Is Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia too hard?

Talking with Castlevania fangirl Leigh Alexander today, I was surprised to hear that she abandoned Konami’s latest vampire-slaying installment, reaching for something less hardcore after finding Order of Ecclesia too frustrating.

My wife, also a devotee of the series, found a particular boss fight unyielding and eventually asked me to struggle through the encounter so that she could get on with the rest of the game. Even with the aid of GameFAQs, it took me too many tries than I’d like to admit before I finally walked away from the battle victorious.

Wired also noted the difficulty, describing Ecclesia as “one of the hardest 2-D Castlevanias since the NES era.” While this makes progress more satisfying for some, is the game too hard for most? Based on the short amount of time I’ve spent with the title so far, I think it is.

See also: My last GameFAQs/Castlevania experience

[Image via the Order of Ecclesia site’s wallpaper section]

tags / castlevania / order of ecclesia / konami / ec