Archived Discussion Franchise / Castlevania

This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.

Ununnilium: Was Mina actually the reincarnation of Dracula's wife in the original story? I haven't read it, but I've gotten the impression that that was a detail added by later adaptations.

Looney Toons: To the best of my recollection, Bram Stoker's Dracula (the one with Winona Ryder) was the first time I ever saw that particular detail.

Andyzero: True, it wasn't in the original novel (I changed it) yet I'd bet my teeth that the name thing was intentionally based on that movie concept.

Chris X: The summary seems to be too long. Anyone care to shorten it?

• He is FAR more genre blind than genre savvy. Seriously, why does he not put his elite army at the entrance so the heroes has to go through them when they are at level one? Why does he leave healing statues and candles for heroes to use in HIS castle? Why does he try so hard to put meat into walls? If anyone needs to read evil overlord list, it's Dracula, period.
• The healing statues, meat in the walls, an other assorted items aren't his doing. The Belmont clan has a pact with an entity called the Poltergeist King, who hides these things to assist them.

First, natter. Second, the Poltergeist King part is nothing but fan conjecture.

Falcon Pain: The Poltergeist King was actually invented by American manual writers. Still, it hasn't come up since Legends, and we saw what became of that game. Aside from that minor point, I agree. We know what Dracula is, and Portrait was a break from the norm for him.

Trigger Loaded: Oh, I know that the Poltergeist king is mentioned in passing in Castlevania 3. Though I didn't know that he was mentioned in Legends, nor that he was created purely for the American versions of the games. Not that it surprises me, though. Either way, I know that there is mention of the Poltergeist king. The fan conjecture is the whole bit about being responsible for the save statues and the wall meat. (Mmmm.... Wall meat.)

—-

Falcon Pain: Pulled this part out. Not only has it become incredibly nattery in tone and desperately in need of a snappier rewrite with fewer bullets, it's not even the right trope. The Only One Allowed to Defeat You is not about being the only one who can. It's about ensuring that you're the one who does. (The closest thing to it in the series that I can recall is Dario and Dmitrii's rivalry, complete with Dario getting mad at Soma for killing Dmitrii because he wanted to do it.)

• The Only One Allowed to Defeat You (The Belmont clan seems to be the only one able to take Dracula down; then again, the plot of Circle of the Moon may exist solely to counter this. It was removed from continuity, but that's probably just because IGA didn't want Camilla to have so much power or something. Officially because its creators stated it was never supposed to be a part of it.)
  • Actually, if this troper remembers correctly, Circle of the Moon is a timeline game again, the only ones that are currently excluded are Castlevania: Legends and Castlevania: Order of Shadows.
    • Considering that Lament of Innocence details how the Vampire Killer was created, it is quite possible that the Hunter Whip was created in a similar manner. On another note, it is quite ironic that Walter ended up accidentally allowing the creation of the only weapon capable of defeating him and Dracula just simply by biting Sara.
  • Averted partially in Portrait of Ruin and completely averted in Order of Ecclesia. In the former, Jonathan Morris is a partial Belmont descendant, and thus can't use the Vampire Killer without it eventually killing him; in the latter, humans explicitly set out to create a non-Belmont-linked means of defeating Dracula.
    • Not really averted in Order of Ecclesia since all those researches except the use of Dominus ended in failure. Even then, the power of Dominus comes from Dracula himself so that doesn't really count. The Belmont clan seems to be the only people who can stand against Dracula on their own.
  • Also averted in Symphony of the Night, since Alucard is quite capable of destroying Dracula single-handedly. Then again, being Dracula's son means he has his own edge.
  • Averted in Curse of Darkness, where Hector is neither a Belmont nor does he wield a particularly special weapon (unless you make one). Then again, Devil Forgemasters are supposed to be bad-ass so that might have something to do with it.

Does anybody have a source for the 'Uwe Boll did the original Castlevania script and it eventually became Van Helsing' statement? I'd love to email someone the proof of that.

