Topic: Dark Souls style Castlevania game or a Horror Castlevania game?

[Zydalc]

You know, I have this idea of rebooting Castlevania to focus more on dread and horror to be entirely like Dark Souls and Bloodborne especially with the same difficulty and also have the same atmosphere focused and style as the Dark Souls games especially the third one.

Thoughts?

[piscesdreams]

I'd rather see Castlevania focus on gameplay, tight controls and being good again rather than a full on horror game.  We already have Dark Souls and Bloodborne, and I highly doubt Konami could beat From Software at their own game.  Even if FS was at the helm of a CV reboot, I wouldn't want it to be Dark Souls with a Castlevania skin.  I'd prefer to see the series return to its own roots, not someone else's roots.

That said, if From Software rebooted Castlevania, I wouldn't be mad.  I'd still play the fuck out of it.

[Zydalc]

That said, if From Software rebooted Castlevania, I wouldn't be mad.  I'd still play the fuck out of it.

Actually I this is what I forgot to suggest...maybe they should give Castlevania to From Software to make a Dark Souls/Bloodborne style game out if it....

[Lumi Kløvstad]

I'd prefer to see the series return to its own roots, not someone else's roots.

I think that this bit here perfectly encapsulates how most of us feel. For the people who like Dark Souls REALLY love it, and the people who like Bloodborne REALLY LOVE IT (like I do), but neither is a great fit for Castlevania. To take it in that direction would be an obvious tactic that wouldn't be received well -- examine some of the hate directed at Lords of Shadow to see what effect that kind of move can have in a fanbase.

Castlevania has timeless roots in the first few games, and some of the later stuff would add a great deal that would become really memorable for us as players. A lot of the disappointment we had with Lords of Shadow was that it was so focused on borrowing from what other series did well that it deteriorated the things Castlevania actually brought to the table, resulting in a great game with the Castlevania brand name that nevertheless was disappointing because it simply never really felt like Castlevania.

If we got a game that did that, just moving in the direction of Dark Souls/Bloodborne instead of Uncharted/God of War, then we'd run into the exact same problems all over again: a decent to great game that feels like something other than what it's supposed to be.

Castlevania has a great foundation.

We'd want whoever made the next game to build on that.

[Claimh Solais]

Castlevania is, and has always been, at its core an action-platformer. This is why the few of its jumps into 3D haven't been all that well-received.

-CV64 and Legacy of Darkness still had platforming, but it was slow-paced and clunky.
-Lament of Innocence and Curse of Darkness were more of dungeon-crawlers with very few platforming elements.
-Lords of Shadow 1 & 2 went more of an Uncharted route with the platforming, and it required zero skill to perform any of it.
-Judgment and The Arcade are spin-offs, so that's excusable.
-DXC and MoF (to an extent) to these right, but their viewpoints are still 2D so they don't count.

Having a CV game styled after the Souls series still wouldn't give us that "good 3D CV" we've been asking for since 1999. It'd just give us Dark Souls with a CV skin.

That being said, I'd say Ys: The Oath in Felghana and Ys Origin are FAR closer to Castlevania in terms of design than the Souls games are.

[Zydalc]

Castlevania is, and has always been, at its core an action-platformer. This is why the few of its jumps into 3D haven't been all that well-received.

Well here's the thing, the reason why Castlevania is commonly a action-plateformer was because the game originally started out as a side-scroller which was the standard model during the 1980s and early 1990s due to the extremely obvious limitations until 3D world spanning games came until much later, all that time they were trying to imitate the platform genre foundation it was originally built on with some or little successes.

Call me a progressive or 'sacrilege' at this point but Castlevania is whatever you want it to be which in this case, engine technology has moved on to the point that plateformers and side scrollers are kinda 'irrelivant' and pretty much optional than the standard requirement as it was during the 1980s/early 1990s due to limitations which in this case, they could might as well abandon the plateforming elements in Castlevania and just make it a fullblown Action-Horror RPG game of Dark Souls and Bloodborne which could be a nice experiment.

[Lumi Kløvstad]

Call me a progressive or 'sacrilege' at this point but Castlevania is whatever you want it to be

A-- are you from Konami Zydalc-kun?

[Zydalc]

A-- are you from Konami Zydalc-kun?

Of course not, what makes you think I am?

[Lumi Kløvstad]

Of course not, what makes you think I am?

Because you REAAAAAAALLY sound like it.

[Claimh Solais]

Well here's the thing, the reason why Castlevania is commonly a action-plateformer was because the game originally started out as a side-scroller which was the standard model during the 1980s and early 1990s due to the extremely obvious limitations until 3D world spanning games came until much later, all that time they were trying to imitate the platform genre foundation it was originally built on with some or little successes.

