Death Boss Guide - Castlevania: Belmont's Curse Published

Welcome to this guide on how to beat Death in Castlevania Belmont’s Curse. Death sits at the end of the Notre Dame and unlocks following the completion of the organ puzzle. Death is a necessary boss for progression, but can be rather difficult to beat. This guide will walk you through the best tips and tricks to beat Death.

Death has quite a few attacks that are hard to dodge and can drain a lot of health if you aren’t careful. The hardest attack to dodge is his laser attack. This attack starts simple, but can be nearly impossible to dodge by the end if you don’t position yourself correctly. The attack starts with a laser going horizontally.

 It starts with just the outline and then shortly after, a beam cuts across that is notably wider than the outline, so make sure to keep a strong gap between yourself and the laser. After the horizontal, there is a laser going diagonally down and to the left, then diagonally down to the right, and then purely vertical. These lasers spawn at Rose's current position, so effectively positioning yourself makes dodging the later lasers much easier. Additionally, if you position well enough, this can be a great time to heal.

This mainly boils down to using your horizontal space effectively. Only that first horizontal laser will stretch the whole width of the arena, so if you move across the map as the attack progresses, you will avoid having to dodge all of the lasers at once. This does mean you should be careful with your horizontal lasers, especially if you are going to be on the edges of the arena where there aren't platforms.

For example, if you put one at the first platform height and another at ground level, you would have an incredibly hard time dodging. Try to avoid having a laser on the ground, as this hugely limits your ability to dodge easily.

As the fight progresses, this attack will go on longer with more and more lasers, so especially at the end of the fight, try to always leave room for dealing with more lasers, and don’t let your guard down.

The next important attack to know is what I call the touch of Death. This attack isn’t too hard to dodge, but if you are hit, your health will drop to 1, making this attack important to know how to deal with. Death starts with a wind-up where a bunch of black circles converging on his hand move inwards as he gathers the energy for the attack.

The second this happens, start moving away as fast as you can. Utilize your dash to make space between yourself and Death. You can also utilize the grapple points as well. Death will extend his arm, with a point of green light at his finger, which will be the epicenter of the attack.

After a second, the energy at his finger will burst in a small circle. The trick with this attack is to start moving away the second you realize it's happening. Initially, Death moves towards you slowly during the attack, but he quickens later in the fight, making a fast reaction the only way to effectively dodge.

Death also has a variety of attacks where he uses his scythe. An important one of these is a swipe that creates a horizontal band across the whole arena.  The best way to dodge this attack is to do a forward dodge slide towards Death. This will let you not only dodge the attack, but also bring you in close and give you an attack window after Death finishes the attack. While winding up for this attack, Death holds his scythe more sideways and doesn’t hold it above his head, distinguishing it from the other scythe attack I will discuss later.

This attack changes in two important ways once the second phase starts. Firstly, Death can do swipes at the floor level. This invalidates the above dodge strategy, which can cause some problems. Once you reach this phase, simply jump (ideally on a platform to avoid falling back down into the hitbox) to dodge. Additionally, after his sideswipes, he will spawn spinning sickles that will fly towards you. These are relatively slow-moving and shouldn't give you too much trouble; remember your parry, as well as the fact that hitting a projectile will make it disappear, in order to handle these.

Death’s next scythe attack is an overhead swipe that covers a wide arc in front of Death. This attack is rather hard to dodge and is performed quickly. The best way to dodge this attack is to go through to the other side of Death. This is also ideal as it allows for a window of attack. Unfortunately, Belmont’s Curse can be a little finicky with dodging through enemies and immunity frames, so there is a chance you will take damage. If you are at low health or want to play it safe, instead try to dodge away and quickly get out of range of the slice.

An important note on this attack is that it often comes right after a teleport following other moves. For example, Death will do the laser move above, teleport next to you, and then immediately swipe. He also has a tendency to do this after the projectile move I am about to discuss.

This next move is pretty simple to dodge, but primarily requires consistency. Death will teleport to the center of the arena, where he will then radiate small projectiles that come out in circles. An important note is that these projectiles are homing and stick around for a little after the attack, so make sure to keep an eye on them, especially once the attack has ended and Death is on to other moves.

A great way to dodge this attack is to utilize the parry. This timing can be hard to get at first, but once you find the rhythm, it can trivialize this attack. You want to press the parry button when the projectile is just about to hit the outer edge of your parry hitbox. This timing is hard to describe and is something you will have to find for yourself, but it will be super helpful once you do. If you have a hard time with the parry, simple maneuvering around the projectiles will also work, but it is just less reliable.  

After this attack, Death will often teleport to you to do one of his close-range attacks. Make sure you are watching and ready for this, and that no remaining projectiles will block your dodge path. This attack has different colored projectiles in the second phase that deal more damage, but the strategy remains exactly the same.

Death’s last attack only comes up in the second phase of the fight. Death will do a horizontal slash hitting both sides of him, and throw his scythe horizontally, where it will then move forward, spinning. Once it gets far away, Death will teleport to it and then, in rapid succession, do his horizontal slice attack.

The initial throw is not hard to dodge, but the subsequent slash is incredibly fast and can be very jarring if you aren’t prepared for it. For that slash in particular, Death will teleport to the height of his scythe, meaning you have a good range for where he can do his horizontal slash. Leaving this range before he teleports is a good, consistent dodge strategy. An important thing about this attack is that before and after Death throws his scythe is a great attack window, and one of the best and only easy times to attack you will get later in this fight.

This attack has a good windup, and he is defenseless and stationary while his scythe is thrown, making this a perfect time to use your equipped arcana(using Fist of Talos during the windup and then dodging the throw is a great strategy that allows you to get full utilization of the spell since Death won't move from its attack area). Also use the time during the teleport to get a quick flurry of attacks. If you use this window correctly, particularly in regard to arcanas,  you can take out a sizable chunk of Death’s health bar in one go.

Generally, Death is a hard boss and requires you to stay on guard the whole fight due to his teleports and fast attacks, especially late in the fight. Utilize the platforms in the arena to fight; this will allow you to drop down in order to dodge, which is hugely helpful for quite a few attacks. Additionally, make heavy use of your grapple attack(pressing the attack button immediately after grappling onto an enemy), as this is a great way to close distance after teleports and allows you to get good hits in.

Playing aggressively, while risky, is a generally good strategy (for Death as well as many other bosses in the game). If you utilize arcanas effectively and pick high damage output weapons, Rose can deal incredibly high burst damage. Even if you lose some health in the process, getting one of these huge damage bursts in return is normally a pretty good trade-off, so don’t be too afraid to get in there to mash and trade blows, especially if the boss is on lower HP, since bosses get more dangerous as the fight progresses.

It may take you a few attempts, but stick with it and soon you will have killed Death itself! Remember to hold your potion button to absorb him into your tarot cards.

After you beat Death, you unlock both the Vampire Killer Whip, an incredibly strong weapon, and the double jump, which revolutionizes Rose’s movement kit. With both of these tools, you will be well equipped to continue your journey to kill Dracula!