Genre: Action/RPG
Publisher: Konami
Developer: Konami
Release Date: October 14, 2008

Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia is set a while after the events in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. The Belmont clan of vampire hunters and their legendary whip have vanished, leaving the world defenseless against the forces of evil. In response, various organizations have been set up to combat the potential spread of evil, including the Order of Ecclesia. Shanoa is the greatest warrior of the Order, a powerful woman capable of using magical glyphs to defeat her foes. The Order was in the process of developing the Dominus Glyphs, a trinity of magical glyphs that only Shanoa can use and contain the power to destroy Dracula, which was previously thought to only be contained in the Vampire Killer. Unfortunately, a member of the Order, Albus, betrays them, steals the glyphs and wipes out Shanoa's memories and emotions in the process. It's up to the weakened Shanoa to defeat Albus and recover the Dominus glyphs, so that Dracula's resurrection may be stopped.

Shanoa is a bit different from your usual Castlevania protagonist in that she actually has no physical weapons at all. Instead, everything she can do is done in the form of glyphs, which are magical spells, each with its own unique element and function. Some take the form of weapons ? like axes, rapier and spears ? while others are beams of energy, fireballs, or even the ability to transform into various creatures. Shanoa can equip three different glyphs at once: one on each hand and one on her back, with the back glyphs being distinct from her hand glyphs. Despite some of them looking functionally like weapons, there are a few important differences that glyphs have from your regular Castlevania weapons. For one thing, glyphs can be obtained in a number of ways. Some may be found in the stages, hidden in statues, dropped by defeated enemies, or stolen directly from enemies by absorbing the glyph as they try to attack you.

The second important difference is that each glyph is a magical spell, not a physical item. Whether it's a sword or a screen-clearing blast of energy, you're going to have use MP to attack. The more potent the spell, the heftier a magic cost it takes, although no spell takes that much MP. This leads us into our third difference: combos. The two hand glyphs can be chained together to combo their attacks. Weapons can be spammed rapidly, or two magic spells can be tossed out at once. By finding spells that chain together fast or well, you can do absolutely stunning amounts of damage, although this will eat through your MP bar fairly quickly. Luckily, Shanoa also regenerates MP at a fairly healthy clip, so as long as you allow her to recover, you can use spells to your heart's content. You can also combine glyphs by using Glyph Unison to unlock even more powerful attacks; much like the old sub-weapons in older Castlevania games, it's access by pressing up and attack, which causes Shanoa to spend hearts and unleash a special attack. The unison powers in Order of Ecclesia are entirely reliant on which glyph you have equipped. Equip two swords and you may summon a giant blade, while a sword and a light-based glyph may summon a glowing lightsaber instead. The more powerful the attack, the more hearts it uses up.

Order of Ecclesia is probably harder than any recent Castlevania, partly because the glyph system brings a new focus to the elemental properties of each attack. In previous Castlevania games, the elements were really not that important, so equipping a fire sword against an enemy who's weak against ice might do some extra damage, but the protagonists were so powerful that it stopped mattering. Not quite for Shanoa. You must learn how to use the elements in order to succeed in Order of Ecclesia. Enemy damage is significantly reduced for attacks against which they are strong, and even neutral attacks don't do as much damage as they used to. If you want to defeat enemies swiftly and without great risk, you'll need to learn to use the elemental properties of your attacks.

Thankfully, figuring this out isn't too complex. Solid, non-fleshy enemies like skeletons tend to be weak to smashing damage, fleshy enemies to slashing damage, and the elemental weaknesses are not too hard to figure out. If you encounter an enemy made entirely of shadows, you'll probably want to use light magic. The DS' top screen will show you the exact strengths and weaknesses after you defeat one of an enemy, and you can equip three different "sets" of glyphs, allowing you to switch between monster killing builds on the fly. Using different elements even builds up Shanoa's affinity toward them, so the more you use a particular element, the more damage you can do with it.

Even with the glyphs, however, Shanoa has a bit of a rougher time than most Castlevania protagonists. The entire game has been scaled up in difficulty a bit. Enemies tend to hit a bit harder, there is a hefty dose of newer and nastier enemies, and in particular, bosses are much more of a threat than the increasingly lackluster opposition in previous Castlevania games. The good news is that these fights are significantly more fun and satisfying than bosses like Portrait of Ruin's Kermet. The game encourages you to learn patterns and exploit weaknesses, and while it is entirely possible to power-level and grind your way through, chugging healing items the entire time, it's going to be a more frustrating experience, particularly since one of the earlier bosses can't be defeated through traditional means, relying instead on your knowledge of platforming and pattern recognition to see the battle through.

