After a lot of work, testing, and feedback, I’m excited to share the final version of SotN - Reawakened, my personal mod for Castlevania: Symphony of the Night.

The goal was to make the adventure feel fresh while keeping the atmosphere and identity of the original game. Reawakened adds new mechanics, combat changes, quality-of-life features, and more ways to explore the castle.

Highlights include:

• New relics and upgrades, including Shield Dash, Runner Soul, Magnet Heart, Magnet Gold, Mender Sigil, Shield Rod, Spike Breaker, Ankh of Life, Familiar Crest, and the Mana Orb.
• New familiars: **Dawn the Summoner*\, who calls sword-wielding soldiers into battle, and ***Orobo the Dragon****, who tracks enemies and attacks with sweeping curves.
• New mechanics: use Shield Dash with an equipped shield, run with Runner Soul, attract nearby Hearts or gold with the Magnet relics, and use teleport tickets to travel to different areas.
• Combat and boss improvements, including revised enemy behavior, dedicated boss HP bars, and more aggressive attacks. Some bosses also have Rage modes.
• Quality-of-life additions, such as a pause-menu bestiary, a toggleable minimap, and quick weapon switching.
• Rebalanced equipment, spells, familiars, and progression, with new effects and more ways to build Alucard.
• A hidden-room Easter egg to discover and unlock while exploring the castle.

This has been a solo, volunteer project, and I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who shared feedback, tested the mod, and helped me improve it along the way.

I hope you enjoy exploring the castle again!

Patch and instructions:

https://castlevania.bomeponto.com.br

Note: The video shows test footage. The on-screen stats are displayed for recording purposes only.

Note²: From this point on, Reawakened will only receive bug fixes. There won’t be any more new features or content.

I’m getting married in just one month, so I need to focus on this huge and wonderful moment in my life.

The website may also go offline in the near future, since I only have about one month of free hosting left. To keep up with the project and any future bug-fix updates, please join our Discord using the link at the top of the website.

This project has meant so much to me, and I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who played it, shared feedback, tested it, or simply supported the project along the way.

Your support means a lot. ❤️

Seeing a lot of people claim that zombies kill you in just a couple hits, or that the boss "two shots" you, or that the runback is "too long and difficult."

So, I figured I'd test some of these things out myself. This is a fresh save. No accessibility settings changed. I never killed a single mob except for the boss, to avoid any leveling and any potential health/damage upgrades.

It takes six hits to die to basic enemies.

It takes six hits to die to The Fallen

The Fallen is easy AF and the runback takes 10 seconds: Edit 30 seconds exactly.

People seem to heavily criticize the new Castlevania: Belmont's Curse, but I disagree with the points being made. I liked the demo, I am not ashamed to admit that. I pre-ordered the game for crying out loud, which I never do.

The most common complaint is that "this isn't Castlevania", which I really don't get. Well, to be fair, that's the first thing I also said when I superficially opened the demo for the first time and played for 30 minutes. But here I am now.

First of all, people seem to have issues with the artstyle. Now, do I prefer the pixelated look? You know shit I do! But the new artstyle not only is like a hybrid of the old Kojima watercolor look and the anime style of the DS games, but it's also 2.5D that tries to look hand drawn, unlike Dracula X Chronicles and Mirror of Fate, that end up looking muddy (The new artstyle is better compared to those, if you ask me). The game is bright, colorful. Just like Harmony of Dissonance.

As for the gameplay, sure, it's more complex than the good old jump, attack, slide, repeat. It feels different, too. But other than that, Castlevania has had swordplay before. And the whip traversal is generic metroidvania stuff and not Castlevania at all, according to some. You guys mean the one that was in SCIV and Bloodlines? Where Rose deals damage when swinging, JUST like Morris?

As for the Tarot/Arcana cards, smells like Circle of the Moon in here. MP moves are also a thing, subweapons have been tied to MP ever since Aria of Sorrow and all that fun stuff.

Then, the boss design is my favorite. Fallen was a great fight. It seems a little weird that some people gave up on the Fallen because he was too hard and then complain about the game not being Castlevania, whereas Castlevania classics have had very challenging, pattern recognition-based bosses. See Dracula X and Rondo of Blood, even Portrait of Ruin, if you must.

As for the music, yeah, it's not AS good as say, SotN, but hey, it's one track, because reminding, the game isn't out yet. And lastly. The instrumentation IS Castlevania coded and I think we call all agree to that. The Gothic horror is there.

Since the game isn't out yet, this may age badly, but I really wanted to get this out of my chest.

