Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin for Nintendo DS Reviews by Gamers

If there's one thing that the Castlevania thing has been good for, it's providing great gameplay that you can continually enjoy from game to game. If you've played Dawn of Sorrow, you're probably wondering: "How can this game get any better?". Well, get ready for some good reasons.

TWO CHARACTERS: Although they may not be quite as interesting as the one's in Dawn of Sorrow, they play a huge part in the game's newfound greatness. You have two characters, Jonathan and Charlotte, that you control. You can control one at a time or have a CPU player control your partner. Your ally will attack enemies that they're close to, but it's up to you to tell them to use their equipped skill with the R button. When your character takes a hit, you lose HP, but when your ally gets attacked, you BOTH lose MP. You also get several Team Attacks and Abilities as you go through the game for working together. Not to mention the fact that you can play co-op with someone via local wireless or Nintendo Wi-Fi connection.

Art Style: The art style, while not STUNNING, is very beautiful in this game, and you'll appreciate the level of detail that was put into the game's locales.

New Adventuring: No longer do you spend your time exploring JUST the castle, now you can also enter Magical Paintings, each with a different theme of their own.

Bosses: Of course, as with all other spectacular Castlevania titles, Portrait of Ruin contains some very intimidating and awesome looking bosses. Most of these bosses require some good reflexes to battle and emerge victorious, but sometimes you just have to beat them to a pulp.

This game continues the trademark greatness of the series and you WILL NOT be dissapointed. Don't rent this game... BUY IT!