Topic: Konami Facebook team responding to Operation: Akumajo

[e105beta]

I agreed that it was successful. I mentioned in the first post that by all the metrics I've seen both LoS and the 2D games have gotten past the "success" lines. The question is more about the degrees of success, which is somewhat hard to gauge beyond a murky guess without info that isn't really out there in the public domain.

As far as another issue brought up in the last couple posts, it doesn't really seem like Konami has the number of 2D artists needed to do HD sprites. They'd have to outsource or Vanillaware or something. Supposedly there's a big shortage of well trained 2D sprite artists as it is and very few who have ventured into HD spriting. It probably wouldn't be that reasonable for them profit-wise to go for HD sprites when it's difficult for them to make a new SD sprite for each enemy for every new game (although I don't really have as much of a problem with sprite reuse as other people seem to since there's only so many ways to design a skeleton, minotaur or a medusa head; I have more of a problem with copy-paste level design). They'd need to actually have a decent amount of spriters before they could even think of making a new HD sprite for each enemy in a new game and acquiring that many might not be within the budget possibilities on the 2D CVs.

Agreed.

And to what you're saying, I would bet most of the HD sprite artists have been gobbled up by the fighting game companies. Seeing as they're the ones in the greatest demand for them. I can't even imagine the fan backlash if SNK released a 3D model based King of Fighters game.

It's funny how absurd a full 2-D game for sale on a home console sounds to some people now. If a very stunning 2-D game with excellent gameplay was made, which had all the other bases down, such as music, atmosphere, and so forth, that was also well advertised, I bet it would be a hit. Of course, that probably sounds silly to many people, because, "No one will buy a 2-D console game these days."

The people who are real visionaries are the ones who do things no one else is doing, and make them work. Way back in the day, many of the classical composers broke "the rules" of music at the time and did their own thing. Nowadays, they're revered as legends of the highest order, and the new rules have been written around them. They did stuff no one thought or dared to do at the time, and they did it well.

It would be great if Konami made a 2-D Castlevania on a home console, but cast aside that "hardcore retro video game player" stuff that's often associated with 2-D games now, and made it approachable for everyone without compromising it to be stupid or simple. This is something that many developers who make 2-D games do not do.

When people make 2-D games while pretending that it's freaking 1991 and making it seem as though you retrieved the game from a time capsule, it will, of course, only appeal to people who like retro games. 2-D needs to become separate from the retro deal that's it's associated with and become approachable to everyone to become recognized as a respectable medium in which to make serious games again. It can do that, but people within the industry need to seriously back it and stop developing 2-D games that try so hard to appeal to people's nostalgia. They need to treat it not as though it's an old way to make games, but just that it's another way to make games that is in no way inferior to 3-D.

Theoretically, if any game had the full-package it would sell well, but that ignores the stigma of a 2D game. For one, from a design standpoint, you can do more in a 3D game. Two, where as a 3D game can look like and be marketed as some sort of cinematic experience in a new quasi-world, a 2D game, lacking that third dimension, will psychologically always look like and play like a game, and while this might be engaging to some people (i.e. hardcore gamers) that base is everyday shrinking rapidly in relative comparison to gamers as a whole. And that matters, because games are all about money, and the market has tended to gravitate towards cheap, simple looking 2D games while leaving the high budget games to the 3D devs.

But I don't disagree with you in the slightest. 2D developers have definitely gotten this idea of "2D games are old-fashioned", thus why I applaud companies like Vanillaware who acknowledge 2D limitations try and artistically adapt their games to the medium, or Retro who revived the Donkey Kong series by augmenting the gameplay with technology that wasn't possible back in the early 90s.

However I don't think it's just the developer's fault. From what I've noticed, after the influx of 2D series switching to 3D games in the late 90s, all a lot of fans want is to sit there and play the games they grew up with, whether they're dated or not. I won't bother touching the mess that is Sonic fans, but significantly large portions of fans from numerous other fanbases explode in protest when developers try and expand their audience, either with arguments of "too casual!" or "too different!" whether those claims are warranted at all. This ultimately drove the whole retro thing, and we started getting games like Megaman 9 and 10, or Sonic the Hedgehog 4, which good or bad, did absolutely nothing for gaming as a whole.

