Genre: Action platformer
Developer: Nintendo
Publisher: Nintendo

Castlevania's red, orange, blue, and green-themed tiled dungeon-esque stage art is neatly drawn, their little staircases and ledges are fun to traverse. They don't always communicate what's a ledge and what's part of the background, however. It's interesting to see how the player and core enemy designs, like the flea men, zombies, and ghosts were already figured out.

The Castlevania series eventually became known for its music, and the musical pedigree started right from this first title. Composed by Kinuyo Yamashita, the Halloween-esque minor key became a series trademark for the ensuing several decades. Even some of the melodies themselves, like "Vampire Killer", were started here. The game's sound effects aren't much to write home about.

Like so many early NES games, Castlevania has many unforgiving elements: enemies which come suddenly from off-screen, no ability to adjust jump momentum once in the air, and so forth. There is also a fair amount of depth to the mechanic, for instance "raking" the whip attack. The levels do a good job of gradually introducing new challenges.

It's incredible how little the pre-"Symphony of the Night" series actually changed from this original game: all of the elements, from the core gameplay to the music to the aesthetic, were all in place. The only thing this first raw and unforgiving entry lacks from the later titles is that extra element of refinement.