The early success of Castlevania meant that sequels would appear on a regular basis, and due to the dominance of Nintendo hardware in the 8-bit era, most of these games would be developed for the Big N. In 1989 Nintendo supplemented its wildly successful NES console with their first portable system, the GameBoy. After releasing Simon's Quest on the NES, Konami sought to bring their burgeoning monster-slaying game to Nintendo's newly-released handheld console, and the result was the Castlevania Adventure. This four-stage action game attempted to recreate the thrills of its console cousins and heralded the beginning of the saga's marriage to the handheld format. This marriage got off to a decidedly rocky start however, due to poor play mechanics and uninspired stage design that greatly disappointed Castlevania fans.

Castlevania Adventure takes place over a hundred years prior to the events of the original Castlevania, and marks the start of the time-warping antics that will come to characterize the mythos of the series. Players assume the role of Christopher Belmont in his quest to defeat Count Dracula, who has risen from the grave exactly 100 years after his defeat at the hands of Trevor Belmont (Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse). While the protagonists in the saga are usually distinct from one another in some way, Christopher looks almost exactly like his descendent Simon. This can be attributed to either the limitations of the GameBoy hardware or a lack of dedication from Konami's development crew. I'm choosing the latter here, as Castlevania Adventure is a shockingly timid entry in all respects that lacks the charm and basic playability of its NES brothers.

The play mechanics in Castlevania were certainly unwieldy, but they were balanced by numerous power-up items that at least gave players a fighting chance. For whatever reason Konami decided to do away with such amenities in Castlevania Adventure. While there is the multi-stage whip that players are used to, they will quickly lose it when hit by any enemy. As a result, Christopher will be forced to fend off the majority of his enemies with a weak whip that has very little range. To add insult to injury, there are absolutely no sub-weapons in the game! No axe, no dagger, no holy water, no nothing. Platform jumping is also unusually difficult, as you must execute pixel-accurate jumps in order to progress. This is less a problem in the first two levels, but you'll be chased by spikes for nearly the entirety of level three, forcing you to make dozens of perfectly-timed jumps just to survive. With responsive controls this wouldn't be too difficult, but it's nearly impossible to have any fun with the clumsy and downright unforgiving play mechanics in Castlevania Adventure.

It's tough to gauge the visual quality of GameBoy titles, as the screen's puke-green hue and migraine-inducing scroll blur make it difficult to look at a game for any length of time. Compared with other games of the era though, Castlevania Adventure is squarely in the middle of the pack. Sprites are small and poorly-animated, as only Christopher moves with more than two frames of animation. Bosses too are incredibly small and lacking in animation, though you likely won't play the game long enough to see all of them. The backgrounds themselves are quite competent and feature artwork similar to that in Simon's Quest. The monochrome display tends to dilute their effect though, and I must admit that playing on that cramped, unlit screen is not much fun. (Thank heavens for emulators!) Overall there isn't much to get excited about here, as the visuals strictly serve to let you know you're playing a Castlevania game.

Castlevania Adventure provides a respectable musical score considering the reduced audio capabilities of the GameBoy hardware. Stage 1's Battle of the Holy is typical of many GameBoy songs, with high-pitched "bleeps" layered over decent-sounding drums and bass. Death Fair is a surprisingly moody arrangement reminiscent of Castlevania's Walking on the Edge, and the melodic Evil Devil is a particularly memorable composition. Of course I've only heard some of these songs on CD (I've never finished this game, naturally), so I can't honestly assess how well they fit with their respective stages. The main problem with GameBoy music in general is that, much like NES music, it doesn't sound like music that comes from real instruments. After extended playtime the music, no matter how good the composition, starts to grate on the ears. With that said, the music in Castlevania Adventure is at least decent and stands as the high point in this otherwise disappointing game.

Despite respectable sales, Castlevania Adventure proved to be a huge step backward for the young Castlevania series. Its combination of poorly-thought-out game design and frustrating play mechanics conspired to suck all of the fun out of its bloated, garlicky corpse. The unfamiliarity of the GameBoy format is absolutely no excuse for its mediocrity, as later Castlevania debuts would prove Konami extremely adept at immediately harnessing a system's power. While there are certainly poorer GameBoy titles around, fans of Castlevania demand (and deserve) much better than the shamefully lacking Castlevania Adventure. Luckily, Konami would deliver much better portable Castlevania titles in the future, so players who missed this one shouldn't worry about it.