Castlevania Fighter

Castlevania Fighter is a homebrewed Castlevania game, developed by Serio using MUGEN as the game engine. While the plot - such as it is - involves characters coming together from several alternate universes and timelines (a bit like the cast of Castlevania Judgment coming from several points in the timeline - and ironically, we are speaking of the official Castlevania Fighting Game), the game itself plays like a very long Boss Rush styled after the platformers of the series, with graphics borrowed from Symphony of the Night and the DS games along with new sprites drawn in the same style.

Tropes used in Castlevania Fighter include:

After Combat Recovery: Just like in the main games, every boss leaves behind an orb when beaten. If you catch the orb so that you're in some kind of animation when the freeze-frame happens (jumping, attacking, doing a special move), your maximum HP, MP and/or attack power will increase. Catch enough orbs like this and you'll get a Double Shot or Triple Shot, which lets you toss more subweapons at a time, or strengthens them if they're the kind you can't use more than one of in quick succession. Depending on the character you use, it may be easier or harder to time an "Excellent/Perfect" orb catch.
Alternate Timeline: In the universe where this game takes place, in 1476 Trevor Belmont lost against Dracula, whose power then extended over the whole of Europe. 400 years later, such power has grown so much it starts to affect even timelines where Trevor won. This may explain why there are some baddies, even a version of Death, among the selectable cast - they may not be good doubles from some Mirror Universe but rather just interested in not having a Dracula from another reality influence their own.
Background Boss: Balore.
BFS: Axe Armor has its own take on this, using a humongous axe for one of its special moves.
Bonus Boss: Remilia Scarlet and a Succubus in Survival Mode.
Boss Game: You go straight from one boss to the next, with nothing between them.
The Cameo: Both Reimu Hakurei and Remilia Scarlet appear in their forms from Koumajou Densetsu, as a playable character and boss respectively.
- The Succubus boss that sometimes appears in Survival Mode is from a mobile phone ripoff of Castlevania.
Charged Attack: Many characters like Hugh, Charlotte, Axe Armor and Master Skeleton have special moves you can charge up. Whatever character it is, you can see an aura around them which builds up, and starts flashing when it's fully charged. Charlotte has to charge up a moment to use her magic spell subweapons, but you can also keep charging to use a stronger version of them.
Combos: In a frightening inversion, the BOSSES can do these, because you flinch from their attacks and not vice versa. Lots of them have at least one possible method of juggling you, and you get Mercy Invincibility only when you touch the ground.
Continuing is VERY Painful / Unstable Equilibrium: If you die and use a continue, you lose all the stat boosts you got from special orb catches. Ergo, the best (perhaps only?) way to beat the game is to "one-credit clear" it.
Double Jump: One of the common abilities that all the playable characters have, even if they didn't in their original games.
Dummied Out: The Creature from Symphony of the Night got replaced by the Cyclops from Harmony of Dissonance.
Gatling Good: One of Hammer's special moves involves charging up and firing a gatling gun, and while actually firing it he's invincible. Time it right and you'll be dodging attacks you probably didn't think you could avoid as Hammer.
Glass Cannon: Maria Renard's animal helpers make for very effective subweapons, but she's noticeably fragile. By the same token, Charlotte has some extremely useful spells (especially Ice Needle charged up), but she can't take physical hits well.
Gradual Regeneration: Your MP recovers over time during the fights. If you have enough time, you can hold Up to pose for at least 2 seconds and make it recover faster.
Guns Akimbo: Another of Hammer's specials lets him do his best impression of Dante, hanging in the air while shooting twin pistols diagonally down.
Harder Than Hard / Nintendo Hard: Just about every boss has new attacks, and even on Normal mode things can get pretty hectic. Past Normal there's Hard mode and Nightmare mode, the latter of which isn't visible until you highlight it on the difficulty select screen.
Invulnerable Attack: Quite a few characters have at least one move which gives some invincibility, like Albus' Igniz Kick and Richter's Whip Rush. When playing as some characters, you're pretty much forced to exploit this invincibility if you expect to beat the boss at all.
Joke Character / Lethal Joke Character: Since Serio doesn't like Jonathan Morris that much, he's in the roster as a joke character, with a teddy bear instead of the whip, a set of silly subweapons, and special moves that can backfire. However, if used wisely he can still hold his own against the bosses. The joke turns a little more mean-spirited if you play Survival Mode and end up against an AI-controlled Jonathan, since he'll use proper versions of his armaments from Portrait of Ruin, including the whip and a Holy Claymore for his main weapons.
- There's also the Frog from Rondo of Blood. He can only use his tongue as a whip-like attack and hop around. Despite this he is a small target and isn't really weak.
- The latest version has Ronald Mc Donald from Treasure Land Adventure among the roster. I kid you not.
Last Ditch Move: Dario, Lesser Demon, Dullahan and Flying Armor all have some method of hurting you as they die, but most of the bosses have another form of this - if you strike the killing blow while they're doing an attack, they won't die until the attack is finished.
Level Up: Not quite played straight. You can power yourself up, but only by catching the after-boss orbs in special ways. Soma and Alucard also grow a little bit stronger with every boss they defeat, by absorbing their souls.
Life Drain: Alucard, Maria, Persephone and Yoko have moves that can drain HP as they attack the enemy. On the opposing side, Brauner, Remilia and Dracula all have attacks to grab you and drain your health.
Limit Break: Everyone who uses the classic Castlevania subweapons (Dagger, Axe, Cross, etc.) is able to perform their corresponding Item Crushes, except for Simon. Nathan and Hugh have to activate DSS Mode first.
Real Time Weapon Change: Every playable character has at least two or three subweapons, and you have a button to cycle through them.
Sequential Boss: Dracula is fought in his human appearance, then turns One-Winged Angel, and finally, when you think it's over, has to be fought in a powered-up version of his first form.
- Death and Shaft have two forms as well.
Special Attack: Almost every character has at least one, and the commands for them aren't particularly exotic since this is a platformer we're dealing with. The usual motions before the button include tapping forward twice, a quarter-circle forward, Up and a quarter-circle forward (rolling Up-Back-Down-Forward works too), a half-circle forward, and a half circle Down-Forward-Up (used for Item Crushes and similar super-powerful attacks).
Spin to Deflect Stuff: Everyone who uses a whip can spin it around, which deals very little damage but is incredibly useful for blocking projectiles and clearing away any small-fry baddies the boss summons, as well as pushing back Gergoth's poison and petrifying gas and wiping away Brauner's Blood Art strokes.
Time Stands Still: Soma, Charlotte, Death, and anyone with a Stopwatch can slow down time for a bit, causing the boss to move and attack in slow-motion. While it doesn't freeze anything completely, it works on just about every boss.
Turns Red: Just about all the bosses do at least something new when they've lost enough health.
- Death (as the penultimate boss, not the playable version) literally Turns Red mid-fight (along with the Moon in the background), taking a more ragged and angry look.
Unnecessary Combat Roll: Super Castlevania IV Simon does this instead of sliding, and he's actually invincible while rolling. Since he has no special attacks with invincible frames, it's more of a necessary roll.