Thus why I can't support OA. I don't want Castlevania III HD or Castlevania Demon Castle War of the Night. I want a new game.

Hands down, that's the most liberal interpretation of a statement I've ever read in my whole entire life--and one with which I would totally disagree, if only because I'm taking what Cox said at face value and am reading absolutely nothing into his words as far as what he "really meant" or what I would like him to mean.

Indeed, Cox's words imply that he believes "Castlevania" to be a separate series from "Akumajo Dracula", which is a relatively novel idea considering the only differences between the two in the past have been title (likely due to 1980s censorship differences between regions) and maybe the occasional nude or overly demonic-looking sprite.  Sure, one could argue that even IGA attempted to differentiate between "Castlevania" and "Akumajo Dracula" with Lament of Innocence, Harmony of Dissonance, and Aria of Sorrow--but later entries into the Akumajo Dracula series by IGA suggest that, again, the difference was ultimately to be superficial at best (related only to title and nothing more). 

No, Cox has struck new and, as far as I'm concerned, unnecessary (and unnecessarily vague) territory with how he views Castlevania vs. Akumajo Dracula, and really shows that he has sort of a fratboyish understanding of what made the two different in the first place (i.e. nearly nothing).

But, if Cox's view is to be taken seriously (seriously enough to be shared by, say, the higher-ups at Konami), then that just goes to prove that LoS is not an entry into Akumajo Dracula, and is therefore part of a different series--and thus there's little reason to NOT continue Akumajo Dracula as a series simply because LoS (which by Cox's own admission is not connected) exists.  Hence, IMO, Operation: Akumajo's existence is completely validated by Cox's own words.

I agree with you in that I'm pretty sure the word Castlevania is an 1980's attempt at getting Americans to play a Japanese game by making it sound less Japanese.

Which is why I have to ask: didn't Cox only say Lords of Shadow wasn't an Akumajo game AFTER Operation Akumajo made the distinction? Because by his own words he sees it as a Castlevania game, and if his ultimate goal is to differentiate Akumajo Dracula and Castlevania, then he'd be putting Lords of Shadow in the same bin as Harmony of Dissonance, Aria of Sorrow, and Lament of Innocence.

It's a title, and everyone needs to get over it.

[cecil-kain]

No need to change topic.
I know that my sentiment is not shared by everyone. However, what you call "a honest feedback" as of now looks like your own opinion about series. And most likely not every single "old school fan" share your own thoughts.

Looking back on this topic, it occurred to me that you may not know of my reputation for polling this forum.  I’ve always been interested in asking my fellow fans for their opinions and have polled a variety of topics over the last few years.  I can guarantee you that nobody has setup more polls on this forum than I have.  With that said, the CVD may not be the most accurate place to take the pulse of the Castlevania fanbase, but it is better than making the kind of arrogant presumptions you seem to think I’m guilty of making...  And it’s certainly more than Konami itself has ever done to engage the fans.

And no, it’s not realistic for 100% of the fans to reach an agreement, however it is possible to build a consensus and set an agenda around that consensus.  Like I’ve already explained OA’s Mission Statement was largely tailored to address popular topics and issues where there was a consensus of opinion.  The problem was that the Mission Statement tried addressing too many of these issues at once.  Someone opened a poll quite a few months ago now, asking “why haven’t you joined Operation: Akumajo?” and the majority of those that hadn’t joined responded that “they don’t agree with the mission 100%”  It may well be possible to broaden the base by trimming the mission, but I’d like to see the results of the next viral campaign before making any cuts or radical changes .

Unless of course, a visionary partner came aboard to take some of the workload of my shoulders..  lol

As for mass market appeal - it is excatly why big corporation create games. And, yes, sells are natural showcase of the game quality and appeal. Previous CV games wasn't thta succesful, so its natural that they will be replaced by something more interesting to the people.

