#at this point sotn is less a game and more of an idea

[ariaofsorrows]

yall want an adaptation of symphony of the night, but yall want maria to get possessed, yall do not like ayami kojima’s designs, yall can’t handle richter being a little annoying, yall can’t handle alucard being nerfed, yall cant let go of trevor and sypha-

[beevean]

https://gizmodo.com/castlevania-nocturne-interview-spoilers-alucard-annette-1850892875

This is an interview that for once is not only with Deats but with Clive Bradely as well, Nocturne's writer and Ellis' replacement.

Before I start, I love how they talk about *that* ending like it's the hypest thing to ever hype. They know. They know what the fans only care about.

It ends with a clear and ready indicator that team is ready to tackle arguably the most iconic Castlevania narrative of all time, Symphony of the Night, as Richter and his allies find themselves bolstered in the darkest hour by the arrival of a familiar face… well, to us, at least, even if our young heroes aren’t as up on their Castlevania lore as gamers are.

Fucking peak. I love it. The gang is ready to tackle the SoTN story because even though they were about to die badly, after losing Tera, Alucard is there to save the day. Goddamnit if you suck his dick any harder you'll vacuum it off his body.

Also lol and lmao they cannot adapt SoTN at all. Where is Richter grappling with the fear that after killing Dracula his life is now done, making him easy prey for Shaft's manipulations? None of this can happen. Dracula isn't even around!

The character of Annette, trapped in a castle, made me think of Esmeralda in The Hunchback of Notre Dame—this extraordinary woman who sweeps into France. It seemed an obvious step to make Annette a revolutionary from St. Domingue/Haiti on that sort of model.

This... sure is a train of thought. I'll just say N!Annette fucking wishes she had Esmeralda's charisma.

Later we had a Haitian adviser on board, Cècile Accilien, who helped us with aspects of the history and culture. We wanted it to be as authentic and grounded in reality as possible.

oh god no spinning i'm wheezing

If i was Mrs. Accilien I'd be offended by how the character named after me can't even be a proper wise guide without degenerating into "your entire self is rooted into being a slave" and "those stupid frenchies will never understand our pain, so don't bother expecting empathy from your boo", but what do I know

also yeah sure it's realistic how Annette uses the power of her gods to run away from slavery

I just loved the idea of Richter’s grandfather as this bitter old guy who’s been through hell, lost his magic (which at the point they meet is also true of Richter)—kind of the opposite of Richter, or an image of how Richter could end up if he doesn’t evolve into the hero he needs to be.

Fuck off. I've already ranted about this. My poor man Juste deserves better than being "that one stupid asshole that exists as a warning".

I just wanted to add that Juste is a really special inclusion in the series for me, and Clive brought him into the show in a really great way that resonates really well with the Castlevania fan in me.

"wah i'm so glad juste was included in my story as a cynical fuck to be bullied, for meeeee 🥺 i'm such a big fan guys 🥺🥺🥺"

I don't like Deats. I know it's mean of me, but the more I read him talk, the less I like him as a person, he's just so conceited. I don't know who is the bigger hack between him and Flynn now.

So there’s almost a bit of a debate about Alucard’s design and whether he has intended to have pale blonde hair or white hair in Symphony of the Night based on the artwork of him and even his character’s sprite in the game. At the time of designing him in the original series, though, I decided to lean towards the pale blonde hair in order to invoke his mother, which was appropriate to the story. His hair got more saturated during lighting/compositing than I had ever intended, though, which was a constant frustration of mine. But even back then I tinkered with the idea that if we were to jump forward in time, to show how time has passed by leaning more towards the white haired direction (this also had the added benefit of not being something we would have to worry about getting over-saturated during lighting!).

Well, there you have it. N!Alucard's hair got lighter in-universe. I wonder if he changed color naturally or he decided to change his appearance.

for Nocturne, we wanted to invoke his SOTN look while also reflecting that this is a version of him that’s been awake and fighting for 300 years

Mhh. So I was right. He did live on for 300 years and witness his friends' death, abandoning his castle and village and Trevor's descendants to fight by himself. I'll make sure to judge this decision once S2 comes out.

[maxwell-grant]

Having asked your thoughts on designing Frankenstein's daemon, might I now ask your thoughts on bringing Count Dracula from the written word into illustration? (I'm definitely in favour of the 'Hairy Old Mountain Man of Horror pretending he's people' look from the original novel; one of the small tests too many Draculas fail to pass is an absolutely tragic lack of the Evil Beard and/or Wicked Moustache explicitly described by Mr Stoker).

Unlike with Frankenstein, where I think the design needs to be painstakingly thought out in order to achieve the best balance of the creature's traits for horror and tragedy alike, I think with Dracula you can actually just take an approach of "whatever works". Because as I mentioned before, I think much of the appeal and longevity of Dracula is how the character's both a layered villain as well as a shapeshifting narrative force that can be tailored to whatever you want to do with. Granted, there are bad or dissappointing Dracula designs, of course there are, but in regards to the leeway you get for reinterpretation, you get a lot more of it with Dracula than with other literary icons.

Like with Frankenstein, I'm gonna bring up how I'd tackle a less grim, more comedy-centric Dracula first, one that's less a force of horror and more of a charismatic villain, and I think to that end I definitely agree that people are sleeping a lot on the hairy old man barely-passing-off-as-humanoid of the original story. Despite very much loving these performers, I'm actually not a fan of takes that mold Dracula too closely to people who've portrayed him, like Bela Lugosi and Christopher Lee, partially because I think it's a waste of an opportunity to create your own Dracula design. Since I can't draw (yet), I'll do what I usually do and make a board of images to try and convey some of my thoughts on one way I'd design Dracula.

(Pictured: Kiwi's design for Dracula, Hotel Transylvania concept art, Nandor, Castlevania Dracula, Charles Dance in Dracula Untold, Vladislav, a Transylvanian rug)

I used the images in my other Dracula post and I’ll post it here again because I absolutely adore @kiwibyrd's designs for Dracula and it's main heroes, in particular I love the way it strikes a good balance at making sure Dracula looks distinctly separate from the humans, but not too much that he couldn't conceivably operate in society as just a harmless old man. I also adore the mustache and bushy eyebrows and pointy ears and I think these three are wonderful features to keep on any Dracula design. I'm also very partial to the Hotel Transylvania concept art, even if it makes me incredibly depressed to look at all the great designs they had for Dracula that they threw in the trash because they somehow decided making him look like Adam Sandler was the idea to go with.

I deeply adore What We Do In The Shadows, both the movie and the show, and Jemaine Clement's Vladislav is one of my favorite (maybe even my actual favorite) on-screen Draculas. But I also enjoy Nandor just as much, and I think it's really great that as a character he's completely different from Vlad while also being ostensibly a take on Dracula, and in particular I bring up his Jersey look because "Dracula in common clothing" is a criminally underrated concept for a joke.

As a character, I'm very partial to comedy takes on Dracula that play him up as a decadent aristocratic supervillain, the kind that can get away with talking in third person. I also have this idea for a version of Dracula who dresses ostentatiously in finely-broidered Romanian or Transylvanian patterns, maybe even wearing a rug as a cape, claiming that he's carrying the legacy of his people on his back. And of course he's lying, he's not Vlad Tepes and he's not even Romanian, he is just a parasite pretending to have a history to be proud of, but good luck getting him to admit that. And finally, I'd like this version to be played by Charles Dance, and I consider it a tremendous crime against humanity that he has yet to play Dracula proper even despite being in a film with the character's name on the title.

So that's kinda how I would design a take on Dracula for something more comedic or more based around him as this guest character and personality on-set. Now, if we're talking a more serious version, I think the possibilities increase, and I won't be getting into all of them because I may prefer to keep them to myself, but I'll elaborate a few ideas.

