Category Archives: Kainetober

Hack Showcase: Castlemania (SNES)

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Hack Showcases and RPG Hack Showcases are a series where I show off various game and rpg hacks. I try to stick with hacks that improve gameplay or add quality of life features, completely or partially change the plot and characters, along with additional content, dialogue, graphical and sound improvements. Non-rpgs I try to give a full run to, or at least enough for a solid review. Rpgs I will stick with titles that have enough changes in the beginning to show off, and when I can, show parts later in the games where more differences appear. There may be spoilers in the reviews and videos. Some of these I may stream fully in the future or play on my own. Reviews are open to later revisions due to bug and content updates or me playing them and finding anything new I wish to bring up.

Created by LetsTalkGames, this hack combines gameplay and other elements of the Super Mario series with Castlevania into one fun package. 6 levels of platforming among Mario and Castlevania element await with enemies, tight jumps, bosses inspired by Mario and more. The hack has 2 versions: the main one and an “EASY VERSION”. The main version doesn’t save progress after levels until you finish it, the easy version does save after levels.

For the purpose of this review and streaming my first gameplay, I did do EASY Mode in case I ran into difficulty and save me from major setbacks or pc issues (all of which happened, lol).

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Hack Showcase: Castlevania Aria of Sorrow Persephone Hack (GBA)

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Hack Showcases and RPG Hack Showcases are a series where I show off various game and rpg hacks. I try to stick with hacks that improve gameplay or add quality of life features, completely or partially change the plot and characters, along with additional content, dialogue, graphical and sound improvements. Non-rpgs I try to give a full run to, or at least enough for a solid review. Rpgs I will stick with titles that have enough changes in the beginning to show off, and when I can, show parts later in the games where more differences appear. There may be spoilers in the reviews and videos. Some of these I may stream fully in the future or play on my own. Reviews are open to later revisions due to bug and content updates or me playing them and finding anything new I wish to bring up.

Created by Caminopreacher as a spoof hack of Aria of Sorrow, this hack presents Persephone (the ninja maids) as the playable hero, in a plot building off of the bad ending of Aria of Sorrow. She finds herself with her willpower along with familiar faces in Castlevania Olrox and Carmilla and others, and has to explore the castle to find answers. Plays just like Aria of Sorrow but with Persephone’s melee attacks (like Soma using Knuckles) you’ll be changing up how you play fast. Soul collecting is still a thing but all the Souls don’t correspond with the enemies you get them from normally! Souls needed to trigger the Good Ending have also been changed! Players will have a blast with this for a different story, some great laughs and gameplay experience.

Seeing how this was a longplay over multiple streams, there’s 2 gameplay videos for this, combined from their respective streams.

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Hack Showcase: Castlevania: Maria of Sorrow (GBA)

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Hack Showcases and RPG Hack Showcases are a series where I show off various game and rpg hacks. I try to stick with hacks that improve gameplay or add quality of life features, completely or partially change the plot and characters, along with additional content, dialogue, graphical and sound improvements. Non-rpgs I try to give a full run to, or at least enough for a solid review. Rpgs I will stick with titles that have enough changes in the beginning to show off, and when I can, show parts later in the games where more differences appear. There may be spoilers in the reviews and videos. Some of these I may stream fully in the future or play on my own. Reviews are open to later revisions due to bug and content updates or me playing them and finding anything new I wish to bring up.

Maria of Sorrow by Kyoski replaces Soma with maria from Rondo of Blood as the main character. The story has been changed so this hack acts as a story taking place between Rondo and SOTN where Maria ends up in 2035 in place of Soma! A lot of other changes were made including:

1.0 What’s been changed:

  • Playable Maria over Soma
  • Enemy/Boss HP x2
  • Enemy/Boss Atk x2
  • Enemy/Boss Def x2
  • New Custom Weapons
  • New Custom Armor
  • New Custom Accessories
  • Drop rates increased
  • Modified HUD/damage numbers
  • Modified pause screen/portraits
  • Modified all red soul limits
  • Some custom sprite edits to fit Maria in
  • Some weapon stats modified
  • Some armor stats modified
  • Some accessory stats modified
  • Some modified soul ability graphics (to suit Maria)
  • Some new item placements throughout the castle
  • Some enemy experience values increased
  • Minor text alterations (to suit Maria)