Order of Ecclesia takes place in a wide variety of locations in the European countryside. You travel from a monastery to mountains to undersea sunken ships, all the while fighting a wide variety of monsters and rescuing lost villagers. These stages are actually far more linear and straightforward than one might expect from the recent "Metroidvania" style of gameplay, almost closer to the classic Castlevania gameplay that we haven't seen since Castlevania X: Rondo of Blood. There are still hidden areas to the sides and things to explore, but it isn't quite on the same level as the previous games, focusing more on enemy placement and traps instead of large areas to explore. It may be a bit disappointing on levels like Misty Path, where you basically walk forward and fight enemies Castlevania 1 style, but most of the levels are large enough that it is fun to explore, and the last level is pure Symphony of the Night-style gameplay.

You rescue villagers as you explore the various levels; some are hidden in plain sight, while others may be behind breakable walls or in an obscure area deep under the sea. You have to rescue all of the villagers to access the last area in the game and get the good ending, but there are also other benefits. Each villager offers you quests to complete if you rescue them, and these quests, which generally involve finding a rare enemy or item and bringing it back to the quest giver, reward you with some of the best equipment in the game. The blacksmith may give you new armor, the tailor a fancy magic-improving dress, and the town herbmaster will get the general store to sell healing items. Beyond the obvious rewards, it's also just rather fun to find and talk to the villagers, each of whom has a unique personality. It is worth noting that a few of the villagers are hidden in fairly obscure places, and unless you're the kind of gamer who checks every wall to see if it is breakable, you may end up rushing to GameFAQs to continue the plot.

Order of Ecclesia brings back Portrait of Ruin's Wi-Fi shop feature, and much like Portrait of Ruin, it has the potential to break the game wide open if you use it. There are a few hefty flaws here. For one, you can sell anything you've ever found, even if you don't have it, so earning money is as simple a matter as finding an annoying quest drop, tossing it on your shop and selling it for vast amounts of easy cash. My first foray into the Wi-Fi shop, with some very basic equipment, earned me well over 100,000 gold, which could be enough to last me for the rest of the game.

Most bizarre of all, you can buy from your own shop. You don't get money, but this allows you to copy almost any item in the game for fairly cheap, and since many powerful pieces of equipment are stackable, that can allow you to gain some rather insane bonuses for a small cost. It's a feature that doesn't do much to help the game and just feels tacked on to get the Wi-Fi logo on the box. You can also enter a Wi-Fi Race against a friend, which challenges you and a pal to race across an enemy- and trap-filled section of the map. The game scores you on such things as damage taken, enemies killed and how fast you finished the map; the winner … well, is the winner. It's rather fun, but it degenerated a bit too quickly into two people using the same attacks and equipment over and over again.

Order of Ecclesia also offers a fairly good amount of replay value. A new character mode is unlocked once you finish the game, but more interesting is the game's Hard mode, which caps Shanoa, either at level 50 or level 1, and revamps almost all of the enemy spawns in the game. Strong enemies may appear earlier, and certain enemies may get new and nastier attacks. If you found Ecclesia's normal mode overly frustrating, then Hard mode isn't for you, but if you're looking for a new challenge, then it's exactly what you're looking for. This is good, as Order of Ecclesia is a bit on the short side. Dedicated gamers will probably finish it in a day or two, and while this isn't really that much shorter than the other Castlevania titles, the smaller stages make it feel like it is going by faster. You'll also be able to unlock the ability to take Shanoa to level 255 instead by completing the game on Level 1 Hard mode, or by connecting the game to the upcoming Wii title Castlevania Judgment.

Order of Ecclesia is a godsend as far as visuals go. After what feels like a near-eternity of the exact same sprites over and over and over again, Ecclesia finally revamps a good number of the classic Castlevania enemies, so you're not staring at the exact same 16-year-old sprites. Honestly, I didn't like all of the redesigned sprites, but the majority was quite good, and the freshness was appreciated even when I preferred the old design. While some of the older ones are retained, they're not quite as glaring and tend to be some of the more obscure enemies. The levels in Ecclesia are a little less obviously repetitive than those in Portrait of Ruin, although there are still a good number of reused tilesets and rooms, so be prepared for a bit of déjà vu as you explore the stages. Order of Ecclesia's soundtrack is also tops, with a lot of catchy and fun tunes. If you don't like them, Portrait of Ruin's records come back, allowing you to replace the background music with a few classic Castlevania tunes instead, assuming you can find them.

Order of Ecclesia is a top-notch Castlevania game. It has a few problems with linearity and length, but the flaws are few and far between. The gameplay is incredibly fun, the animations are lovely, and the overall enemy design is some of the best we've seen from recent Castlevania titles. If you're a Castlevania fan, or even just a fan of good action-RPGs, you owe it to yourself to pick up Order of Ecclesia.

Score: 8.8/10