Allandrel: No, because it's completely untrue. I've removed the mention from the main article. Van Helsing was an original script by Steve Sommers, inspired by Monster Mash movies like House of Frankenstein. Uwe Boll never had anything to do with it. I know some people don't like Steve Sommers, but falsely claiming that his screenplays were really written by Uwe Boll is just low.

Arrow: Moved this out of the article:

• (The original Dracula novel by Bram Stoker is canon to the series, thanks to Castlevania: Bloodlines.)
  • Which would make John(ny) Morris two at the time he witnessed his father annihilate Dracula. When you consider that Quincey was quite young and courting Lucy in the novel, things get a bit braintwisty with regard to Bloodlines.

It's clearly been orphaned from some other (re)moved line, and I can't figure out where it's supposed to go to fix it. Anyone else who can figure out, feel free to put it back; it's obviously useful info.

Trigger Loaded: Took out -

• Or mis-translated so badly as to fall into either category. "Get a silk bag from the graveyard duck to live longer" had thousands of kids fruitlessly searching for mercantile anatids in cemeteries. In reality, it's two sets of instructions mssing a space between them: "Get a silk bag from the graveyard / Duck to live longer."

I'm not absolutely certain about the two separate topics. I always thought that was the case when I was younger, but since the orignal Japanese mentions a graveyard duck as well, perhaps it was all one senteance. Unless there was a line break in between the two in Japanese, though this is beyond my knowledge.

Trigger Loaded: Did a pruning of the article. Some adjustment to make most entries use parenthesis rather than colons after trope entries, but also trimming a lot of Natter and Walkthrough Modes.

• "Blind Idiot" Translation (In Castlevania I, the credits attempt to credit monsters with actors who are famous for playing them. For example, Death was credited to Bela Lugosi. However, they didn't do a very good job translating the names... Dracula was credited to "Christopher Bee", Frankenstein to "Boris Carloffice", the Mummy to "Love Chaney, Jr."...)
  • Either that or it's a sequence of Incredibly Lame Puns.

I am quite certain they are puns, and thus the trope isn't needed. I suppose it COULD be bad translation, but I'd want some evidence.

Under Grand Theft ME

• He started doing it in CVII: Simon's Quest. That's the entire point of the game - Simon has to exorcise the old bat so he himself doesn't become the next vessel. Shockingly creepy stuff for such an early game.
• Is this supported? Everything I've read suggests that it was nothing more than an attempt to kill him and end the bloodline. (Though even if it isn't canon, it's not a bad WMG theory.)
• I recall a gaming mag claiming this, but it might just have been gaming mag crack.

Too nattery. I suppose a quick pruning could still make it a worthwhile entry, though, just mention the questionable source.

Under Game-Breaker:

• By the end of Dawn it WAS still the best. It may have taken a nerfing, but when you realized it had the second best ROF in the game (right below the Kaiser Knuckle) and DIDN'T REQUIRE AN ANIMATION . . . My favorite in-game combo, especially when combined with the underused 'Black Panther' (dash) soul. Spam Y + Hold R + Direction = Mook death. Incredibly effective on stationary bosses such as Gergoth.

Natter and Walkthrough.

Informed Ability (The Belmonts are supposed to be the best vampire hunters around, but you'll have a much easier time beating the game with a little girl or a high school student. The Vampire Killer is supposed to be the best weapon to use against Dracula and his minions, but you'll find high-end swords can be much better)

