Castlevania: The Adventure

The player controls Christopher Belmont, the ancestor of Simon Belmont, who goes on a quest to defeat Dracula. The game consists of four stages, and unlike other Castlevania games, there are no sub-weapons, but hearts are used to restore health. There is a point counter, and at 10,000 points, a player receives an extra life, and receives one for every 20,000 points after that. Each stage has a time limit in which to complete the level. ==Development==

Programmer Masato Maegawa joined Konami after graduating university and worked on Castlevania: The Adventure. He later left Konami, stating that at Konami you had to make sequels to big titles like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or Castlevania games. Without the freedom to develop games like Gunstar Heroes, Maegawa left Konami to form Treasure. In a 1997 interview, Maegawa said that Castlevania: The Adventure was not good. ==Release and reception==

Castlevania: The Adventure was released in Japan on October 27, 1989, for the Game Boy. Contemporary reception On the games initial release reviews in Electronic Gaming Monthly (EGM), Aktueller Software Markt and the Pennywhistle Press praised the graphics noting crisp details, fine graphics, and that they were surprisingly well done for the small Game Boy screen respectively. An EGM said it was one of the few Game Boy titles they had reviewed that had overcome the Game Boy's lack of color. Power Play said it was the best of the Castlevania games while the Aktueller Software Markt reviewer said it was not as strong as the NES titles. GamePro said that along with ''Castlevania II: Belmont's Revenge (1991), they were both "excellent additions to the Castlevania'' series." The game was re-released for the Nintendo 3DS Virtual Console on October 25, 2012. In retrospective reviews of the series, Damien McFerran of Retro Gamer dismissed the game saying it was basic in its graphics and had slow and plodding gameplay. In the American magazine Play, it was called "notably slower" and lacking sub-weapons. Mark Bozon of IGN stated that it lacked "true inspiration" and was "pretty basic in its overall game design." Game Informer Tim Turi felt that it was held back by its technical limitations but praised its sound quality. Time Extension placed The Adventure second last on its list of ranked Castlevania games. It was described that "The gameplay is sluggish, the level design uninspired and the controls painful. Only a decent soundtrack saves this one from the scrapheap." Re-reviewing the game for the 3DS virtual console, Retro Gamer said the games biggest sticking points were poor visuals, stiff controls and "some frustratingly precise jumps later on". They concluded that the slow pace, lack of sub-weapons and question hit detection only added to the disappointment. McFerran complimented the games score while concluding it was "one of the better-looking Game Boy launch titles, but that's not saying much." ==In other media==

A series of comic books were released in 2005 by IDW Publishing called Castlevania: The Belmont Legacy, which are based on the game. ==Notes==