On its surface, the genre of the Metroidvania seems obvious. It’s a combination of the Metroid series, and the Castlevania series. Specifically, Super Metroid and Symphony of the night. Take the map based exploration of Super Metroid, with its hidden secrets, ability upgrades, and backtracking, and combine it with an RPG system. The character levels up, and has a huge array of weapons, equipment, and spells to choose from. This allows the player to express themselves in how they wish to tackle the many enemies and bosses as they explore the Metroid space. The genre has gained a resurgence in popularity over the last decade, especially in the indie scene, but as the more astute of you may have noticed while thinking about the two games that inspired the naming of this genre, and thinking about the titles that have gained popularity in the genre (Hollow Knight, Axiom Verge, and Guacamelee for instance), that most of the genre doesn’t actually qualify as a Metroidvania. They’re just Metroid-likes, specifically Super Metroid-likes. Without the RPG mechanics, without the levelling up and the choice in weapons, equipment, and spell usage, these games are building their identity on the foundation of Super Metroid, just like Symphony of the Night did back in 1997.
Which brings us to 2019, and Bloodstained: Ritual of the night. A spiritual successor to not only Symphony of the Night, but the games developer Koji Igarashi made afterwards (as these titles took Symphony of the night as a foundation rather than Super Metroid). Bloodstained is a Kickstarter success story, crowdfunding over 5 million dollars from players who wanted Igarashi to make the type of game he hadn’t been able to make for years. A Symphony of the Night-like in everything but name. Yes, a Metroidvania. The term applies. Let’s talk about it.
The player controls Miriam, a shardbinder, one who is able to absorb the powers of demons. Her good friend Gebel, the only other Shardbinder left in the world has gone rogue. He has summoned a castle full of demons with the goal of destroying the world as revenge for the horrors inflicted upon him by the guild of alchemists. In the town outside the castle, and within its walls, Miriam meets other characters that help and hinder her in her quest to stop Gebel. The player spends their time charting the castle as they explore its halls, collecting shards from defeated demons, and acquiring and crafting all manner of weapons, armour, and accessories. Certain sections of the castle are blocked off until the player finds a specific shard to progress, and like Symphony of the Night, fighting the person you came into the castle for can be the end of the game, but if you have a specific item equipped, you can open up more of the castle and reach the true ending.
Symphony of the Night isn’t the only game Igarashi has taken inspiration from however. Well, calling it inspiration is a bit tongue-in-cheek as Igarashi was producer on most of the side-scrolling Castlevania games after Symphony. Aria of Sorrow has the Tactical Soul system where enemies have a chance to drop their souls when defeated, allowing the player to use their special powers. Hello shardbinder. Order of Ecclesia meanwhile displays glyphs on the main character’s arms and back like tattoos. Both ideas inform the lore of Bloodstained, what Miriam is, and she how interacts with the game. I should also mention that each weapon type in Bloodstained has special techniques that be can accessed through fighting game inputs. These reminded me of the spells Alucard was able to use in Symphony. I remember them being a great help in that game, but rarely used any of them in Bloodstained.
And all this influence ends up leaving Bloodstained with little of its own identity. It’s odd to say that as it has nothing to do with Dracula, Belmonts, or that long-standing world of gothic horror, but even though the lore has been changed, any player who’s played any of the Metroidvania titles in the Castlevania series will feel right at home. This is by design too. Igarashi has said, quote: “I was figuring out how to approach a game for fans who wanted to play another exploration-based action game. This is also the first game I would be making after becoming independent, so I made it my motif to create a traditional game that would meet their expectations”. Endquote. It sounds like Bloodstained was made to directly appeal to the fans of his previous Castlevania titles, and to ensure that such fans got what they wanted, Igarashi didn’t want to reinvent the wheel. That’s why Bloodstained borrows heavily from those other games, and why it felt to me like it lacked its own identity.
But what of the future? Seeing how Bloodstained feels like a “greatest hits” from the Castlevania days, I initially thought that Bloodstained might be Igarashi’s swan song, one last Metroidvania for the fans before riding off into the sunset wearing his cowboy hat. From the interview quoted, it sounds more like Igarashi wanted to make what he was sure would be a success based on past successes before venturing off in a new direction. Does this mean there will be another Bloodstained? If so, will Igarashi move in that new direction? How will the fans react? Igarashi’s feelings were correct because I think the success of the initial Kickstarter was the fans wanting a game like the ones they remembered loving from the past. Reactions to Bloodstained are mostly positive (excluding the Nintendo Switch version), with criticism either being levelled at bugs and performance instability, or that it adheres too much to the design of the past and doesn’t do anything new.
