun. When you checked an area to see if it was progress but found an item instead, it felt good because your curiosity was rewarded.

Even if you only found the way forward it still felt rewarding. Because you found it, you searched for it. The game didn’t tell you where to go, you had to figure it out. So even if you were just looking for the way forward you still felt rewarded because you had to look for it on your own.

But in Mirror of Fate, you always know where to go because there’s an objective marker pointing you in the right direction. Any satisfaction you could have gotten from finding your way through is destroyed by this thing. Even finding secrets since all you have to do is look anywhere other than where your supposed to go. It sucks all the fun out of exploring the levels.

I suppose one benefit to this is you never get lost, but that’s kind of the point. You’re supposed to get lost in Search Action games. That’s part of the appeal. I know there are some games in the genre where it can get so convoluted it becomes frustrating, Harmony of Dissonance I’m looking at you, but this is an example of the complete opposite problem.

This wouldn’t be so bad if the backtracking wasn’t so annoying. Because of how linear the levels are designed, there’s no easy way to loop around meaning you’ll have to backtrack through several areas just to get where you need to. Fast travel stations are few, and your movement speed isn’t exactly what I would call fast. And since there’s still so much climbing, it makes backtracking a real pain in the ass.

So what we have here is a Search Action game where both the search and the action sucks. If you haven’t figured it out yet I didn’t enjoy this one very much. Mirror of Fate is the prime example of a game trying to please everyone that ends up pleasing no-one.

If the game was designed like the first Lords of Shadow, the more linear level design would have made more sense. You could still have backtracking, but just have me select levels from a world map like last time. It worked well there and there were still secrets in those levels that were fun to find.

But by trying to merge the design of Lords of Shadow with a Search Action game, you end up with this weird middle ground that does neither justice. If they wanted to be Search Action it needed larger more interconnected levels, not linear ones like this.

I also think the game shot itself in the foot by having 3 playable characters. By doing so they ended up having to make 3 different segmented maps when they would have been better served by making one large map. One well designed map is better than 3 mediocre ones.

And there isn’t much of a reason to have 3 characters from a gameplay perspective anyway. Aside from their abilities, which could have been given to one character anyway, the only difference between the three is Simon has more combat, Alucard has puzzle rooms and Trevor has quick time event sequences that fucking suck. There was no reason to split the game up like this.

They should have just focused on Trevor and Alucard since he’s the only one with any major story importance. But they wanted Simon in for fan service, so he ended up being shoe-horned in here. In a desperate plea to win back fans of the old games, Mercury Steam ended up with a game that only further alienated them and pissed off their new fans in the process. Great job guys.

I’m honestly shocked at how bad this game is. Especially since Mercury Steam would go on to develop for the Metroid series with Samus Returns and Metroid Dread. I haven’t played them myself, but I have heard nothing but good things.

By all accounts they’re excellent Search Action games. Which makes the fact that they’re first attempt at it ended up so poor. I guess you could say that Mirror of Fate walked so Metroid Dread could run, but it’s more like Mirror of Fate stumbled drunkenly near the finish line, puked and fainted just shy of passing, so Metroid Dread could run.

Mirror of Fate is the low point of the series for me. I will admit I liked it when I first played it, but after experiencing more Search Action games its flaws have only become more apparent. And with how inconsequential the story is, this is one you can easily skip.

Tune in tomorrow where we finish the trilogy with the third and final game, Lords of Shadow 2. This should be interesting because it’s the only Castlevania game where you can play as Dracula, Soma Cruz doesn’t count shut up. But will it be a bloody good time, or a bloody mess? Only one way to find out.