Symphony of the Night is a masterpiece. Dawn of Sorrow builds on the foundation Symphony laid with a tactical soul system that gives Soma Cruz one of the biggest arsenals in any Castlevania game. While metroidvanias in general are all about exploration and finding gear that lets you get even further, the soul system empowered gamers with an overwhelming number of play styles. It helped transform the classic formula into an experimental romp that made combat a joy. Add gorgeous visuals and arguably some of the catchiest music in the series, and you have the formula for one of the best Castlevania games ever made.
Released for the DS in 2004, Dawn of Sorrow received a modern port in 2024, which is probably the definitive way to play it. For nostalgic reasons, I still like playing it on my 3DS, which is the way I replayed Dawn of Sorrow this time around.
An Aria of Dissonance
Aria of Sorrow was one of my favorite metroidvania Castlevania games on the GBA. It took the series into the near future with an interesting premise. What if the original Dracula had actually been defeated and you could play as the newest incarnation of the classic villain? Soma Cruz is an unlikely antihero, thrust into the events of Aria seemingly by accident. It’s fascinating to consider how, in some ways, becoming Dracula is a choice, which makes Soma’s arc all the more compelling. Soma is literally struggling with his soul so that he isn’t consumed by darkness. One of the legendary Belmonts, Julius, views him as a threat until Soma defeats the chaos within the castle and emerges without succumbing to evil.
In the sequel, Dawn of Sorrow, we start with Soma thinking he’s left that part of his life behind. But as with all cycles of violence, it rarely ends when we want it to. There are those who want to seize his power and exploit his abilities for their own devious purposes. Celia Fortner is one of them, head of a strange cult called “With Light” that wants to resurrect the Dark Lord (why do the most vile cults always have thinkspeak names?). She feels her God can achieve absolute good only if there’s a countering force. To fulfill that purpose, her followers have reconstructed Dracula’s castle and populated it with monsters. Those creatures probably had no idea they were being set up as bait for Soma, agreeing to come only because the Belmonts constantly destroy where they live.
With the castle complete, Celia attacks Soma while he’s out with his friend Mina. Her unprovoked strike awakens Soma’s powers again. As they’ve mostly been submerged since Aria, he has to start all over without any powers or abilities. It sucks, but hey, at least they give a reason for him starting off with practically nothing.
Playing as Soma Cruz makes it easy for players to understand why the antagonists want Dracula’s power so much. Wielding souls is immensely gratifying. The tactical soul system lets Soma master the souls of almost every enemy in the castle and use their strength to wreak havoc. The Enchant-Type Souls grant abilities that are passive, like the Ghost Dancers, who increase luck, and The Creature, AKA Frankenstein, who restores HP to players. Others are Bullet-Type Souls, which use up MP, but act like the traditional subitems. My favorite was the Mandragora, which is essentially a screaming bomb and is extremely powerful. The Erinys is a deadly area attack (it’s the one I used against the final boss), as is the trusty Axe Armor. You can also throw cards with the portraits of characters using the Killer Clown, while Malachi’s katamari of destruction becomes an avalanche destroying everything in its path. There are also a few quirky souls, like the one gained from a waiter that grants you the power to serve curry. I need one of those in real life.
The essential Ability-Type souls grant Soma the power to freeze time, float in the air, and the best skill of all, double jump (my Metroidvania gameplay experiences are always divided between pre-double jump and post). Like Symphony of the Night’s Alucard, Soma feels very good to control. He has the trailing afterimage, the backdash, a downward thrust kick, and even flips on his double jump.
While experience levels are important to Soma’s progression, it’s equally important to utilize the best combination of souls. Some of the earlier boss battles can be difficult without the right souls to combat them. The updated Balore with his eye laser is insidious, especially considering he’s back to life after Soma slayed him in the previous outing. Death has also returned and is as lethal as ever, though the Manticore tail soul in conjunction with bullet souls will return it back to whence it came. The series always has fun boss fights, and the monsters here are a memorable bunch, like the spidery puppet boss who spits out floating dolls, then traps one of them in an iron maiden to hurt Soma. I also enjoyed the optional battle against Paranoia hiding in a gallery of mirrors and using laser beams to try and pulverize Soma.
In order to gain better weapons, Soma has to work with Yoko Belnades who can synthesize his arms. Yoko returns from Aria alongside Julius to investigate the cult. She is also descended from the Belnades family, first introduced in Castlevania 3 (I love how Dawn connects with previous games that way). She’s also the one who teaches him how to use magic seals to destroy boss enemies permanently.