I echo that sentiment. Bloodstained felt like I was playing a spiritual sequel to Symphony of the Night. I loved the variety in shard and weapon choice, and how tense the game became when I was low on health in a new area desparetly searching for a save room. Sadly the story and characters made little impact, and I had to google the way forward on more than one occasion. It sounds like fans got exactly what they wanted, an old school Castlevania game on modern systems. It was fun to play. Good, not great. What I’m interested in now is what’s next. What can Igarashi do when he’s no longer looking at past successes. I’m looking forward to finding out. Thanks for watching.
But what are your thoughts? Was Bloodstained what you were hoping it would be? How do you feel it holds up next to other Castlevania games? What are your favourite Metroidvanias? I’d love to hear all about it down in the comments. I would like to take the time to thank the sources that helped inform this video. There are two. Kris Graft’s interview with Igarashi over at Gamastura, and the video ‘How Bloodstained kept its promise’ by The Sphere Hunter. Links for both are in the description. So what’s next? Well we’re continuing to focus on exploration, but with the next game it’s more about uncovering an understanding of the game world than filling in a map. I’m going to be playing Outer Wilds (not The Outer Worlds). I hope you join me for that one. If you’ve made it this far, thank you for your time and interest. If you enjoyed the video, I’d appreciate a like, a comment, or sharing it with your friends, and as always, I hope you’re all having a wonderful day.
The Witcher 3 is the best open world game I’ve ever played. What’s funny is the reasons that make it great have almost nothing to do with the open world itself, but rather how the strongest parts of the game clash with the scale of the open world. This tension is everywhere. Geralt himself is a great example of it. A witcher travels from town to town, looking at notice boards to find work slaying monsters. Often the rewards for such a dangerous task are meagre, and the townsfolk treat Witchers with suspicion or outright malice. These contracts, treasure hunts and all manner of sidequests are in opposition to the larger conflict of Geralt searching for his adoptive daughter Ciri. Even that small scale of a man searching for his daughter is juxtaposed against the threat the Wild Hunt pose to the world itself. They wish to use Ciri’s power for an invasion, and as if they weren’t a large enough threat on their own, the cataclysmic event known as The White Frost is the reason they had to flee their own world, and are causing havoc in the first place. Despite an attempt to stay small, and enjoy his life in relative peace, Geralt finds himself getting dragged into conflicts much larger than himself, and due to the open world nature of The Witcher 3, the player finds themselves in this same situation.
This is why I’ve read about so many people leaving The Witcher 3 in the middle of a playthrough. It becomes too overwhelming. Yes the writing is strong, the characters are fun, and the world looks beautiful as the player rides through it on Roach, but choice paralysis sets in. Which sidequest do I attempt next? What about the notice board in that town over there? Do I want to complete the armour set I’m working on? Do I want to uncover the question marks on the map near my location, or do I want to put blinders on and just plough through the main story? You’re kidding right? In the end it may be easier to just find some other way to spend one’s time. I admit if I wasn’t playing this for a video, it might have been like many other large RPGs I’ve played in the past. For whatever reason I stop playing it, I leave for a week or two, I come back to it one day, I forget how it controls and what was happening in the story, and then it feels like I need to start over or move onto another game... so I move onto another game.
So the question is, besides playing through Witcher 3 for a video, what kept me going? Simply put, Geralt. This is a game where the player character is the foundation. The core of the game, and the glue that holds it together. In the tutorial at Kaer Morhen, we see Geralt act as lover to Yennifer, son to Vezemir, and Father to Ciri. These familial connections humanise him. The core conflict of the game (Geralt searching for his daughter) is easily understood motivation. Despite the complications of the plot and how big the stakes end up becoming (the literal end of the world), Geralt is just trying to help those he cares for. And they say a Witcher’s mutagens strip away their emotion. Similarly on this small scale, each quest in the game is Witcher 3 in microcosm, often utilising dialogue, witcher senses, some preparation if the player desires it, combat, and often things not being as simple as they seemed when the quest began.