• The claim is a little more credible after fighting Julius Belmont in Aria of Sorrow. He's easily the most difficult of the game's bosses. He's fast, resistant to Holy damage, and capable of dealing insane damage with Vampire Killer, even before he starts using sub-weapons. And after the fight, Soma notes that he was clearly holding back during the fight. That is what a Belmont is like.
  • Not just holding back, if anything, he wasn't even trying. No, seriously, Soma notes that even a regular vampire hunter fights better than that.
  • Also note the the VK was depowered from the final battle with Dracula in 1999. That's right, he was also handicapped during that fight. Still feeling tough for taking him down?
  • Also of note, in Dawn of Sorrow Soma has to create a seal to fully destroy the boss enemies he defeats to prevent them from regenerating. When he asks Julius (who is also exploring the castle) how he deals with boss enemies regenerating he admits he'd never noticed: he simply kills the enemies too much for them to be able to.
  • Remember kids: There Is No Kill Like Overkill
  • Do you expect any less from the Belmont who finally killed Dracula forever? He's got experience with this kind of stuff.
  • Why does everyone I've ever heard talk about him say he was so tough? You can totally punk him by spamming the diagonal kick if you took the time to get it. Seriously, beat him on the first try without getting hit by repeatedly kicking him in the face.
• Averted in Portrait of Ruin with the empowered Vampire Killer being better than the best weapons of all other classes against the end game bosses, especially Dracula, despite having lower power than the Alucard Spear or Final Sword.

Oh, sweet lord, was this entry painful. I tried to trim it down, since most of it involves Julius. Hopefully the replacement line works well.

• Mis-blamed (The belief that IGA is a sexist despite the fact that the Castlevania series has numerous Action Girls that he never removed.)
  • In slight defense of the people who do hold this belief, he DID explain the retconning of Sonia in a rather awkward manner. Someone who 'can't see' a woman being so heroic at that time period, yet he grew up in a culture that features such bad-assed historical Action Girls as Tomoe Gozen? Oh, IGA. We love you even if you are crazy.
  • Castlevania Legends didn't take place in the time and place of Tomoe Gozen. It was considerably closer to the time and place of Joan of Arc.
    • Probably he wouldn't have heard of Boudicca, who predates them both by a thousand years plus.
  • This troper thinks the real reason Sonia was retconned out of existence was because apparently she was lovers with Alucard. Think about that. In spite of how cool having the Belmonts having vampire blood in their veins might sound, Fridge Logic dictates otherwise. Wouldn't being part-vampire make the Vampire Killer harmful to them, too? Also, in Symphony of the Night, Alucard doesn't seem too keen on the idea of his own existence as a half-vampire, much less the idea of making more human/vampire hybrids.
    • According to vampire lore, vampire-human hybrids lose their weaknesses and possibly benefits of vampires.
    • If Alucard (who, noteworthily, can use the subwepaons in SotN, though not crash/crush with them except with the perma-crushed cross) was Trevor's father, that would make Trevor only one-fourth Draculaic-blooded. That's likely not enough to cause the VK to go 'say what now;' besides, they wear gloves (said the troper, tongue in cheek). Further, if the whip's powered by Sara Trantoul's soul and her love for Leon and strong dislike of Mathias, it might 'know' who it's going after. (That plot point in LoI makes the life-force-nomnomnom in Portrait of Ruin seem utterly bizarre...)
    • The VK is an Empathic Weapon really, so there's no reason to nix the Drac blood link. On the other point, the whip was 'for a Belmont forged', and the Belmont line is known for it's sheer power. Perhaps those without Belmont blood running through their veins need to use their own life force to power the whip. The shortest wick burns the brightest indeed...
  • Whatever his reasoning, there's no denying IGA put his foot squarely in his mouth when interviewed by EGM and asked whether fans could expect a female protagonist at some point in the future:
    IGA: It's possible I guess. Although, I purposefully left the Sonia Belmont character (from Castlevania: Legends for GBC) out of the official Castlevania chronology. (laughs) Usually, the vampire storyline motifs, females tend to be sacrificed. It's easier to come up with weak, feminine characters. I'll think about it more in the future, though.
  • The poor man clearly never read Dracula. Mina's tougher than everyone else in the book.
  • I thought the reason was that he felt that a female hero using a whip had too many dominatrix undetones.

