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How the hell did people beat Castlevania 1 & 3 without save states?

itsaziz

itsaziz

Member
Nov 8, 2017
533
I just finished both these games on the Castlevania collection. I don't see how it's possible casually, especially Castlevania 3, which forces you to do the final level all over again if you lose all your lives to Dracula. Losing your hearts, sub-weapon and upgrades just seems so demoralising.
 
linkboy

linkboy

Member
Oct 26, 2017
13,678
Reno
Patience, lots and lots of patience.

Also, if you didn't have a lot of disposable income back then, so if you got a game, you had to make the most of it.

It's basically how I beat the Super Mario Bros and The Legend of Zelda.
 
Manmademan

Manmademan

Election Thread Watcher
Member
Aug 6, 2018
15,980
Get good, son.

edit: serious answer- game design philosophy was just different. A LOT of NES games took a lot of cues from arcade game design where "beating" the game wasn't possible, you just went as far as you could before losing.

Your casual gamer wasn't expected to "finish" games like Castlevania 1 or 3. They were expected to lose and (eventually) get better. "Finishing" the game was for exceptionally good players who mastered it.

Castlevania isn't even all *that* aggressive about it. SOME games (Fester's Quest comes to mind) would kick you all the way back to start if you lost a life no matter how far in the game you got.
 
Nephtes

Nephtes

Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,545
Castlevania 3 was like the only game 9 year old me was able to afford in 1990 (my parents never bought me games). It was play that… or go outside.

I chose Castlevania 3.
 
Josh5890

Josh5890

I'm Your Favorite Poster's Favorite Poster
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
23,117
Back in my day, we didn't have save states!
 

Deleted member 9241

Oct 26, 2017
10,416
It was the way of things back then so I never thought twice about how different they were. I just played them over and over and over until I eventually beat them.
 
Jonathan Lanza

Jonathan Lanza

"I've made a Gigantic mistake"
Member
Feb 8, 2019
6,779
Game Genie.

At least 30% of boomers who told you they beat anything back then fair and square is lying to you.
 
BrickArts295

BrickArts295

GOTY Tracking Thread Master
Member
Oct 26, 2017
13,712
We were more talented as kids and less likely to be annoyed by a time wasting death.
 
JustinH

JustinH

Member
Oct 27, 2017
10,380
Had a fucking LOT LESS to play at any time than we do nowadays. We had more time to practice.
 
Strings

Strings

Member
Oct 27, 2017
31,360
17927711.gif
 
jwhit28

jwhit28

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,045
Now imagine you only have the weekend to play it before it goes back to the rental store.
 
GameShowPresident

GameShowPresident

Member
Mar 5, 2019
557
Honestly, it took about as long for me to beat the last level of 3 as it did to beat the final boss of Sekiro.

Unlike a lot of games from back then, Castlevania was nice enough to have unlimited continues.
 
SoH

SoH

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,733
It is like learning to play a song on an instrument. You are going to mess up a bunch but when you nail it the satisfaction is the best.
 

NuclearCake

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
9,867
Castlevania 1 isn't that hard and is fairly short. The holy water is pretty much the only item you need to kill any enemy in the game.

Castlevania 3 is harder, but I would still say that games like Ghosts N Goblins and Super C are harder. Still, it is all about patience and practice.
 
ghostcrew

ghostcrew

The Shrouded Ghost
Administrator
Oct 27, 2017
30,337
You learned the game. Those enemies and enemy patterns are the same every time. You had to replay it a lot and, eventually, you would remember where to crouch or when to jump etc
 
kubev

kubev

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,533
California
I do still have problems with Dracula in the original Castlevania as far as timing goes, but I think the level itself is what makes Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse so difficult to beat; the Dracula battle itself isn't that hard in comparison.
 
Zetta

Zetta

The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
7,626
When you only had 1 or 2 games a year to play you got really good at them.
 