The same actually happened in the CV early history. CV2 tried to go into different direction rather than the first part. It wasn't that succesful and CV3 returned to CV1 formula with few twists, practically removing almost every innovation CV2 brought. Much to my disappointment, I must add.

CV2 was simply a different format, the gameplay was actually very faithful to the original.  Or at least moreso than the other oddball sequels of the time --like Super Mario 2, or Zelda 2...

And it's wrong in the big businees because?

Nothing wrong with profit.  I’m self employed and I LOVE PROFIT!  :-D

I understand that you're hurt, by Konami abandoment of the old formula(s) and 2D direction. However you need to approach this maturely and understand that in the world of big money (and video game industry is about big money, like it or not), PROFIT means much more than hurt feeling of old school fans. And no matter how you try to hide that fact, LOS sold more and this is deciding factor in the Konami politics. As it always had been.

Where did you get this idea that I don’t like profit?  I was simply pointing out that Konami will measure LoS’ success in terms of the profits that are generated (dollars and percent) --moreso than the sales.  And also since you and I are not privy to the relevant data (production cost and revenues) the real profits are unknowable to us.  Therefore, debating LoS’ relative success compared to any other Castlevania game would be a *highly* speculative discussion.

Besides, technical advancement creates neccesity for the games (and developers) to adopt to the new rules and powers. It's only natural that games will change, sometimes radically. I bet some of the fans of TEXT RPG were enraged, when they favorite interactive books were replaced with kiddish primitive graphics. And can you imagine majority of the people playing those games today? I don't think so.  The same thing happening with 2D games. There are niche market, living on the life support provided by enthusiasts, DLC and portable consoles. And even portable console nowadays grow powerful enough that many of the games step into 3D. It's only question of time, when 2D will completely disappear as a commercialy relevant product. It's evolution, and as much you can disagree with it, hate it, it couldn't be stopped. Old things will be replaced or lose they value. Its inevitable and, when we talk about big money title, it's very unlikely that big corp. decide to spent they time and efforts on something oldfashioned, that will take time and resources, but will not guarantee any positive outcome.

You obviously have a strong point of view on this matter.  I don’t want to take this topic in pointless circles, as the merits of the 2-D artform were thoroughly debated several pages go, but I will say this.

We didn’t stop drawing because we could sculpt.  We didn’t stop painting because we could snap photos.  We still have Broadway stage productions, even though we have big budget Hollywood films playing at the cinema.  We didn’t retire symphony orchestras, just because we had rock and roll.  And we didn’t stop going for a walk just because we can drive everywhere.

There IS a market for 2-D.  If what you believe is true, there is no way *NO WAY* a 2-D Mario game could possibly outsell a flagship 3-D Mario game *much less two 3-D flagship Mario games combined* on the 3rd generation of 3-D home consoles.  I just don’t see how you can possibly rationalize that position, and I don’t understand why you can’t see the potential for Castlevania to capitalize on that example.  24 Million copies sold is a MONUMENTAL ACHIEVEMENT in this industry by any reasonable measure.  This kind of willful blindness is honestly beyond me.

Essentially requesting the same "big budget" title, but with roundabout words.

“Big budget” is a relative term.  Relative to the system.  Relative to the developer.  Relative to the genre.  Etc...  Perhaps 3-D games have higher production costs than 2-D games.  Perhaps these 2.5-D models have higher production costs than high res sprites.  The fact of the matter is we don’t know because we don’t have access to that kind of data.

In another words you think that Konami obligated to create game for the old fans, just to know how well it would sell?

No.  I’m suggesting that Rebirth and HD may have already tested the market to see how much interest exists in the Akumajo series.  Konami may want to study the sales, the revenues, the costs, the profits, and the margins to help determine what they should be doing next.

The fact that they had nothing to present on the CV 25th birthday and lack of any information about future 2D titles is kind of telling in that situation.

My cynical side thinks that Konami’s avoiding the past to hunker down and sell the reboot .  But who knows, maybe they’re just really callous.

Once again: Quality is not limited to your desires and vision.

No it isn’t.  Quality is a consensus issue.