Again, waaaaayyyy too much natter and Thread Mode. Simplified.

Under Randomly Drops

• Order of Ecclesia, though, greatly reduces the amount of drops.
  • Goddamned Mandragora, I've had you respawn over fifty times now. Drop that Mandrake Root so I can unlock High Potions at the store, already!

'Greatly reduces?' Not all that much, honestly. Not enough to be really worthy of note.

Under Sequence Breaking

• In Dawn of Sorrow, large sections of the game can be skipped either after the first playthrough, or with some other method of accessing the cross-hilt dagger Cinqueda— Because it has a special move that teleports you, it can trigger every single door-switch from the wrong side. Also, the entire "underwater" area can be skipped, as one of its early sections has a wall that you can dive-kick under, thus never getting the scales. You could also skip the Clock Tower boss entirely... if they hadn't made it necessary to go through him on the map, the one spot his power is used is circumventable without glitches.

Just got too long. Again, tried to simplify.

McJeff In regards to the Castlevania 1 credits. When I originally wrote that entry, I picked only the funniest bad translations, which were funny because they were inadvertent puns. However, most of them were not puns. Belo Lugosi (mistranslation of Bela Lugosi), Vram Stoker (mistranslation of Bram Stoker), Barber Sherry (mistranslation of Barbara Shelly, including the r to l mistake common in Japanese to English), Mix Schrecks. Another thing is that this was an early NES game and most of those had notoriously awful translations. And in addition to this, there's absolutely no sense in going to the trouble to credit a bunch of actors and then screw up their names on purpose. Really, I'm astonished that anyone would think those are supposed to be puns.

Trigger Loaded: Maybe not puns, but perhaps intentionally bad misspellings. I've seen that before in several mediums, where Captain Ersatzs are given names that just look like the original name misspelled. I suppose it's possible to be bad translation, but since the rest of the lines in the credits are pretty smooth ("You played the greatest role in the story/Thank you for playing.") I'm not entirely certain. Usually bad translations seem to occur in Japan, where sentence structure is screwed up, or in the US, where they guess what the Japanese developers were trying to say and misspell everything. But if it was done in the US, you'd think they'd know who these movie characters were. I'll just add a line afterwards... which puts us right back where we started, I suppose, but whatever...

Trigger Loaded: Moved this from Nintendo Hard:

(In reference to Order Of Ecclesia)

• The game is only hard by metroidvania standards only...most people who plays this game would realize that this is quite easy once learn to equip some armor and dodge the enemy attacks...

As the edit reason stated, the beginning of Natter and Walkthrough Mode. This isn't the place to brag about how good you are at the game, and put down those who do find it difficult. Even if the challenge is pretty moderate overall, most people agree it is a sharp step up from previous games in the series. Though I could see argument for removing OoE from that entry entirely, if most people agree that it's "hard" but not Nintendo Hard.

Trigger Loaded: Good lord, is this the same guy that changed all the mentions of Judgment to JustAsPlanned last time? Yes, you hate Judgment. That doesn't make TV Tropes an open forum for you to bash it.

(From Ensemble Dark Horse)

• Judgment tried - and failed - to cash in on this. Because of the broken tiers and general poor quality of the game (it took less than a year to make - I'm sorry, you can't make a working, good game in that time any more), he's either horrifically nerfed or approaching That One Boss.

What the hell does this have to do with Ensemble Dark Horse? Tier listings aren't relevant.

• One who apparently was raised by Isaac - look at the tats and leather! This troper does not understand how some fellow fanboys can gripe about Chronicles Simon and give Simon Yagami a pass. Chronicles Simon looks like a fabulous barbarian; Judgment Simon looks like he became lost on the way to a fetish club.

I've heard more complaints about Judgment Simon than Chronicles Simon. And we already have said several times in the article that the designs weren't well-received. You don't need to beat a dead horse.