The routine of the gameplay loop
Starting off, the overwhelming nature of the open world is tapered. White Orchard is a smaller area where completing every sidequest and uncovering each question mark seems manageable alongside the main conflict of hunting down and slaying a Griffin (which is a rather modest quest in and of itself). This is why I enjoyed the final piece of DLC, Blood & Wine so much. It was much larger than White Orchard, but it too seemed self contained and manageable compared to the vast landscapes of the main game. I didn’t start reading the notice boards until about halfway through my playthrough, and the amount of question marks that littered the landscape was dizzying. I’m not a completionist by nature, but even I felt the urge to clear out as many as I could, especially on the way to other quests (or when I needed cash, since no matter what happened in the game, I always felt short on money, which helped reinforce the fantasy of playing as a Witcher).
And that’s why each quest feels generally the same. Being a Witcher is a trade. Geralt is a professional monster slayer. Some monsters we come across are rare, or in the investigation phase of each quest, it could be any number of creatures responsible, but by and large, each day is just like the last. Even the most dangerous work can become routine, but routine can be calming, and it’s the ‘quest to quest’, ‘question mark to question mark’, or ‘contract to contract’ nature of The Witcher 3 that helps stave off the anxiety about the sheer vastness of the open world on offer. The small and familiar helps ground us in the face of the large and unknown. Once the player leaves White Orchard, they’re familiar with pretty much everything the game has to throw at them. All that remains are the twists and turns of all the narratives. The short one-offs, the multi-stage sidequests, and the main story. All are given a similar level of care, and influence each other, so it ends up being the writing itself that is the guiding force for the player during their time in this world. At least it was for me.
The Witcher 3 as an RPG
I want to take some time here to talk about The Witcher 3 as a roleplaying game. Genre definitions are a contentious topic, especially when it comes to what constitutes or does not constitute an RPG. It’s been argued that The Witcher 3 is more of a third person action game than an RPG, and the open world design of it does lean more towards an Assassin’s Creed than a Baldur’s Gate, but at least according to how I define an RPG, the Witcher 3 definitely qualifies. My definition is simple. Does the character gain experience as they play which results in levelling up? Then it’s an RPG, but over the last decade, even my definition has been put through the wringer as more games add level up progression systems to keep players engaged. Witcher 3’s level up and progression systems are cumbersome to me because Geralt only has enough room to equip 12 enhancements with mutagen modifiers in the base game, so no matter how many different skills the player puts points into, they have to pick and choose their build. I much prefer a linear sort of levelling, where the overall power of the character strengthens as the game goes on (or the choices when levelling create a cumulative effect). This is somewhat handled by the Diablo 3-esque gear system, where the player is constantly equipping new swords and armour with stat increases (and augmented with runes), but I imagine most players didn’t pay this system too much attention, instead just choosing to upgrade one of the Witcher armour sets at the appropriate levels.
But that term roleplaying, that’s one of the reasons why genre definitions for RPGs in particular are messy. In most games, the player is playing a role, whether that be an omniscient overseer or the character they’re controlling. The characters can be a blank slate, or already well defined, and that’s the case here with Geralt. One reason the writing is so strong, is that Geralt and all his friends and colleagues are well defined, and well written. This seems to fly in the face of the fact that players are presented with narrative choices to allow them agency, but we can’t make Geralt go against his own nature. What we can do is choose the shade or flavour of Geralt we want to play. This means no matter how benevolent or selfish the player wants to be, the choices are only going to reflect that so far. This adds to the believability of Geralt as a character, and the fantasy of playing a Witcher. Keeping the player grounded in a character that isn’t the most important person in the world helps sell this Witcher fantasy, and the scope of the open world reinforces it. The open world itself is also a fantasy because roaming the landscape in the service of completing the checklist of question marks is the least interesting aspect of the game.
What matters most
Before writing this video I went back and watched the videos I made on The Witcher and The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings (you should check them out too). I wanted to see if what I loved about those games was in any way similar to what I love about The Witcher 3, and if the open world helps or hinders what that is. It may sound cliche, but the most important aspects of those games to me were the narrative choices, and the choices that really mattered to me are those that felt the most meaningful to Geralt. Out of all the political intrigue of the first game, the most meaningful choice is whether to send Alvin to Triss or Shani. In The Witcher 2, (well it’s funny because that video was all about choices, I had no idea what else to write about), the most important choice from that game was with Letho at the end. In both games, it wasn’t the political factions and the fate of the world that mattered, but Geralt’s relationships with those around him.
