Topic: Konami's Approval Rating

[DarkPrinceAlucard]

That's basically what it is. Some sort of odd CV ripoff.

Thats actually how I look at it lol.

More specifically its more like a CVLOI ripoff.

I mean

Walter Bernhard family
The Forgotten One
The Cronqvist family
Rinaldo Gindolffi

And maybe even more that I can't remember.

Thats why I was pretty suprised to hear that Joachim was not in the game.

[Flame]

It used LoI names because it was a "prequel". But it took other names too.

Carmilla
Cornell
Brauner
Olrox

[DragonSlayr81]

*ahem*

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also, I am 100% certain if it WASNT titled Castlevania, people would be comparing it to Castlevania the same way they compare other games to castlevania, like say- Demon's souls. Not to mention the Dracula thing in the epilogue, the massive amount of name drops, a protagonist with a whip, etc. people would say "wow this reminds me of Castlevania"!
or even accuse it of ripping off castlevania.

Had it not had the easter eggs, name nods and Gabriel used a sword and not a whip, it COULD very well be it's own thing. The whip thing is probably the biggest tie to CV. You could easily change the identities of the other characters with a quick name swap. Rename Cornell to "Volg", Carmilla to "Morganna", Olrox and Brauner to "Ulger and Thaag" and swap the name "Belmont" with "Warheit" and it could be a totally different game. You don't even have to say Gabriel turns into Dracula. Take out the Combat Cross and give Gabriel a grappling hook and a Cross shaped sword and you got a new IP entirely.

[Flame]

Except the Whip was ALWAYS part of the game. In fact, in earlier concepts, (like the original LoS teaser) it was a pyrokinetic whip. AKA a fire whip. The reason being the afformentioned fact that it was always intended as a castlevania game, and was originally named as such but had the name tossed for the teaser due to Judgement's release before Konami let them keep it.

[Kingshango]

Had it not had the easter eggs, name nods and Gabriel used a sword and not a whip, it COULD very well be it's own thing. The whip thing is probably the biggest tie to CV. You could easily change the identities of the other characters with a quick name swap. Rename Cornell to "Volg", Carmilla to "Morganna", Olrox and Brauner to "Ulger and Thaag" and swap the name "Belmont" with "Warheit" and it could be a totally different game. You don't even have to say Gabriel turns into Dracula. Take out the Combat Cross and give Gabriel a grappling hook and a Cross shaped sword and you got a new IP entirely.

Many people would have perfered this instead of using Castlevania's name, I loved the game regardless but it would have been %100 better if it was it's own IP.

*controversial opinion incoming*

Lords of Shadow as it's own game could have been the true sucessor to Castlevania similar to how Maximo was the spiritual sucessor to Ghouls N Ghost.

[DragonSlayr81]

I think a lot of companies are wary of releasing too many IPs over something familiar in name to the public. That's a business standpoint, but I always saw that it's never a bad thing to have a few IPs grace the market. You can only milk big name franchises so much. It's like with movies and all the reboots you see now. Production companies are too afraid to test the waters and step out of the wading pool. I'm not saying, all or none, but a little adventurous soul is good. Most, if not ALL the big name franchises we have now were once adventurous steps taken by video game companies back in the day. You wouldn't never had Mario, Link, Castlevania, Mega Man, Sonic, had those companies never taken the chance and tried something new and adventurous. Hell, had LoS been it's own IP, Konami would have two great fantasy adventure series under their belts(CV and LoS). That would be great for CV, AND LoS(because it would be given even MORE freedom to do it's own thing, and would have NO ties to CV keeping it down).

[cecil-kain]

For the most part I believe all the "easter egg" name dropping was shoe-horned in later in the game's development cycle.  The only reason to believe that LoS may have been a Castlevania game from the beginning is the whip wielding hero.  But if there's one thing IGA taught us about Castlevania, it's this.
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Castlevania doesn't need a whip-wielding hero, Dracula, or even the Castle itself...  Castlevania's soul is in it's atmosphere --darkness, mystery, and gothic romance --and that's where LoS ultimately FAILed.  The right music alone may have nearly saved it.

[Flame]

For the most part I believe all the "easter egg" name dropping was shoe-horned in later in the game's development cycle.  The only reason to believe that LoS may have been a Castlevania game from the beginning is the whip wielding hero.  But if there's one thing IGA taught us about Castlevania, it's this.
''
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Castlevania doesn't need a whip-wielding hero, Dracula, or even the Castle itself...  Castlevania's soul is in it's atmosphere --darkness, mystery, and gothic romance --and that's where LoS ultimately FAILed.  The right music alone may have nearly saved it.

Im not entirely sure when Konami gave them the green light to name it Castlevania again, but I actually think that it might have been still early in development. Tjose names were certainly not shoehorned.

Carmilla, Brauner and Olrox are all vampires as well they should be, and Cornell was a werewolf. Sound about right. The massive castle which is suggested to be a creature of chaos belonged to the Bernhard Family, the previous owners of the castle- And they were far from saints, even letting Frankenstein hang around.

If anything, only the Bernhards are the out of character name drops. Everyone else seems just fine.

Castlevania doesn't need a whip-wielding hero, Dracula, or even the Castle itself...  Castlevania's soul is in it's atmosphere --darkness, mystery, and gothic romance --and that's where LoS ultimately FAILed.  The right music alone may have nearly saved it.

It very much DOES need Dracula and A whip wielding character involved. In fact,it is because we know there ARE Belmonts that we can have non whipping characters like Soma and Alucard.

The whip is still a core part of the franchise. (as is Dracula)

To quote Zero punctuation's Yahtzee:

"I thought hr first thing you did when coming up with a new castlevania game was to take out a big piece of paper and write "DRACULA" right in the center and then branch out from there."

[Nagumo]

I don't want to be nitpicky here, but Cornell is a man-beast, and not a werewolf. He just might happen to turn into a wolf, but in general man-beast are different from werewolves. By making Cornell some kind off chieftain among werewolves just shows how non-caring MercurySteam is. Not shoehorning in this references only adds to the stupidity.       

[C Belmont]

Lords of Shadow as it's own game could have been the true sucessor to Castlevania similar to how Maximo was the spiritual sucessor to Ghouls N Ghost.

I think I probably would have been more accepting of LOS if it had just been something like this, as opposed to the cut & paste Castlevania reboot that it is.

[Claimh Solais]

I don't want to be nitpicky here, but Cornell is a man-beast, and not a werewolf. He just might happen to turn into a wolf, but in general man-beast are different from werewolves. By making Cornell some kind off chieftain among werewolves just shows how non-caring MercurySteam is. Not shoehorning in this references only adds to the stupidity.       

Correct.

Cornell transforms into a wolf, yes. But it doesn't quite show anyone else other than Ortega from the tribe. So we can't quite be sure what they turn into.

And Ortega's definitely not a werewolf. He's uh............. a man-thing.

[Chernabogue]

And Ortega's definitely not a werewolf. He's uh............. a man-thing.

Seeing this makes me think he's actually a Chimera.

[Claimh Solais]

Well, he's got the lion head right but the rest of his body... I think he's doin' it wrong.

[Nagumo]

Cornell transforms into a wolf, yes. But it doesn't quite show anyone else other than Ortega from the tribe. So we can't quite be sure what they turn into.

Cows and tigers. 

[Claimh Solais]

Wait, it did show them off? Oh, were they the other random were-creatures you fought throughout the game? I wasn't paying much attention when play through this game cuz the platforming really annoyed the hell outta me, but yeah.