The use of the touch screen for the magic seals (which was updated to button presses on the Dominus collection) to finish bosses didn’t bother me, though I did have to practice the last two several times (the key to the fifth seal isn’t so much sketching the lines exactly as it is doing it as quickly as possible). If you fail, you have to repeat part of the boss battle, but it was never a big issue for me.
The cult members did a meticulous job recreating the creepiness of Dracula’s castle. I like the hallway with piano keys, a painting that watches Soma in a hall of manticores, and the psychedelic Abyss that comprises the final sequence of the game. In the guest house, Soma can sit in a chair and a crown appears in a nod to the classic Castlevania games. The recreation of the very first Castlevania level in the Silenced Ruins, complete with a remix of the original music, was an amazing throwback. The Bat Company boss made it even better and pulled on my nostalgia strings. The music is so good in Dawn of Sorrow, I went back to certain areas just to listen to the tracks. Castlevania games in general have great opening songs, but that one in Lost Village, Pitch Black Intrusion, is one of my favorites.
The technique of teasing/foreshadowing players with unreachable areas, only to open them up later with the right soul, works just as well as ever. With the sheer amount of souls available, there are many ways to get past the gated areas. For example, the Cursed Clock Tower is one of the most dangerous sections in the castle. Fortunately, Soma can summon a Bone Ark to pass over a lot of the traps, or he can freeze time to stop many of the obstacles and casually sprint by.
As Soma uncovers more of his powers, Celia Fortner introduces two candidates she wants to replace Soma with, Dmitrii and Dario. Both are easy to defeat and I couldn’t wait for a final battle with Celia. Her goal isn’t defeating Soma, but to awaken the darkness within him.
In one of the bad endings, Celia actually murders Soma’s friend, Mina. Driven to rage, Soma accepts becoming the Dark Lord and kills Celia, who in turns reacts in shock. You can never make a deal with evil and think there are no consequences. This ending also unlocks Julius mode, where you play as Julius, Yoko, and Alucard in a nod to Castlevania 3 (the only one missing is the descendant of the thief, Grant). The final boss in that mode is Soma in a throwback to the fight in Symphony of the Night.
A Short Symphony
One irony of the Tactical Soul system is that so many of the souls are rare and require grinding just to acquire, Soma levels up a lot during the game. This made him overpowered for me, so enemies were too easy. It makes sense from a story progression perspective, but I feel that some of the criticisms about the game’s lack of difficulty were a consequence of players farming for souls and getting stronger than they should be at the point they were. I leveled up my character plenty of times while trying to gain an elusive soul and ended up breezing through most of the boss battles. The amount of farming required for souls also took away from the flow of the game.
There’s one I tried to find for a long time, Valkyrie. I spent hours beating hundreds of them and could not gain its soul. I was so frustrated, I went and hunted down the gold ring (which dramatically increases the money monsters leave behind). Then I spent countless hours farming for 300k to buy the Soul Eater Ring. It did increase the number of souls I got from everyone but the Valkyrie.
It’s kind of unfortunate that some of the best souls take so long to obtain. The whole point of the system should be to encourage players to retrieve as many souls as possible, not make it impossible to find them until they start losing feeling in their fingers.
The Final Guard, a gigantic behemoth of a soldier, is another rare soul. I used the puppet master to get to the other side of him, then used a kicked Skull Ball to dispose of him from behind. That was another soul I couldn’t get, even though I leveled up Soma multiple times in the process.
It turns out I didn’t really need them. Being overpowered, or maybe just cause I had Dracula’s power latent within, the endgame isn’t difficult. I really enjoyed the final fight against Menace, who rises up and tries to punch Soma to death. But ultimately, my gallery of souls was too much for the final boss. Once victorious, Genya Arikado AKA Alucard from Symphony and Soma share a personal moment before he meets with the rest of the group. He also has a touching reunion with Mina.
I had a blast with Dawn of Sorrow despite wanting more. I wished for something like an inverted castle to continue my romp. My overall play time from beginning to end was nine hours, which felt short because I was having so much fun. But that’s what the hard setting and Julius mode is for!
Soma toed the line of wielding the powers of evil to ultimately do good. The one who suffered the most was Celia, who meets a tragic fate no matter which ending the players achieve. Celia’s dawn of sorrow is tied in with the mistake of trying to awaken Soma instead of just letting him be. I, for my part, enjoyed helping him get there, one soul at a time.
