Genre: Action platformer
Developer: Konami
Publisher: Konami

Super Castlevania IV is like a water slide. The climb to the apex is marked more by suspense than anything, with flat and somewhat uninteresting backgrounds-- almost like NES boards, redrawn to use more colors-- giving the player hope that something more exciting awaits. Then the ride down the slide-- that magical flurry of mind blowing Mode 7-based stages right smack in the middle of the title-- commences. And those, suffixed by the latter third of the game, which is a tit-for-tat strategic picking through some quite challenging stages with clearly platform launch-window visuals.

Along with Falcom's "Ys" series, the Castlevania name reflexively evokes the notion of "rockin' soundtrack!" from just about everyone. And yet-- disappointingly at first-- that idea goes completely absent in Super Castlevania IV, which seems to alternate between drab, ambient noise-oriented tracks, and mediocre remixes of tunes from previous Castlevania titles. What's strange though is that the more one plays the game, the more the music's naunces begin to grow, and previously unnoticed subtleties take on their own forms, becoming highly appreciable.

The Belmont du jour in this series iteration is perhaps the most lithe of any of the series protagonists, with surprising amounts of mid-air control especially granted, along with a whip which can be unleashed in any of eight directions, or even swung around limply like a pensioner's manly bit in need of its little blue pill. The levels are well structured, but once the screen scrolls even a pixel upward beyond the floor's threshold, any fall is instant death, as are even the most innocent of brushes with a spike. Frustrating! Still, the overall structure and flow of the levels is some of the best in the whole series.

Super Castlevania IV feels like one of those titles-- think BioShock 2, or Batman: Arkham Origins-- that was outsourced, because the usual developers had too much else to do; this isn't necessarily a bad thing-- it merely means that the game's defiance of expectations forces players to evaluate the game on its own merits. Interestingly and on that note, its superior level designs, flexible character movement, and acquired taste aesthetic qualities make it, in many ways, the connoisseur's choice, versus the more immediately impressive and greatly heraled, but perhaps less sophisticated "Akumajo Dracula" and "Rondo of Blood" releases.