For example, the edition of Dracula I personally own comes with these really scratchy, really creepy B&W illustrations related to the story, that I can't find scanned online so I'm uploading them here so you can look at. They don't necessarily depict the scenes but rather some of the story's moments, like Van Helsing staking Lucy, Renfield in a straightjacket, Dracula as a coachman, and they are more focused on conveying the horror of the concepts at play.

Dracula never looks the same way in any of the illustrations, in fact you kinda have to piece him out of them by trying to find teeth or capes or eyes or bat-features to see where he's hiding this time. In the first, it's the half-man half-bat, in the 2nd, he's the shrieking bat silhouette next to Renfield, and in the latter, he's the gaping jaws and eerily humanoid eyes in the wolf. The effect to me almost feels like if you were to look at a bunch of tv static and then see a humanoid shape form for a split second before everything went back to normal, something like you'd get from Slender Man or other modern creepypastas, and I’ve argued before that Dracula’s form of horror is a very modern one. 

In terms of illustrations of Dracula that keep up the original traits while still pulling off horror, I definitely have to hand it to the one at the left of the image above, drawn by regourso on Deviantart (account deleted at present). Going back to Castlevania’s many takes on Dracula, two in particular that stick out to me would be Castlevania: Judgment’s armored dress Dracula, who’s got this great twisted heart/rose motif going on in his outfit, and Dracula’s final form in SOTN where he just sits in his throne and his cape twists into all these monsters, particularly how it’s depicted by witnesstheabsurd’s depiction. 

I’m not particularly a fan of how Dracula’s “final form” in these games is usually just some big demon, and part of what I like about his final form in SOTN instead is that, while it’s not a particularly challenging final boss, I do find it interesting the idea of us never actually getting to see what Dracula’s true final form looks like, only an ever-shifting pitch-black torrent of teeth and claws and bloody veins pouring out because that’s ultimately what Dracula is and brings to the world.

On the flip-side of the rotten old monster, we have the charming seductor Dracula, and while I’m really not a fan of how various adaptations have convinced people that “the point” of Dracula is that he’s a seductive force and an allegory for Victorian xenophobia and I’m reeeally even less of a fan of adaptations that make Dracula some misunderstood tragic hero (and I think I’ve made rather violently clear my feelings on interpretations that play up a romance between him and Mina), that the seductive force part exists is impossible to deny, so conversely, while on one hand we can have Dracula as the gargantuan whirlwind of predatory violence, we can also go for Dracula as the tantalizing lover.

I’ve seen a lot of opinions proclaiming Frank Langella as the best Dracula because he was the best at actually being seductive while still playing Dracula, although I haven’t yet seen his performances. If I had to point at one picture I look at and do buy for a second the idea of Dracula as a romantic character, it would be that particular still of Raul Julia in the left of the above image. And it’s strange for me to think of Raul Julia as attractive because I mainly associate him with his brilliant comedy performance of M.Bison (I know it’s far from the highlight of his career but, look, I grew up with Street Fighter, I can’t help it) but those eyes are definitely looking pretty convincing to me, if nothing else. 

And I’ve included this still of Sebastian Stan in the right because, during a conversation between me, @krinsbez and @jcogginsa about who could be a good fit for Dracula, jcog suggested Sebastian Stan, partially because he’s Romanian, and I’ve learned recently that Stan was actually interested in playing the character in Blumhouse’s upcoming remake. And you’d think I’d hate this idea  considering how much I don’t care for tragic anti-hero Draculas, but who says that’s what he’d have to play? 

Do you have any idea how much actors, who are traditionally known for heroic or supporting roles, usually LOVE it when you give them a chance to cut loose as the main villain?

I’d want Sebastian Stan to put all of his charm, all of his talent, all of his good looks and etc, into playing the absolute most vicious, bloodthirsty and irredeemable Dracula put on screen. Someone who is exceedingly, eerily good at being a lovable protagonist, who’s all smiles and charming eyes and politeness mannerisms and maybe even a funny accent, and then it isn't as funny when he's flying through your window intent on kidnapping babies to feed to his brides, except he may take a moment or two to do so because he's feeling pretty hungry himself right now.

Now, admittedly this is kind of a lot to juggle in regards to a single character, which is why my answer for questions like these inevitably has to be “depends on what I’m going for”. That being said, if I was going to try and cast someone who I think could both look the part of Dracula, as well as respectively, play “cartoon aristocrat” Dracula, “mercurial embodiment of evil” Dracula, as well as realistically be an attractive, even seductive performer who can charm viewers even as the character descends into horrible villainy, and juggle these performances even?

I think I’d have to go with Mads Mikkelsen. Not specifically because of Hannibal (I actually haven’t watched it yet), although it’s definitely a factor, the thing that actually made me pick him specifically is, other than his looks, his voice, his reputation for playing sinister characters, the fact that he loves the role and wants to play it, or how many people are deeply in love with this man, or that people already joke that he looks like a vampire, was watching him in Another Round, and specifically that glorious final scene where he’s just dancing to his heart’s content and just, moving with such spring in his step and such joyful vitality even though he’s past his mid-fifties, and that was the moment where, in regards to how much you all love this man, I went

And now I am going to add “casting Mads Mikkelsen as a dancing Dracula” to The List of Reasons Why I Became a Filmmaker.

[veratok]

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐓𝐖𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐘-𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐒𝐓 𝐂𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐔𝐑𝐘.     as alucard has lived a long, long life, he has gathered many experiences up to this point. looking at his life in the modern era (anywhere from 2000~2021+ in this headcanon), its pretty important for me to outline where exactly he is and what he is doing. as i am divergent, and don’t ENTIRELY follow the game series going from post-sotn, i have some of my own ideas for who alucard is.   

huge disclaimer: to any cv blogs following that are from ecclesia onward, the story of the more recent games is neat and all, but to be honest, i don’t vibe with it 100% of the way. a lot of it has to do with the debatable canonicity, but also the fact that i don’t want to write aos and dos stuff all the time. which, to be honest, takes place in the future so i don’t have to! in my opinion, i don’t actually super like bloodlines because... well, i’m a dracula nerd, and it kind of takes dracula lore in a really weird way. therefore, in my canon, for roleplay purposes, the whole aos and dos storylines are kind of warped except for the idea that alucard would absolute be buddies with the entire belmont family tree past richter. but that’s framing up to be a whole different topic to talk about at this point.

𝟏.   𝐃𝐇𝐀𝐌𝐏𝐈𝐑𝐈𝐒𝐌     :     in the modern era, vampirism and the occult is often times more depicted as an ancient superstition, and even so is still considered monstrous and an idea of horror, so, outside his connections to the belmont lineage, the idea of him being a dhampir is largely under disguise. starting from around the edwardian era, alucard has largely been disguising himself in the image of his father, adopting less “flashy” form in order to keep himself out of the public eye. however, being insanely tall and beautiful, that doesn’t keep eyes off of him. there are a few he has met in his years who he has shared his existence with, but for the most part, he does not disclose this at all, and goes to efforts to keep it a secret. in the twenty-first century, alucard’s dhampirism is almost indetectable, unless sourced by those who can sense such things. his teeth are straight, not pointed, hair is to his shoulders, and a dark, black color, and his eyes are also black, not yellow. he does not utilize his powers the same way he had in the past, and makes an effort to not display any of his true strength or speed. even in the comfort of knowing company, he is quiet, calm, and does not “relax” this effort of disguising himself. it’s become natural, and he feels nearly human.