• Also, core-canon Sypha doesn't have the Gainax Syndrome. Judgment is in the gaiden timeline, as evidenced by Cornell. So while Judgment Sypha may have had one hell of a time (and a titanium bustier), Original-Flavoured Sypha probably just made with the samurai bosom bandaging.
• Fake Sypha in Symphony of the Night is more obviously female than her Dracula's Curse sprite, but hasn't pomelos in her brassiere like her Official AU counterpart.

No evidence. Especially as the CV timeline is awfully dodgy. And designs change rather considerably over time. Is Chronicles Simon a different Simon than CV Simon? Haunted Castle Simon?

• ...Okay, that game had to have been conceived on drugs...

Not your personal forum to rant.

Trigger Loaded: Edited the Adaptation Decay article a bit. Some solid entries, don't get me wrong, though some still needed adjustment. Took out the following:

• Japanese to NA translations lost a lot in those days (see: Zero Wing), so that probably counts toward this trope too.
• The only game of that era that really lost nothing was Simon's quest because the townspeople are insane liars and weirdoes in any language.

This was in reference to [1] Which, while it does mention story getting lost in translation due to lack of space, seems kind of odd and doesn't fit, as it refers to translations in the past. Judgment is a Wii game, though.

• And last but not least the arcade version of Castlevania, Haunted Castle - possibly the most wallbanging transition since Rondo to Dracula XX! Simon does not do the Belmont Shuffle - he does the Wedgie Walk, and that's just the beginning of the indignities.

As mentioned in edit reasons, Haunted Castle would've been a solid, early game title, if it wasn't so MADDENINGLY difficult. Since it was its own game rather than a port (Like Dracula X ostentatiously was) I don't think Adaptation Decay really works. Besides, the music rocks and has been reused many times. Great for Nintendo Hard, and possibly even Platform Hell, not so much Adaptation Decay.

Trigger Loaded: Yet more cleanup.

(From Fanservice)

• You have some low standards for fanservice, my friend (and shaky grasp on what is and ain't gaiden in CV). Justasplanned is a huge YMMV in this category; all this troper's friends, and this troper himself, found it ball-shrinkingly uncanny valley. Kids these days. You got low standards.

Enough with the Judgement bashing, now there's bashing of other tropers passive-aggressively?

Cleaned up the entry on Fantasy Kitchen Sink, starting to slip into Natter. I shrunk it down a bit.

Took out For Massive Damage. Not only for Thread Mode, but after reading the trope, I'm not even sure what it's supposed to be discussing anymore. For Massive Damage just says "More Powerful Attacks on Bigger Enemies." Heck, it doesn't even have examples, it's an index of Big Damaging Attacks.

• For Massive Damage (Most bosses, although Dracula himself falls victim to this trope in nearly every appearance)
  • In recent appearances. In the pre-Castleroid games hes very much an Attack Its Weak Point kind of a guy. His head is the only vulnerable point of his anatomy in the games up to Rondo. This troper has many, many friends who got a hell of a rude awakening when they purchased '"Dracula X Chronicles and expected the Big D to be as (relatively) easy to defeat as his prologue iteration in Symphony. This troper laughed the laugh of sweet schadenfreude when they found out the hard way that she wasn't shitting them about the old games being demoniacal that way.
  • (Ironically subverted by the Giant Enemy Crab boss Brachyura in Order of Ecclesia, since you can't really defeat the boss until you activate the elevator that finally crushes it. How's that for Massive Damage?)
    • Dracula turns it back on you in order of Ecclesia if you don't slap him with the Dominus glyphs in time. Two words: DEMONIC MEGIDDO.
    • Which he'll spam until you're toast. It's not avoidable. Flying up into the corner will only last until your hearts run out.

(From Game-Breaker:)

• The Muramasa/knife subweapon/room full of octopodes trick is also a gamebuster, though this one takes a little more effort.

