History YMMV / CastlevaniaSymphonyOfTheNight

* HighOctaneNightmareFuel: The ''music.'' Notable tracks include "Abandoned Pit" (both versions of the Abandoned Pit), "Door of Holy Spirits" (Reverse Colosseum), "Curse Zone" (Floating Catacombs), and "The Door to the Abyss."
** "'''''[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ao7ATGYquBU GAME OVER. MUAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!]]'''''"

** Voice acting aside the game itself has this as well such as whether it should be praised or hated for being known as the cause of {{Metroidvania}} as a lot of other Castlevania games [[FollowTheLeader tried to be like Symphony of the Night.]] Fortunately even those whom are getting sick and tired of Castlevania games trying to be like Symphony of the Night generally do not bash SotN itself but whether if the fact that this game popularized the subgenre is still a rather divisive subject.

* XenSyndrome: The second castle. The same background music plays in ''six'' different areas (see EarWorm above), very little if any story happens here (save for the final two bosses), and the game suddenly goes from linear to having minimal sense of direction. Not to mention that you can snag some {{Game Breaker}}s here on your ''first playthrough'', given enough grinding for [[RandomlyDrops random drops]].
** WhatCouldHaveBeen: If they'd just started with the massively beefed-up enemies and traps of the second castle, the game would've been NintendoHard and it wouldn't have [[BaseBreaker broken the base as hard.]]

* [[SugarWiki/{{Ptitleh7wzr92t4un4}} So Cool It's Awesome]]: The game overall.

* GoodBadBugs: When playing in 99 Luck mode, Alucard can skip the conversation with Death and keep his equipment. It seems that in the PSP version, you can do this simply by leaving the screen before the cutscene starts. You get the Shield Rod reasonably early in the first castle. This means you get to start owning bosses with the Alucard Shield combo early.

* MemeticMutation: WHAT IS A MAN?
** A MISERABLE LITTLE PILE OF SECRETS!
*** Apparently the quote [[OlderThanTheyThink originally]] comes from [[http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/André_Malraux André Malraux]]. Which means it's actually [[AnachronismStew out of period]] for a game that's supposed to take place in the 18th century.
** BUT ENOUGH TALK! ''HAVE AT YOU!!''
*** HYDRO STORM! HYDRO STORM! OOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH, HYDRO STORM!

* PortingDisaster: The Japan-only Saturn port attempted to add some extras to the game by making Maria playable and adding two new areas. Unfortunately the novelty of the new features are quickly canceled out by the actual quality of the port itself: the game suffers from constant slowdown when the screen is filled with enemies, most of the graphical transparency effects are lost, and the game loads before and after entering the transition rooms between areas (you know, those rooms that were there to ''lessen'' the loading times in the first place).
** And if Wikipedia is to be believed, they removed several small rooms to keep the map total at 200.6%, making one item impossible to get.(The rest were just random drops).
*** Wikipedia is not to be believed in this case. The game goes over 200.6%. The first castle itself goes over 100%, because the new areas add upon it.
** The reason for this is '''because they directly ported it'''. The game is actually built on a 3D engine (only noticeable in a few places like the FinalBoss), and the Saturn had trouble handling 3D games. Do the math.

* CrowningMusicOfAwesome: Considered one of the best game soundtracks ever. The song at the entrance, "Dracula's Castle," is very popular.

* SoCoolItsAwesome: The game overall.

* WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds: Dracula is heavily implied to be this in the game.

* ExecutiveMeddling: Sony really thought a primarily 2D game like this [[ItWillNeverCatchOn would never catch on.]]

* ExecutiveMeddling: Sony really thought a primarily 2D game like this would never catch on.

* VindicatedByHistory

* XenSyndrome: The second castle. The same background music plays in ''six'' different areas (see EarWorm above), very little if any story happens here (save for the final two bosses), and the game suddenly goes from linear to having minimal sense of direction. Not to mention that you can snag some {{Game Breaker}}s here on your ''first playthrough'', given enough grinding for [[RandomlyDrops random drops]].

* GoodBadBugs: When playing in Hard Mode, Alucard can skip the conversation with Death and keep his equipment. It seems that in the PSP version, you can do this even when you start the game for the first time.

* BaseBreaker: The English voice acting in this game is the most prominent aspect in this case. Years ago the PS1 version's voice acting was flat out despised and was highly considered to be a SoBadItsHorrible aspect of an otherwise SoCoolItsAwesome game. However then there were more people who considered the voice acting to be more SoBadItsGood for various reasons and is becoming the more popular consensus on the game. (Such as "Yeah the voice acting is terrible but it made me laugh instead of angry" to folks who use this as a reason to prefer not to take the game so seriously.) But in recent years there is a small but growing amount of people whom found the PS1 version's voice acting to be underrated and genuinely good either in general or at least for a character or few, they are no where near as vocal as the SoBadItsHorrible and the SoBadItsGood crowd but people whom unironically like the PS1 version's voice acting do exist.
*** The PSP English voice work has this in spades as well... Is the PSP version's voice acting genuinely good and an unfortunate victim of the NostalgiaFilter from fans of the PS1 version? Or did the PSP version try to take the game far too seriously? Or is it really not any better than the PS1 version as they sound too generic? (At least the PS1 version tried to sound a bit more European as just about everyone in the PSP version sounded too American.) It depends on what you felt about the voice work in the PS1 version or if your a fan of Californian Anime English Dub VAs such as YuriLowenthal, WendeeLee and MichelleRuff.

** By using the Sword Brothers spell in Master Librarian's room to enable them to open the menu while within the Librarian's menu, the player can use a glitch that may quickly maximize Alucard's money by selling him a negative amount of gem rings, ending up with 255 of them and then selling those. This was one of the very few bugs actually fixed in the PSP version, unfortunately.

* XenSyndrome: The second castle. The same background music plays in ''six'' different areas (see EarWorm above), very little if any story happens here (save for the final two bosses), and the game suddenly goes from linear to having minimal sense of direction.

* VindicatedByHistory

* {{Narm}}: During the climactic final duel with Dracula, he unleashes a wide variety of devastating attacks... One of which makes a [[MoodDissonance jarring]] "SPLAT!" noise.

* SoBadItsGood: The {{PS1}} voice acting.
** SoOkayItsAverage: The {{PSP}} voice acting.

* JustHereForGodzilla: Many people bought ''The Dracula X Chronicles'' just for the port of ''Symphony of the Night''

** The reason for this is a massive WallBanger. '''Because they directly ported it'''. The game is actually built on a 3D engine (only noticeable in a few places like the FinalBoss), and the Saturn had trouble handling 3D games. Do the math.