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Suffering Castlevania Fatigue

It's hard to look a gift horse in the mouth, especially when it comes to Castlevania--I'd rather see an installment from Koji Igarashi's beloved franchise on the DS than yet another animal grooming game. But since the series has moved to the DS, I've been slightly disappointed. As good as Dawn of Sorrow was on its own terms, the game felt waaay too much like Aria of Sorrow, even within the limited Castlevania framework established over a decade ago by Symphony of the Night. (I'll go ahead and admit that, three years later, Dawn is a game I really need to re-visit, now that I'm even further removed from its predecessor.)

My reaction was even worse with 2006's Portrait of Ruin which claimed to be a return to the roots of classic Castlevania that I never liked much to begin with. I can't tell you if Portrait lived up to its promises, because my limited time with the game was spent pressing the character change button in order to annoy people in my immediate vicinity.

"Charlotte!"
"Jonathan!"
"Charlotte!"
"Jonathan!"

You get the idea.

Posted Oct 21 2008, 09:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 1 comment(s)

Filed under: castlevania, castlevania 2, ds, koji igarashi, bob mackey, castlevania portrait of ruin, castlevania aria of sorrow, castlevania dawn of sorrow

Castlevania Symphony of the Night 2: What is a Screenshot? A Miserable Little Pile of Secrets!

Can you dig it, everyone? Tokyo Game Show is off to a running start and while it appears that some games that everyone expected to appear, like Team Ico’s Playstation 3 debut, are nowhere to be found, plenty of other exciting games are rearing their glorious digital heads. Who in their right minds expected No More Heroes 2 to be announced? That is a beautiful, beautiful thing. Of course, Tokyo Game Show isn’t without a little mystery here in 2008. For example, take this screenshot Koji Igarashi showed off during a chat about Castlevania:

Why, that appears to be Alucard, star of the ubiquitous Symphony of the Night and apple of ten billion goth girls’ eyes.

Posted Oct 09 2008, 01:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 3 comment(s)

Filed under: john constantine, konami, castlevania, koji igarashi, rumor

What Is a Man? More Than a 4Chan Meme

Konami will never live down the original translation afflicted upon Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. It tried to atone for past sins by re-doing the voicework for SOTN in Dracula X Chronicles for the PSP. It was a fine attempt, but a worthless gesture overall; you can't erase the past. I can't deny the fact I'm descended from sheep thieves and Konami can't deny Dracula's infamous riddle to Richter Belmont. "What is a man?" (I don't know Dracula, what is a man?) "A miserable little pile of secrets!"

I hang out and make trouble at Gamespite because sometimes I learn something new. Today, for example, I learned through a fellow forum comrade named eirikr that Dracula's riddle is not his own. It was, in fact, lifted from a French author named Andre Malraux. Interestingly, Malraux was born in 1901, meaning he picked up the quote from Dracula during a time jaunt through the Carpathian Mountains. Damn, I need to manipulate some kids into writing this down for a history project. These are TRUFAX being doled out here, people. Remember them, and pass them onto your children.

If you're interested in the source material, check out The Big Curmudgeon: 2,500 Outrageously Irreverent Quotations from World-Class Grumps and Cantankerous Commentators. If you can recite the book's title to the store clerk before running out of breath and dying, that is.

Posted Jul 28 2008, 11:17 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 2 comment(s)

Filed under: konami, castlevania, dracula x, koji igarashi, castlevana: symphony of the night, what is a man, dracula, bad quotes, angry french dudes

When Good Developers Go Bad: Koji Igarashi

Koji Igarashi’s a consistent guy. The man-in-black of videogames – he doesn’t really look like Johnny Cash, but he does have a habit of wearing black leather and carrying a whip around in public – Igarashi rose to prominence in 1997 when he released Castlevania: Symphony of the Night for the Playstation. SOTN was a fairly dramatic re-imagining of the Castlevania franchise, expanding on the non-linear style of 1988’s Castlevania 2 and molding it into a circuitous, fluid environment in the vein of Metroid. In the past eleven years, Igarashi has overseen seven more Castlevania titles, four of which are in the exact same style as SOTN. On the two dimensional front, Igrashi’s resume is un-indictable; even when his 2D Castlevanias are a little dry (as is the case with 2002’s Harmony of Dissonance), they’re still well-made games. It’s his work in the third-dimension that’s been the problem.

Posted Jun 04 2008, 12:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments

Filed under: john constantine, playstation 3, xbox 360, wii, castlevania, koji igarashi, nanobreaker

about the blogger

John Constantine, our superhero, was raised by birds and then attended Penn State University. He is currently working on a novel about a fictional city that exists only in his mind. John has an astonishingly extensive knowledge of Scientology. Ultimately he would like to learn how to effectively use his brain. He continues to keep Wu-Tang's secret to himself.

Derrick Sanskrit is a self-professed geek in a variety of fields including typography, graphic design, comic books, music and cartoons. As a professional hipster graphic designer, his recent clients have included Nerve, Pitchfork and MoCCA, among others.

Amber Ahlborn - artist, writer, gamer and DigiPen survivor, she maintains a day job as a graphic artist. By night Amber moonlights as a professional Metroid Fanatic and keeps a metal suit in the closet just in case. Has lived in the state of Washington and insists that it really doesn't rain as much as everyone says it does.

Nadia Oxford is a housekeeping robot who was refurbished into a warrior when the world's need for justice was great. Now that the galaxy is at peace (give or take a conflict here or there), she works as a freelance writer for various sites and magazines. Based in Toronto, Nadia prizes the certificate from the Ministry of Health declaring her tick and rabies-free.

Bob Mackey is a grad student, writer, and cyborg, who uses the powerful girl-repelling nanomachines mad science grafted onto his body to allocate time towards interests of the nerd persuasion. He believes that complaining about things on the Internet is akin to the fine art of wine tasting, but with more spitting into buckets.

Joe Keiser has a programming degree from Johns Hopkins University, a tiny apartment in Brooklyn, and a fake toy guitar built in the hollowed-out shell of a real guitar. He writes about games and technology for a variety of outlets. One day he will stop doing this. The day after that, police will find his body under a collapsed pile of (formerly neatly alphabetized) collector's edition tchotchkes.

Cole Stryker is an American freelance writer living in York, England, where he resides with his archeologist wife. He writes for a travel company by day and argues about pop culture on the internet by night. Find him writing regularly here and here.

Peter Smith is like the lead character of Irwin Shaw's The 80-Yard Run, except less athletic. He considers himself very lucky to have this job. But it's a little premature to take "jack-off of all trades" off his resume. Besides writing, travelling, and painting houses, Pete plays guitar in a rock trio called The Aye-Ayes. He calls them a 'power pop' band, but they generally sound more like Motorhead on a drinking binge.