Let’s Play Super Castlevania IV!

From time to time I record video Let’s Plays and put them on YouTube. I’ve decided whenever I finish one I’m going to post a link here as well as some background information about the videos to kind of reward any YouTubers who actually visit the site.

This is an LP of Super Castlevania IV for the SNES, played at 143% speed. It’s twelve parts, one level per part, and the whole thing takes just shy of an hour to watch. I played the game first, then recorded my narration over it at a later time. Usually when I narate in this way I’ll script each video, but I didn’t do that this time, so there’s lots of ums and uhs and I repeat myself a lot. Also my good headset breaks partway through and I had to record the last few videos on a crappy headset, so the sound quality isn’t so great in spots.

(If you’d rather watch the videos from the safe confines of YouTube, I’ve got you covered.)

I try to give all my videos fancy names. For Castlevania I decided I’d let good ol’ Babelfish translate the various levels into Romanian to help give the whole thing an authentic gothic flava . They are:

1. “Sat şi grajd.” = “Village and stable.”
2. “Pădure şi râu.” = “Woods and river.”
3. “Cavernă, cascadă şi ruină.” = “Cave, waterfall and ruins.”
4. “Turn de mişcător.” = “Moving tower.”
5. “Poartă de intrare.” = “Entrance gate.”
6. “Mare conac.” = “Great hall.”
7. “Bibliotecă şi galerie.” = “Library and art gallery.”
8. “Donjon.” = “Dungeon.”
9. “Trezorerie.” = “Treasury.”
10. “Turn cu orologiu.” = “Clock tower.”
11. “Pod spre Slogra şi Gaibon.” = “Bridge to Slogra and Gaibon.”
12. “Moarte şi Dracula.” = “Death and Dracula.”

I actually agonized quite a bit over what to call the very last video. “Moarte” is the Romanian word for “death”, but as Castlevania fans know I’m not referring to actual death here, but rather a character named Death. Somehow “Death şi Dracula” just didn’t have the same ring to it, though, and besides, Death in time is known in every language to every man. I feel I made the right choice here.

So there you have it, both people who asked me about this. I told you the translations weren’t very exciting. And incidentially, to any Romanian readers I might have: I deeply apologize for butchering your beautiful language.