Castlevania: Belmont’s Curse is a sprawling adventure across the streets of Paris and Dracula’s Manor. Its scale can make revisiting precise locations frustrating, particularly when the Ferryman’s boat only carries you to a broad area rather than a specific destination.
There is, however, a much more useful travel system hidden in plain sight: you can move between the save-point mirrors you have unlocked.
How to unlock mirror fast travel
First, you must summon Dracula’s castle. After that point, approach one of the game’s mirrors, crouch in front of it and wait. Rose will eventually teleport into the mirror world.
From there, you can select almost every mirror you have activated within the relevant zone. Later in the story, the system expands so you can travel from mirror to mirror across the entire game, removing the need to rely on the Ferryman for these journeys.
The game does not explain this essential shortcut clearly enough. If you are exploring a large map or returning to unfinished objectives, knowing about the mirrors can save a considerable amount of backtracking.
A strong hint system with one major blind spot
One of Belmont’s Curse’s strengths is its diegetic hint system. Rather than simply listing every objective, the game often provides clues about optional bosses, secrets and other rewards that sit outside the critical path.
For example, the Mammon boss is concealed behind a door that opens only after you collect three special items. Careful exploration reveals clues pointing towards those items, giving you a route to the encounter without spelling everything out.
The map also helps players chasing a 100 percent completion run. A fully cleared section has a brown background, while a purple section indicates that a secret remains to be found. This is particularly useful if you do not yet possess the item that alerts you when a hidden area is nearby.
When subtle clues are not enough
The problem is that Belmont’s Curse is so large, and contains so much optional content, that important mechanics are easy to overlook. Sometimes a hint is welcome; at other times, the game needs to give the player a direct instruction.
Getting lost can have serious consequences. It is possible to wander into the extra-bad ending after taking a wrong turn while trying to reach an early boss. Even the clue for unlocking that boss arena can be missed, despite the game’s generally thoughtful approach to environmental guidance.
There may be a note somewhere explaining that kneeling before a mirror enables mirror-to-mirror travel, but this information is too important to leave so obscure. The map is enormous—large enough to make a labyrinth seem compact—so a plainly stated explanation would have been more helpful.
In this case, the shortcut was discovered only because another player, also working through the game, found it by chance and passed the information along. Keep it in mind before committing to another long trek through Paris or Dracula’s Manor.
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