Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night

Bloodstained does indeed look interesting, however, I'm disappointed that we probably won't get more actual Castlevania games, especially with everything that's going down in Konami. I always wanted to see the Demon Castle Wars made into a game, you know, the event mentioned in Aria of Sorrow of the war against Dracula in 1999 that led Julius Belmont to defeat ol' Drac. for good until he reincarnated in Soma Cruz?

This is a proper Castlevania game (of the IGA lineage, that is) in all but name. It's not any more different from its predecessors than Dark Souls is from Demon's Souls. Konami and all of their classic franchises are deader than Lincoln, so losing Dracula and the Belmont clan in favour of expies (and it's not like Soma Cruz, Shanoa et al were ever particularly unique and inseparable from their franchise) is a pretty minor quibble in my opinion, if the rest of the game delivers where it counts. Since almost all enemies in Castlevania were public domain anyway, most of them will probably make their return here.

edited 11th Jul '16 10:49:25 AM by TAPETRVE

I am glad that Castlevania actually got an ending. A Grand Finale, if you will. Sure, I'd have liked certain threads to have been tied up, which might have happened if IGA and his team were allowed to continue, but I'm glad that it had a true ending.

Many dead franchises don't get that luxury.

We still never got to see the battle of 1999.

i don't think we were ever meant to see it, and honestly i don't care to.

I do, since it's Dracula's final stand, and probably one of those battles where he had enough energy for three forms. I so want to see how that final battle played out, and what Julius was capable of in his prime.

At least the Lords of Shadow games aren't canon. The developers failed to grasp even the most basic principle in the Castlevania franchise, that Dracula himself is the literal Devil, not just some errand boy for bumfuck Satan.

...he was never an errand boy for Satan, at all. Hell, Satan was too scared of him after he became Dracul to even attempt being summoned onto the mortal plane as long as he was still alive, same with Zobek.

Errand boy is the wrong word; what I mean is that they turned Dracula from the crude interpretation of an "original evil" he represents in the main series into a rather mundane usurper of Hell's hierarchy. Dracula being sort of a "Captain Ersatz Satan", with the latter not even existing in the same universe, had always been one of the more novel concepts in the franchise.

edited 11th Jul '16 6:23:10 PM by TAPETRVE

I feel an actual game with the battle of 1999 would never live up to what people imagine it was like.

Have to agree.

I honestly don't care about the IGA timeline anymore.

The war of 1999 was like the Near Apocolaypse of 09 in Batman Beyond, It anchors the time, but the event itself isn't important.

I'd still like to see the Dracula battle, if only to see what Dracula used as his final form in his last battle.

Delayed to 2018 Bloody No.9

Wait, what happened?

This happened.

TL;DR: IGA is moving the game to the first half of 2018, saying that after the awesome responses that he got from the game, he wants it to be "done right the first time."

Obviously taking notice of a certain KS-funded game, aren't we, IGA-sensei?

Still a two year wait hurts...

I'd probably be worried about this if a demo hadn't already come out and shown that they got the basic stuff down pat. Do you think this delay means they'll release some of the stretch goals at launch? Because earlier Iga said he wasn't going to do that because it would push back the launch date.

Now I'm concerned Yooka-Laylee will also get pushed back. Because as much as I love Igavanias I think I'm more excited for Yooka-Laylee.

So, A) IGA & Co have found a publisher for Bloodstained, 505 Games, whose list of published titles include [*puts on glasses and boots up Wikipedia*] Sniper Elite III, Payday 2, Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, Terraria, How to Survive, Rocket League, ABZU, ADR1FT, Virginia and lots lots more, and B) the announcement trailer for these news contains some new footage:

Could someone explain to me exactly how this affects things? They seemed to be doing fine with a simple digital release on all platforms before.

It has been announced from the very beginning that they will be working with a publisher.

So, this is just an update to inform backers of the progress they've made?

Sure, why not.

So, what do people think of the possible cancellation of the Wii U version? Would be super unfortunate to me, since I really don't want people to turn on this like with MN 9. Not to mention I'd feel bad for Wii U players since they're shafted so often. But at least they have Chasing Dead.

https://www.destructoid.com/igarashi-doesn-t-sound-confident-about-a-wii-u-port-of-bloodstained-391369.phtml

Also, who would you cast as Miriam?

The Wii U version of Bloodstained is officially no more, long live the Nintendo Switch. There's compensation details in the link, if you're among the inconvenienced parties.

No surprise, really.

I'm really excited for the game, I just finished Symphony for the first time and loved it. With all the extra features, it sounds like it'll be even better, and hopefully not have the reverse Castle nonsense. That really bogged down the last few hours of the game for me and once you get past the novelty it outstays its welcome.

Also nice to see the protagonist's looks call back to Shanoa a bit, I love Order of Eclesia.

I'd like a reversed castle but improved, myself. Shanoa and Miriam should have a kid and get married.