MediEvil: Journal Entry #1

Heya, readers! 👋

A few days ago, on Halloween night specifically, I began playing Medievil on the original PlayStation for immaculate spooky vibes as I CRAVED it, and I’ve heard a lot of great things about it. I’ve made reasonable progress, so I’ve decided to whip up the first ever journal entry here on Retrograde today! This post will contain my initial thoughts, my progress so far, potential difficulties, a bunch of screenshots, and even my favorite soundtrack so far into the game.

First impressions & initial thoughts

The first thing I thought when first entering Dan’s Cave was that everything felt a bit goofy: from Sir Daniel’s rather foolish appearance, the strange nature of the talking gargoyle, and the whole concept of Dan rising from his coffin, this time being pure skull and bones, to save the world. I was also astonished by the playful spooky vibes the game gave off, and it reminded me specifically of those dark fantasy videos that took over TikTok a few months ago!

The vibes and ambience is amazing throughout most of the levels I’ve played so far. The dark medieval fantasy setting in an unstable world works really well, and the soundtrack is just pure barbeque (that means good. very good). My favorite level so far is The Sleeping Village: a small, secluded village in Gallowmere where its citizens have been been manipulated by the evil sorcerer Zarok and turned into brutal killing machines. The story of this little place really resonated with me, and the soundtrack certainly enhanced the experience even further, making the place feel dangerous and especially mysterious.

Where am I right now?

I’m a good few hours into the game, and I’ve just beaten the Pumpkin King in the Pumpkin Serpent level! This “boss fight” was very simple, all I had to was break all of his 8 pods and then shoot arrows at him from a distance. His health went down quickly, but SO did mine!!! I actually had to defeat this boss twice because, when I beat him the first time, I was killed RIGHT after by some other enemy! I ended up doing that thing when you aggressively try to eat your controller out of frustration… Oh wait, does anyone else do that???

I attempted multiple times to slay the Demonettes in The Enchanted Forest, but failed ABSOLUTELY miserably every time!!! They fly around ya, never shedding the distance between us so I HAVE to use ranged weapons, AND the floor TILTS!?!? WHO MADE THIS? I got relatively frustrated, and after a bit of searching, I learned that the optimal weapon against them is the flaming longbow. I DO NOT HAVE this weapon currently, so I’ll have to get enough chalices to unlock it and get back to them later :’D

I’ve played for 6 hours according to DuckStation, the PlayStation emulator I’m running, but total hours on the actual save file in-game is around 3 hours, so I’m not terribly far into the game just yet 😉

What I like and dislike

I generally have great things to say about Medievil so far:

• The ambience, vibe, setting is incredibly immersive and unique
• The soundtrack is amazing
• It certainly is difficult, but always somehow manageable
• The story is simple but still interesting
• Levels are well designed and they feel alive in the world of Gallowmere

However, there are still a few things I dislike, of course 😉

• The controls are pure jank – everyone who’ve played this game agrees!
• I often cannot rotate the camera much when moving, but can when I stop and stand still? Makes it difficult to escape enemies sometimes 😭
• No lock-on targeting makes difficult to hit enemies, especially when there are many of them

Most of the negative points are obviously due to PlayStation 1 developers experimenting with an entirely new dimension in a video game, so there’s naturally going to be more jank compared to modern videogame titles. While the controls and overall jankiness definitely is frustrating at times and will continue to frustrate me as I play further, the story and setting certainly makes up for it!

What comes next?

I’ll spend the next couple of days backtracking to earlier levels to get more life bottles (I have too few, I die a lot…). I’ll also be collecting more chalices so I can get the flaming longbow and finally kill those damn Demonettes in The Enchanted Forest! More journal entries will come as I progress further, stay tuned for that 😎

Below is my favorite soundtrack in the game so far, along with screenshots I’ve captured for you to enjoy. Take care until next time <3

Screenshot gallery