Not for being a bad example, but lacking explanation. To whoever posted this, describe why it's a gamebreaker, and then put it in the Symphony paragraph. You don't have to make it a sub-entry. Look at the examples for SOTN, they describe why the weapon combos are game breakers.

(From Heroic Albino)

• One of them. Juste.

Are you saying that Juste was described as an Albino? (Which I don't recall) or that he's the only Belmont that looked like a Heroic Albino?

(From Heroic Sacrifice, talking about the Golem)

• Igarashi's understanding of golems is somewhat scattershot...they are sentient to a limited extent, though beholden to their maker's will (which begs the question - who made the 'Vania golems, since Dracula and Walter are hardly virtuous men). At least he got the emeth/meth thing down in Lament. That was cool.

Only the first depictions of Golems. They've been depicted in many other ways since, so it's hardly a case of Not doing any research, just putting one's own spin on them. Especially in Dungeons And Dragons, where they aren't sentient, and can be made by anybody. Though the bit about Emeth/meth is interesting, and could be put in somewhere. Nowadays, the only really consistent thing about Golems is that they're essentially magic robots.

(From Infallable Babble)

• This troper was reduced to profane Angrish at the tender age of seven over that, and he's not the only one he knows who was.

We don't need This Troper entries.

(From Magic Skirt)

• Judgment dropped the ball on this. Rather than the fanservice it was meant to be, though, Maria's flylike face makes it into Nightmare Fuel.

I get that not only do you hate the character designs from Judgment (I'm not a fan of them either) but I haven't seen anyone complain about the models as much as this. I can see where you're coming from, but it's hardly universal on how supposedly off-putting the models are.

• Misaimed Fandom (When Judgment was first pitched there was an enormous (and heavily mocked) hissy fit thrown by a small group of fans about the game being marketed only to Japanese fans. If this is the case, Konami missed the mark, since Japan think the game is a joke at best and an insult at worst - and a bunch of the latter group is quite certain IGA retconned backstories and turned characters into weird off-model cliches to dumb things down for the US of A. While certainly neither case is accurate, this troper'd be pretty insulted if Konami was marketing the game to him.)
  • Wait, wait, wait - someone got angry about a Japanese company wanting to market their game enthusiastically IN JAPAN? ...OKAY!

Aside from the "This Troper," this doesn't seem to be the right trope. While Misaimed Fandom does have an index, it seems to be about people liking something that's supposed to be insulting them. (Or just not something they're supposed to like.) Can't seem to find the trope for the opposite, where something marketed for that group is reviled. Closest is stuff like Unpleasable Fanbase, but that's more over time.

(From Multiple Endings)

• Simon's Quest has the most ambiguously good, medium and bad endings of the bunch, and on account of the spotty localization fandom still argues over which is which.

As was mentioned many times, the script for Simon's Quest was as bad on the Famicom as it was on the Nintendo. Still an interesting entry, so I put it up, and gave it some detail.

(From Nightmare Fuel)

• This troper screamed like a goosed cheerleader.

Don't need This Troper entries. Should have gotten this one earlier.

(From Power-Up Letdown)

• It has its use though. Richter is invulnerable while performing item-crash and since key item-crash consume no heart, you can spam it to get out of tight situation. Just - don't do it on moving platforms.

I don't think this really fits there. It's a good entry, but Power-Up Letdown is more about the behaviour (how Trevor acts) rather than the gameplay. Still, it should fit somewhere about how useless abilities actually do have a use.

Kuruni: On Power-Up Letdown. The trope is really mean "power up that make player disappoint". Statement above ("The key has its use...") is counter supplement to description how it is useless. Actually, listing key as Power-Up Letdown seem to be wrong since...what would you expect a key to does anyway? (and veteran gamers should be aware that key is alway a burden when you have to hold it) The entry (Richter "wonder what the hell you're trying to do.") is more fit with Breaking the Fourth Wall. Wait, I will turn it to Lethal Joke Item entry instead.