TGS: Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 Is Most Impressive

MercurySteam’s maiden Castlevania game, Lords of Shadow, is the best 3D Castlevania ever made. Not only is its gameplay solid, but it truly understands what Castlevania is all about, if not in how it plays, then in how it looks and feels. Indeed, Lords of Shadow, in many ways, feels like a modern-day Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest, an adventure that was about far more than just treking through Dracula’s fortress. It felt meatier and more substantial – though not as traditional – than many entries in the franchise.

The brief portion of Lords of Shadow 2 that I played doesn’t indicate, one way or the other, if that substance – from long play time to occasional backtracking – will make its way from the original to the sequel (although it all purportedly takes place in an open world). But in terms of sheer gameplay, MercurySteam’s upcoming continuation of the Castlevania series is quite promising.

If Lords of Shadow was a modern-day Simon’s Quest (right down to some of its references, like Veros Woods), then Lords of Shadow 2 might be its Symphony of the Night, at least when it comes to sheer fan service. There were no fewer than three direct odes to arguably the best Castlevania game ever created packed into the 15 minute demo, including an iconic toss of Dracula's chalice and two verbatim quotes shared between Richter Belmont and Dracula at the very beginning of Symphony of the Night. This nod to old-school fans is a nice touch.

Like the original Lords of Shadow, its sequel takes a great deal from Sony Santa Monica’s God of War series when it comes to combat, and like those games, clobbering enemies is quite enjoyable. While I couldn’t read the on-screen text (as it was in Japanese), nor could I invert my controls (as I couldn’t read the menus), I quickly got a grasp for the game’s interplay between button mash-type moves and switching between a couple of Gabriel’s special attacks, the Void Sword and the Chaos Claws.

Using the Xbox 360 controller’s bumpers allowed Gabriel to put away his whip and opt for weapons that could quickly shift the tide of battle. This early portion of Lords of Shadow 2’s demo felt a little bit run-of-the-mill – indeed, the God of War-like arena battle was complete with multiple waves jumping in one after the other following a quick camera pan – but it’s no doubt placed at the beginning of the demo to give players a feel for how the game is played.

Now you're the bad guy.

Of course, calling the main character Gabriel is a bit deceptive. Gabriel is now very much Dracula, and it shows. As such, to heal himself, he can grasp onto wounded enemies and suck their blood dry. It’s a tad bit difficult to get the timing of this simple move down at first, mostly because doing so often requires you to break a combo, but it adds to the feeling that Gabriel is very much undead.

The midway portion of the demo gave me a look at some of Lords of Shadow 2’s almost Uncharted-like climbing section, complete with bricks that predictably break and nearly plummet Dracula to his death. This part of the demo felt overly-scripted and exceptionally anti-climactic (if not a bit silly), but when the game’s climbing and combat mechanics eventually combined, Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 truly began to floor me.

A war wages outside of Dracula’s castle, and a mysterious character, plated in ornate gold armor, confronts our vampiric protagonist as he emerges from his fortress. Exchanging the aforementioned Symphony of the Night quotes with one another, the two thereafter get mixed-up in a brutal fight. The fray appears, at first, to be fairly typical for a hack-and-slash game such as this. But when a massive golem-like creature appears to mix things up, the situation gets turned on its head in a wonderfully Shadow of the Colossus-like sequence.

The original Lords of Shadow had huge monsters in it – including a memorable fight with a giant creature on an ice lake – but there was nothing quite like this. While fending off continuous projectile attacks from his armored foe, Dracula must climb up the enormous, constantly-moving enemy. Basic quick-time events force you to stay focused on hanging on for dear life, while the occasional wave of soldiers gives you a reason to break out Dracula’s repertoire of weapons.

This section didn’t only feel epic, but it had a hectic and almost dangerous feel to it. It felt a bit quick-timey, too – though the quick-time events don’t pose much of a challenge once you get the hang of their timing -- and it was especially frustrating when the game felt it was necessary to zoom in on certain things over and over again to throw in your face exactly what you were supposed to do. But it was nonetheless an undeniably fun romp, especially when all of the introduced elements were finally combined and unleashed.

Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 launches for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC in February of 2014.

Colin Moriarty is IGN’s Senior Editor. You can follow him on Twitter and IGN and learn just how sad the life of a New York Islanders and New York Jets fan can be.

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