𝟐.   𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐀𝐒     :     in almost a nod to his parentage, alucard’s aliases range in many ways. his most-used name, the one known by the belmont family and often used in introducing himself to others, he is called  alucard cronqvist,  using his father’s family name. he never uses adrian, and, to this day, the only people awarded the right to even use it remain to be his mother, his father, and trevor belmont. adrian is not his “true name,” but a person he no longer is. he is alucard, and that is his “true” name. other aliases he is known to use are often variants of the first names  alucard, mathias/matyas, or auguste   and the surnames   cronqvist, kardos, and belmont.     for now, he does frequently use the moniker  a. cronqvist  in his daily dealings.

𝟑.     𝐎𝐂𝐂𝐔𝐏𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍     :     other than the fact that he helps slay beasts that mean to do humankind harm? his occupational income sees more charity than it does his own wallet, to be honest, but he does has a “job.” i say job, but lets be real, alucard does not have a job. even if the idea of him working at mcdonalds is really funny. the belmonts are fairly self-sufficient in terms of money, and being their eternal patron, alucard has never asked for much for them. he has his own income, and he has been building it since the 1800s, mostly by... establishing himself then as a land-owner, and still, to this day, does manage this land acting as the descendant owner. the land is fairly old, and well-kept, and alucard does not disclose where each lot is, but it is well-maintained. several of his locations are used as wedding or tourist destinations, while some are still lived-on today, and he has both sold and acquired much property in his life. not using the money for many of his means has allowed this to accrue greatly, and, given that he lives fairly humbly, with some exceptions, he really has become a quiet, unbothered king.

𝟒.     𝐇𝐎𝐁𝐁𝐈𝐄𝐒     :     there are times when alucard is too busy to do much else, but when he does have any free time, it is usually spent continuing a passion of his father and his own from the old, old days: the pursuit of knowledge. alucard’s patronage of the arts is unending, and as for material knowledge, he does frequently find new things to study, if not dive deeper into the things he already has interest in. he is a professional in no field, but possesses knowledge in small amounts for many, many fields: however, places where he is best suited are usually in the realms of science and associated humanities. in the latest decade, alucard has continued his passion for science, and can often be found somewhere, somehow associated with latest advancements in medicine.

𝟓.     𝐅𝐀𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐎𝐍     :     while seeing alucard dressed to the nines in his traditional wear would be wonderful, he, sadly, does not dress the same way he did centuries ago. it’s a pity. in the modern era, alucard tends to keep himself immaculately dressed, having a weak spot for finery, which means that jewelry, brocade, and leather are all still very much high on his list of vices. on the average day, he can be found wearing fine suits, a few rings, a necklace, a bracelet, and a watch, all impossibly expensive. when not working, or making any public appearances, even in the comfort of his own home, he tends to spoil himself in rich fabrics, long silken robes, articles of clothing purchased right off the latest designs that suit his fancy. it is pretty shallow of him... but shiny things just really draw his eye, and feel so nice on his skin.

[miloscat]

[Review] Castlevania: Circle of the Moon (GBA)

It’s the silly season, so time to catch up on vaning some castles.

Circle of the Moon (stupidly called simply “Castlevania” in PAL territories) is the first game in the series to take after the gameplay style of Symphony of the Night. To get in the mood, I played the SotN Saturn port’s Maria mode for the first time, but it’s not worth doing a full review for that as it didn’t change my opinion of the game. It helped contextualise this one though, which is a different team trying to replicate the success of the first game in the series to strike into a more exploratory mode.

As such it’s a successful if basic take on the formula. It’s kind of refreshing not to be overloaded with gimmicks like SotN or other successors are. There’s just one garden-variety castle, no shop, no alternate character modes, and one major gameplay system: the DSS (more on that in a bit). It can feel too basic at times though, with recoloured enemies and castle environments that lack variety. There’s slightly more of a focus on platforming, so it’s good that dash and double jump abilities are frontloaded, and the late game superjump feels great and lets you clear out all the collectible health/MP/heart boosts. Otherwise getting stronger is a matter of grinding for experience points.

Now, the DSS involves collecting two sets of cards as rare drops from specific monsters, then combining one of each set to give an effect, such as increased damage or a familiar companion. It’s a fine idea that encourages experimentation, but it can feel limiting to only have one effect active at a time from such a big range of potential spells, and it’s fiddly to change. Plus getting new cards basically requires a guide, as there’s no way to know where you’ll get the next one from.

Another factor I appreciated about this game that possibly stems from it being from a new team is that they don’t simply reuse monster sprites from SotN/Rondo of Blood, which can get tiring in later games. Graphically, everything here is original and while the animations are perhaps less detailed (again, basic is the watchword) it still fits the Castlevania look, particularly those lovely faceless human characters.

Speaking of them, the plot... there’s not much there. Camilla the vampiress has abruptly revived Dracula, and equally abruptly they’re confronted by some Belmont-style vampire hunter expies. You are Nathan Graves, prodigal whipper-guy and apprentice to an old bloke. His son is your hot-blooded shonen rival and you find your relationship strained over the game’s events. It’s an adequate story and nothing more, with a “gaiden” feel due to its evasion of established lore and characters.

I’m glad this one exists as a stepping stone to establishing the exploration and RPG mechanics of SotN as a viable new avenue of growth for the franchise, but it is somewhat unremarkable in other ways (and the characters are boring). I enjoyed playing it, and found it satisfying. I hit a difficulty wall at a certain point, and it was fun to try and force through it before eventually finding a way around it. That’s what these game are all about! That and whipping a bunch of skellingtons.

[shyguycity]

Goty 2019

Hey. It’s game of the year 2019 baby. By now you know the kinda justice we seek on these streets, so no long-winded introductions, except to remind you that these aren’t reviews, and honorable mentions have been moved down to the bottom this year because we're evolving.

12. Super Kirby Clash (Switch) - A free to play online Kirby spinoff centered around combat that features microtransactions sounds like an awful idea on paper, and yet it’s somehow my most played multiplayer game of 2019. I won’t try and present the game as anything more than what it is, which is basically a very (very very very!) simplified, arcade-y Monster Hunter game with a very (very very very very!) cute aesthetic. But as a recent convert to Monster Hunter and a longtime Kirby lobbyist, it turns out that that’s all I need to play a game for nearly 100 hours. The four classes all have varied abilities, gameplay and roles to play, and there’s nothing more satisfying than freezing time as the mage in the middle of an enemy’s jumping animation. I found the microtransactions to be completely fair, as I spent around 10 dollars total on the game and never found myself hurting for apples (the game’s main currency and the only one you can buy with real money) to upgrade my equipment. This isn’t a game I would be able to recommend to everyone, but if it’s your type of thing then it’s going to be very much your type of thing.

*Image credit: 505 games

11. Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night (Switch/PS4/Xbox One/PC) - Despite horrible first impressions from my backer copy of the Switch version, Bloodstained really ended up delivering the true Castlevania: Symphony of the Night successor it promised to be, and I had a fantastic time with it (after trading in my Switch version and begrudgingly purchasing a PS4 copy). While I love almost all of the Castlevania games in their own ways, even the best entries post-SotN didn’t end up feeling much like SotN. Bloodstained, meanwhile, wears its inspiration on its sleeve. Or rather on its wolf hood and gas mask combo.

Obscure, bizarre, and goofy secrets are around every single corner of the castle. I mean, like, really esoteric ones that I can’t imagine having found without a guide. From the myriad of hidden (and very challenging!) boss fights, to trophies popping for playing a piano while having a fair familiar out to entire sprite based areas, the surprises never stop being thrown at the player. It adds so much goofball flavor to the game that’s missing from just about any other entry in the genre, and it does the brunt work in giving this game its identity.

