Simon's Quest

Main Player Mechanics

Controls
Basic Movements
Fighting Techniques
Other Controls
To move left: Directional pad left
To move right: Directional pad right
To crouch: Directional pad downward
To climb up stairs: Directional pad up
To climb down stairs: Directional pad down		 To attack: "B"
To jump up: "A"
To jump left or right: "A" plus directional pad left/right
To activate mystic weapons: Directional pad up + "B"		 To bring up inventory screen: "Start"
To pause the game: "Select"

Simon Belmont is back for the direct sequel to Castlevania (his fourth appearance in the series), and his bag of tricks remains largely unchanged from the original--while the genre has changed from action-adventure to just adventure with RPG elements, Simon has only picked up some speed and a change of outfits. As such: Simon is a bit more agile this time around; he's quicker with the whip and mystic weapons, he's able to jump cleanly over even bigger enemies, and he's less clunky in his walking motion. His ducking ability is only important to use when a shield is equipped; otherwise, this action is used solely to initiate magical effects. If enemy contact is made while he's standing, moving or ducking, he'll be knocked back about the length of a single block.

Simon's biggest mechanical foe hasn't changed--he still has trouble with those stairways. The problem is not that great this time around because stairways aren't as prominent a feature as they were in Castlevania. Instead, they show up less frequently throughout the land and are only a minor nuisance in mansions. The stairway-over-the-cliff problem is gone because all existing staircases are embedded into middle portions of the bricksets, so whether at the top or base of a staircase, you'll have to place yourself within a 1-block distance while pushing up or down to climb it. To compound any problems you'll have, enemy contact while climbing stairs will, this time, knock you off of them and, potentially, into an abyss below. For more on stair problems, see the weapons system.

As for jumping, as mentioned: Simon is a bit faster this time around, so he can propel himself upward more easily. Because he's now able to jump a tad higher vertically, both upward and forward (2.5 blocks upward), his distance suffers, as he'll fall just short of being able to clear 2 blocks horizontally. However, Simon can gain momentum for his jumps when coming off of a vertical-moving platform on its ascension; he'll gain a 1-block boost in either case, clearing 3.5 blocks upward and 3 blocks horizontally. Of course, this changes depending on if the intended target platform is higher or lower--here, we're dealing with an even keel. Simon has no control over his jumps once they're executed, so you must commit to the action; if any enemy contact is made during this time, you'll be knocked back, potentially down into a pit.

There are two different types of terrain you'll travel across during your adventure: Regular walkways, which include rocky structures, bridges and, most of which, blocks (which we call "bricks" or "bricksets" while in the game); the other means for travel are the less-frequent moving platforms, those that move horizontally and vertically. To get onto a moving platform, you'll have to study its movement and jump at the right time to land safely. Once on a moving platform, you'll have to do the same calculation to jump to safety. Also, you'll have to take into account the movement required to jump from one vertically-moving platform to another; in most cases, you'll have to utilize upward momentum to make the distance. If you jump during the platforms' descent where a boost is necessary, you risk falling short of the target. This problem doesn't exist with horizontally-moving platforms.

These will be your basic movements as you traverse the many haunting scenes of this nonlinear, goal-oriented adventure. You begin with 3 lives in stock, but you can't add onto that. If you lose a life, though, there is no penalty in placement, as you restart right at or near the point where you die; the same holds true if you lose all of your lives and use one of your unlimited continues. However, you pay for using the continue by losing all of your collected hearts and current experience. There are no time limits placed on you to complete this game, so you may take however long you want. But the game has multiple endings that depend on how much time you take to complete it, so you may choose to hurry through it in that sense.

Other Characters

Day-Night System

Health Meters

Instead of a horozontal 16-bar meter, Simon now uses a vertical 12-bar meter. The damage you take for enemy contact is dependent on 2 things: (1) The power-level of enemy set you're facing, and (2) your current level. If you choose not to gain levels, the weakest enemies will cost you 1 bar, stronger will cost you 3, and the enemy sets near game's end can cost anywhere up to a devasating 8. For every level you gain, your defense increases by 33%. By the time you're on Level 2, most near-the-beginning enemies will only take away 1 bar of energy, while ones near the end may be able to deplete it by up to 3 bars. If you manage to make it to Level 3, you'll never lose anything more than 2 bars against non-boss enemies. Any levels after that are icing on the cake--you'll only take 1 bar worth of damage for anything less than Dracula.

In any event, you have the ability to increase your energy meter's length. If you're not happy about having only 12 bars of energy, you can increase it by 4s, and you do this by gaining 2 levels. Whereas reaching Level 1 will simply increase your strength, Level 2 will see your energy meter increase by 4 bars, with 4 more for Level 4, 4 more for Level 6, and so on. You may be limited in this regard, as any level past 3 is hard to come by. (For this explanation, and how exactly levels are gained, see the "RPG System" portion.)

RPG System

As mentioned: This game has an RPG system that's easy to take for granted because many will never see its effect on the gameplay. But it's true--the meter used to measure experience can be an important part of your quest if you want it to be. While no one will ever mistake a Castlevania game for an RPG, Simon's Quest borrows a modified version of the levels-by-experience system from classic role-playing games. In that regard, it's not as conventional a process as you may think.

First of all: Experience points are not gained by defeating the more and more powerful enemies that you'll find as you get deeper into the game; rather, you'll gain experience from the hearts that you collect by defeating those enemies, and each heart type equals the same amount regardless of the enemies' power. Those heart-type amounts are the following:

Small
Value
Half
Value
Big
Value
1 Point
3 Points
5 Points

Each point will be added onto your meter until you reach the amount needed to increase levels. When you reach 100 points, you'll be on "Level 1." The experience meter will then reset to 0, and the next level-quota will be set at 150. It'll increase by 50 points thereafter every time you reach another level, resetting itself to zero each time. Every time you gain a level, your whip power will increase slightly; it may not seem like much, but you'll notice that you can defeat the stronger lesser enemies more quickly than you could before after you've put on a couple of levels. More importantly: Your health meter will increase by 4 bars when you reach Level 2, and it'll increase by more every other level thereafter.

Unfortunately, it's not that easy. Once you gain a level by hanging around a certain area, the hearts that you collect from that enemy group will no longer be applicable. Basically, you're stuck on zero until you decide to start battling an enemy set that's more powerful. Even so, there are only about 5-6 different power-levels of enemies, so realistically, if you try hard enough, you may only be able to reach Level 6. This will be tough, though, since the difference in some enemy sets' power-level is negligible, and hearts from one set may not be applicable after you've toiled around near another. So most fervent but less informed gamers will probably settle around Level 2 or 3 before making it to Dracula.

Weapon Attributes

Enemy AI

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