Harmony of Dissonance

Harmony Menu: Areas - Walkthrough - Weirdness - Opening - Ending - Foreign

Entrance

After being chased by a very large mechanical knight that you'll face later, you make your way through the Entrance - which is decorated in pretty much the same manner as Symphony of the Night. Naturally, this area is weakly guarded and is fairly small.

The Wailing Way

The Wailing Way is pretty cool because it resembles the first level of Castlevania 3. The original name was the "Approach of Deplore" - what that actually means, I haven't a clue.

Shrine of Apostates

A very spooky, dark area filled with lizardmen.

Corridor of Marble

Despite the name similarity, this corridor of marble looks a bit different from the one in Symphony. Unfortunately, it's also fairly nondescript, so this paragraph is going to be a very short one.

Room of Illusion

An offshoot off the Marble Corridor, this tiny area is a cave that doesn't really have a lot of illusions but does have a trippy blue background.

Castle Top Floor

A mostly vertical area that has an elevator for convenience.

Castle Treasury

The first area you go to when you "transport", you'd be hard pressed to actually call this a treasury. Other than the usual nondescript hallways, there's a cavern of crystals, and some rooms (at least in Castle B) that appear to be next to a volcano. Nowhere near as cool as the Treasury in Super Castlevania IV. Also home to Juste's room of collectibles.

Sky Walkway

Remember the clouds in the chapel in Symphony of the Night? You get to see them here again. This small area just serves as a bridge to the next area, which is...

Chapel of Dissonance

Yet another chapel, which, again, spans vertically. This is the route to the Castle Keep, which is unfortunately sealed off with that usual "mysterious power" jive. There's also a dark room filled with many, many spikes (sound familiar?) but the only way to navigate it is through trial and error, not some sissy bat echo. Juste takes it like a man.

Clockwork Tower

It's like every other damned clock tower in every other Castlevania game - harpies, medusa heads, gears, swinging pendulums over pits of spikes. There are, however, a few interesting innovations: there's a large open area where you must "race" a rolling ball and take on a gauntlet of enemies in order to receive some goodies; and you can even knock one of those Living Armors into some gears, hear it torn to pieces, then steal its armor. Very keen.

Luminous Cavern

It's a cavern with witches and bats. Meh. The cave in Castle A is flooded, and since there's no "Holy Relic" (snorkel), you need to drain it. Also of particular note is a room that fills with the blood of a crushed monster.

Cave of Skeletons

A very interesting area that not only features skeletons of very large, dead creatures (some of the skulls look curiously like Ridley from Super Metroid) but also skull wallpaper. The Castle A version also features the most reviled obstacle in video gaming - box puzzles.

Aqueduct of Dragons

Once again, the usual sewer area filled with fishmen and creepy zombies. Also very dull.

Castle Keep

What else can I say that hasn't been said before? Kudos to the Konami programmers at making the clocktower in the background look exactly like it did in Symphony of the Night.