Castlevania Extreme

Castlevania Extreme was one of those Flash games you'd find tucked away on a fan site in the early 2000s. It felt like a quick tribute, a simple distillation of the series made for a browser. You played as Simon Belmont, and the goal was straightforward: fight your way to Dracula.

You move through side-scrolling stages, using your whip to attack enemies that approach. Before each level, you select a special weapon, like an axe or holy water, which you can then use with a separate button. The main draw was the boss fights, which pulled characters from other classic games, turning each encounter into a small crossover event. The pacing is brisk, and the difficulty can spike unexpectedly on some of those later bosses. It feels like a condensed, slightly rough version of the larger adventures, built for a short play session between other tasks.