Bloodstained Ritual of the Night just added two new game modes for free, but theres something you need to know.

shortylickens

No Lifer
Jul 15, 2003
82,854
17,365
136
First off, people around the internet keep calling it DLC but on Steam its not DLC, its a patch, so you dont have to click or unclick anything in the DLC tab of the game properties.

2nd: in order to access the new content you need to load up an old save near the end of the final boss of the game and beat it again. NOT the fake boss in the middle of the game, the true final boss.
If for some reason you lost or deleted your old saves then you have to play the entire friggen game all over again to go and beat that final boss.

3rd: If you wanna play as the new character you merely need to select New Game and select him as an option during character creation. He looks cool and he's got some special moves, but near as I can tell the gameplay is basically the same. You can use him on a New Game + as well as normal, hard, and nightmare difficulty.

4th: If you wanna access Random mode you have to go the the Extras tab and select that then select Randomizer. Then you make a brand new character with the random options. You may not use Randomizer on old saves.

5th: IF you use Randomizer theres some things you gotta know.
- Story elements all seem to be disabled, and theres a speed run timer in the lower left corner you can never disable. it doesnt affect you, but may be annoying if you dont wanna see it.
- Theres a wooden wall (bulkhead) early on that you need to pass thru. If you selected random shard drops from enemies you probably wont get the fire cannon shard you would normally need to bust down that wall. That doesnt matter, because the devs were smart enough to account for that and now its already open when you run into it. HOWEVER, later on in the same ship theres another optional wood bulkhead to break down and you can't do it without that fire cannon shard. You'll have to hope you get it later in the game and then come back to it. I suspect other essential areas are handled similarly.
-Random enemy item and shard drops are not completely random. Once its established an enemy gives you a particular item and shard, that enemy will ALWAYS give you those items and shards. Also item and shard drop rates are now 100 percent, so no farming for crap. However what they get assigned to drop is truly random and its possible to get some wild stuff from those first area enemies. I actually got a really great sword from those stupid bird things on the ship.
- Random drops from chests are truly random. So you may get a REALLY good weapon early in the game, or may run around without finding any weapons for an extremely long time. You may also get junk like low grade bullets without finding a gun for some time. You may also get gold, which is nice but not useful in that first section of the game when you can't spend it.
-The above combination of factors means you may be in deep trouble on that first boss who has a crapload of health in Normal mode. You may have to restart or grind for levels.

I did not try the Random crafting or store locations or warp zones, because that seemed kinda silly to me.
 

KentState

Diamond Member
Oct 19, 2001
8,397
393
126
Luckily the game is pretty quick to play through so if you did lose the final save, it would take little time to get back there.

I agree, it's a patch. The developers already decided to move on and not do the DLC.
 

zinfamous

No Lifer
Jul 12, 2006
110,588
29,213
146
I had a game near the final area (nightmare Newgame+ playthrough) when this dropped. I read those issues when it released, went through and finished that game...still no playable character. Annoying, but whatever. It's not supposed to be that way so I assume they will patch it and I will probably play through again at that time. As it is, I just played through it a lot so I'm good.

The game is very good, but I don't know why people call it "the proper sequel" to SOTN. It IS SOTN. It's the same damn map, reskinned to look fancy, pretty much all of the same weapons, with some crafting and fetch questing thrown on top. ...not that I'm complaining. It's very good. But it's weird how the entire castle is just a reskin. It's like trying to claim that Saint's Row 4 is an actual stand alone game instead of an elaborate DLC package for Saint's Row 3.
 

Stg-Flame

Diamond Member
Mar 10, 2007
3,511
477
126
Randomizers have been huge in the retro console gaming community for the last few years. Castlevania SoTN, Zelda ALTTP, and Super Metroid are by far my favorite randomizers to play. I've played Bloodstained randomizer mode on my PS4 copy and there are times (especially with the crafting and shard options) when you feel like the game is soft-locked but it's likely that you're just missing a room or haven't farmed an enemy long enough. I personally hate the randomized shard and crafting options, but the rest reminds me of a simpler SoTN randomizer with flashier graphics.
 

Stg-Flame

Diamond Member
Mar 10, 2007
3,511
477
126
I haven't looked into this in a long time since people were complaining about not getting Zangetsu as a playable character. It might be time to jump back into this to see what all has changed.
 

zinfamous

No Lifer
Jul 12, 2006
110,588
29,213
146
^ I'm also curious, because I wasn't able to get the Zangetsu thing to work on my saved game(s). Also, now you can play that umbrella chick that bathes in blood, so that might be neat?

It's a fun game, well worth it if you love the castlevania stuff, and especially SoTN--the map is literally a clone of that game. ...I mean. It is that game. The only thing you don't get is the upside down castle--which is replaced by a decent-sized extra zone in like, some other dimension, if you manage to unlock the "real ending" by "not killing the fake end boss" ---so exactly how SoTN played out. It's a beautiful thing, really.
 

Stg-Flame

Diamond Member
Mar 10, 2007
3,511
477
126
The only thing you don't get is the upside down castle
According to Koji on Kickstarter, the upside down castle was only partially finished for the release and would be filled in as DLCs/updates were released alongside Zangetsu, new modes, etc. Technically, it was just a combination of Super Mario 3 World 4 (giant world) with a very small portion of the upside down castle available. I primarily played it on PS4, but there were a lot of people saying that console players were getting screwed and wouldn't receive the same updates as the PC version by 2020, but it's been a while since I played it last.