Not only are the secrets plentiful and good, but the combat is also excellent; much like a couple entries in the latter Castlevania games, just about every single enemy in Bloodstained has a chance of dropping you a shard upon defeat, and each one gives your character Miriam a new ability. Some of these are simple passive buffs, while others completely change your combat options. From ghostly portrait guardians to giant dentist drills coming out of your hand to summoning disembodied dragon’s heads, the shard system is never not entertaining, and leaves the player so much room for experimentation and realizing their ideal build it’s actually a wonder they were able to bug test this thing at all. And truly, the main issues holding Bloodstained back from true greatness are its technical issues. Which is a shame, and seemingly an issue on all platforms. But if you can handle a hard crash here or there, you’re in for a treat.

10. Fire Emblem: Three Houses (Switch) - I never thought I would care at all for any Fire Emblem game. Certainly, I saw the appeal of them prior to Three Houses, but they just never seemed like something I would want to devote a lot of time to. But putting the game in a school setting and recontextualizing your soldiers as students really made a huge difference for me, and I bonded with the characters in the game in a way I normally reserve for my Pokemon teams. And unlike Pokemon, I can marry my students, which is beautiful and horrifying.

There are definitely issues with Three Houses. A silent protagonist has no right starring in a game like this, especially with all the emotional story beats the game is trying to pull off. The writing in general was also all over the place, ranging from odd decisions with both the characters as well as the overarching story (some of this is remedied by replaying the game multiple times and going down different routes, but I put 60 hours into the game and couldn’t even finish two paths, so that’s a bit unrealistic). Lastly, the monastery that serves as your school needs just a tad more variety in activities to do in between the battles, as what started out as my favorite part of the game became a chore for the last dozen or so hours.

All of that said, I am anxiously waiting for the sequel, as the foundation that’s been put down here could lead to something truly special. As it stands, this is the best secret Harry Potter game ever made, and that alone is going to have a lot of appeal to a lot of people.

*Image credit: Gamespot

9. Resident Evil 2 (PS4/Xbox One/PC) - Truly, I have never been more stressed out when playing a game than the first time I had to start dealing with Mr. X. Yes, on each subsequent playthrough (of which I did many!) and even encounter he became less of a threat and more of an annoyance, but much like a good horror movie, that first time will remain embedded in my brain as one of my most memorable gaming moments.

And that kinda sums up Resident Evil 2 as a whole for me. An amazing, unforgettable start in the police station, followed by a somewhat middling second act in the sewers, and ending on kind of a weirdly short whimper in a very tonally different setting than the rest of the game. And that’s without getting into how disappointingly similar the “B” playthroughs of either character were to their “A” counterparts. It was all still great, mind you, and the gameplay and scares remained excellent throughout. But man was that first act in the police station something truly special, and I’m hopeful that the eventual remake of 3 keeps more of that tone throughout.

8. Pokemon Sword/Pokemon Shield (Switch) - Cutting hundreds of Pokemon was pretty close to the bottom of my list of concerns going into the latest Pokemon. The series hasn’t really grabbed me in a major way since Black and White on the DS almost 9(!) years ago, and I had largely accepted the idea that I was finally growing out of the franchise. While this 8th generation of Pokemon titles is far, far from perfect, and in fact doubles down on a lot of the aspects I don’t like about modern Pokemon games, Sword has become my favorite entry in the series in a very long time.

This is down to two things: my favorite batch of new Pokes the series has ever had (Galarian Farfetch’d, my prince............) and the introduction of multiplayer coop content with raids. The former is subjective I suppose (but seriously, Galarian Farfetch’d), and the appeal of the raids is going to be dictated by how into repetitive content you are and if you have people to raid with. I’m fortunate enough to love repetitive tasks in video games, especially repetitive tasks that amount to fighting and capturing giant monsters for rewards, and to have a partner to enjoy those repetitive tasks with. We lost entire weekends to hunting down new raid opportunities in Sword, and this feels like the first major step the series has taken in nearly a decade to try and reengage me in a meaningful way.

And don’t get me wrong: Pokemon has a long way to go to bring me entirely back into the fold. The dungeons are nonexistent, the routes are largely completely straightforward affairs, the post game content is so light that “barebones” feels like a generous descriptor, and the performance issues in the wild area (the game’s more open, free roaming space) are inexcusably awful when played online. I hope by the time the 9th generation games roll around that we’ll get a bigger advancement than what’s been seen here, but to me, this feels like an all around better made product than any of the 3DS entries, with or without Galarian Farfetch’d.

7. Risk of Rain 2 (Switch/PS4/Xbox One/PC) - The original Risk of Rain is a personal all-time favorite, so seeing the developers successfully make the jump from 2D to 3D while still maintaining everything I love about the first game is a truly remarkable feat. Both games sport essentially MMO-lite combat with abilities dictated by cooldowns and items that you get from chests and bosses, with rogue-like progression and permadeath. That’s a lot of jargon even for me talking about video games, so essentially: keep shooting things and powering up by grabbing items and defeating bosses, and when you’re dead you’re dead (bar a specific item), rinse and repeat.

It’s deceptively simple while being endlessly replayable. The true fun comes in when playing with other people, as every character plays completely differently, and figuring out builds for each person on the fly is extremely fun and rewarding. This also means that if you start getting bored of one character, simply play a different one on your next run. Add in an extremely moody sci-fi aesthetic (including one of my favorite soundtracks of the year) and that’s Risk of Rain.

The main issue with Risk of Rain 2 at this point is that it’s simply unfinished, and won’t even have an actual ending state until spring of 2020. This doesn’t hamper my enjoyment of the game much, hence it being on this list, but I imagine a lot of people would be bothered by it. The developers have done a great job of updating the game at a decent pace so far though, and every major patch has come with a new character, among a ton of other things. And if I’ve already gotten this much enjoyment out of an early access title, it’s exciting to think about a feature complete version down the line. And hopefully that feature complete version of Risk of Rain 2 includes the Chef character from the first game *ahem*.

6. Astral Chain (Switch) - In a year full of some real dang weird yet shockingly great games, Astral Chain stands tall as probably the weirdest surprise of them all. You’re a future cop fighting invisible ghost demons from an alternate dimension with your own invisible ghost demon chained to you through some high tech handcuffs. That’s just the first half hour of the game, and it ratchets up the anime nonsense many magnitudes over in the course of its 20ish hour runtime. And it’s great and stupid.

It’s not just the plot that’s over the top, though. Coming from developer Platinum Games, renowned for their nonstop super sweaty action portfolio, Astral Chain spends just as much time tasking the player with exploring its world, characters, and lore as it does asking you to punch enemies the size of skyscrapers (or bigger). It’s a formula that works shockingly well, as I found myself enjoying the downtime segments just as much, if not more, than the action portions of the game. And the action that is there doesn’t really play like your typical Devil May Cry or Bayonetta, either; the player character, while critical to pulling off combos and the like, is not your primary damage dealer, with that role being fulfilled by your five “legions” (the aforementioned ghost demon buddies), all of which have different strengths, weaknesses and abilities. The gameplay ends up feeling kind of like a realtime Pokemon game by way of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, and no sentence I’ve ever written has been as cool as that one.

I do think Astral Chain falls a bit short in the combat department, at least compared to other games in the genre. It’s a bit too simplified, despite how crazy looking and overwhelming the actions you and your legions end up doing can be, and I think that the obligatory Platinum-style grading system in this is very poor - it doesn’t seem to grade overall performance so much as it just wants you to constantly be switching your legions in the midst of battle. Which is a great lesson to teach your players, but I would also like if anything else about my combat performance seemed to have significant weight on my grade. Having said all that, it’s a flaw that I found much easier to overlook in the midst of battle when I sent my wolf legion ahead of me, biting and tearing its way through a cluster of enemies, while I hung back inside of my punching legion, finally able to fulfill my years-long Star Platinum “ora ora ora” fantasies.

