Castlevania: Belmont's Curse Review

A new Belmont, a deck of captured souls, and a burning Paris that rewards every detour.

Castlevania sat quiet for a long time. Konami's vampire-hunting series left such a big legacy that hundreds of indie games have grown out of it, putting real pressure on anyone who tries to bring the original back. With Castlevania: Belmont's Curse, Konami handed the job to Evil Empire, the studio best known for Dead Cells.

The pick makes sense, since the same team worked on Dead Cells' Return to Castlevania expansion in 2023. The game launches on October 15 and costs around £25, a small ask for what you get. The story picks up 23 years after Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse, where Trevor Belmont finally killed Dracula. 

You play as his daughter, Rose, who has trained her whole life to carry on the family work. Anyone who watched the first two seasons of the Netflix show will feel at home, since those seasons were built on Castlevania III, and several voice actors return, Trevor's included.

If you have never touched the series, you can still jump in. Castlevania: Belmont's Curse stands on its own, and the opening scenes cover everything you need. The setting is Paris in 1499, a city overrun by monsters that roam the streets stealing souls.

A letter from the Bishop of Paris pulls Trevor and Rose into the mess, and they sail into the ruined city together. When the boat docks, they split up. Trevor goes to find the bishop, and Rose heads out alone to hunt whatever is causing the chaos.

Alone in Paris, Rose's tarot deck and curse tie her to Dracula's servants.

Before he leaves, Trevor hands her a deck of tarot cards that once belonged to her late mother, Sypha, and tells her to keep her curse under control. That curse is a red mark crawling up one of her arms, passed down to her at birth. Dracula and his armies have plenty of reasons to want it, which makes Rose far more important to their plans than she would like.
 
You soon learn that the tarot deck is tied to the monsters collecting souls across the city. Each card represents one of Dracula's followers, with titles like The Fallen, The Warrior, and The Builder. Beat one of them, and its soul locks into the matching card.

From then on, that character can talk to Rose in her head, and you gain some of their power, too. What begins as a lonely trip becomes a road trip with a crowded back seat of former enemies and allies, all commenting on whatever happens. 

The Fallen is gruff but grows protective of Rose. Even trapped on the deck, Medusa quietly hopes you fail and keeps nudging you toward choices that would help her master. It doesn't take long for Dracula himself to become the real problem, and his castle rises right in the middle of Paris. 

At its core, the plot feels like classic Castlevania, with a heavier focus on dialogue that makes it easy to follow.

Rose is a determined young hero who stays on mission from start to finish, while every other character orbits her. It works, even if she is a bit more naive than the cast around her. The heavier twists come near the end, tied to the curse and what it really means, so the details stay under wraps here. 

The game also has three endings: a bad one, a normal one, and a true one. You can see all three in a single playthrough because, once an ending finishes, the game drops you back to your last save. The bad ending comes quickly, the normal one follows, and the true ending asks you to finish side tasks scattered across the maps.

The way you spend your time in Castlevania: Belmont's Curse follows the search-action formula. You wander the streets and the undercity of Paris, and later Dracula's castle, in a free-form way, and the layout only lightly steers you toward the objectives you need.

Most of them unlock a piece of equipment that opens another corner of the world. When you are unsure where to go, the tarot deck helps, since each card holds clues about where its target hides. Those clues range from simple early-game moments to cryptic missions that stretch across the whole map late in the game.

The final handful of cards had the most creative hunts, and tracking them down feels like real detective work.

The map is crammed with secrets. You hunt for hidden paths, open shortcuts, and crack open chests that hold weapons, relics, and accessories. Castlevania: Belmont's Curse also does not hand you a marker to follow. You keep your eyes open for anything that looks off, and if you get stuck, expect to run from one side of the map to the other more than once.

Every one of those trips tends to uncover something you missed the first time, so the running rarely goes to waste.
Moving around in Castlevania: Belmont's Curse is a joy, and it keeps growing as you gain tools. At the start, you only have a slide and a jump. 

After the first boss, you pick up an arcane whip that lets you swing from anchor points to reach ledges and cross gaps. Later you gain a parry, the ability to push through certain walls, and eventually a dash and a double jump. Those last two arrive late, so you spend time returning to areas you couldn't reach before.

From the midgame onward, the platforming gauntlets ask you to chain several tools together, and nailing the timing feels smooth and rewarding. They are tough without feeling unfair, and they usually pay out with a relic or another hint for your deck.

Teleporting works differently from what you might expect. 

Each map has rooms run by a fairy keeper, and those rooms let you jump to other areas. It takes a little getting used to, especially since the save rooms could have done the same job. Then you meet a woman trapped in glass who asks you to kneel before certain mirrors.

Do it, and you land in a completely different area, easily the least pleasant place in the game. Once you are there, though, you can travel between every region where you have unlocked a teleporter or save room. Combat is where Castlevania: Belmont's Curse shines most, and it offers the series' best fighting. 

Rose starts with a longsword and a ranged fireball, and the options grow fast. Seven weapon categories have about four weapons each, so you end up with roughly two dozen to find. The lance works up close or as a thrown projectile. Dual swords, a claymore, and, much later, a whip join the lineup. 

Each category has its own moveset and charged special attack. Weapons also come in rarities, and legendary versions add a bonus. The legendary sword leaves an afterimage that adds damage, and the legendary whip, which comes from the story, sets enemies on fire.

