Sword Brothers is a spell in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night that is performed by Alucard's Sword Familiar (while it is being used as a Familiar, not equipped in the hand). It is the only spell that is accomplished by a Familiar in this game. The Sword Brothers spell is accomplished by pressing down, then rolling the directional pad 180° forward and holding it for a while once it reaches up, and then suddenly press down and attack at the same time. The sword will perform a move that damages all enemies on the screen. This will consume a hefty 30 MP, the second highest consuming spell after Soul Steal.
Glitches and exploits[]
- Note: None of the glitches listed here can be performed in the PSP port of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night included in Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles, nor on ports based on it, such as Castlevania Requiem.
Sword Brothers is well known for the large number of glitches that surround its use. Even though most players will not see these, there are two major effects that can be exploited, and a few other minor tricks.
Jewel duplication[]
This integer glitch requires the player have at least one jewel in their inventory and the Sword Familiar active, and works in the Saturn and Xbox Live versions, as well as the PSX original. By performing Sword Brothers and then talking to the Master Librarian while the speech is playing, the player can pause the game on the Librarian's buy menu, something which is normally impossible.
To get the glitch to work, the player must have exactly one of the type of jewel they wish to duplicate. After selling any more than one, the menu is selected and the remaining jewel equipped to one of Alucard's equip slots. The player then exits the pause menu (Saturn players must do this by pressing START rather than B) and sells the remaining jewel to the Librarian.
Successfully pulling this off will result in an integer error which turns the number of items backward from zero to its maximum value of 255 (this shows that inventory amounts in the engine are stored as unsigned 8-bit integers). Obviously, 255 jewels rather than 1 is rather useful, and is the easiest way to afford the Duplicator. It should be noted that the gold counter stops at 999,999 and any money above this is lost, so selling more than a million gold's worth of gems is a waste.
Even if the 255 glitched Jewels are sold, Alucard will still have one equipped, allowing the player to perform the glitch as many times as they like. Alucard's total of that Jewel will show as 0 until he unequips the remaining one, and then will return to 1 again in the store.
This glitch can also be performed with other familiars with long speech, such as the N Demon with a very long "on summon" speech.
Since the mobile ports disable the Pause buttons when talking to the Master Librarian, this glitch cannot be performed with any method.
Percentage glitching[]
Sword Brothers can be used to add rooms to the castle map and increase percentage; this requires the Sword Familiar's level be 90 or higher, and for the player to be at the bottom of the first bell tower in Royal Chapel or its inverted equivalent. By going to the lower-left door, triggering Sword Brothers and then entering, Alucard can be made to walk right outside the map. The Shield Rod/Mablung Sword and Alucard Shield combo can then be used to fill in extra rooms on the map after this.
This trick does not work in the Saturn version.
Save file corruption[]
A similar trick to the jewel duplication glitch can be used to deliberately corrupt the player's save file, with potential effects such as resetting map completion (allowing for completion percentages exceeding 400%) or resetting items balanced by a fairly high likelihood that the resulting save will be rendered impossible to load. It is therefore wise to back up the save file before attempting this.
Performing the glitch is done in the same way as the Master Librarian glitch, but this time in a Save Room. Initiating Sword Brothers and then saving allows the player to open the pause menu during the save operation; altering Alucard's equipment and then exiting the pause menu will result in a corrupted save. Equipping the Axe Lord Armor is often seen as a good way to trigger this.
The game is then reset; if the save file loads at all, it will probably be corrupted. It is normal for the map to become scrambled and virtually useless if this glitch is performed.
This is often used in tool-assisted speedruns to achieve a state where the game confuses the inventory and map completion data, allowing for a buffering error that lets the player complete the game just by switching their inventory around in a specific way.
Item Data[]
| Item Data: Sword Brothers | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Image | Name - Game Type - Users Description |
Attributes / Consume | Statistics / Sell | Found | Notes | |||
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| Summons Sword Brothers | Attrib: Cut Consume: 30 MP |
ATT +20 |
Buy: $6,000 Find: Obtain the Sword Familiar. Then either purchase Magic Scroll 8 (DXC-only) or successfully perform the action (...) |
Sequence: With Sword Familiar press ↓↘→↗↑ (hold), ↓ + [Attack] Effect: Damages all enemies on screen | ||||