Kinsei

Kinsei

Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
20,513
Infinite continues meant it was a hell of a lot more feasible to beat them than some of their contemporaries.

Also aside from some difficulty spikes (like the Death fight in CV1) they just flat out weren't as difficult as a lot of NES games.
 
steejee

steejee

Member
Oct 28, 2017
8,593
When you were a kid in the late 80s you got maybe a game or two a year. Length wise start to end they're not that long, but given the lack of alternatives you basically just devoted all your game time to nailing it.
 

Phediuk

Member
Oct 27, 2017
3,321
In Castlevania 1, just get a holy water with a multiplier block and it's way easier. Both are in the first level.
 
ShinUltramanJ

ShinUltramanJ

Member
Oct 27, 2017
12,949
You should've seen Zelda.

We didn't have no walkthroughs or online guides. You literally had to find all of that shit on your own, and if you found something great you brought your map to school to show your friends where it was.

We bombed and pushed at everything.
 
GreenMonkey

GreenMonkey

Member
Oct 28, 2017
1,861
Michigan
linkboy said:
Patience, lots and lots of patience.

Also, if you didn't have a lot of disposable income back then, so if you got a game, you had to make the most of it.

It's basically how I beat the Super Mario Bros and The Legend of Zelda.
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This

We only had a few cheap games, and whatever we could get loaned from our friends. Which wasn't hard because we were always a generation behind.

Don't underestimate some of effect is input / display lag as a little bit of this. I've played games on my Retropie on a normal older LCD, and my Analogue consoles + ~13ms lag OLED feels a lot better. I'm sure a CRT would feel better - having played some arcade games at our local arcade, they definitely feel snappier.

That said I don't think I ever quite beat Castlevania 1, I didn't have it as a kid besides a few rentals. I think I took my shot at it on the GBA and I only got about 3/4 of the way through it most of the time.

I'll add my 14 yr old daughter beat the NES version of Ninja Gaiden last year the hard way last year, mainly because I told her I'd buy her a PS5 down the road if she did it. She did leave the Analogue NT mini on for days at a time though to do it. It wasn't as hard as I remembered since you have infinite continues as long as you don't turn it off. And she used a few YT videos for strategies on a few tricky stages and the last boss.
 
Manmademan

Manmademan

Election Thread Watcher
Member
Aug 6, 2018
15,980
Rayasab said:
People used to buy couple of games per year, they had no choice
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steejee said:
When you were a kid in the late 80s you got maybe a game or two a year. Length wise start to end they're not that long, but given the lack of alternatives you basically just devoted all your game time to nailing it.
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lobdale said:
Easy, you can get your hands on one or two games per year tops, and those are the only games you play.
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Rentals existed and were pretty cheap. MOST kids were renting these things if they didn't have a ton of money.
 
aerie

aerie

wonky
Administrator
Oct 25, 2017
8,023
We put dozens, if not hundreds, of hours into these games. They were a major part of our entertainment, and when they were new, it was easy to pour countless afternoons into them. We practised, memorized, and learned.

We approach video games of that era very differently today.
 
lobdale

lobdale

Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,987
Easy, you can get your hands on one or two games per year tops, and those are the only games you play.
 
OrakioRob

OrakioRob

Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,491
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
itsaziz said:
I just finished both these games on the Castlevania collection. I don't see how it's possible casually, especially Castlevania 3, which forces you to do the final level all over again if you lose all your lives to Dracula. Losing your hearts, sub-weapon and upgrades just seems so demoralising.
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I first played and beat Castlevania 3 on the Wii Virtual Console, where you can't cheat with save states. It was on par with old Mega Man and Ninja Gaiden games, but that damn stage where you fight the doppelganger at the end... I think it took me 5-6 hours to get through it.
 
Nephtes

Nephtes

Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,545
Also can I just point out that the Castlevania anime on Netflix covering the events of Castlevania 3 is bullshit…

Seriously, game would have been much easier if Sypha had a fraction of the power and agility of her anime counterpart…
 
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