5. Anodyne 2: Return to Dust (PC) - There’s a lot going on in Anodyne 2, and I fear trying to describe it in words, not only because of all the jargon I’d inevitably have to use, but also because I’m not sure I can do the game justice. To that end, here’s a brief trailer of the game to get you started:

If you find that trailer at all intriguing, Anodyne 2 is definitely for you. And if you’re still skeptical, know that the game has far more to offer than just its (beautiful) low-poly aesthetic. While visually it’s obviously most evoking Playstation 1 era games such as Mega Man Legends, in terms of the tone of its writing it strikes a pretty peculiar balance between Earthbound and Nier: Automata (names I do not invoke lightly!). The visuals aren’t just an aesthetic choice, either - throughout the game you find yourself in 2D overhead areas, solving puzzles inside of the minds of other characters, and these varying layers of abstraction serve to further the game’s message and atmosphere. And it’s all of these things combined that pushed Anodyne 2 over the edge of “memorable” and into the realm of “haunting” for me.

It’s a game that wants to be played and experienced by everyone; you can tell how much love was put into every single corner of the world, every line of dialogue, and each and every single goofy joke. Steven Universe (another seeming inspiration of the developers) is the only other piece of media that has reminded me of just how lost and alone I’ve felt at various stages of life, while choosing not to dwell on that and instead using it as a launching pad to remind me of just how far I’ve come. As the game itself says, Anodyne 2 is a game about life, and I’ve rarely come across one that felt so full of it.

4. Judgment (PS4) - With the release of Yakuza 0 a couple of years ago, the Yakuza games went from a series I was vaguely aware of in my periphery to maybe my all-time favorite video game comfort food. They’re silly, melodramatic, sad, and beautiful, tonally swinging back and forth like a large imposing guard wildly trying to hit Kiryu with a couch section. Most importantly, they manage to feel heartfelt and personal in an age where high budget games seldom feel anything of the sort. I was initially hesitant, then, to play a spinoff that threw aside its entire cast of established characters for a crew that dabbles in detective and lawyer work; I didn’t think there was much of a chance that this new band of very handsome crimeboys with hearts of gold would be able to compare to Kiryu, Majima and the like. How glad I was to be wrong, as Judgment is now maybe my favorite of the Yakuza games I’ve played.

By pulling further out (but not completely away) from the culture of organized crime as the central driving factor of the story, you no longer need to memorize a dozen different yakuza organizations and all of their subsidiaries and patriarchs within, nor do you have to try and remember which side is feuding with who. And that isn’t to say that the story doesn’t have just as many twists and turns; it does, and despite the larger scale of the stakes, ends up feeling more focused and personal. I also found it easy to bond with the two main characters, Yagami and Kaito, as not only do their personalities play off of each other very well, but they simply share more screentime together than I’ve ever seen Kiryu get a chance to do with anyone. Truly, the story ended up being one of my favorites in the entire medium, and I fell in love with the characters to the point where I got misty eyed during the credits.

With regards to gameplay, it’s a Yakuza game. Which means a lot of running around Kamurocho, talking and shopping and playing minigames and brawling. Since the player character in this entry is a detective, there are various mechanics and events related to the profession, such as investigating crime scenes and tailing suspects, but they’re by far the weakest part of the game, and you shouldn’t come to this game looking for incredible detective gameplay. Instead, come to the game for literally everything else it offers, because it’s a fantastic experience all around, and a great jumping on point for anyone unfamiliar with Yakuza.

*Image credit: Steam user Symbol

3. Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (PS4/Xbox One/PC) - Frankly, I did not much care for Sekiro for the majority of my first play through. Specifically, I dreaded its boss fights. To go from the sheer joy of being able to dispatch a courtyard full of enemies in any way I pleased in the game’s relatively free form stealth sections, to being killed in a matter of two or three hits to every single boss and miniboss was frustrating; how could I not groan when I started that duel with Genichiro at the top of the castle, knowing full well that I was going to be stuck there for a few (or more) frustrating hours? It wasn’t until the fight against the protagonist’s father figure, Owl, hours later at the same location as the aforementioned Genichiro fight, that something clicked. It only took around 30 hours, but suddenly, instead of approaching the situation like a Dark Souls or Bloodborne boss, I was not only being defensive, but I was being aggressively defensive, parrying nearly every single blow. Suddenly it was me standing in place, baiting out my opponent’s attacks only to throw the force of his own momentum back at him. Suddenly combat made sense in this damn game. And suddenly I was dead again in a quick three hits after inhaling some magic gas that prevented me from being able to heal. But that was ok! Because suddenly this game was amazing, and suddenly I had completed it four times and adored every second of it (except for that fucken four form final boss with no checkpoints).

I still stand by my (and a lot of other’s) original complaint that the disparity between the freedom offered in the rest of the game compared to the unflinchingly rigid roadmap you have to follow in fighting the bosses is jarring game design, and it’s very fun to imagine a version of Sekiro that lets you approach bosses any which way you like. On the other hand, no other game that I’ve ever played, not even Sekiro’s predecessor and my favorite game of this console generation, Bloodborne, has come anywhere close to making me feel this cool when fighting bosses. And that’s a mighty impressive accomplishment on any game’s part, speaking from the perspective of an overweight, sweaty, hairy, very uncool man.

But really, fuck that final boss though.

2. Dragon Quest Builders 2 (Switch/PS4/PC) - When we were around 10-years-old, one of my best friends, Patrick, used to host fairly regular Lego-building sleepovers, where everyone built whatever they wanted, and our creations were then showcased to the rest of the group. Being that the group consisted entirely of pre-pubescent boys, this meant building various robots or cars, all of variable quality/ability to stand upright. During one of these nights, in lieu of the usual deathbot piloted by the ghost minifig, I instead constructed a little bunker for the ghost - a place where, after a long day of being forced (by me) to pilot his mech suit and commit unspeakable acts, he could hang up his ghost hat and be forced (by me) to ponder the morality of his actions. It was just a tiny little room with the necessities: bed, table, bookshelves and pizza, but when presenting it to my friends I proudly declared that the bunker was also located at the bottom of the ocean, a factor that couldn’t be visually represented due to the harsh limits of time, Lego pieces and my ability. I was pretty proud of my cool-down chamber, but if memory serves correctly, it was Patrick’s no doubt boorish creation that was the apple of everyone’s eye. And who am I to try and convince a room full of my peers that actually, a secluded room where you could read in peace for all eternity was much cooler than a punching gorilla bot?

This is all to say that I have never been a creative type, especially when it comes to building. I had previously played Minecraft and the first Dragon Quest Builders, and while I enjoyed them, there wasn’t quite enough there to make me want to engage with them on a level beyond just playing them like any other game - I don’t think I ever built anything in DQB1 that wasn’t required for the sake of progression in the main story, and the less said about my Minecraft efforts the better. Builders 2 expertly sidesteps this issue by wrapping its building mechanics around an engaging and hearfelt story (I got teary-eyed multiple times!), great characters (especially the main character’s mysterious best friend/partner in crime, Malroth) and a lovely localization. It also encourages more freeform building than the previous game by tying the progression of the story to the progression of your main, customizable island. You don’t ever really have to go off into the weeds on your own in regards to building, but the game gives you so many opportunities to fill in the blanks on premade templates that you eventually just become comfortable in doing so. It’s hard to stop myself from gushing about the game, to the point where as I type this I’m questioning why it’s “only” number 2 on this list.

