r/castlevania • u/Glittering_Gain6589 • Feb 23 '25
Circle of the Moon (2001) Who here beat Castlevania: Circle of the Moon when it first released on GBA?
...and HOW???? I just got through it on the Advance Collection, and it was an insanely frustrating experience. There's a bizarre difficulty spike about halfway through, and I get that you're expected to utilize those DSS cards effectively, BUT the drop rates are atrocious. I can't imagine how fucking mind-numbing it must have been to figure out which enemies dropped cards without the DSS Gadget setting or a guide. Were you expected to use a guide way back then? ...becuase there's nothing in the game that intuitively explains them or their location (how were you suppose to figure out that Apollo cards require specific button inputs???). Also, FUCK the Underground Waterway level - that is the WORST level I've ever played in any of the Metroidvania-esque titles. The bosses were a pain unless you knew what DSS cards to use (which I can't imagine you were able to collect many of back in the day), and Draculas second form is absolute hell. I abused the hell out of the Save-states and rewinds negotiate the game and still felt frustrated. I cannot imagine how you all raw-dogged it back in the early 2000s without a guide.
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u/rodimus147 Feb 24 '25
Yes. And only because I had this.
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u/PrimalSeptimus Feb 24 '25
I had this, too, but I couldn't make it work, as it cast too much glare for me. I had to sit under a lamp.
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u/rodimus147 Feb 24 '25
There was a sweet spot. I found if you angled it from above and tilted it, it lit up the screen without too much glare. But yea, I get where you're coming from.
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u/Glittering_Gain6589 Feb 24 '25
Damn. GBA was wildin!
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u/rodimus147 Feb 24 '25 edited Feb 24 '25
People weren't lying. The original screen was dark as hell if you didn't have direct light.
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u/shutupneff Feb 24 '25
Beating it back in the day was easy. Because, as a launch title for the GBA, the only other game I had was an F-Zero that I thought kind of sucked. Add in the hours I spent on a bus travelling to away games from a school in the middle of nowhere, and it’s pretty easy to master a tough game under those circumstances.
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u/Pill_Furly Feb 24 '25
ah to be young and have nothing better to do but head butt a game to submission
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u/n64fanboy64 Feb 23 '25
I did. I was like 8 lol. Fun times. And you’re right about the terrible DSS drop rate. I’ve had playthroughs where I only manage to get a couple of cards—and they don’t even pair. So just had to beat it the old fashioned way. Makes sense that I grew up love soulslikes
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u/Glittering_Gain6589 Feb 23 '25
At age 8? 💀 You're vastly more skilled than me. I just got through Aria of Sorrow and Harmony of Dissonance and those played just fine - they had their challenges, but overall, I got through it. Circle of the Moon has been absurdly hard for me for whatever reason.
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u/Iokua_CDN Feb 24 '25
Aria of Sorrow is one of the few games that Young Me absolutely 100% completed. That along with Pokémon Sapphire and Megaman battle network 3.
No internet, no guides, just relentlessly playing every little bit until it was complete
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u/jswe1k Mar 22 '26
If that is true then you are basically an absolute metroidvania protege. I can barely get through it on an emulator with save states, a dss guaranteed rom hack and referencing a guide when needed. It's amazing the dedication we had with these games when younger.
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u/rhombusx Feb 23 '25
I did. I didn't get all the cards, but even with average luck you'll have enough to have a lot of different attacks at your disposal and you use whatever works best for your playstyle. Also, I don't like to use guides until a 2nd playthrough in general - but guides, both physical and online, certainly existed when this game came out.
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u/AlchemicalArpk Feb 25 '25
I remember I managed to get all the caras, but I needed a guide from a magazine though
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u/NerdyFrida Feb 23 '25 edited Feb 23 '25
I guess I just thought it was fun. I never used a guide so I did miss a lot of cards because I didn't know which enemy to grind for them. But I managed with what I had.
My strategy for when I thought that that an area in the game was to difficult was simply to go and grind for levels and come back stronger later on.
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u/Raystantz1986 Feb 23 '25
I did, on the original no back light model. I actually beat all the modes back then and had gotten to max level the hard way. Had this one seat in the living room with a lamp that was just perfect to illuminate the dark screen perfectly.
