So I just finished Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia.
Wow, this game was really good! Fourth Castlevania I've played and by far the best.
Let's start with the obvious: challenge! The game is certainly quite tough, but in a very fun way. Going save point to save point in a stage is typically not trivial, and bosses, aside from that scrubby first one, are brutal, but very well-designed for the most part. About the only one I found at all frustrating was Eligor, and that was mostly because it takes too long to kill off all his legs and those crossbows before the final stage which I found very unpredictable/difficult to dodge, but it was frail enough to item-spam through, so eh.
But even aside from that, the game's gameplay was a notable improvement on previous games. The glyph system worked really well. Weapons not only felt more varied and interesting than in past games, but they integrated them nicely with spells, and as a result I found myself actually using a wide variety of different attacks to deal with enemies. My biggest complaint was that I'd be constantly switching between them by going to a menu... and about ten minutes after I realised this was going to be a problem, the game handed my the glyph sleave. Awesome. Granted, I did sometimes wish for even more glyph slots as I certainly did end up having to do some menu-swapping, but in general it worked well enough, and three sleaves is a pretty good number so you're always one swap away from any give one at any time.
The game also fixes another of my main gripes with Castlevania, the large hitstun from previous games. Combat felt much more fluid and fun than any previous games.
The game is the most linear of the Metroidvanias I've played, which doesn't bother me at all of course, but it's there. I like it well enough, it breaks the game up into pretty manageable chunks, though I did appreciate the return to the big epic-feeling castle at the end. Quests and stuff... a bit too much rare item farming but otherwise fine, and they at least make the townsfolk personalities memorable. Overall not a terribly important part of the game anyway.
Plot doesn't exist much. Not really great when it is there, but it has sceneskip for when you inevitably die to a plot boss for the second, third, fourth, and twelth time.
Music is solid enough, but I can't remember too many standout tracks. The first section of Dracula's castle is probably my favourite.
The game isn't perfect. My chief complaints are the amazing Castlevania tradition of keeping a decent chunk of the game hidden behind a FAQ-bait requirement (yes, I could probably have gone around destroying walls to find the two villagers I'd missed. Not really my idea of fun, though) and the lack of documention about the glyph unions (the game doesn't really reward testing them because keeping your hearts full = more monies).
Will definitely replay this though. Aw yeah Hard Mode, sounds delicious.
Glyph notes...
Confodere (rapier) & Secare (sword): I liked these, and often held one of each. They could be spammed very quickly and generally were optimum damage against any boss I could stand in place and hit, even beating out weaknesses. Slash also seemed like an incredibly common weakness to boot. Rapiers were faster but swords are stronger and have overhead, so it's nice to have access to both.
Hasta (lance): Seemed like a crappier rapier. Yes, a bit more attack and a bit more reach, but losing the mad spammability = meh.
Falcis (sickle): Used this some to pair with magic when I wanted slash damage, since its slowness is less big of a deal when not spammed. Kinda abandonned it as time went on and just stuck with the swords though.
Arcus (bow), Culter (knives), and Ascia (Axe): Magic generally felt better for range. I guess these do slash damage, but if I wanted that I could close to melee and do huge damage. Did get some use out of the first bow, but then the second had a pretty bad firing direction so screw that.
Macir (mace): Oh look, after fifty million slash weapons we get hammers, which actually have a different damage type. Pretty great for things they hit weakness on, and I used them to complement spells if I was expecting to want blunt damage in particular. Also quite damaging, though slow, so not optimum at raw offence... except against Dracula who you have to jump to hit anyway. So yeah, dual hammer beatdown was all the rage there.
Lapiste (stone fist): A bit more range than the hammer. Not wonderful, but I liked to pair it with...
Nitesco (laser): Range is awesome, and the hits really add up, and you can launch it and move backwards while still facing forwards which has plenty of use. Very solid magic attack.
Ignis (fire): Didn't like either of these much. Found the three flames to be very weak. In theory it's fine at short range, if I'm there why not melee spam? Most things weak to fire were weak to something else anyway (often light).
Grando (ice): Only got the upgraded version. Decently damaging area of effect bomb-type move, and destroys the sand shark boss which is nice. Didn't use it too often but it was quite handy at times for that large coverage.
Fulgur (lightning): Again, only got the second version, but you get that really early. Homing damage is nice (oneshots frail enemies), and great underwater where it hits weakness on everything. Pretty undamaging when it doesn't hit weakness (so basically worthless unless the enemy has 10 or less HP) but there's enough things to make it feel useful.
Luminatio (light): Duh, you're fighting the legions of darkness, so of course you face lots of light weakness. That pretty much make these useful by default. Even the first version, which has a laughable MM5 Power Stone-like trajectory, is useful due to this. Second version with its homing is pretty great and managed to displace physical spam against two bosses!
Umbra (dark): Well, correspondingly, element concerns make this one less good. Still, a few things are weak to it, and the homing trajectory.
Custos (Cerberus attacks): Felt like Lapiste but for slash. Serviceable enough, but you don't have it for long, and since swords are faster they have less of a niche.
Magnes (magnet): I really liked this one and thought it was a shame it wasn't used a bit more, but I guess they wanted you to use other glyphs and fair enough. Just really liked the spice it added to some of the platforming and I'm glad they used it against bosses.
Volaticus (Nina2 cosplay): Obviously pretty awesome, and not just for platforming. Pretty much owns Dracula's first form since it both easily dodges his fireball attack and causes him to always use it. Hovering while you unload damage can also be fun times.
Stat boosts: I didn't find the defensive ones worth it, offensive ones were pretty good for all that I only really used them late when they were very inexpensive. My loss.
Arma Custos (Cerberus head): Really great strength boost as your HP drops, doesn't take long to beat the strength buffer.
Summons: I didn't use them a huge amount, but I did like the owl one for some free added damage, Beat-style.
Since the game tracks my element use, it's easy enough for me to note that slash > blunt > light > lightning > ice > dark > fire.
Think that's about it!
So yeah. 9/10 game or so? Pretty high at that? Really impressive, one of the best games I've played this year and certainly my favourite Castlevania. Challenging, well-designed platformer with shades of Megaman in it = obvious Elf-bait.