And thanks to DQB2, for the first time in 20 years I revisited my first creative endeavor: the underwater solitude bunker, this time no longer held back by the technology of the day, instead fully realized in digital form. Built as far down as the game would allow my character to dig, hidden beneath the still waters of a reservoir inside of a pyramid, it is truly a testament to mankind’s ingenuity. And it is wicked. Naturally I had my artist (and DQB2 fanatic) girlfriend visit my game’s world so she bask in my true brilliance. I gleefully guided her down to the catacombs and down the intimidatingly long chain that dangled into the deceptively still depths. After a brief swim into the murky unknown, we arrived at our hidden destination at the bottom of the earth, where she was greeted by the sight of my submerged masterpiece. A wry smile snaked itself around my lips, as I knew, was absolutely certain, that within seconds, once she had made it through the de-pressurization chamber at the entrance to my paradise, I would be hearing the words of someone simultaneously shocked, awed, and hopefully only a bit jealous. Instead, I was met with a few seconds of silence followed by a patronizing “Well, I’d have never thought to build something like this.”

So, I guess that’s why Builders 2 couldn’t quite reach the number one spot: true art is never appreciated in its time.

1. Hypnospace Outlaw (PC) - No piece of commercial art has ever felt like it was made for me in the way that Hypnospace Outlaw does. I grew up on the internet during the time period this game’s alternate reality take on the 90s internet is drawing its inspiration from; I have talked at length, to anyone who will listen, about how this early incarnation of the internet felt more like a physical space than it does now, and how much I miss the days of stumbling on to weird Geocities sites, meeting people in AOL chatrooms, and the early days of pirating. I met my first girlfriend through the internet, as well as my current one. The vast majority of the friends I’ve made in my life would not have happened without the internet, and not just because of distance; the internet allowed the younger me to be the person I was too insecure to be in person, and to develop my own voice. I owe who I am to the people I met in freeware fanmade Dragonball Z games and IRC chat rooms, and I think that’s kind of fucked up and magical, and it’s all kind of a miracle that I’m not even more of a mess of a person than I am today. And the developers of this game have clearly had those experiences, too.

I’m not going to sit here and tell you that Hypnospace Outlaw is for everyone, because it’s absolutely not. It’s essentially a detective game, but you’re solving cases by investigating user made internet pages circa 1997, and the “cases” you’re working on are largely things like bullying and copyright infringement. In other words, you’re mostly just reading gaudy websites and figuring out more about the back end and exploits of the Hypnospace experience. It is incredibly specific and niche and, as someone that sorely misses staying up until 3 AM downloading Winamp skins, I can’t stop thinking about this game, even months later.

I wrote a longer piece on the game on this very blog, and instead of rehashing anymore of it here, I’ll just direct you that way. Though if I may, I’d like to give one last endorsement for the game for any hypothetical person reading this that’s on the fence about trying it - if you’re the kind of person that somehow finds yourself reading this game of the year list, and have made it this far down the page without getting bored, I promise you that you’ll find something to love about Hypnospace Outlaw.

Honorable mentions (for games that were either not originally released in 2019 or I still wanted to briefly touch on):

Dragon Quest 11 S: Echoes of an Elusive Age - Definitive Edition (Switch) - Somewhere in between listing the original release of Dragon Quest 11 as my 7th favorite game of 2018 and now, it went from being “a really great JRPG” to “one of the best games I’ve ever played”, and in all honesty should have probably been at the top of last year’s list. A beautiful, unmatched experience all around.

Overcooked! 2 (Switch/PS4/Xbox One/PC) - The Overcooked games are possibly the best coop games I’ve ever played by merit of them actually requiring communication between players. Framing the game’s mechanics around cooking food, a universally understood act, is brilliant.

Baba is You (Switch/PC) - This is the most clever puzzle game I’ve ever played. Hell, it’s probably the most clever game I’ve ever played period. What prevented me from truly falling in love with it was that every single puzzle after the first couple of worlds became the hardest thing I’ve ever tried to do in my life. And while that did make solving those puzzles equally satisfying, the thought of dedicating multiple hours each to stumbling through dozens and dozens more of single screen puzzles was a bit more than I was able to handle. Still, for any puzzle fans, there are some genuinely jaw-dropping moments in this that shouldn’t be missed.

Kirby’s Dreamland 3 (Switch/SNES) - The things I didn’t like about DL3 as a single player game are exactly what makes it a great coop Kirby game, which was a way to play this game that I never had the pleasure of experiencing until this year when it was re-released on the SNES Switch app. It’s skyrocketed up my list of favorite Kirby games, as well as become my favorite SNES coop game. Also, Gooey.

Kind Words (lo fi chill beats to write to) (PC) - I don’t quite qualify this as a game, as it’s more of a message in a bottle app with a very warm and charming aesthetic. But if you’ve ever wanted to anonymously reach out to strangers and tell them things are going to be all right while listening to some calming music, this is the thing for you.

Luigi’s Mansion 3 (Switch) - I have a deep, deep fondness for all three of the Luigi’s Mansion games (the GameCube and the original game were my first launch day purchases!), and 3 is by far the best game in the series. Every single moment of it was some high degree of charming and/or cute, and it’s a game I would feel confident in recommending to just about everybody. However, while I truly loved my time with the game and will no doubt replay it years down the road, there was nothing inside of it that really left any kind of deep impression on me. It’s a summer blockbuster in a kid-friendly spooky form, and that’s great for what it is.

Super Mario Maker 2 (Switch) - Mario Maker 2, sequel to what I would consider to possibly be the best game Nintendo’s ever made, is by far and away my most disappointing game of the year. It’s still an amazing toolkit, and I’ve been very satisfied with the levels I ended up making. That said, the gaming landscape has changed a lot in the 5 years between the original and the sequel, and with Nintendo’s nigh complete silence regarding updates coming to the game, I can’t consider it to be anything but a massive disappointment. And maybe that will change! But as of this posting, there’s been almost nothing to keep me coming back to the game a mere few months into its life, and that’s a huge problem. All of that said, it’s still a fantastic game and value, especially if (like most) you didn’t get a chance to play the original due to the console it was stuck on.

[bluebeetle]

How do you hope the castlevania show handles the other games?? it seems like they arent gonna be following curse of darkness well ...

Yeah! It does seem like theyre gonna take their own direction… i suspect Dracula might still be revived by the end of it but it definitely seems like theyre trying to be smart and not have Dracula be the main villain/end villain every season which makes sense, as to viewers it can seem tiring. 

Im hoping even if they scrap most of CoD’s story,, we still get a few story beats like 

Trevor and Hector meeting–perhaps even fighting–but teaming up in the end (And thus sypha and probs alucard too!!). pls i NEED them to met my son

isaac and trevor fiiiight. hopefully with the same amount of gay.

JULIA! Personally, im hoping they scrap Rosalee altogether bc she basically existed to die and be man pain so im hoping Julia will sorta be a mix of Rosalee and Julia–i.e. still a witch and isaac’s sister, but also being hector’s saviour in a way. 

speaking of, even if she isnt isaacs sister, JULIA BETTER NOT BE FUCKING WHITE!!!!!!!!!!!! like thats such a cop out if they do, to make her brother black but not her?? she better be black and awesome and heroic and save hector’s ass from carmilla, im just saying. also her and sypha NEED to bond.

i hope we get more backstory on everyone as well

ALSO DEATH!! even if its as Zead, id love for Death to show up. Maybe even be the reason for Dracula’s later cycle of ressurection. seriously, where is he? where is Dracula’s BFF and Best Bro Ever??????

as for the other games… I suspect they might ignore a few of em, but the main ones i’d like to see are, roughly in order:

Okay first of all, I kinda DONT want a Lament of Innocence game. I actually dont rly care for it, i think a lot of the story ideas are really dumb, Leon is lame…. etc. However he is already established in the show, so if they DO touch on his game i want either a: there to be a shit ton of focus on Joachim bc hes the best character and also less Wife Death and better focus on Mathias

or b: it to have all of those things and also be a B plot told in flashbacks and not the whole season, particularly in:

Simon’s Games! Simon has NO supporting cast, its just him and Drac really, so having the B plot saves them a lot of time making up a ton of things wholesale tbh… that said, id lvoe to see a Simon based on Kojima’s art, with a personality that isnt too much like Trevor or Richter’s… Id also love for them to do Simon’s Quest too, because while it isnt a well liked game, it would be the PERFECT drama. 