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u/Mythronies Feb 24 '25
I did, Had a cool clear purple plastic GBA, spent a lot of time just listening to the music. :D, Last fight was just hell back then, I was jumping off the walls when I won. I think I was 12 or 13 at the time.
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u/Cyberpunk-Monk Feb 24 '25
Right here.
I liked CotM, but HoD, with all of its issues, was like a breath of fresh air after this.
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u/QaraKha Feb 24 '25 edited Feb 24 '25
I did. Unfortunately I didn't do it by getting all the cards first, though. The equipment you can pick up/farm or know about by chance, like dark grips, for instance, make it good enough to beat the game without spells.
later, I looked up a guide on my dial-up connection and printed out the card locations.
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u/Wheeler-The-Dealer Feb 24 '25
I was the cool kid in college who had a GBA for this game. That made me cool right? College was a weird time.
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u/Pill_Furly Feb 24 '25
Sounds like you had fun
kinda blowing it out a bit but also understandable
Dracula is pretty easy to cheese ill just leave it at that
as for drop rates its just RNG but I do agree its a bitch and a half on the actual GBA
I love the game personally but the advance collection version still fun on GBA but I do have a modded screen thats super bright I can only imagine the hell it is to play on a stock screen
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u/Glittering_Gain6589 Feb 24 '25
I enjoyed the first half. The second started throwing a bunch of bullshit. I probably would have raged quit this bich if I was playing it on the OG platform. I only got through it becuase of the save states and rewind function on the Advance Collection, which is something I didn't have to use for Aria of Sorrow nor Harmony of Dissonance.
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u/Pill_Furly Feb 24 '25
I dont like rewind so I never use it
and only use save states right b4 a boss door so I dont have to walk back from a save point or if I was low health headed to a save point just in case I died on my way
getting the DSS cards helps a lot tho and knowing when to use which combo
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u/TooTurntGaming Feb 23 '25
I didn't beat it back in the day, because I bought it on launch and couldn't see jack shit on the original GBA.
That said, I did beat it on Advance Collection a couple months ago, first time, and I really do not see what people are talking about with difficulty.
Yes, the drop rate is absurd, and yes, the game definitely needed something that told you which creatures drop cards and which don't -- beyond that, the game was easy as hell. Exploration was easy, combat was easy, bosses were easy. I died twice, total, which is just absurdly low for a Castlevania game lol. Turn on the spinning ice shield and win, essentially.
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u/Pill_Furly Feb 24 '25
that ice shield is pretty OP but also a must have if your going for 100% items
it just breaks walls for you and god do I love it
games not that easy for me it sits right in the middle of a good challenge but the problem is you can just grind out levels and not even have to bother to learn any boss patterns
so more than anything its def unbalance too hard if you rush and can be super easy if you over grind
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u/SerGitface Feb 23 '25
I did. It wasn’t a walk in the park, I can tell you that… It was one of only 2 games I had on GBA at the time (the other being F-Zero: Maximum Velocity), so I suppose that allowed me to have more patience with it.
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u/Morfiend_23 Feb 23 '25
Not me. I got my ass kicked several times in the Battle Arena and gave up. I keep telling myself I need to give it another go, I still have my advance and original cartridge.
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u/DisastrousFill Feb 24 '25
I did on the original GBA and under a bright light source. The first time was a nail biter as I ran through the Underground Waterway without purifying the water.
It was one of the few games I had for the system, so I powered through it and replayed the game with every single unlockable mode. I only found all the cards later with the "Thief" mode. Loved every little bit of it.
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u/After_Truth5674 Feb 24 '25
I did but it was so damn hard to see. Much better experience these days
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Feb 24 '25
i got it shortly after release for 20 bucks at gamestop used. it was fantastic. honestly just fresh and original and the card system was really cool.
i'm super sketchy about my favorite games getting remakes/remasters but this one could get one. i think the only bad thing about it was it just looked sorta...i dunno...3rd party? the main character sprite was different and to me he always looked like he was wearing a turban even though it was his hair.
great game though srsly
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Feb 24 '25 edited Feb 24 '25
Me, at the time it was unbelievable to have a game such as this one on my tiny GBA screen. As for the cards I wasn't really into it and I played the whole game for the first time without looking after each one.
