Topic: Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.

I just received an email from the developers.

I copy-paste parts of the email:

It's me, IGA.

For this month's update, we have an incredible support who will be joining the Bloodstained team. Can you guess who? It's WayForward!

That's right, WayForward, the makers of Shantae! As you may already know, they are top-tier when it comes to side-scrolling action games. There is even a staff member who previously worked on one of my projects, which is incredibly encouraging.

In consideration of their past achievements, WayForward will be helping the development team realize my vision for this game. Maybe I am even more excited than everyone else - with their help Bloodstained will become an even better game.

We cannot be happier to have WayForward on the project. Best known for the Shantae series, they bring decades of development experience to help us bring Bloodstained to the finish line.

Thank you, everyone, for your continued support!

To address the ‘when’ questions that pop up each time we don’t announce a release date, I’ll point to my comment in our previous Kickstarter Update. As soon as we have a concrete release date, we will let everyone know. With WayForward on the project, we get closer to that announcement.

Thanks for being with us as we continue to work on Bloodstained!

Jason Ryan, a.k.a. “Question”
Sr Community Manager – 505 Games

Seems like they can't make the game and hired WayForward? Lol

Bit strange this late in the day to hire another studio. Does anyone think this will actually release in 2019?

Nintendo Direct spoiled the release window. IGA confirmed, Summer 2019

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/iga/bloodstained-ritual-...

So to get out of my game funk I decided to start this game up. So far I am enjoying it. I am not to far in but the game does have that Metroidvania vibe to it. The shards remind me alot of the souls in Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow.

One question I have is does anyone have any suggestions as what weapon to craft with an 8bit coin? I looked at.several walkthroughs but there are several good suggestions. So I figured I'd ask here for some suggestions.

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy In fairness, "'Vania, but with a girl" could actually describe a few different games in the series.

If I recall correctly, you weren't a huge fan of Hollow Knight, right? I'm eager to hear what a vania virgin thinks of the game, personally.

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy So... puts on 2D Castlevania fan glasses... at least two of the games (Legends on the GB and Order of Ecclesia on the DS) had singular female leads. One, Portrait of Ruin, featured a set of protagonists, male and female, that you switched between during the game. One of the playable characters in Castlevania III was female. Several of the games (most notably the delightful Rondo of Blood) featured unlockable female characters.

But you're not wrong to say that Castlevania's biggest faces are male.

And... oh, yeah, I misremembered for sure. It would make sense that you liked Hollow Knight, though, given the Souls-esque atmosphere and cryptic lore.

I don't think any of the Metroid-inspired Vanias are as good as Hollow Knight, personally. Although I'm of the firm, if unpopular, opinion that the unique action game design of the older titles represented the series at its best. One possible exception to that is Order of Ecclesia, which felt like it drew just as much from older games in the series as the post-SotN games with its superior level design, often brutal difficulty, and gorgeous gothic artstyle (since the GBA games, the games started adopting character designs that had a very 'generic anime' look to them, but Order of Ecclesia ended that trend).

Well, I'll quit gabbing about Castlevania in the Bloodstained thread. If you get the chance, also try the side game, Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon. It's basically Castlevania III, but with a much fairer difficulty curve.

I'm playing this at the moment. The story reminds me of the Castlevania Netlflix show. I'm not too fussed on the talking heads for all the cut scenes and dialogue. The game looks great though and the small bits of when you see the game in full action, it looks incredible I just wish there was more of it. I suppose that was down to budgetary reasons.

Is the only way to switch weapons by going into the menu? I'm picking up a fair bit and would like to experiment with them, but it interrupts the flow of the game having to go in the menus all the time to change weapons and chards.

An answer to my own question, you gain the ability to put different loadouts into shortcut slots, you access to these by holding L2, the direction the left stick and then X. So that solves thst dilemma.

My next one is I'm levelling up but no idea what it does or if I'm supposed to do anything. And there is an option to dismantle stuff, but I've read online that it's not worth doing it. This game really doesn't explain some of the mechanics that well.