While I agree with this, I also think that "metroidvania" formula was milked for all its worth and it was time to change "foundation" onto something else. Even good qality "metroidvania" would be a "metroidvania" - copy of the SOTN. That's not what I personally want to see from the series. At least not now.

Putting out a new game every couple years certainly didn’t help matters.  Saturation may have also been a problem appealing to a wider market, but I still think quality was a far bigger factor than the format.

Actually it should. Digi.restribution only is a sigh that the project is pretty small scaled.

I am a huge fan of digistrib!  I’d love to see the entire retail sector (Best Buy/Gamestop/etc) kicked out of the market, so I can buy the games I want without any middleman markup.  Not to mention having a huge collection of disc media eventually leads to unwanted clutter...

[Flame]

I love my sidescrollers.

I could totally dig a Castlevania that plays like Betrayal. (And looks as pretty as it too) Will never happen though.

[TheouAegis]

Anyone else here play(ed) the PC game Trickster Online? It was an MMORPG in 2D (hell, you could even hack the sprite files fairly easily). Simplistic graphics. Enemies themselves had only a handful of frames of animation. And it made Ntreev hundreds of thousands of dollars, even when they gave away cash points freely to players on numerous occasions (my cash item box was nearly full from stuff i bought with the free cash). And like I said, IT WAS ENTIRELY IN 2D.  It had SNES-quality graphics (not dissing on the SNES, mind you) but was still fun for the most part (until they nerfed drilling).

Granted, the PC isn't the same as a console, but that has nothing to do with the hardware -- many console gamers view PCs with disdain and likewise many PC gamers view consoles with disdain. I finally bought a PS2 recently just so I could play Front Mission 5, but most console games I would just download and play via emulator. Hell, you can play N64 games in 3D even without a 3DS! (Not shitting you, Mario 64 in 3D is pretty fun.) You couldn't do that on a real N64 prior to modern 3D TVs, but I was playing Mario 64 in 3D four years ago on my PC.

But that's beside the point. Make 2D games with some sort of 3D aspect, either 2.5D or Paper Mario style, and it might be ok. But anyway, my buddy and I are both saving up for Shinobi 3DS. Sure, it's on a handheld, but it's a classic 2D(ish) platformer, which is what it should have always been.

[Neobelmont]

I love my sidescrollers.

Me too....

[Malus793]

I love my sidescrollers.

Me, three.

[Sumac]

With that said, the CVD may not be the most accurate place to take the pulse of the Castlevania fanbase, but it is better than making the kind of arrogant presumptions you seem to think I’m guilty of making...

If anything, I believe, CVD is one of the balanced CV communities I ever encountered. Others were very one-sided (fans of Classic CV only / rabid haters of everything IGA ever done awkwardly  save for SOTN and big fans of CV Legends and Sonia; fans of IGAvanias only / semi-rabid haters of everything that is not IGAvania acting like they are higher than commoners who couldn't appreciate true beauty of those games).

And it’s certainly more than Konami itself has ever done to engage the fans.

Now, that's arrogant. =)

It may well be possible to broaden the base by trimming the mission, but I’d like to see the results of the next viral campaign before making any cuts or radical changes .

It's better to change some stuff on the way, rather than wait for the results, when it would be to late to change anything.

CV2 was simply a different format, the gameplay was actually very faithful to the original.

Still it was a different approach, that was axed in favor of more "traditional one" after gamers reaction. And I think Super Mario 2 is a bad example - it wasn't even Mario game to begin with.

Though there is opinion that is supposed to be Mario game from the begining and then changed to see if formula worked or something, but its to convoluted to take it seriously.

Where did you get this idea that I don’t like profit?

It's not what I meant actually.
I meant more along the lines that you kind of don't understand significance of PROFIT in the modern video game business. You saying "give us big budget title with created by rather expensive (and old fashioned technology) for fans". But in order to big a big budget project this game should appeal to more people than fans only. I doubt that there are big projects that live only because of fans. Well, maybe except for Mario, but Mario is covered practically every single genre and in the end he is too has appeal to everyone, not only old fans of the franchise.

