This is my favorite metroidvania Castlevania game. Expectations from Aria of Sorrow for me were quite high. I finally gotten to play this through Castlevania Dominus Collection. In nearly every possible way better than Aria of Sorrow. Sure the money trick technically better in Aria of Sorrow. You also need to correctly perform the seals or a boss regains some health during boss fights. Despite those problems it's a truly fantastic Castlevania game. Once again you play as Soma Cruz with amazing presentation for the story. A great lineup for the bosses as well. You get one massive map with a smaller map later on. You get a few merchants this time around. Your usual merchant being Hammer. One of the supporting characters, Yoko Belnades whose an descendant of Sypha Belnades deals with souls. Either free em or use souls to improve weapons. Plus you can find the right combination of souls for truly amazing effects. Dawn of Sorrow is currently the end of the classic Castlevania timeline. I felt it was a worthy conclusion. The audio as a whole truly fantastic work. This felt like an improved Aria of Sorrow that's differs enough to be it's own Castlevania game. In other words it's not quickly release the same game but change some stuff that's it. There's an insane level of depth. Julius Mode is even improved to a degree. You can recruit both Alucard whose not in disguise and Yoko. This recreates three of the four Castlevania 3 characters together. Boss Rush mode is a lot of fun as well. I really can not criticize it much because the game just that damn great!!!