The Witcher 3 is very much the same. Even with the Wild Hunt and the White Frost, what matters the most to Geralt is Ciri. I think this is exemplified by mentioning that one of the quests with the greatest impact to the world (assassinating Mad King Radovid) is a sidequest that can be ignored. The heaviest emotional moments are when Geralt first finds Ciri, the aftermath of the battle of Kaer Morhen, and the ending of the game when I wasn’t sure what happened to Ciri after she went to stop the White Frost. Even in Blood & Wine, I cared more about Geralt’s friendship to Regis then I did about Detlaff or Anna Henrietta, and the best part of Hearts of Stone is the Wedding, when Olgeird’s brother Vlodimir possesses Geralt for the evening, and you get to see how he interacts with Shani and the rest of the wedding guests.
The ending of Witcher 3 is influenced by what kind of a father figure Geralt is to Ciri, but the triggers themselves seem inconsequential while playing through the game. The greatest example of this is in Blood & Wine. When rescuing Syanna from her fairy tale prison, you can purchase Syanna’s childhood ribbon off a little girl. I thought it was a nice gesture for a character who had a rough upbringing that led to some terrible choices. Little did I know that the ribbon would save her life and lead to the death of Detlaff (who I wanted to save as well). Once again the small cascades into the big, and the most important decisions are all related to how Geralt relates to those around him. The roleplaying on offer is whether the player is resentful for how Geralt is treated with suspicion, whether they decide to just perform their duty as a Witcher and ignore everything else, or whether they treat those around them with kindness and empathy.
Why the open world is important
So it’s not to say that the open world doesn’t matter, but there’s a push and pull between small and large at play in The Witcher 3, a balancing act so deft that it works. It’s the moment to moment that’s the most important. Travelling along the roads at sunrise with Roach, taking up a new contract in a small town. Helping the people who need it, and the satisfaction of a job well done alongside their gratitude. Having a goal in mind, and helping those closest to Geralt, but always the larger world, and its larger implications looming in the distance. The player cannot help but be aware of them, and then be dragged into their vortex. It’s very similar to how a lot of self-help literature advises that the true source of peace and contentment is the ability to live in the present moment, but the difficulty of this “simple advice” is that we can’t help seeing not only the bigger picture of everything terrible going on in the world, but the suffering that could be in our own future every step along the way. It can be overwhelming and debilitate our ability to take action or interface with the world at large, and that’s definitely what’s happened to some with The Witcher 3.
The scope of the open world can be too much. It can be difficult to just focus on the current quest when you are aware of 20 other quests that need completing, let alone all the question marks on the map, and all the unexplored towns (their yellow notice boards mocking you everytime you open up the map screen). I want to say that if you can just focus on Geralt and the immediate goal in front of you at any given time, you’ll get into a rhythm of enjoying the moment while systematically making your way through the open world, but if it was that easy to be in the moment, I wouldn’t be making this comparison. To take it further, we never know what tiny interaction is going to cascade through the world and have the potential to reshape the planet. We could be the butterfly flapping its wings that causes the hurricane on the other side of the globe at any moment and we would never know it. Geralt at least has the knowledge that he’s dealing with dangerous people and forces, and he has the skills to help him survive anything that gets thrown his way, but he still has no idea how his choices are going to play out. The best he can do is the best we can do. Prepare for the worst, hope for the best, and to be there for those we care about. Being able to control someone with that knowledge and power as they make their way through an overwhelming and dangerous world may be able to give us some perspective in our own lives. It at least shows that if we just focus on what’s in front of us and make choices to the best of our ability, we can make it through, and hopefully do some good along the way. The Witcher 3’s success is due to its small scale of Geralt, his job as a Witcher, and those he forges relationships with, but without the juxtaposition of the large open world and its seismic events our own relationship with the game would not be as strong. Thanks for watching.
Questions, thank yous, and what’s next
But what are your thoughts? Did you find the open world of The Witcher 3 a positive or a negative? How did your choices shape who Geralt is? What are your thoughts about The Witcher 3 as a roleplaying game? I’d love to hear all about it down in the comments. As usual, many of the ideas that led to this video were from the writing of others. Critical Distance helped with their Witcher 3 compilation. It, and all the pieces of writing and video that shaped what this ended up becoming are linked in the description. So, what’s next? Well we’re staying in the RPG genre, kind of (hey, there’s levelling up so it counts). I’m going to be playing the closest thing we’ll probably get to a new Castlevania game, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night. I hope you join me for that one. Thank you for your time and interest. If you enjoyed this video, I’d appreciate a like, a comment, or sharing it with your friends, and as always, I hope you’re all having a wonderful day.