Like okay, I imagine it like this: We have this man, whose family is still not well liked by the people of Wallachia and who still have a bad wrap of being associated with evil and dark magic… hes  been raised basically his whole life to fight monsters and especially Dracula.

and he eventually does it and earns respect from the people who once hated him. Hes not sure how to handle this, since now his main purpose for living is over, but he tries his best… only for the back wound he recieved from dracula to cause him pain, almost like its not healing, and suddenly people are weary of him again as it becomes clear over time that the wound is cursed, that hes dying–or perhaps, worse, becoming some sort of creature of the night (maybe hes turning into a zombie, falling apart, or showing traits of vampires or werewolves or who knows).

One way or another he finds out he has to revive Dracula and kill him again to save himself fromt he curse. But that goes against everything he wants, to risk bringing Dracula back into the world–but is other option is to die painfully and risk becoming a creature of the night. All while trying to keep the unsteady trust he’s made with the people of Wallachia… basically, its very good drama that is a good break from having a Looming Big Bad!!

plus, i can imagine the final fight between them could be very interesting–both are weak, Simon from dying of the curse and Dracula from just being revived, so the fight isnt just about brute strength, especially as the longer it goes on, the weaker Simon gets but the strong Dracula gets as he readjusts to his new form. 

Juste’s on the other hand would be a more straight forward jaunt through the castle with monsters, with the twist being it’s his friend possessed by Dracula and all. Id LOOOVE for there to be focus on Maxim, Lydie, and Juste’s trio as well as talk about Juste being the most magic-based Belmont and what that means for them, as well as their much cozier place in the society that once rejected their family, and especially for what that means for White Haired, Magic Juste.

 Basically all I need from this part is good character writing for the three of them, but esp Maxim and Juste… Lydie wont be too hard bc she has like no personality in the games lol… give her one please. 

After that, theres of course Rondo of Blood and SotN. For the first one, I figure they can probably be pretty straight forward: Richters gotta fight Dracula, rescue some people, he meets a nice girl named Maria who helps him, etc… most of it will come fron the strength of Maria and Richters writing but theres bound to be some really cool action scenes with Richter and his skills and powers, but maria too! 

However, Id LOOOOVE for there to be more focus on Richter during his possession at some point, and his struggles with that!!! Also, Cameo from Juste his dad/grandpa pleaaase. 

As for Alucard and Maria… I hope they age up Maria a bit bc while Alucard is forever like, 18, itll nudge any romance that may happen between them outta an area of “Is This Weird?”. Anyways from there you get the usual Tepes Family Drama from Alucard having to kill his dad AGAIN and the Succubus as his mom oooo that good drama…

but I hope we get really good Maria characterization and stuff from her, like!! Please. Im also wanting her to not be white bc we NEED heroic characters of colour pls…..

I really hope they cover Order of Ecclesia bc Shanoa is great. I dont have much to say there tbh…. Idk if theyll do Bloodlines or Portrait of Ruin but there also a good way to break up the formula. Id also die if they made Sonia canon again….

Finally, i’d say the Sorrow series are the best ones to end the show on… I mean, on top of being the latest in the timeline–which means they can also do some neat stuff with modern or future tech–it also creates the best way to wrap up the series. Like, its a great way to say good bye to everyone, but especially to wrap up the Alucard and Dracula plot via Genya and Soma. 

I dont have too much to say here, other than I thin they could do some really good stuff by building up on whats already established in the show esp with Alucard and his Dad and then contrasting it with how they write Soma. 

Plus, Soma’s powers could make for some REALLY REALLY awesome fight scenes!!

[6ad6ro]

regarding the much desired mondo castlevania vinyl releases like rondo and sotn... even though the wait seems annoying and pointless, i think they probably have very good reasons for taking this long.

(taken from an overly long reddit comment i made) in vgm vinyl sub) at one point there was an interview where mondo explained sometimes things can just take forever due to licensing issues? and they can't do anything but wait. probably applies here.

i think one problematic aspect was putting out the records in order of release. average person clearly wanted sotn the most from the beginning and i think they feel they had to dangle it at the end just so people wouldn't lose interest. but that backfired and it's all taking too long and people kinda stopped caring anyhow.

their decision of releasing cv 1 and 2 as two separate 10" was probably a mistake. 12" are more popular. and they were competing with the high quality moon boot 12" that came out earlier and had both 1 and 2 along with a bit of 3 (nes) and 4. had they released 1 as a a 12" and included something short but desired like "haunted castle", many people (myself included) would have bought it even having already owned the moon boot. maybe packaged 2 with the gameboy ost too idkidk?

i think their incredible release of 3 sold really well for this very reason. i doubt their decision to release both the fami and nes ver had to do with passion alone. someone in the company was really smart to what people wanted. i just wish that awareness had carried over to the release of 4. maybe they knew it wouldn't sell all that well to begin with and that's why they just used the audio from one of the old cd releases? i still loved it but reviewers tore it apart if i remember. also doesn't help that 4 is less popular as an ost than other cv.

the longer wait might be associated with them wanting to sell out their stock and recoup any losses from unpopular releases. in that sense i can't blame them at all bc flooding market with similar releases when they haven't profited that much woulda been a bad idea.

they announced SO MANY k releases all at once too. so much castlevania AND multiple silent hill AND multiple contra? if you include posters and other merch (like that lovely alucard statue), they're actually releasing konami stuff like clockwork. so looking at the big picture, their release schedule makes a lot of sense.

and i wouldn't be surprised if konami is involved in staggering releases in between multiple companies. the cv anime and the smash announcement and japan exclusive stuff like slots? i don't think it's a reach to assume konami is an annoying company to work with right now.

but gosh these are all just "educated guesses" and opinions. i'd be really interested in looking at the sales numbers of these releases. western pressers licensing japanese game ost from 20-30 years ago is such a weird, niche thing!

[beevean]

On the topic of nfcv and its inconsistent; i tend to feel im harsher on nfcv and it's usage of representation since i dont tend to pay much attention to it ( It is good to let ppl see themselves on screen and its important to not fall into harmful sterotypes but it wont make or break a show for me unless its really bad). And castlevania has multiple historical/mythological inconsistencies (Matthias Corvinus rolling in his grave) and could have better representation ofc (the only poc main character i can think of is Ortega the were-lion antagonist from Legacy of Darkness the obscure n64 game). But you know? Cv's half goofy tone from it's origins as a monster smash makes it work w that, plus it's not the main focus. Meanwhile a huge selling point for nfcv has been it's ""gritty realism"" and ""seriousness"", and it's been praised to hell and back for it's "representation", when said rep isn't really good. So, i can be fine w SotN using a funny n completely historically innacurate mummy boss or having an skeleton serpent named Qetzacoatl (even if you can debate how those stereotypes can be harmful like egyptologists having to debunk the mummy curse myths), but the whole Sekhmet catgirl n aztec Orlox parts just makes me roll my eyes bc it will be blindly praised. I fear to be hypocritical here so that's my argument, and apologize for rambling in your inbox i swear this was shorter in my mind-

Pd: Yes Ortega is the og catboy, respect for him

I use this logic for Isaac lol. Yes, he relies on old and potentially offensive gay stereotypes, such as being in-your-face sexual, kinky in a creepy way, and even effectively molesting Trevor in the stabbing scene with his little kiss. And he's the villain contrasted with the more masculine hero. And he dies in the end. Yeah.