To put it simple - game could be big, if it would:
a) revolutionize genre and / or be extremely well crafted (Portal comes to mind);
b) have PR power (but it's not guarantee that the game will be any good);
c) have appeal to gamers in general, not only fans (simple way);

There IS a market for 2-D.

I never said that there is not market for 2D games.
I said that big 2D commercial projects soon will be thing of the past. In general 2D will never die since it would live through small scale very cheap projects of independent studios and fan developers (Mugen, Beats of Rage projects).
And once again - Mario is a Mario. He and "Nintendo magic" could sell anything. But there is only one Nintendo and tonnes of the developers who haven't their approach and creativity.

“Big budget” is a relative term.  Relative to the system.  Relative to the developer.  Relative to the genre.

 
Looks like relative attempt to not admit what you have said in the past.

My cynical side thinks that Konami’s avoiding the past to hunker down and sell the reboot .  But who knows, maybe they’re just really callous.

Actually it is not exactly controversial to what I said.
More like those two reasons could be related to each other.

[Charlotte-nyo:3]

And once again - Mario is a Mario. He and "Nintendo magic" could sell anything. But there is only one Nintendo and tonnes of the developers who haven't their approach and creativity.

I think his point is that 2D Mario outsells 3D Mario ("Nintendo magic" is equally at play for both styles, both being Nintendo-made), meaning in at least some paradigms, 2D is more financially viable. I wouldn't really think some kind of special Nintendo creativity would factor into 2D Mario selling better than 3D Mario either, since Mario Galaxy has generally seen more creativity than NSMB and NSMBWii.

Of course there are some extenuating issues that make this issue something CV probably couldn't really take advantage of: 3D Mario is a 3D platformer, and those are innately more awkward to play than 2D platformers, so they already have that working against them, while 3D CVs can minimize platforming elements if they have to; and 2D Mario has a nostalgic element for a decent-sized portion of the gaming public who played the older games on NES/SNES, while CV reached a much smaller audience; Mario is a household name, CV's niche.

[cecil-kain]

If anything, I believe, CVD is one of the balanced CV communities I ever encountered. Others were very one-sided (fans of Classic CV only / rabid haters of everything IGA ever done awkwardly  save for SOTN and big fans of CV Legends and Sonia; fans of IGAvanias only / semi-rabid haters of everything that is not IGAvania acting like they are higher than commoners who couldn't appreciate true beauty of those games).

The CVD does have a healthy variety of opinion, but only the hardest of the hardcore really call this place home.

Now, that's arrogant. =)

Touche, sir.

It's better to change some stuff on the way, rather than wait for the results, when it would be to late to change anything.

As I’ve explained, some changes have already been made.  Right now our top priority is to sharpen the focus on the Demon Castle War for the next viral campaign.
 

It's not what I meant actually.
I meant more along the lines that you kind of don't understand significance of PROFIT in the modern video game business. You saying "give us big budget title with created by rather expensive (and old fashioned technology) for fans". But in order to big a big budget project this game should appeal to more people than fans only. I doubt that there are big projects that live only because of fans. Well, maybe except for Mario, but Mario is covered practically every single genre and in the end he is too has appeal to everyone, not only old fans of the franchise.

To put it simple - game could be big, if it would:
a) revolutionize genre and / or be extremely well crafted (Portal comes to mind);
b) have PR power (but it's not guarantee that the game will be any good);
have appeal to gamers in general, not only fans (simple way);

Castlevania should be somewhat appealing to anyone that enjoys gothic atmosphere and action-oriented gameplay.  But after years of stagnation, Konami has only recently decided to make a serious investment in 3-D Castlevania.  Now LoS has succeeded in reaching a market that had passed over the brand for over 10 years.  This begs the question --  Why wouldn’t a serious investment in 2-D Castlevania yield similar results?