Call me a progressive or 'sacrilege' at this point but Castlevania is whatever you want it to be which in this case, engine technology has moved on to the point that plateformers and side scrollers are kinda 'irrelivant' and pretty much optional than the standard requirement as it was during the 1980s/early 1990s due to limitations which in this case, they could might as well abandon the plateforming elements in Castlevania and just make it a fullblown Action-Horror RPG game of Dark Souls and Bloodborne which could be a nice experiment.

I don't think it entirely matters what the limitations were or whatnot back in the 1980's. The fact of the matter stands is that that's what Castlevania was, and a large majority of Castlevania IS.

Take a look at Mario, for example. Mario has always been a fast-paced, precision platformer (albeit a bit too slide-y). It began this way with Super Mario Bros., and even after limitations were lifted on newer generation consoles, the Mario series stayed this way (with the exception of games like Super Mario 3D World, which are a bit more slow-paced and down-to-earth). Zelda is much the same way. And even other titles like Metal Gear pretty much remained at their roots for most of their franchise (though with The Phantom Pain it's a bit debatable).

Castlevania being "whatever you want it to be" due to limitations being lifted is a bit of a weak point to make as far as where the series could or should go. For example, what if I wanted Castlevania to be a music rhythm game? Like the Souls-styled game, it'd be a nice experiment (well, for this one, "nice" is debatable), but it wouldn't really be Castlevania, would it?

I also wouldn't consider platformers "irrelevant". Mind you, Mario still sells like hotcakes. And even lesser known ones like Yooka-Laylee are getting a lot of hype. Castlevania doesn't need to remain a 2D-platformer. It can be done in 3D, despite the fact that it hasn't been done yet.

Mind you, I'd be all for a spin-off in the vein of Souls (or a rhythm game), but as for the main series, I think it should remain being action-platformers.

[JR]

If there was ever a Soulsvania game (as in From Software making a Castlevania game, and not a studio making a Castlevania-themed Souls clone), I'd buy it in a heartbeat, but I'd rather see them return to the "camp" horror that drew me to the series in the first place. There are so many directions they could take the style and atmosphere while staying true to the original theme, and I would just love to see it.

[KaZudra]

I don't get it, With Banjo Kazooie, SM64, Crash, Spyro, ect. Why are good 3D platformers pretty much only geared to kids?
Is it really so hard to take something like Ratchet and Clank, and mix it with Dark Souls to get castlevania?

[X]

If there was ever a Soulsvania game (as in From Software making a Castlevania game, and not a studio making a Castlevania-themed Souls clone), I'd buy it in a heartbeat, but I'd rather see them return to the "camp" horror that drew me to the series in the first place. There are so many directions they could take the style and atmosphere while staying true to the original theme, and I would just love to see it.

I agree. And I definitely don't want the Souls series difficulty in a CV game. That's asking too much from many players. CV has it's own thing and it shouldn't be just another clone of a game that isn't CV at its core.

[Nagumo]

I think people are putting the classic games too much on a pedestal here. The series was indeed a side-scrolling action-platformer back in the 80s, but back then that hardly was an original idea either. Nobody is calling those games "Pac Land with a Castlevania skin". That's because they were building on a already established game concept, improved it, and added their own original touches. Obviously, they shouldn't just do a straight up clone game of Souls. People just want a game with a similar design philosophy. I see absolutely no reason to object to that idea since I don't think CV is a series that has its identity rooted in a specific gameplay system. It has always been more about the Gothic-horror atmosphere for me.

[Lumi Kløvstad]

One thing I *do* want to take from Bloodborne is the very Victorian Uber-Goth aesthete that Bloodborne did so well. I think if nothing else the artistic design of the characters and environments would be a great match for Castlevania, at least for a few games. A watered down version of Lords' combo system would also do well. I don't have much against Lords' combat system, but there were simply too many combos and special attacks that I never really used because they tended towards Awesome But Impractical. Pare it down to 6 or 7 combos that are relatively easy to memorize and make it easy to chain those combos together or segue from one to the other mid-combo; the result would be very satisfying. But that action adventure parkour element needs to stay -- I think "platforming" specifically hasn't aged too well and would feel clunky in such a combat-centric series, but updating it to a more Assassin's Creed/Infamous style of quick movement and navigation around large open settings with traversals, jumps, slides under obstacles, and diving from cover to cover in combat against a much more powerful foe could work wonders for updating the series to a more modern 3D style of play.

And then of course have the lore and characterizations be more faithful and repecttful to the "classic" timeline.

Obviously.

Or it should be obvious, but clearly MercurySteam missed that memo, so...

Yeah.