1.1 more update information in Read-me

  • New armor
  • New accessories
  • New weapons
  • Rebalanced equipment for normal.
  • More souls to fit Maria.
  • Hard mode – Calamity mode
  • Female voice added
  • Mariacula screen added
  • More story changes to suit Maria.
  • Small armor nerfs to Chaos/Julius

1.11 update, more info in read-me

  • “easy mode” patches
  • fixed some weapon stats/animations

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Hack Showcase: Ghostbusters Special Edition (Genesis)

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Hack Showcases and RPG Hack Showcases are a series where I show off various game and rpg hacks. I try to stick with hacks that improve gameplay or add quality of life features, completely or partially change the plot and characters, along with additional content, dialogue, graphical and sound improvements. Non-rpgs I try to give a full run to, or at least enough for a solid review. Rpgs I will stick with titles that have enough changes in the beginning to show off, and when I can, show parts later in the games where more differences appear. There may be spoilers in the reviews and videos. Some of these I may stream fully in the future or play on my own. Reviews are open to later revisions due to bug and content updates or me playing them and finding anything new I wish to bring up.

Ghostbusters: Special Edition from BillyTime! Games finally adds Winston to this Genesis game! You can also use Louis Tully also and both characters are added to the game’s cutscenes! Other changes include changing the uniform color for your Ghostbusters, a SRAM feature along with a new harder Nightmare! mode to make the game harder. Another change to Ghostbusters in an additional patch is Ectoplasm mode that allows you to use various cheat functions in-game, but disables the SRAM feature. The built-in cheats (which some were restored from the Japanese edition of this game) for Ectoplasm mode are in a readme file included with the patches. Other changes include:

  • New Playable Character:

Winston Zeddemore (To select, press Right on Egon.)

  • Stamina: Normal
  • Speed: Normal
  • Unique Attribute: Increased Jump Height
  • Uniform Color Select
  • Press A,B or C for new costumes.
  • Five brand new color choices for a total of six!
  • New Cheat codes and Unlockables (Ectoplasm Patch Only)
  • Listed in separate readme file
  • Nightmare Mode Difficulty

Hold B upon booting up the game to receive the challenge and how to enter.

  • Lives are reduced to one. *Extra lives can be earned in this mode*
  • Reduced health cap
  • No Continues
  • No Cheats allowed
  • Saves are disabled
  • Soft Reset function
  • Press A+B+C+Start will return you to the Sega logo at anytime.
  • Coffee mugs take less damage to destroy. (Ectoplasm Patch Only – v1.2)
  • SRAM Save Function
  • How It Works:

Loading: Select Load Game at the main menu, then select your character. after the initial cutscene all weapons, upgrades, Items and level progress will be retained.

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New Ghostbusters 2 (Famicom) Review

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New Ghostbusters 2 was released in Japan and Europe by Lal Laboratories. This game is much different and a lot better than the crappy ghostbusters games that came out in the US. It’s likely thought licensing issues is what stopped this hidden gem from a stateside release. You proceed through 5 levels based on the movie and trap ghosts which appear and fight some bosses in levels. You can pick from the 4 Ghostbusters: Egon, Ray, Peter and Winston (who is blue) and even Louis. Your partner is controlled by the ai and controls the ghost traps while the player traps ghosts with the proton packs. your player loses a life with one hit and there’s limited continues, so a lot of proceeding through the game is memorization of where ghosts appear, avoiding any attacks, and how they move. This game is really fun! I discovered this last year but couldn’t finish it, but recently did in 2021!

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Retrorevisited: Ghouls & Ghosts Series

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Retrorevisited is a stream series where I revisit a game or a game series I haven’t played in over 10 or 20+ years. I’ll go through to try see what I remember until a game over or I run out of continues. In some cases muscle memory may slowly return, in others probably not. This is a chance for me to revisit games of my youth that I still have or had at one point, playing them with and without nostalgia goggles, and do with mini-reviews of them too. If I decide to play any fully later and do a full review, parts of the mini-review would be incorporated into it. Depending on the playstyle or system, games reviewed will either be mini-reviews or one about all games in this session.