Surely Konami knows that 2-D Castlevania has a loyal, hardcore fanbase over 300,000 strong --and if indeed that fanbase is willing to pay for higher quality, say $20.00 more than they paid for the DS games --then logically, Konami may be able to invest an additional few million dollars at extremely low risk.  Speculative?  Yes it is.  Mainly because I don't know the original production costs or profit margins of the DS games.  But it's also interesting to note how the DXC outsold each of the DS games.  It would be a very interesting study to examine all of the data on those games for a more thorough analysis...

I said that big 2D commercial projects soon will be thing of the past.

That’s what the industry “experts” have been saying for over 15 years --and still we have 2-D on home consoles selling by the millions!

In general 2D will never die since it would live through small scale very cheap projects of independent studios and fan developers (Mugen, Beats of Rage projects).

Sadly, it’s the big companies like Konami, that can afford to “gamble” on 2-D, but seem to have the least ambition and confidence in themselves to do so...

But there is only one Nintendo and tonnes of the developers who haven't their approach and creativity.

And this too is a sad thing...
 

Looks like relative attempt to not admit what you have said in the past.

?   Explain.

[Sumac]

The CVD does have a healthy variety of opinion, but only the hardest of the hardcore really call this place home.

Sounds like a political propaganda.

That’s what the industry “experts” have been saying for over 15 years --and still we have 2-D on home consoles selling by the millions!

1) I don't think there are many of them.
2) 2D games will no disappear no matter, but their commercial viability will decrease.
3) Experts always hype new technology beyond any reasonable manner. I bet in days of 3DO, "experts" said that FMV games are the future...and how this ended. =)

Sadly, it’s the big companies like Konami, that can afford to “gamble” on 2-D, but seem to have the least ambition and confidence in themselves to do so...

Not really. Even for the biggest company inadequate risks and gambling could have very undesirable consequences.

This begs the question --  Why wouldn’t a serious investment in 2-D Castlevania yield similar results?

Because Konami lose to much time creating copypasta-filled games.

?   Explain.

You said that basically you want the game with big budget. Than you tried to say that you didn't mean it. Then you again said that you want game with big budget, but in another words. Finally you said that "big budget is relative term...". Essentially you jumped back and forth with big budget thing.

[cecil-kain]

Sounds like a political propaganda.

How so?  Do you have an opposing view of the CVD?

Not really. Even for the biggest company inadequate risks and gambling could have very undesirable consequences.

Risk is part of any business.  There was a time when it was "do or die" for the game industry.  Risk was not optional.  Quality was not optional.  I'm sad to say, it may take another market crash to shake this industry out of its complacency.

Because Konami lose to much time creating copypasta-filled games.

If they have the money (and the time) why wouldn't this problem be fixed?

You said that basically you want the game with big budget. Than you tried to say that you didn't mean it. Then you again said that you want game with big budget, but in another words. Finally you said that "big budget is relative term...". Essentially you jumped back and forth with big budget thing.

Let's take a moment to define "serious investment" as best I can without real data to work with.

Asking for a "serious investment" is meant to imply that past investments were timid and detrimental to quality.  Therefore, the development budget should DEFINITELY be the largest of any 2-D Castlevania to date.  With that said, any increase should be substantial enough to noticeably improve quality, but not so excessive or gluttonous to pose an unreasonable risk  --as your interpretations have often implied.

For example, OA is not expecting a 90 million dollar investment.  Considering the 2-D Castlevania fanbase is only 300,000 strong --Konami would need to sell an additional 1.5 million copies at a wholesale price of $50 (retail around $60) just to break even.  In fact a 20% profit would require 2.16 million sales.  Expecting Konami to improve 2-D Castlevania's sales over 500% is beyond irrational.

Just for fun, let's indulge in some more speculation...  Let's suppose Konami expected to sell 900,000 copies of a high quality 2-D Castlevania (an increase of about 200%).  And let's also presume a wholesale price of $35 (retail around $45.00)  The projected revenues would be about 31.5 million dollars.  If Konami were confident in the sales goal, and satisfied with a 50% profit, they could invest $21 million dollars in a 2-D Castlevania budget.

