History YMMV / CastlevaniaSymphonyOfTheNight

* PortingDisaster: The Japan-only Saturn port. While it adds some extras to the game such as a playable Maria (and boss), two new areas and additional items, the novelty is unfortunately soon 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). It also loads when entering or exiting the main menu and due to the fact that the Saturn controller doesn't have as many buttons as the [=PS1=] controller, there's no dedicated button to open the map: as a result, you need to enter the main menu every time you want to check the map, meaning a process that took a second on a [=PS1=] now takes around 30 seconds. This is because the game was originally built on a 3D engine (only noticeable in a few places like the FinalBoss), and the Saturn had trouble handling 3D games.

** In the redub, Dracula is voiced by Creator/PatrickSeitz, who not only famously voiced [[Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventure Dio Brando]], an expy of Dracula, but also voiced a vampire who butted heads with [[Manga/{{Hellsing}} a different Alucard]] and lost. The best part? [[spoiler: The other Alucard ''was'' Dracula in that series]].

** Alucard's absolutely ridiculous {{Knockback}} if he so much as brushes against an enemy, along with his overly long hurt animation (at least compared to [[VideoGame/CastlevaniaHarmonyOfDissonance later]] [[VideoGame/CastlevaniaChroniclesOfSorrow games]]). Coupled with hard-to-hit enemies and tight corridors and later stages can have you pinball between foes until you die, or get stun locked by a perpetual onslaught of weak attacks, or even [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking get knocked back into another room]]. The knockback is so ridiculous, that it actually is part of retaining your starting gear on a luck run, among other exploits (see the main page and GoodBadBugs above).

** In the original dub, Richter Belmont speaks with the ([[TheOtherDarrin first]]) voice of [[VideoGame/ResidentEvil1 Chris Redfield]].

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Richter Belmont. His {{Motive Rant}} when Alucard confronts him in the throne room is unclear as to how much of it is actually Shaft's control... or if what he says is actually a legitimate fear that Richter holds of becoming useless after defeating Dracula once. Given that Dracula is revived once a century, once a Belmont has defeated him, that Belmont (theoretically) will never again face him in their lifetime, meaning their purpose boils down to fathering a family that will continue the war while they no longer take an active part otherwise. Is this just part of Shaft's brainwashing? Or was Richter legit afraid of this future, and Shaft simply capitalized on this weakness in his mentality?

* AuthorsSavingThrow: With the PSP and later releases based on it, Maria Renard's summon mechanics, originally a situation of GuideDangIt, are completely reworked, taking the place of the sub-weapons, with her being able to Item Crash them, with her basic sub-weapon being a doll of her Rondo counterpart. As a trade-off, she completely loses the ability to triple jump as well as use the regular sub-weapons, with almost all containers holding hearts or health upgrades.

* SuspiciouslySimilarSong: The song from the credits of the original game, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyXhNmsgigM I Am The Wind]], sounds a lot like [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpZkY47-cVI Because You Loved Me]] by Celine Dion. Similarities include the melody and the sidesticks on the snare, which later transition to full-on hits.

** The Beryl Circlet isn't a general GameBreaker, but it is definitely when fighting against [[BonusBoss Gala]][[ShockAndAwe moth]], since it absorbs electrical attacks.

* SuspiciouslySimilarSong: The song from the credits of the original game, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyXhNmsgigM I Am The Wind]], sounds a lot like [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpZkY47-cVI Because You Loved Me]] by Celine Dion. Similarities include the melody and the rimshots on the snare, which later transition to full-on hits.

* FranchiseOriginalSin: the first of the "IGA-vania" type games and generally the most beloved, but it's also the first Castlevania game to extensively recycle sprites from prior games, in this case ''VideoGame/SuperCastlevaniaIV'' and ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaRondoOfBlood.'' Thankfully it's pretty easy to overlook here, since it was only the first time these sprites had been reused, many of them got new attacks and animations, and there were more than enough interesting new enemies to make up for it. Later on, subsequent 2D Castlevania games would become notorious for shamelessly recycling sprites en masse, often with no modification. This came to a head with ''[[VideoGame/CastlevaniaHarmonyOfDespair Harmony of Despair]]'', a game released in 2010 made up almost entirely of reused assets, some of them still dating back to ''SCIV"" and thus nearly ''20 years old'' by that point.

* FranchiseOriginalSin: the first of the "IGA-vania" type games and generally the most beloved, but it's also the first Castlevania game to extensively recycle sprites from prior games, in this case ''VideoGame/SuperCastlevaniaIV'' and ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaRondoOfBlood.'' Thankfully it's pretty easy to overlook here, since it was only the first time these sprites had been reused, many of them got new attacks and animations, and there were more than enough interesting new enemies to make up for it. Later on, subsequent 2D Castlevania games would become notorious for shamelessly recycling sprites en masse, often with no modification. This game to a head with ''[[VideoGame/CastlevaniaHarmonyOfDespair Harmony of Despair]]'', a game released in 2010 made up almost entirely of reused assets, some of them dating back to ''1991'' when ''SCIV'' debuted.

