The Castlevania series has been a mainstay of gaming culture since the early days of the NES. Originally a series of action/platforming titles, the games took an interesting turn with the release of Symphony of the Night for the PlayStation, including exploration and RPG elements, a change that was well received by most fans. Several titles for the Game Boy Advance were released that continued using this style of gameplay. While these three titles met with varying degrees of success, Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow for the Nintendo DS comes as close to the masterful brilliance of Symphony of the Night as any game since, and some would daresay it exceeds it.

High graphic quality is a very important part of any Castlevania title. While the DS cannot match the sheer resolution of a TV screen, the quality of animation and special effects easily meets and exceeds that of Symphony of the Night. The sprites in the game have a dizzying array of colorful animations, and watching enemies die is just as satisfying as watching Soma, the game’s main character, smoothly execute his wide range of attacks to dispatch them.

The detailed sprites and their animations are only one side of the coin though. The game also features some very nice effects. The first area of the game includes a very impressive 3D rendered village in the background that beats the pants off anything seen in Symphony of the Night. The amount of detail included is wonderful. There’s even a character you can see swirling a small glass of wine in his hand.

Ever since Symphony of the Night, which was given that name for a very specific reason, the soundtrack has always been an important part of any Castlevania game. Dawn of Sorrow continues this tradition. While most of the new scores are merely average for a Castlevania game, Dawn of Sorrow also includes wonderful new remixes of four old favorites including Beginnings, Vampire Killer, Bloody Tears, and Dance of Illusions. The original Japanese voice-acting, while sparse, is also kept intact. Since the voice-overs mainly consist of battle cries and character names, this makes perfect sense.

One small thing I need to note is the game's specific art style. While the in-game graphics themselves are as dark and gritty as ever, the box art and dialogue boxes feature the characters with a heavy anime influence. While this may turn off some people, its really only a minor thing and doesn’t influence the actual gameplay graphics in the least.

Dawn of Sorrow is a direct sequel to Aria of Sorrow, both in terms of story and gameplay. Since Aria of Sorrow has been out for awhile now, I can tell you that the main character, Soma, is actually Dracula reincarnated. It seems that in 1999, Dracula was finally defeated once and for all and, for whatever reason, his soul was reborn in the Japanese boy Soma Cruz. Now the year is 2036, one year after Aria of Sorrow, and Soma is still dealing with the repercussions of learning this fact.

Appropriately enough, playing as Dracula comes with a very different game system. Like in Aria of Sorrow, you have a chance of collecting a monster's soul when you defeat it. The abilities you unlock from earning souls are the foundation of Soma’s abilities. The souls are classified into four categories. Bullet type souls are used by pressing up and attack and include things like throwing axes and bones. Guardian souls can do a wide range of things such as spinning a spear, turning into a bat, or double jumping. Enchantment souls increase your statistics like strength, intelligence and luck. You can only equip one of each of these three types of souls at a time. The last category, ability souls, are not equipped but rather have effects that are always in play.

Dawn of Sorrow takes this system one step further by increasing the power of abilities as you collect more of the same soul. There are over 100 different souls in the game and discovering the interesting little things different souls can do is half the fun. You’ll get the typical abilities you would expect, such as transformations and special attacks, but you can get some pretty odd abilities such as throwing a plate of curry or getting a ride in a skull-shaped ark. Aside from the soul system, the game plays just like all the recent 2D Castlevanias. You will find new equipment, level up, and explore the castle.

The story of Dawn of Sorrow is not much different than Aria. The only difference is that rather than simply trying to resist the dark power within you, this time there are outsiders actively trying to make a new dark lord. It seems this cult believes that God can only embody absolute good as long as there is a being that embodies absolute evil. The whole cast from the last game returns (those that survived anyway) including Mina, Hammer, Yoko, Julius Belmont, and Genya Arikado (you aren’t fooling anyone buddy). The story’s simple structure is a little bit of a letdown, but it’s hard to top the feeling you got in the last game as you slowly realized that you were actually playing as Dracula in a Castlevania game. The game includes multiple endings, as has become the tradition, though this time some of the “bad” endings are actually much cooler than the “best” ending.

Castlevania has traditionally been a very difficult series. Few games were as unforgiving as the original. Obviously the introduction of levels means you can always just level up so much, nothing can possibly stand in your way, but what’s the fun in that? For those that enjoy the challenge, Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow does not disappoint and includes some pretty nail-biting boss fights, especially in the “extra” mode. Don’t let this scare you off, though. At the end of the day, if you really have to, you can gain a few more levels, stock up on potions, and just force your way though a boss. For those that are really masochistic, the game also offers a hard mode after you have finished it.

Being a DS game, we can assume that Dawn of Sorrow will use two screens and touch-pad functionality. The game makes use of the extra screen exactly as one would expect. The bottom screen is your normal gameplay screen and includes both the playing field and also your pause screen where you can use items and change equipment and souls. The top screen serves two functions: it will either display the castle map or a status screen that includes information on the monster you are fighting.

As for the touch pad, don’t worry. Obviously Castlevania wouldn’t really work well with a touch-pad interface, so the controls are still focused on using the D-pad and buttons to jump and attack. The touch pad does serve a use, though. Throughout the game, you will find several magic seals that include more and more complex patterns on them. Whenever you defeat a boss, a display will pop up and you have to correctly draw the pattern to finish the boss off. If you fail, the boss won’t die and instead will come back with a smaller pool of hitpoints and you will have to fight it again. This system of magic seals does feel a little tacked on, but it looks cool and the timer for drawing the seal doesn’t start until the stylus touches the screen, so you can take as long as you want removing the stylus out of its holder.

Another interesting addition is the ability to construct new weapons. Traditionally, the really good equipment has been found in obscure parts of the castle or as rare drops from really strong monsters. This still holds true for armor, but if you want the really good weapons, you will have to make them yourself. New weapons are constructed by combining a specific type of weapon with a specific soul to make something new and more powerful. Suffice to say, if you want the best weapons in the game, you will have to get some pretty rare souls off some pretty strong monsters.

One surprising feature the game includes is the ability to create your own small level and race through it with friends. You and a buddy can connect via the DS Wi-Fi and see who can get through your custom levels first.

I’ll finish up by talking about Dawn of Sorrows' “extra” mode. It has become a Castlevania standard that whenever you finish the game, you can play through it again as a different character. This extra mode is usually fairly humdrum and typically consists of going through the castle again as a super powerful character (with almost no defense) able to skip through most of the areas right to the end and has little to no story attached to it. I’ll try not to spoil anything here, but if you’re a big Castlevania fan, you’ll find that this time around, Julius mode is just as fun as the standard game.

Dawn of Sorrows continues the unique new gameplay style introduced in Aria of Sorrow and takes it one step further. With its combination of engaging gameplay, classic mechanics, and top notch art and music, Dawn of Sorrows gives Symphony of the Night a run for its money as the best Castlevania game of all time.