Per wiki policy, Spoilers Off applies here and all spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned.
All the Kings of Evil are decking their castles out with giant rotting corpses nowadays.
What is a game? A miserable little pile of horrors!
- The Game Over screen. Whether it is the imagery
◊ or the music, either one of those things are more than likely to catch gamers off-guard when combined.Death: "Game Over. (Evil Laugh)" - After descending far underground to the deepest part of the castle, you encounter Granfalloon/Legion in the catacombs. It is a Cosmic Horror creature covered in a "shell" of naked, faceless corpses, and they're screaming.
- The inverted castle can be this, with more powerful and often disturbing enemies, eerie music in parts compared to the uplifting pieces in the normal castle, and new bosses like the one below that can easily catch one off guard. Some parts of the castle are notably darker, and it shows how this is the real lead-up to Alucard's showdown with his father.
- Beelzebub (as provided in the page image) is a truly giant, green, rotting corpse with various equally sickening organs showing. It's also grimacing and got long, stringy white hair. It's suspended by chains and meat hooks. And covered with maggots and giant flies, which it sends to attack you. They have a way of appearing "close to the screen" when they zoom into the room as well. To top it all off, the arms and legs of the corpse fall off after they have been damaged enough.
- The demise of the succubus can be creepy, especially in Japanese. Alucard is terrifyingly calm as he explains what happens when your astral body dies in a dream, and the succubus starts frantically trying to dissuade him. The screen blacks out, and her scream cuts off. This is the only death in the series you do not see. Even the Narmy dub can be freaky, as her death cry bounces between pain and orgasm.
- She had no idea who Alucard was at first, either. No one sent her after you, and she masquerades as his mother. Given Dracula's attitude toward his wife — and his lack of ability to keep his temper in check — how well do you think he might take some half-dressed harlot of a demoness pretending to be her? Consider his historical namesake's penchant for people on sticks, combine it with his hellbound powers, and then wish they made Clorox for the mind's eye. That may explain why Dracula summons her during the Final Boss battle, only to immediately crush her between his massive claws and drink the blood to heal his own wounds — presumably as punishment for daring to take Lisa's visage.
- On the other hand, consider the situation from Alucard's viewpoint and think about what it means to be attacked by a Succubus — a succubus who impersonated your dearly departed mother. If you think winning that fight is nightmare-inducing, losing it would be worse. The original Japanese version and the DXC port even have an alternate game-over voice clip of the Succubus saying something to the effect of "Come wander the darkness with me, love." while the dummied-out English version of the original release had her say "Now you'll be my own personal slave!" — both quotes had her give a lascivious laugh.
- Think that if the Succubus hadn't tried to impersonate Lisa that things might have gone better for her? Take a good look at her face in her true form — eye color notwithstanding, it still looks exactly like Lisa's. On one hand, Alucard might still have been offended at the idea of some demoness sharing his mother's face and simply rip into her, and on the other, it might have made things easier for the Succubus to mess with Alucard's head, which is a mess as it is.
- The method of finding her is rather eerie, to say the least. You make your way to a relatively empty section of the castle and find a Save Point, but instead of pulsing with the usual red and gold colors, it's inverted in color. There's a legit save point in another room on the other side of the hallway, so you know that something is up with this particular not-savepoint; attempting to use it results in the succubus dream sequence.
- Shaft. He gets into Richter's brain, which can be horrifically paranoia-inducing — if such a righteous hero as Richter couldn't resist his powers, what chance do your companions — or you — have?
- Dracula X Chronicles makes it worse. Look at his hands in the opening cinema, and just try not to shiver convulsively.
- It's possible that Richter's rants prior to the boss fight with him is actually Richter's own personal fears of losing purpose in his family's war against Dracula, with his one victory being the only thing he could contribute before needing to father the next generation. Think about that for a moment: if Richter's words are indeed from his own self, then Shaft is using the Belmont's own fears against him by forcing him to selfishly act on them and put the whole world at risk. His guilt and near-panic in the PSP version only makes that more chilling…Richter: No! What have I done!?
- Dracula X Chronicles makes it worse. Look at his hands in the opening cinema
- Some of SotN's songs themselves are terrifying to listen to. Door of Holy Spirits, the Background Music to the Reverse Colosseum, sounds like something you'd hear in a horror movie. Abandoned Pit has the potential to drive you insane if you're listening to it in real catacombs, and to worsen matters, it's played not only in the normal Abandoned Pit, but also the Cave (the Reverse Pit). And should you go through that area, beyond the boss battle with Death, into the Floating Catacombs, you're greeted with Curse Zone, which starts to get more chaotic and freakish at the 0:41 mark. There's also Enchanted Banquet (which plays during the fight with the succubus) which has a droning One-Woman Wail Last Note Nightmare and Door to the Abyss (which plays in the center of the castle).
- There was a planned alternate ending where Maria intervened during the Richter fight and saved Richter herself, but would have subsequently become possessed or transformed by Shaft. She'd fight Alucard to the death and make the castle collapse if you won, killing herself and Richter.
- The confessional in the Royal Chapel. Instead of music, there's a somewhat eerie ambient track with what sounds like a neverending clockwork bang. There are two seats for Alucard to sit on, which will cause either the ghost of a priest or a woman to appear, depending on what side of the confession booth Alucard sits on. Either will either listen to you/tearfully confess to you or stab you after cackling, depending on the color of their clothes.