You can also equip up to three relics at a time. 

These give Rose passive abilities, like stronger healing potions or a bat that follows you around. Accessories add more to play with, and some of them turn a potion into a full heal instead of the usual twenty to thirty percent. You can swap weapons, spells, and gear from the pause menu at any moment, so trying new setups never costs you anything.

An aerial build with a greatsword and a couple of damage-boosting relics feels fantastic, though a favorite weapon like the lance can carry you for a long stretch, even after better ones turn up. The parry ties it all together. You get it from your second boss as a holy shield, and it works separately from your regular strikes.

Attack sits on a face button and the parry on the left trigger, so you can swing and parry at once without interrupting yourself. Every fight becomes a fast series of choices where you are on offense and defense in the same breath. Hitting an enemy, parrying a projectile from behind, and then grappling over to finish the job is a loop that never gets old.

The whip helps in fights too. Grab onto an enemy and pull yourself toward it, then land a well-timed strike on the way in for serious damage. The spells come from your tarot deck. Defeat one of Dracula's servants, and its card becomes an Arcana you can cast.

Arcana spells add variety and power, plus Works of Mercy upgrade objectives.

The first boss gives you a boomerang axe and a whip, and other cards give you fireballs, a magic cross, or a blast that turns enemies to stone. You start with one Arcana, get a second after your first boss, and keep collecting more. They give you more ways to hit, stun, or bind enemies, and the strongest can quickly turn a fight around. 

A few are almost too strong, since some bosses practically melt in front of them. Castlevania: Belmont's Curse isn't a pushover, though, and the bosses hit back hard. Each Arcana has three objectives called Works of Mercy, and completing them strengthens your spells.

Some are straightforward, like using a spell 20 times or defeating 44 skeletons. Others push you to explore, like finding every room in the Clock Tower or reaching a specific location for The Warrior. One for Medusa has you turn a shield-carrying enemy to stone, a nod to the myth of Perseus.

Complete an objective to open a node where you pick one of three power-ups. Complete all three, and the character inside the card rewards you with extra dialogue. It gives you a good reason to use spells you might skip otherwise, and it helps when the late game throws so many options at you.

The loop of tracking down a boss, taking its power, and using it to open the next stretch of the map feels very Mega Man.  

The bosses are a big highlight. One runs away twice and drags the fight into tough platforming sections before you can finish it. Another puts a sigil on you that counts down the hits you can take before you die, so even with plenty of healing items, you still have to avoid getting hit. 

Learning their patterns takes effort, and you will lose a few times, but you always know what went wrong. A few details are worth knowing. Early enemies can be hard to read, and without a block button, you have to dodge or parry at the right time.

Now and then, the screen fills with so many attacks that you miss a parry window. The whip pull sometimes carries you past the platform you were aiming for, and a few recolored enemies show up early, which at least spares you from relearning their moves.

These are minor, and none of them dull how good the combat feels. Castlevania: Belmont's Curse's difficulty is flexible. Dying is easy because Rose is fragile, but checkpoints are forgiving, and you keep all the experience you earned during runbacks to a boss. Even a failed attempt leaves you stronger. 

Custom mode lets you adjust damage dealt and received, experience gained, respawn points, and more.

You can place a checkpoint in front of boss doors or reduce trap damage, and you can switch it on or off at any time, at no cost. The one thing missing is a navigation helper, which fits a game that wants you to work out where you are going.
 
Castlevania: Belmont's Curse is easy to pick up. You level up by defeating enemies, and each level mostly raises your base stats, which determine how hard you hit and how much you can take. Pickups hidden around the map add health and mana upgrades on top of that. 

Gear adds another layer, so the numbers matter more once you combine a good weapon with the right relics. Spell upgrades follow their own track through the Works of Mercy. You improve in several ways at once, which keeps the grind from feeling empty.

Returning to earlier zones with new traversal tools pays off too, with fresh areas, weapons, upgrades, and some big optional zones. Reaching 92 percent takes about sixteen hours, and a full run to 100 percent can land around thirty hours or more if you get lost for a while.

Castlevania: Belmont's Curse looks like a treat. 

The characters lean toward an anime style, and the 3D models sit atop layered 2D backgrounds that give everything a painted feel. It may not be the darkest take on gothic horror, but it grows on you fast. Animation is smooth, and the way Rose moves through a room makes everything feel connected.

The walk to Dracula's castle silhouetted Rose and every enemy against the pink-and-red glow of a burning Paris, one of the most striking scenes you will see in a game this year. Carmilla, a hemomancer in a gown made of dripping blood, is another memorable design.

Plenty more await, so go in without spoilers. The sound work in Castlevania: Belmont's Curse is solid, too. The Clock Tower theme stands out, and the final boss track is excellent. A few other boss themes hit hard too. You get fresh versions of classic Castlevania music alongside new tracks that fit right in. 

Voice acting is good across the board, and the cast brings real personality to the characters. By the end, Castlevania: Belmont's Curse leaves you feeling that the series is in good hands. Combat, traversal, puzzles, characters, and visuals all work well on their own and even better together. The tarot system acts as the glue, turning signposting, lore, spells, and dialogue into one connected loop.

It pays tribute to the older games while pushing the series somewhere fresh, and you finish it excited about what comes next. If you like Metroidvania games, pick up Castlevania: Belmont's Curse. If you are new to the series, it is a friendly place to start.