This is one of my favourite metroidvania titles. It has a lot of flaws as you mention but it was one of my first ones so it has a special place in my empty heart.

One aspect that I didn't see you mention is the extremely low drop rate of the cards, it seems to be even lower than equips and common items and that was bullshit. I think I spent the whole game with what... 3 or 4 cards?

Maybe I did something wrong (or it's just my poor luck) but I reached the end with those few cards. I did go and search for more with a guide because the final portion fo the game was hard.

Those suck, the summons as you said in your review are pretty good for bosses. There was specially this one that called a lightning storm which you could use to beat the final boss in a few uses. In the end it's all about luck... thank god for the other game modes.

I've honestly never cared too much for Circle of the Moon... When it came to the GBA Castlevania games I always thought Aria of Sorrow and Harmony of Dissonance were much better games, specially Aria of Sorrow!

This was my first GBA game along with Mario Kart Super Circuit and the level of detail compared to the GBC blew me away at the time, when I could see it that is, the game was too dark for a non back lit screen, I have read that it is because the dev kits that were sent out had better brighter screens so it was not really Konami's fault.

Nathan did need more urgency for his walking animation, more like Alucard from SOTN, I think the animations in general could have been better and yes the game was hard, but that made it more rewarding after taking down a boss.

Good review!

Good review. The way you get the cards is a bit of a hassle and a shop would've been nice. Still, it was pretty entertaining. It had some good boss battles and Dracula in particular was a major pain in the ass to beat, which is good in my book.

I tried playing the other Castlevanias for the GBA after this one but I'm just kinda tired of the Metroidvania formula, even though I've only beat this and SOTN.

When it came out, it was brilliant. With all due respect, you can't review a game unless you review it within the context of the time it came out. When you do this, COTM is clearly a 9-9.5 and the reviews at the time reflect as much.

Later on, the following two GBA titles refined and improved upon it enormously but, when it launched? It was right behind SOTN.

I actually liked this one the best of the handheld Castlevanias. Later games in thenseries became increasingly flimsy despite large graphical improvements.