How has this become a castlevania and dark souls debate?
Probably due to how little the trailer showed. It didn't particularly show how the game was going to be different than the first. At first glance, the castle areas didn't look much different, visually or structurally, than in the latter part of LoS1 from what was shown. Gameplay showed us some biting and sword play, but that's not exactly what was missing from LoS1. It seemed like there were some finishers with the sword, probably QTEs, which was a no-no the first go around. Meantime, we get the complaints from Robert Carlyle's "Dracul" (who sounds very sympathetic
), and glimpses of a skin-and-bone Dracul, a Gabriel-looking Dracul, and a modern city area out of Infamous or DMC.
They are really putting a lot of their bets on the fact that people will be drawn in by an anti-hero Dracula who has amnesia and delusions of grandeur. Oddly enough, this game (and to a lesser extent MoF) is being sold on STORY. It doesn't make a lot of sense, especially when you're getting TV time, unless you're going after new crowds or people introduced to CV by LoS1. The CV crowds here would really want to see some evidence of Castlevania gameplay, music, monsters, level design, or something beyond the fundamental basics of what LoS was like. (Which wasn't a unifying experience for the fanbase in of itself).
Even though I think MoF is mixing contradictory gameplay styles and overdoing the melodrama, I think at first glance, it makes more of a Castlevania impression than LoS2. That said, neither of the new games has won me over.
PS: trailer's been taken down from earlier in this thread.