I beat Order of Ecclesia for the first time today, it was a neat game and I generally liked it, though grinding for sidequest items and glyphs got tedious at times (not sure if it was better or worse than grinding the cards in Circle of the Moon, which is the only other Castlevania game I've fully beaten). The glyph system was fun to mess around with even if I got complacent and spammed Nitesco once I got it. I also really liked Shanoa and I was legitimately surprised by the twists and turns involving Albus. Also while Dracula's fight was fun and exploring his castle was also pretty neat, I think Barlowe stole the show in terms of villains and that the game peaked with his boss fight. His hammy voice lines, his batshit insane fighting style, that fucking punch combo, I feel like even when I immerse myself further in the series, it's still going to stick out as one of my favorite fights.

Not sure where to go from here: I'm thinking about going back to either the first game (got filtered by what I think was an underwater cave) or the fourth (got sidetracked by other games and never went back lmao) and finishing them, but I'm also contemplating Symphony of the Night since it seems to be one of the biggest defining games in the series.