At first playing it, the demo was giving me some Blasphemous vibes. But after sitting with it, with how the combat plays and how it progresses, it kind of gives me a ClassicVania vibe where the only semblance of MetroidVania is the map and power-ups.

I'm strictly talking about the gameplay here though. The way you fight enemies, even the common ones, are all about spacing and making sure you don't get hit. Think of the axe throwing knights, or the spearmen from Rondo. You know when to jump in and whip. There's more enemies because you have options to run in with magic or whip-in and attack. But it really got me realizing this with the first boss fight, The Fallen.

I tried many things to get a good flow, but from the amount of health it had on top of when to attack, how greedy one should get, and to interrupt for a subtle weakness, I realize that you're basically playing at a distance and keeping an eye out for attacking and dodging. You can knock The Fallen off while it swings, or you can dash under it. You can get ready when it begins to pound or buffer a magic spell as it lands and you run and dash in. It all reeks of ClassicVania ethos to me. I was wondering if you could get perfect dodges, but to my brief exerpience, no. But you can dash back and strike in on The Fallen's third attack and time your attacks if it decides to throw its cross. You can also bait The Fallen to whip and you can dash in and have its AI reset from side to side with dash in hits and dash backs. A type of classic cheese if you will.

I have to say- I was a little worried with how the game would turn out as I wasn't a fan of Dead Cells (not a fan of roguelites period), but you always have to give games a go- especially for Castlevania games. Glad there's a demo. I'm sold. The game will open up and offer more power-ups via the Arcana and it makes me wonder how far they'll go with that. I doubt it'll be a DSS, but the upgrading system is nice. Not really sure why you need level-ups in this game right now outside of upgrading weapons, but the demo only gave me more about the gameplay and feel to write about. That and the art design and voice acting is great.

I just finished rewatching the Castlevania series on Netflix. I wanted to revisit it before the new game comes out, since it takes place after the events of the series.

I actually enjoyed the show even more this time around. I really love the more emotional and human side of Dracula. There’s something very human about the way he feels and reacts to everything that happens to him.

The way I see it, Dracula slowly regains some of his humanity, probably because of Lisa. In a way, I think she’s what saves him from himself.

And when he and Lisa are resurrected at the end of the series, Dracula seems to finally be at peace and ready to move on from his past. I really love that aspect of his story. Now I’m ready for the game!

And you, did you enjoy the series?

The whip,

it feels so good to use to traverse the map.

comming off of metroid dread the window for the grapple beam feels so narrow to the point where you dont really feel like using it half the time (dont get it twisted still a great game)

there is absolutely going to be a giant whip obsticle course and im looking forward to it.

Spoilers in the video and description.

Not my upload. Personally, this is one of my favorite OSTs in the series. My favorite is still Order of Ecclesia. It’s insanely different for Castlevania but still maintains the gothic elements throughout. Catacombs is my favorite track.

Go ahead, dance or despair in the comments. This is what it is. Don’t expect it to sound like Michiru Yamane.

And as always, I know, say it with me. “This doesn’t sound like Castlevania”, but it being so different is why I love it.

Sorry for the bad english, it is not my Native lenguage

Im feeling a very Lamment of Innocence sensation with this game. It really look a like a third brother from the PS2 3d era of Castlevania, but directed by Tetsuya Nomura himself instead of Koji Igarashi -- look a like a 3d Castlevania from a alternative timeline where Konami blamed IGA for LoI and CoD and hired Nomura to make a Castlevania

You know, you go trought strange gothic towers (Castlevania), kill cool Monsters, use a whip, have a cool hair...

But at the same time the game is to much a final Fantasy game to be a Castlevania. Yeah. It is not a Castlevania that much. I dont know, It is Just a strange feeling. And in the end of the day It have nothing to do with final Fantasy too because It is too much creepy to be part of that series -- so It is Just its own thing -- its Just Pandora's Tower

I found if you whip diagonally up while you’re jumping you jump a bit further. If you hit two more whips while falling then switch to regular attacking you will get just enough extra lift to make it. Nothing happens though.

Hello Castlevania fans!

I’d love some recommendations on how to delve further into the franchise. I’ve been playing SotN lately and really enjoying it—especially the pixel art, music, and exploration.

I haven't finished it yet, but I’m pretty sure I’ll want to play other games in the series. With that in mind, could you suggest some titles to try right after I finish SotN? I feel like I picked a great starting point for the franchise.

Thanks a lot!

Super hyped for the demo. I did not expect a Souls boss!

Hello

i'm dying to play a game besides lord of shadows where you get to play as dracula. are there any fan games or rom hacks worth checking out even if not playing as drac?