Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow

A Castlevania game that, shock, isn't about one of the Belmonts! Instead, we get some white-haired emo kid that happens to have the ability to absorb souls.

Unused French Script
The script for the French version of the game is still present in the US version. With that, there's also some unused graphics including (surprise) French versions of some of the status effects. This script can be found starting from in the ROM.

Unused Graphics


There are several things that can be found inside the game's tiles. A lot of items, weapons, a new doll that was probably supposed to have an attack and a hang-glider that was probably supposed to be the flying armor.



Sprites of Konami Man and his accomplice, Konami Woman. Early mascots for the Japanese branch of Konami.

Unused Key


A Skull Key is present in the game, but is unused and has no effect. It's possible that there were going to be locked doors around the castle, as in Harmony of Dissonance, but the idea was scrapped, probably fairly early on. The Visual Boy Advance RAM code will add the item to the inventory.

Chaos Listing


Apparently the final boss, Chaos, has a listing in the game that was taken out before release. The different graphics for the boss in the listing show that it may have been early in development when it was removed. Add this Action Replay V3 cheat to add Chaos to the Enemy List:.

Debug Menu


You can access the debug menu with the GameShark code: 5F1A6135 63794818 CCEC9F6E 5A2A0F12

Selecting Start makes the game begin like normal. Selecting Trade brings up the file select screen for item trading mode. Selecting Staff Roll starts up the credits sequence.

Exit


If you select Exit, you get this menu, which lets you start a normal game from various locations.

1967


Selecting 1967 brings up a menu, which allows for testing objects and enemies.



Selecting ENEMY gives you a screen where you can select an enemy using left and right on the D-Pad. Then, pressing A loads a room from the game with the desired enemy placed inside it.



You can select any enemy in the game, even the final boss, which behaves strangely in a wide room.

Selecting SDTEST opens up a sound test menu, but there is only a blank white screen, so it's hard to use. A will play a song/sound effect, B will stop all sounds playing, and the D-Pad will change the selection.



Selecting START immediately spawns you here, at level 99, equipped with the Axe Armor, Black Panther, and Skula souls, armed with the Caihm Solais, and wearing Dracula's Tunic and Satan's Ring. Most likely used for testing the final boss in its proper environment.



Selecting OBJTEST brings up this sprite of Julius Belmont, which loops through his idle animation.

2229


Selecting 2229 immediately spawns you in this room in the Clock Tower, right into a hazard.

2739


Selecting 2739 brings up another graphics testing menu.

BG


Yet another menu inside a menu.



DISP TEST brings up most of the exterior background of the Clock Tower, which can be panned around with the D-Pad.



LINK TEST puts you, as a doll version of the protagonist (which is used by a Bullet soul), in a warp room that you cannot exit. You can still move about, and even jump, but not much else.



VRAM HIT TEST puts you in the very first room in the game, at the top, as a bat that can somewhat move around freely. However, another copy of the bat lags behind, and the camera struggles to look at both sprites at once. Going too far from the start point, or colliding with another object, will crash the game.

OBJ


This just shows a graphic of a bat.

ETC


This menu has only two options.



SIO TEST 0 spawns the player here, with a broken HUD.



SIO TEST 1, on the other hand, brings up a screen with ASCII art Japanese characters reading "transmission", and a menu for linking two games together via a GBA Link Cable.

4531


This menu gives you the ROM revision and a list of places to warp to.