The Silence of the Daylight –

Bloody Tears –

Continuing on with our video game soundtracks, I knew I had to include at least one chiptune (or 8-bit) soundtrack. A little late at night to finally getting around to posting this week’s LP, but I suppose it fits with this record in a weird way…

Castlevania II (1987), a game by Konami, composed by Kenichi Matsubara. A classic game title from the NES library that has its fair share of praise and critique. A direct sequel to the previous year’s successful Castlevania, it made several additions that would become staples of the series to this day.

Castlevania is a game series that often focuses around its whip-wielding heroes, the Belmonts, as they hunt down vampires and other creatures of the night. In this game Simon Belmont has been cursed and is seeking out the remains of Dracula to undo the curse and seal him away for good. While the gameplay is very similar to the first game, there are some notable differences. The game is still a very difficult platformer, but the game now contains a non-linear map to explore and RPG elements where the player can obtain better items as they progress through the game.

These new changes have now become almost synonymous with Konami’s Castlevania video game series, going as far as to define a game genre known as “Metroidvania” (pulling the “Metroid” part of the name from the other series that is similar in design). However, these now series staples are also one of the game’s biggest weak points. The game is often too cryptic and it is nearly impossible to figure out where to go or what to do. On top of this the game also features a poor selection of boss fights, which is an area where the series normally excels at.

In retrospect, the game is often praised for pioneering where the series would eventually go, while simultaneously criticized for less than smoothly making these additions. One of its larger praises though tend to get laid upon the soundtrack composed by Kenichi Matsubara. This would be the only Castlevania game that Matsubara would write music for and one of the few video games soundtracks he would have his name credited to at all.

“Bloody Tears” is an instantly recognizable tune from the series. Along with the popular tune “Vampire Killer”, this is one of the most likely tracks that a fan would pick out. It starts off immediately with several fast high pitch notes that mimic an organ’s sound, before slowing down to carry a more distinct melody. The other track is titled “The Silence of the Daylight” and also became a very common mainstay for the rest of the series. The track doesn’t contain the same amount of sheer speed and drive that “Bloody Tears” bears, but it is the track that is played during the day when enemies are weaker and less dangerous, so it does a solid job of matching its setting well.

This vinyl print was created and published by the talented people over at Mondo, who create custom poster prints and vinyls, primarily for movies, but also for some video games. This vinyl copy of Castlevania II contains the full NES soundtrack (or the US version) on the A-side and the Famicom soundtrack (Japanese version) on the B-side. I mixed both versions of each song together so that the tracks begin with the Famicom version and then fade into the NES version roughly around the one minute mark.

While the Famicom was released before the NES, it actually contained several technical advantages over the NES. One such perk was the ability for the game cartridge to take the sound outputted by the system’s sound chip, run it through an additional sound chip in the game cartridge, and place more sound layers over it before outputting it through the TV. This allowed developers to create a more complex soundtrack. However, while this helped several games like The Legend Of Zelda, it is kinda infamously known for making Castlevania II‘s soundtrack possibly “worse.” Several of the more complex songs like “Bloody Tears” become almost too muddy with all the extra layers and don’t have as much of a punch to its staccato notes and rhythm parts.

Well I included both back to back so you can come to your own conclusion. Let me know which you prefer!