SNES · Classic Vidya Review
Demon's Crest
Completed 6 Oct 2023
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Ending Screen
- Has for sure earned its’ status as “hidden gem.” I have tried (though never finished) Gargoyle’s Quest (GB) and Gargoyle’s Quest II (NES) and this is the best one of the bunch.
- Collecting the power ups, exploring the world, slowly getting further and further into each level, is very rewarding. It’s a little bit of a Metroidvania except for the fact that Demon’s Crest has an overworld.
- Kinda short, but this is way more than compensated by the difficulty curve. 90% of the game is easy-medium challenge, and the last 2 bosses (Phalanx and the secret final boss) are brutally hard.
- Getting to the real final boss is sort of a pain because you’re required to collect every Life increase (i.e. max out your health), and the final Life increase is hidden behind a mini game that is EXTREMELY annoying. In general, I played this game for maybe 1-2 hours /night for a few days. There was one day when I did nothing other than work on that mini game.
- The music is shockingly good, and perfect for comfy late nights here in October. It always puts you in the mood of the level; I wish there was a lot more music in the game.
- Level design is good, monster/boss design is GREAT, though I did notice a lot of slowdown when there are tons of sprites on the screen.
- If you play this game, do not bother with any potions other than Ginseng, and do not bother with any spells at all. Every spell which seems like it might not be worthless, has a bug which makes it not work.
- The password system is a little annoying, since restoring from password does NOT save any of your gold (it does save the rest of your items) but I guess this is offset by a pretty generous Continue system (you can restart from not just the level you’re in, but the section of the level where you died)