The Ghouls & Ghosts series by Capcom is known to strike fear in the hearts of gamers due to their high difficulty, cheap deaths, and having to complete the game twice for the ending. I’ll be covering the NES, Sega Master System, Genesis and SNES ports in this edition of Retrorevisited. Prior to this I had only played the arcade version, NES and the SNES games, and had forgotten the Genesis and SMS ports existed. Each port brings something new to the table, especially the SMS one with its rpg elements. The NES game being based on Ghosts & Goblins, the prequel title to the Ghouls & Ghosts series. The Genesis and SNES ports are close to the same as the arcade G&G, but with a key gameplay mechanic difference: the Genesis one lets you shot up while the SNES port has the double jump and you cannot shoot up. I’ve never really been that good at any of these, especially the NES one, but willing to give these a try again. After doing this edition of Retrorevisited I still enjoy the SMS port and plan to finish both loops on stream sometime, and I really enjoyed the Genesis port too! I did enjoy the SNES game to a point when it was released in my teenage years and I was surprised with how well done and how much I enjoyed the SMS and Genesis ports too! least they all have unlimited continues!

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Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (PSX) Review

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Released in 1997, SOTN is a direct sequel to Castlevania Rondo of Blood, which at the time hadn’t gotten a proper US release. In this one, Richter Belmont has disappeared and Castlevania itself reappeared 4 years after the events of Rondo of Blood. Alucard, Dracula’s son last seen in Castlevania 3, awakens to discover what has happened with the help of an older maria from the previous game. This is the first of the Metroidvania style games, where the player explores an entire castle, gains new abilities, and fights bosses to uncover the plot. A second mode letting you play as Richter in a traditional Castlevania is opened up upon finishing the game. The game sports an amazing soundtrack and a number of dialogue scenes with voice acting (even if it is cheesy). SOTN wasn’t a big hit at first, until critic scores and word of mouth raised its status among gamers, prompting a number of re-releases.

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Castlevania – Aria of Sorrow (GBA) Review

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Aria of Sorrow is the 3rd Castlevania game released for the GBA. Another Metroidvania style game, this one takes place in the future 2035, where Dracula and Castlevania were trapped forever in a solar eclipse in the aftermath of the Demon War of 1999 where the current Belmont, Julius, as a hero of. Soma Cruz finds himself trapped in Castlevania with his childhood friend and discovers he can absorb the souls and abilities of enemies in the castle. Aided by Genya Arikado, Soma discovers the truth behind his abilities and meets others trapped in the castle and one trying to revive Dracula himself. Aria has an amazing soundtrack and graphics and plays like the previous titles, and has a Pokemon aspect to it with collecting souls to gain different defensive and offensive abilities. Finishing the game unlocks Julius mode (who is a total badass!!), a boss rush, and a hard mode.

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Castlevania – Harmony of Dissonance (GBA) Review

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Release in 2002, this is the second of the GBA Castlevania trilogy and another metroidvania style game. Telling the story of Juste Belmont (next Belmont after Simon) who with his friend Maxim, infiltrate Castlevania to save their kidnapped friend Lydie. As the plot moves on, you discover there are 2 castles, one harder than the other that you can switch to via warp rooms. Sporting a great soundtrack and a different style of graphics than the previous game. Juste has access to use all the normal sub-weapons, gaining levels and new abilities, and using magic books based on the elements to augment the power of the sub-weapons. A 2nd mode letting you use Maxim and a boss rush opens up when you finish the game with one of its 3 endings.

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Monster Party (NES) Review

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Monster Party came out in North America in 1989. An obscure platformer game with a cult following, this game tells the heartwarming story of a winged monster named Bert enlisting a young boy named mark to help rid his world of evil monsters with just his baseball bat. This game parodies horror movies with the look of enemies and various bosses. This game can be downright weird at times. A canceled prototype of this game was discovered in 2011, and a dump of the unreleased Japanese Famicom edition was released in 2014. A hack made converting the NES edition to the unreleased prototype can be found here.

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