Timespinner - SOTN Lite?

       I’ve just finished Timespinner - a metroidvania indie game that’s been out for a couple of years now. Much of the buzz around the game was how much it pays tribute to Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and having played this they certainly weren’t wrong.

      Call it ‘influenced by’, ‘pays homage to’ or whatever you want but it’s quite surprising how similar certain systems and mechanics in Timespinner are to that 1997 classic: from the menus, the way you equip items and gain ‘relic’ power-ups to access new areas, being able to equip two different weapons in each hand (in this game orbs), the map design and layout, how teleporters work, how there is a ‘fake’ ending and the way you need to acquire certain items to extend the game to fight the true end boss and see the true ending… the list goes on.

      Incidentally there are also nods to designs of other Castlevania games too and not just SOTN. For example the NPC quests, marking the map of its points of interest with feathers and the extra optional ‘enemy rush’ dungeon to get rare items - are all mainstays of the latter Nintendo DS Castlevania games.

      One thing that’s different for sure however is the difficulty. Not that the metroidvania Castlevania games are overly difficult or anything (you could always grind a bit to level up your character if you are having trouble on any particular area or boss), however Timespinner almost always felt way too easy, at least for my playthrough on Normal difficulty. I didn’t die a single time in my whole playthrough and every boss can be beaten on the first try even by muddling through provided you have a few healing items on hand. I never felt the need to grind or level up and only inadvertently did so whilst replaying the ‘enemy rush’ section at the end of the game in order to get all the last two familiars and exclusive gear. Unlike in Castlevania games, this section felt so easy to breeze through that I managed to repeatedly finish it in quick succession in order to get the random loot drops that I needed. In the end I was so over levelled that when I did get to the final two bosses of the game they were each killed in about three hits of a special attack each. Anti-climactic to say the least.

     There are some unique mechanics in the game such as the protagonist’s ability to freeze time momentarily and a few instances of time travel, however in my opinion these concepts were severely underutilized and as a result do not stand out much as unique selling point of this game. Much could have been done with the time traveling aspect however the only things that come to mind are light environmental puzzles (the burning of some branches in the past clears a path in the future) and obtaining items from the future to give to some NPCS in the past in order to fulfill some quest lines. It seems to be there to serve the overly comlex story rather than impacting much in regards to the avtual gameplay mechanics.

     A big part of the appeal of Castlevania for me is the gothic setting which features crumbling castles and many a mythical beats and supernatural entities. Timespinner is a more of a fantasy/sci-fi romp with the enemy design featuring a preponderance of birds for some reason? I dunno - the story and setting didn’t really grab me all that much to be honest.

      If you are hankering for another fix of metroidvania with great pixel art and music then I guess this one can be recommended for its polish, but the scale (the map size is also much smaller than any recent Castlevania game) and challenge is very limited compared to any of the games that it seeks to emulate. Whilst SOTN is very clearly an influence, Timespinner does not come close to its majesty. Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night – now that’s the true worthy successor, but we’ll save that story for another time…

27th May 2020