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I finished Symphony of the Night a few hours ago and (surprising no one) it was excellent. Really fun game.

I'm impressed with how many solutions there are to a lot of the fights. Pattern learning and perfect dodging, smart use of weapons and equipment, and simple over-levelling by grinding for XP on easier enemies are all viable strategies. I was worried the game would be too difficult for me (I'm bad at sidescrolling action-platforming games) but thankfully that wasn't the case.

Of course the artwork - backgrounds, sprites, character design, sound, music - were all awesome. I was surprised how much of the music I had heard outside of the game in different contexts. And it controlled very well too, it felt more forgiving than some earlier Castlevania games I've played.

Anyway. Everybody knows SotN is good, now I know it too.

#streaming Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (PSX, 1997) this evening over at https://twitch.tv/andreaen. I'm in the upside-down castle and it's very difficult; might be near the end of the game.

It's really difficult to keep VtM Bloodlines running on Linux. I swear I have to reinstall it every year because some change in my system breaks it. This time it seems to be because I upgraded Debian (which brought with it an upgrade to Wine).

I'm picking up my Morrowind (PC, 2002) save again this afternoon at https://twitch.tv/andreaen. Not sure what I'll do; more quests in Firewatch, maybe a visit to Narsis.

#streaming more Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (PSX, 1997) this afternoon at https://twitch.tv/andreaen. Going into the "colosseum" area next, I think.

I'm starting a game of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (PSX, 1997) today at https://twitch.tv/andreaen. I have somehow never played this game before.