But again, all of this speculation brings us back to the original problem.  We DON'T know how much Konami normally invests in 2-D Castlevania.  Nor do we know anything about Konami's methodology projecting sales, revenue, or profits.  We're not even really sure how Konami defines success...  Is a 5% profit successful?  How about 10%?  20%?  40%?  80%?  By what standard is success really measured?

We've been told LoS came about because the Castlevania brand wasn't "profitable", but technically that can only be true in relative terms.  Otherwise Konami wouldn't have bothered releasing a new DS game for the same price every couple years.  If you're just looking at hard dollars, then sure, games like MGS (with its millions of copies) will always be seen as "more profitable" based on the sales alone.  Moreover, if MGS has a 50% profit, and Castlevania has a 20% profit, then perhaps Konami may feel even more deeply discouraged...  But even at 5% profit, Castlevania would still be making money.

Unfortunately, we just don't have the facts we need to ask for anything more specific than a "serious investment".  We could speculate in circles for days and emerge from our conversation none the wiser.  What more need be said?

[Gunlord]

"Otherwise Konami wouldn't have bothered releasing a new DS game for the same price every couple years."

This isn't necessarily true, O beauteous Cecil-Cain-sama. Companies can on occasion be fairly bull-headed sometimes, pursuing an unprofitable strategy for years before finally getting the message that it's not working. That *may* have happened with the DS vanias. I'm not saying it necessarily happened, but it *may* have. Or it's possible they simply experienced diminishing returns--i.e DoS did very well, PoR a little less, and then OoE considerably less. If that happened, they might have turned to Lords of Shadow as a means of trying something new--something that might have maxed out returns rather than diminished ones, so to speak.

[cecil-kain]

This isn't necessarily true, O beauteous Cecil-Cain-sama. Companies can on occasion be fairly bull-headed sometimes, pursuing an unprofitable strategy for years before finally getting the message that it's not working. That *may* have happened with the DS vanias. I'm not saying it necessarily happened, but it *may* have. Or it's possible they simply experienced diminishing returns--i.e DoS did very well, PoR a little less, and then OoE considerably less. If that happened, they might have turned to Lords of Shadow as a means of trying something new--something that might have maxed out returns rather than diminished ones, so to speak.

You may possibly be right about diminishing returns on the DS games.
The sales certainly declined...  Here's the data...

--DS Games--
DoS 351,951 sold
PoR 339,691 sold
OoE 289,166 sold

--PSP--
DXC 354,892 sold (not including the PSN downloads)

I was under the impression PoR and OoE recycled a good chunk of DoS' engine, but then again, game code is way outside my area of expertise.  Perhaps DoS sold the most copies, but it may also have been the most expensive and least profitable.  If indeed PoR and OoE recycled a big chunk of DoS' code to keep costs down, they may have reaped some rewards.  Not enough info to say one way or the other...

I was actually really surprised when I learned the DXC outsold each of the DS games.  It looks like the switch over from the DS to the PSP may have even hurt OoE's sales (OoE released a year after the DXC)

It maddens me that I can't find any PSN sales data.  I'm really curious if the DXC ever hit the 400k mark.

[Gunlord]

Prunyuu~! Thanks for the data. Now, I'm no magical code magician myself, but I would be very surprised if they *didn't* recycle the engine of DoS for the other two games. It's possible that DoS may have been the least profitable, but judging by the sales data you provided, the diminishing returns argument still applies...OoE sold less than PoR. Again, it seems to me that after OoE they still would have come to the conclusion that Castlevania was "unprofitable," and thus...alas...T_T

[Neobelmont]

--PSP--
DXC 354,892 sold (not including the PSN downloads)

I was actually really surprised when I learned the DXC outsold each of the DS games.  It looks like the switch over from the DS to the PSP may have even hurt OoE's sales (OoE released a year after the DXC)

It maddens me that I can't find any PSN sales data.  I'm really curious if the DXC ever hit the 400k mark.

If it hit well the greatest hit's it must have sold a bucket loads worth, but then again let's look at dxc you are getting a new game and two classics the original and sequel three games for the price of one dxc was just more bang for your buck.