I mentioned it in another topic that I recently finished Order Of Ecclesia.
As the seventh "Castleroid" game (sixth on a handheld, third on a DS), yes, quite a bit of it is familiar. The Glyphs are neat but aren't really all that different from cards or souls from past games.
I wish there were more Glyphs, rarer Glyphs, like the stringfish soul from Harmony Of Dissonance (I think it was that game, you know, the stringfish is the one where you have to stop time when you see the flashy thing zip by) or that weird fat green worm in another game (Tsuchinko or something?) that allowed you discounts in shops but disappeared quickly if you didn't get to it right away. Stuff like that. Okay, I guess there was the Yeti in this game...forgot about him...but he wasn't quite as interesting. I don't know if I was lucky or what but it didn't take too long to get all of the enemies' drops. Not that fighting the same enemy over and over 'til it's tedious makes a game better, quite the opposite, but at times it felt like there was too little challenge.
It's not a bad game by far, though it seemed a little short (I finished it in under twenty hours), and when you get to Dracula's Castle it didn't seem that epic as it seemed really redundant (repeating the same style of room or repeating the rooms outright within each area). While Dawn Of Sorrow had those two guys who wanted Dracula's power and Portrait Of Ruin had the painter and his two daughters, the only other major non-Dracula bad guy here is killed off just shortly after you find out he's a bad guy so the story falls flat when all you're doing is busting into Dracula's home just to kill him. They make it a bit too obvious exactly when to use what combination of Glyphs to defeat Dracula, as well. Death has no personality in this game, unlike in some others where he at least says something.
Good points? Well, as is usual for Castlevania games, the production values are top-notch (even if they did recycle several sprites of enemies). Most of the bosses are all-new (including a memorable giant enemy crab fight), but I would've liked it if they brought back a least a couple old favorites (I'm a fan of Legion for some reason, but it/they doesn't/don't show up here). The music as always is good, and if you don't like it, you can find/buy some records that when you use them, play classic Castlevania tunes instead (you can even play them during boss fights). There are certainly worse ways to spend your time on the DS.
Castlevania games on the GBA/DS are way better than most other GBA/DS games, but Order Of Eccelsia isn't the best of the bunch, if only because past Castlevania games have raised the stakes, if you don't mind the pun.