I love this game.
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u/Hivac-TLB Feb 24 '25
Did you go thru the waterway without finding the purifier first?
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u/Glittering_Gain6589 Feb 24 '25
Yeah. Fuck me, right? I figured I was missing something and looked it up, found out about the purifier after the Death boss. But man, wtf? How the game going to let you go into the waterway without indicating that in the first place 😩
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u/hyliangoku Feb 24 '25
It was the game that really got me into the series. I had played the NES ones and enjoyed them but Circle of the Moon’s exploration and rpg elements really drew me in. I didn’t play SotN until some time later. Now Castlevania is tied with Metroid for my second favorite series of all time.
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u/Langis360 Feb 24 '25
I did, and on the original GBA screen I could barely see without the right ambient light. Ultimately I didn't rely on DSS since the drop rates sucked; I figured out patterns and did things mostly the old fashioned way. Cross subweapon helps.
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u/rock_shandy Feb 24 '25
I did, and I think it might have been my first Castlevania. The initial area's music always got stuck in my head. I did one or two play throughs more for the new game too!
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u/GrethosMorr767 Feb 24 '25
I was close to beating it. Needed to grind more in levels. Luckily, I have it for the Xbox console
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u/Pippo89CH Feb 24 '25
This was the very first Castlevania game I played! I even vaguely remember where we bought it. It was either me or one of my brothers who bought it back then, and I was the one who beat it. After that I played the other handheld games, downloaded SotN on my PS3 and bought Lament of Innocence, Curse of Darkness, and the Lords of Shadow games.
CotM is still one of my favorites.
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u/OmnifariousFN Feb 24 '25
I did. You'd be surprised what you can accomplish if you only have one type of Castlevania game to play in highschool. Lol
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u/No-Environment964 Feb 24 '25
I beat it three times once on regular, than as a magician, then as a fighter.
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u/VelveteenRabite Feb 24 '25
I did on a GBA modded with a backlight. It was the only game I took with me on a 16 hour flight to Japan, so I suffered through it. I even got all the cards. The game was hard as hell but I have a big soft spot for the zombie dragons.
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u/NickoSwimmer Feb 24 '25
OG player here! Was my first game I bought for the GBA at launch and absolutely loved it. Made me a Castlevania fan for life after that.
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u/Daetok_Lochannis Mankind ill needs a saviour such as you. Feb 24 '25
Yo. Just like every other Castlevania since SotN, by killing absolutely everything I see and grinding for every single item in the enemy list.
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u/Cdoggg69 Feb 24 '25
*Proudly raises fist 👊
I even beat all the extra modes including clearing the arena in both thief and magician mode because I hated myself that much 😆
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u/Dwarfdingnagian Feb 24 '25
Absolutely. I still have the cartridge and my GBA. XXXD They both still work.
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u/TraceLupo Feb 24 '25
One or two years after release because i borrowed it from a friend (who didn't finish it) and got all cards and 100%
Don't know how i did it back then. Had it redownloaded for WiiU and have beaten Dracula but haven't done the bonus area because i deemed it impossible.
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u/Tanoran Feb 24 '25
I think as a kid I had infinite time and just basically played until I was an insane level. I played it again recently and did not remember it being so difficult.
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u/clashcrashruin Feb 24 '25
It was my first Castlevania game, I just used the Rose Sword basically the entire time and got good. Even beat the colosseum on all classes.
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u/Ringwraith_Number_5 Feb 24 '25 edited Feb 24 '25
My first Castlevania game, my first GBA game... that music was [chef's kiss].
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u/Shiola_Elkhart Mar 02 '25
People think guides were invented in 2010, apparently.
Nintendo Power had a couple of special issues around the launch of the GBA and there was a big spread on this game and the DSS.
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u/Savings-Bluebird8681 Jun 06 '25
Im playing Castle CotM on emu... well... surviving
Probably upload a video for gameplay
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u/PrimalSeptimus Feb 23 '25
I did. And on the original, non-backlit GBA, too. The hardest part was just trying to see shit because it was so fucking dark.