Super Zangyura

Genre: Platformer

Players: 1

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Review:

Super Zangyura is a Platformer released on PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch in 2022, technically a remaster of a Japanese-language game released on PC in 2004. Thematically, Super Zangyura is a riff on the Castlevania franchise that mirrors many of the aesthetic elements of those classic Action-Platformers, replacing the vampire hunter hero with a girl in a maid outfit, apparently named “Rachel” in the original release, but simply referred to here as “The Maid”.

In terms of the overall presentation, Super Zangyura looks and sounds pretty good, with some nice-looking anime-style characters and colorful backgrounds with some good animation, backed by a Castlevania-esque soundtrack that’s not memorable, but definitely fits the game. The one element of this presentation that I would point to as an exception is the fact that The Maid is constantly talking (in Japanese), which can get a bit grating.

While this game’s presentation is clearly meant to mirror early pre-Metroidvania games in the Castlevania series, the gameplay itself is a good deal different. Players will be working their way through somewhat small levels that are almost designed like an obstacle course at times, with their pathway frequently blocked by a series of locked doors. Players need to find the keys that are stashed throughout the level to continue, sometimes requiring a bit of backtracking.

The level design here is one of the game’s more frustrating elements. Super Zangyura’s levels are designed in a way that at times borders on a “troll game”. Instant-kill booby traps are frequent, and from the start players only have three lives before they have to retry an entire level. At times, playing this game can almost feel like a Puzzle-Platformer while you try to figure out where a key could be, or how to get to it without dying to an instant-kill trap.

However, even putting aside the frustration of these booby traps, this game still has issues with its level design. Everything feels claustrophobic and filled with little frustrations, and the core Platforming isn’t especially good, either. The actual action feels just a tad sluggish, making everything feel ever so slightly “off”.

Despite all this, the game does have a few bright spots too. When you’re booted out of a level after dying too much, you can use gold earned within the level to upgrade your character, buying more lives, a longer health bar, or a more powerful attack. You can even opt to buy keys if you just can’t figure out where one is hidden. It’s a bit disappointing that this would even be necessary, but I suppose it’s better that this was included than if it wasn’t.

The other element that I need to point to is that while this game’s enemies are generally more annoying than challenging, the boss battles at the end of each level are really quite excellent, inventive, and often silly. The first level boss, for example, is one of those water fountain peeing cherub statues who attacks you with a fire hose-size stream you need to either attack or avoid outright while trying to work your way over to the statue to get in a few hits. The bosses tend to be a tad on the easy side, and many can be defeated by simply tanking hits wily you wail on them, taking them down in a battle of attrition. However, that doesn’t stop them from being fun.

All things considered, I feel like Super Zangyura probably would have been a truly great game if it stuck to its Castlevania parody a bit more closely. The presentation and boss design here are excellent, and it’s a shame that the level design had to be so terrible in contrast to that. As a result, I can’t easily recommend this game to Castlevania fans, and in general I expect most players will probably find this game more frustrating than fun.

tl;dr – Super Zangyura is a Platformer that’s clearly designed to parody the classic Castlevania games. Some elements of the game work very well – namely, the presentation and the boss design. Unfortunately, the level design here is awful, full of tedious backtracking and troll game-style traps. The end result is a game that’s frustrating about as often as it is fun.

Grade: C

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