The first boss you just need to learn the attack patterns and avoid her attacks, and the spam her in inbetween. I didn't find it too difficult as you don't have too many moves at your disposal to think about. And that is pretty much the same strategy for all the bosses I encountered in the the game @Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy.

You will, pick up loads of shards and weapons to use pretty quickly. The shards Grade level up the more duplicates you have of them (gained by defeating the same type of enemy, randomly you will get a shard), and will give the shard more power. You can also level up the Rank level by speaking to one of the merchants and ploughing materials into the shard. Depending on what type of shard will depend what that is. For example, you can get one which has this floating head which attacks enemies. At every 2nd Rank (I think, like I said in my previous post some of this is poorly explained in the game) you get an additional floating head. I think the max Grade and Rank is 9.

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy Ah yes the lure of a shiny new game something to behold!

Yeah I googled the levelling up and it does seem to increase your health, magic strength plus the other stats. I will have not by how much. Think I was getting confused as when 'Levelled Up flashes on the screen, that means for your shards and as well as Miriam, but not all at the same time. I was seeing that every few minutes and wondered how Miriam was levelling up so quick!

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy If not replying back to people every time they tag you makes you rude, then I'm the rudest person on the internet.

The biggest thing that surprised me about RotN, personally, is how involved the narrative is. Castlevania games weren't nearly so talky.

Not the 2D ones, anyway.

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy Oh yeah there have been a couple of words missing. I generally don't like reading subtitles and try to avoid it when I can, so may have missed it on a few occasions.

Did you know you can quick save? Think it is called suspend save or something in the menu. You can save at any point but it overwrites everytime you use it. It comes in well handy at times.

Ooh enjoy Bloodstained @Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy! One of my favourite games this year. What do you think of the music? The missing text did get on my nerves a little and there is a lack of polish here and there, but overall it was awesome to play what is essentially a spiritual successor to Castlevania.

If you like the game you could then move on to the aforementioned Order of Ecclesia.

Of course. Don't get me wrong, I was absolutely delighted that the game released at all. I feel that gamers are lucky to have received such a great spiritual successor to Castlevania.

That first Zengatsu fight is brutal for that point in the game. After him I think the bosses are a lot fairer - with one two hideous exceptions. An Elizabeth Bathory wannabe is quite possibly the worst.
Speaking of NPCs Have you encountered Susie, the gluttonous geriatric?

The first Zangetsu fight was the first point in the game where I died and had to re-evaluate my strategy. It's very much a "progress check" boss fight.

Oh her demands get even more outlandish @Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy. 😂 The lady who wants revenge on behalf of everyone and everything has a hilarious voice.

@Ralizah After several failed attempts battling Zangetsu, being slow and methodical worked. Before him the bosses and enemies are easy enough that you can just power through them.

Once you learn the bosses attack patterns they were are all pretty straightforward so far for me. The combat is too simplistic for them to be otherwise.

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy That means you've gotten to the Tower of Twin Dragons now, right?

The game's music is pretty uniformly excellent, I agree. It's the biggest thing that really makes Bloodstained feel like a latter-day Castlevania title.

I never bothered with the complex attack commands, personally. You can fly through the game with basic running, jumping, and normal attacks (and shard skills, of course).

She reminded me of Jean Slater from EastEnders @Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy.

By the end of the game it's a good idea to level up the stat shards because you then get permanent upgrades to your stats and can then double up by also keeping the shards equipped. Making all the recipes is also a great way to increase stats.

Yeah I noticed the patch too. There was also a patch for season 2 of TT's Batman on the same day which I thought was weird.

Think you are where I was in the game when i last played it, @Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy. I got to the train, but had almost no health and had not saved for ages so went back.

I don't think healing is cheating when facing bosses, but I see what you mean with cheesing. I used to try and save my food and stuff for bosses, and use the save shrine things in normal gameplay.