Topic: Lords of Shadow stories I'm mad weren't explored

[Lumi Kløvstad]

No offense, but this just really seems like an attempt to justify the huge changes that came in LoS, and I would call it a very innacurate view of the series' history and evolution.  There simply was never anything even close to the jump we had to LoS.  Sure change has been a constant throughout the series, but not such drastic change.  Sure we've had other final bosses then Dracula, stories that don't fit into the overall continuity, drastic changes changes in tone, art style, musical style, etc...  But never so many drastic changes at once.

Aaaand.... that's not allowed? For some reason?

Look, if this were a MAIN ENTRY in the primary series, I'd be pissing blood because I'd be so mad. But Lords of Shadow is pretty far removed from the classic series.

The games you listed as being seemingly non related is really just a false equivalency.  Anyone who played LoI would instantly know that Cod was the same series, the gameplay was a little different, but their was enough the same to make it obvious.  I would say the same thing in terms of Cv1 and SoTN (even though it is a little unfair given how much the series had eveolved in the interim.)  While there was a very different gameplay style we still had the same enemy types, same basic level layout structure, and above all a continuing continuity.  Some people like to say that story doesn't really count in linking games but I call BS on that.  Story is as much a part of a game or series as anything else.

Someone wasn't paying attention. I said if you took the narrative hallmarks of Castlevania (and the Castlevania branding) away, you'd have a bunch of similar but almost totally different games.

LOI and COD could be identified as the work of the same creative studio, but we've had those in other franchises before.

The sorrow games gave us a new setting (futuristic)

Given that they have almost the exact same visual setting as 90% of the series, no they really didn't. The most we got was Dawn's opening segment in which we as players spend about fifteen minutes in and it's basically every other Castlevania village ever. Just with cars this time. Oh, and that one-room area where the tutorial is held that is basically a floor. WITH BUILDINGS IN THE BACKDROP.

And Aria didn't even bother. The total non-Castle environments you see are basically... a staircase at the beginning and a cliff at the end.

And while several games have adjusted the art style, music stye, and the cinematic style of the games, none of these things had been so dramatically changed all at once as they were with LoS.  And it is certainly no coincidence that virtually all of these changes moved into the direction of "what's popular at the moment?"  And while this is fine from a business perspective, it is utterly putrid from and artistic perspective, and even worse from the perspective of respecting the series.

Again, is this a crime? Lords is plenty respectful. Well, the first and MoF are. Lords 2 is just inexcusable.

LoS was a fun game, but the truth is that if it didn't have the Castlevania in the title no one would have made much of a connection.  And while this might be true to some extent in some of the previous games, it never came close to the level that we see in LoS.  If you really want to see an example of just how much LoS strayed, compare it to MoF.  MoF it is a dramatic reinterpretation of what Castlevania has always been, shaking things up while still retaining enough to feel like it is part of the series.

And yet if Mirror of Fate had come first, everyone STILL would have pissed all over it for not being a "true" Castlevania game.

Because that's what "true" fans do.

Lords has just as much right to call itself Castlevania as Final Fantasy Type 0 can call itself a Final Fantasy game -- there are just certain expectations we associate with the names. For Final Fantasy, it can pretty plainly be broken down. Moogles, Chocobos, a Guy Named Cid, etc. It's much more obvious when a game doesn't belong because it doesn't have the obvious "ethnic traits" of games that have the Final Fantasy lineage.

Castlevania's DNA is much less obvious and more subjective to boot. Gothic settings are expected, and are about the only given of the franchise. Dark Fantasy is common. There's usually a whip, but not always. There's usually a Belmont, but not always. There's usually Dracula, but not always. The music usually sounds a certain way, but not always. The art usually looks a certain way, but not always.

Final Fantasy is actually more homogenous in the things that always appear in each game than Castlevania, but each game is almost totally different.

Lords is a perfect example of the "but not always" that have pervaded the series, but it subverts almost all of them in some way. The Belmont and Dracula are both present but the same guy. He uses a whip. The art style sure isn't Ayami Kojima, or the High Gothic look she made so iconic, but it's more of a combination of the early 1990's art styles with an injection of High Fantasy resulting in Lords 1 being basically Super Castlevania IV on steroids and Lords 2 being Lament of Innocence/Curse of Darkness on steroids. The music in the more introspective moments takes cues from earlier Castlevania games (Waterfalls of Agharta being the most flagrantly obvious, but Belmont's Theme in particular could fit almost anywhere in the series, and the soundtrack for Lords 2 is a much closer match to what we've come to expect from Castlevania though still not exact).

There is a common DNA that runs through both franchises, and Lords definitely has it for Castlevania. It's just more of a nephew twice removed than a direct heir.

The only constant in Castlevania is that things don't stay constant. With Lords of Shadow, the old elements are still present but are far more subtle, with new elements coming forward to say "This is not that main show. This is something new."

I'm kind of glad of that, because I felt then (and still do) that a huge shakeup was needed.
And the wallets of customers everywhere agreed.

Again, it's safe to pull what Lords did within the context that it did because it wasn't coming forward to fuck up the main series -- it's creative sandbox disconnected from the overall series. I'm much happier that these drastic changes were played with in a gaiden series than the primary franchise where such sudden and huge changes would have surely ruined everything.

Some of those changes are surely going to enter the main franchise if/when someone picks up production of a new game.

Probably, any new project will be a fusion of the two series.

Taken as what it is, a experiment on new things in a creative sandbox, Lords of Shadow is fantastic, and is worthy of being included in the Castlevania family. Now, I don't think it ought to be continued (owing to its many failings), but it's not bad for a Nephew Twice Removed.

But I'm sure all of us are hoping for a new heir to the classic series soon.

I'm hoping for a new reboot more similar to the primary franchise (basically starting the primary franchise over) to make it less daunting as a buy-in for new customers, but stylistically and narratively similar to the Igavania era with the 3D playstyle that Lords accomplished so well.

May such a new series live for 10 or more titles.

[JayDominus]

Lords of Shadow had a truckload of wasted potential that could make for some amazing games. A pity they spent LOS2's dev time jerking Alvarez off. I don't hate LOS2, but had it had a good director at the helm, it would've been marvelous as opposed to "it's actually much better than critics make it out to be". To me LOS' fall from grace is especially painful because to me, as a fan of the older series who really disliked Ayumi's art style and all the post-SOTN story elements, LoS was the chance to finally once again do Castlevania *right*.