* FanNickname: "Holy Snorkel" - The Holy Symbol relic from ''Symphony of the Night'', which allows Alucard to survive underwater and happens to resemble a gold snorkel.

* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: As far as many purists of the PSX original are concerned, any change to the classic game is unacceptable. The re-dubbed script is particularly contentious, and prior to the release of ''Castlevanie Requiem'', the original was easier to find as a digital download.

* AuthorsSavingThrow: With the PSP and later releases based on it, Maria Renard's summon mechanics, originally a situation of GuideDangIt, are completely reworked, taking the place of the sub-weapons, with her being able to Item Crash them, with her basic sub-weapon being a doll of her Rondo counterpart.
** As a trade-off, she completely loses the ability to triple jump as well as use the regular sub-weapons, with almost all containers holding hearts or health upgrades.

* BrokenBase: 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 you are a fan of Californian anime English dub [=VAs=] such as Creator/YuriLowenthal, Creator/WendeeLee, and Creator/MichelleRuff.

* DisappointingLastLevel: The reverse castle, which is just the same castle flipped 180 degrees. "The Final Toccata" plays in ''six'' different areas, very little 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 [[GameBreaker Game-Breakers]] here on your ''first playthrough'', given enough grinding for [[RandomlyDrops random drops]], which destroys the difficulty curve for the remainder of the game.

* RetroactiveRecognition: In the original dub, Richter Belmont speaks with the ([[TheOtherDarrin first]]) voice of [[VideoGame/ResidentEvil1 Chris Redfield]].

** The Reverse Castle at the time of release was a huge shock, while there were games that surprised the player with more content after the [[DiscOneFinalBoss supposed final boss,]] hardly any hid half of the game behind it. Playing through a distorted version of everything you had already seen too was a very novel and unique idea. After the Reverse Castle, it pretty much became tradition for Castlevania games to have a fake final boss where you got more game after doing specific actions and exploring altered versions of places you had been to became common in metrodivanias as a whole. The Reverse Castle is now hardly a surprise and its implementation can seem highly clumsy given you have to fly and leap constantly to get anywhere, there are only a handful of new music tracks, and other than new enemies and the upside-down gimmick nothing about the castle is different.
* SelfImposedChallenge: Given the number of GameBreaker options at one's disposal, any serious challenge for most players pretty much ''has'' to be this.

* {{Narm}}: When you fight Dracula as the FinalBoss, one of his techniques is to summon a previously defeated boss, only to crush it in his claws; but the sound effect picked for the crushing is a Hanna-Barbera-style squish sound, which makes the whole thing unintentionally hilarious.

** The Muramasa's attack power increases whenever Alucard kills an enemy whose death animation spills blood on him. With enough time and patience, this has sword has the potential to be the strongest in the game. The Merman pool near the start of the game is a popular area to level the sword up quickly.

* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: As far as many purists of the PSX original are concerned, any change to the classic game is unacceptable. The re-dubbed script is particularly contentious, never mind the original is now easier to find as a digital download.

** Not being able to sell off the many, many items you'll accrue on your quest as they become obsolete is quite an annoyance. Only gemstone rings are salable, making money grinding a very slow and tedious process unless you're aware of a certain exploitable bug, meanwhile your inventory will become progressively more cluttered with weapons, armor and accessories that don't serve any practical purpose once better replacements are found.

** The 1-kill playthrough, which requires you to kill only ONE enemy throughout the entire game. You're still beating it at 200.6%; you're just limited to killing a puny Blademaster. This is quite difficult, as the mandatory boss fights count as kills. Once you become extremely adept at glitching through walls, it's not terribly difficult, but it will give you a run for your money if you aren't mentally prepared.

** 99 Luck mode, Alucart equipment only, no LevelGrinding or major buffs like the [[ArtifactOfPower Ring of Varda]] is one that provides a nice meaty challenge without being hair-pullingly frustrating (your other stats are at rock-bottom, but 99+ Luck does wonders for your critical hit rate) or requiring the player to find and exploit glitches.

** Black Marble Gallery can be a pain, due to being full of Nova Skeletons and spike traps. It also has [[BossInMookClothing Guardians]], as well as [[GoddamnedBats numerous another annoying enemies]].

** 99 Luck mode, Alucart equipment only, no LevelGrinding or major buffs like the [[ArtifactOfPower Ring of Varda]] is one that provides a nice meaty challenge without being hair-pullingly frustrating (your stats are at rock-bottom, but 99+ Luck does wonders for your critical hit rate) or requiring the player to find and exploit glitches.

** 99 Luck mode, Alucart equipment only, no LevelGrinding is one that provides a nice, meaty challenge without being hair-pullingly frustrating (your stats are at rock-bottom, but 99+30 Luck does wonders for your critical hit rate) or requiring glitch exploitation.

** Not being able to sell off the many, many items you'll accrue on your quest as they become obsolete is quite an annoyance. Only gemstone rings are salable, making money grinding a very slow and tedious process unless you're aware of a certain exploitable bug, meanwhile your inventory will become progressively more cluttered with weapons, armor and accessories that don't serve any practical use once better replacements are found.