But aside from the fact that the game series overall is old-ish so outdated writing is to be at least expected, I don't get the feeling that this is meant to be "representation". And I'm certainly not meant to ohhh and ahhh at it. It is what it is, you know? The story says "here's the antagonist, he's very fruity", and you decide how to take it.

NFCV wants to be praised, and it is praised, for representation, for adding POC and gay people and cultures from all over the world, and it does so in a far less goofy setting that forces me to apply real-life logic to it. It also began in 2017, definitely at a time where writers were asked to pay attention to what the hell they're writing.

CV as a series was born as a love letter to Hammer horror movies, so it's a mishmash of monsters without rhyme or reason. NFCV wants to have a serious, real-adjacent world building, so that's why I ask "why is a Hungarian vampire worshipping an ancient Egyptian sun god"? Why are there Japanese people in Europe about a century before Europeans contacted Japan? Why is your idea of bi representation a threesome turning into rape?

So yes, I do believe that the show, in its arrogance, needs to be put at a higher standard than games written between the 80s and the 2000s. Not that they're exempt from criticism, ofc, I will always complain about stuff like the fridged women. Just... The games don't expect an applause for what they did.

[beevean]

I wanna be tricky with this question:

Y'know how one of the main points of contention about Frontiers (and many games nowadays) is how utterly different it is from previous entries and how obviously it copies stuff from popular open world games and so just feels like "Sonic but in BOTW"?

Don't you think a similar point could be made about SOTN and its sequels in relation to previous games and how it takes very clear elements from Metroid and RPGs (which were becoming more popular at the time)?

I remember you asking a similar question some time ago? I definitely remember you asking me what I think about the radical shift between Classicvania and Metroidvania :P

And... yeah. Yeah, as much as I prefer the Metroidvanias, I can completely sympathize with those poor fans in 1997 who were expecting another simple, tricky but fun platformer starring a beefy badass Belmont, and instead got Gothic Metroid RPG with Bishounen Alucard as the protagonist

I am positive that if SoTN came out in recent times, it would have caused discourse the likes of which would make the Sonic fanbase look cohesive 😂 the Belmont being put aside to make the new protagonist shine? my evil Dracula gaining a sympathetic motive that sounds nearly OOC? retconning CV3 in the meantime? a game so easy that can be broken by anyone, almost as if to cater to the mainstream casual audience? fans can explode for far less 💀

and yeah sure SoTN took obvious inspiration from CV2, up and including the relic gimmick, but imagine if Sonic became a fighting game franchise simply because the new series director loved Sonic the Fighters lmao

I don't really know what to think of this radical shift because I didn't live it myself. Again, I sympathize with the fans who never warmed up to the Metroidvania genre and simply... didn't receive anything except for Adventure Rebirth, which from what I know only 5 people played anyway lol. For them the series died in 1997, and all the newer fans were gushing about what was essentially, from their perspective, CV in name only. I know that the games started to decline in sells after a certain point (rip bloodlines), but even the Metroidvanias eventually suffered the same fate.

I still think Mega Man has some of the smoothest evolution I've seen in a long-term series, with the right idea of creating various subseries catering to different tastes while rarely losing the core characteristics of a Mega Man game (Legends and Battle Network are the only "MM in name only" games I can think of). I wish more series did that.

Anyway. Funnily enough, I think Frontiers is more faithful to the core of Sonic gameplay than SoTN is to its predecessors. When you boil it down, it's an exaggeration of what Iizuka did with Sonic Adventure, giving Sonic a much larger space to run through and introducing RPG elements (lol). It still keeps the Rings, it still keeps the speed, it tries to include momentum gameplay (from what I know the momentum isn't perfect but I could be wrong). It's still Sonic, even under the BOTW aesthetic. What does SoTN have in common with the Classicvanias? uhhhh you have subweapons... you defeat Dracula in the end... the music slaps... you can't even say "you go through Dracula's castle" because only in CV1 you spend the whole game in the castle... yeah.

[beevean]

If you were to rate SOTN's single characteristics individually (graphics, music, gameplay etc) what would you give them?

Interesting question :o

Story: 7.5/10. Nowadays it's a rather simple and famous story, but I can imagine it was quite shocking back in 1997, with a Belmont becoming the Lord of the Castle and discovering more about Alucard's past and relationship with his father. The plot point of Richter supposedly wanting to resurrect Dracula in his lifetime because he otherwise feels like he has no reason to live could have been an interesting idea, and raises sombering questions about how the Belmonts feel once they've fulfilled their purpose... but I guess an awkwardly-named priest flipping the castle upside down works as well :\

Graphics: 9.5/10. It's not a full 10 because they just had to use CGI for the castle cutscenes, and it doesn't look very good :P but everything else? Spotless. Magnificent. I've already gushed about that one 3D room in the Royal Chapel, but it's really so good <3 The Making of Castlevania SOTN video explains briefly how they managed to create some of its graphical effects, and I love it.

Music: 9.5/10. I can't lie and say I like every track, and Final Toccata becomes really grating in the second half of the game, but man, the overall quality is stellar. I really don't know what else to say that hasn't already been said. The range is spectacular, every track is memorable (even the ones you don't want to be stuck in your head for a week straight :P), and most of them help create an unique atmosphere. It's Michiru Yamane's most iconic OST for a reason :)

Difficulty: 7.5/10. If you play as "intended", this game goes from frustrating to mind-numbingly easy in a matter of a few hours. Thankfully the difficulty is very customizable - no one is stopping you from going "naked" through the entire journey :P or more simply to not completely bully the game with the more OP weapons. Also, unless you're going for 200.6% completion (what a number), some areas are completely or almost completely optional, like the sudden difficulty spike that is the Clock Tower (and Reverse Clock Tower).

Navigation and backtracking: 8/10. It's odd how the game is smart enough to give you portals, but not enough to make you select where you go instead of having to cycle through every one until you land where you want to. Even without portals, though, I never felt too annoyed at the idea of having to backtrack to go to a new area. I like how the Marble Gallery essentially connects the eastern and the western sides of the map in a straight like, and of course you power up so quickly that you can make quick work of the enemies that used to annoy you. As for getting into new areas, the game has an odd structure where it's linear for about an hour or so, then it gives you two roads once you get the Jewel of Open, and then everything is open to you once you have the Bat relic - the player has more freedom to choose the correct path, but at first it may feel too much. Also, most areas are pretty easy to get into, but Orlox's Quarters are very well hidden.

Length: 7/10. The Inverted Castle was not needed, honestly, it's not like the first castle was particularly small (you can complete it in 2-4 hours, I think, which is pretty good). I do appreciate how at least most areas are optional, but still, it's not as well designed as its "normal" counterpart and it does feel like they wanted to pad the game but didn't know how.

Bosses: 9/10. There is no boss I outright hate. At worst they're pretty easy (rip Frankenstein's Sonic monster), at best they're unique and memorable. I wish Beelzebub was... less memorable, though... (also, pro tip: please don't use the Shield Rod + Alucard Shield spell. You might as well kick an old man while he's down.)

Details: 10/10. Of course. Everyone knows how detailed this game is, and how many easter eggs it hides. My favorite detail is how, while the Catacombs are deep underground and therefore you see lava floating on the floor, the Floating Catacombs are so high up in the sky that there is ice on the ceiling. That is the most clever palette swap I've ever seen! And do we want to mention that freaky eyeball staring at you from the windows in the Marble Gallery corridor? Or how you can see some upside down objects in the normal castle, foreshadowing the Reverse Castle?

Crissaegrim: Crissaegrim/10. i believe in criss supremacy <3

Voice acting and translation: DIE MONSTER! YOU DON'T BELONG IN THIS WORLD!