Topic: the Lament of Innocence origin story.....

[CaptainCalabaza]

[Phoenix7786]

Everyone has an origin story they don't like, whether it's Sonia's origin on the Gameboy, Leon's origin on LoI, or Gabriel's on the PS3/Xbox360.

However these topics can always make good discussion fuel! And welcome to the 'Dungeon!

[crisis]

What do you mean you don't "buy" it? Explain yourself.

However these topics can always make good discussion fuel!

only if the OP decides to make a good argument in his/her initial post.. or else people should be making topics with the title "mathias was a bad friend, agree?" and just saying "topic" in their post lol

[CaptainCalabaza]

a thousand year feud over a girl ? really ? the cause of dracula's vampirism is a freakin' stone ? character design that looks like world of warcraft rejects ? yet another girly looking protagonist ? whats RIGHT about it ? dont get me wrong, i enjoyed the game ( especially that little Pumpkin guy ), but i dont see it as a good starting point for an age - old conflict storywise.

[Kale]

a thousand year feud over a girl ? really ?

Same can be said for Helen of Troy! BAM!

[X]

Same can be said for Helen of Troy! BAM!

Except the Trojan war only went on for a decade whereas CV has been going on for a thousand years with some century breaks in between.

LoI was alright for what it was and I rather enjoyed playing through it. But the only detail that skewed the rest of the series from then-on was Dracula's origins. IGA should not have touched that subject with an 90 foot poll. And yes some of the characters should have had better designs. Leon didn't look too bad but his 'bed hair' was out of place in that time period. Instead he should have sported a short hair or long braided hair. Also his over sized gauntlet. Not practical in any way and not very attractive to look at. Giving him a wrist buckler would have a wiser choice. Sara's look was very European so high marks for that, however her face did not match at all with the official art style. It was way too Asian-looking and even today just thinking about it makes me cringe slightly. If Sara is a European noble woman then she should not have been made to look Asian in the first place. As for the ebony and crimson stones... This game came out after the first Harry Potter film so I personally think this inspired IGA somewhat to include a brief mention of the Philosopher stone, and thus the Ebony and Crimson stones were born out of this. But originally Dracula never had the Crimson stone. instead he wore the classic bloodstone. IGA just merged the two so know the bloodstone is the Crimson stone. But even if Dracula has both stones he really doesn't need them. He acquired his power all on his own where as IGA's Dracula needed help in order to acquire the power 

Again LoI was a good game to play but some of it's aesthetics could use a bit of polishing and the Dracula origin story itself was a big screw up.

[Sumac]

a thousand year feud over a girl ? really ? the cause of dracula's vampirism is a freakin' stone ? character design that looks like world of warcraft rejects ? yet another girly looking protagonist ? whats RIGHT about it ? dont get me wrong, i enjoyed the game ( especially that little Pumpkin guy ), but i dont see it as a good starting point for an age - old conflict storywise.

Personally I more or less OK with LOI as origin story. It could have been done better, in particular without Castlevania cliche story of "two friends - one become evil", that was used several times through the series by that point. Origin deserved to stand out from the rest of the series. Instead, it's using already tired plot-device and couldn't even execute it decently. For the player "big revelation" of Mathias being the culprit behind Leon's trouble was literally nothing. Unlike Leon, who supposedly knew Mathias for a long time, player was familiar with him for a few sentences in the intro and manual, so he didn't had any reason to care about Mathias or anything. Yeah, some guy, who was mentioned in the intro of the game is the main villain...big deal!!
And thanks to the "brand new plot device (Ah, Sarcasm)" and the way intro accentuated Mathias importance, it was obvious that Mathias will turn out the main bad guy, even for the people who didn't know about the series, I believe.

As for the reason of the feud...well, I think it was a good reason to start personal conflict between Mathias and Leon, but not the thousand-year long war between Dracula and Belmonts. As we can assume, Leon was hellbent to get Mathias who went into hiding. So, hellbent that he purposely trained his son (or daughter?) to become a new owner of the Vampire Killer and "hunt the Night". Now, this is where this story starts to get a little off for me.

I am understand Leon's desire to avenge his beloved, but I'm not OK with him, basically, taking away a chance for a normal life from his descendants and sending them to the war that litterally had nothing to do with them. If, there was a story, where Mathias commits horrible atrocities before CV3 and child or grand child of Leon, decided on HIS OWN to hunt Mathias, not to avenge would-be-bride of they father who they didn't really have much reasons to care for, but because Mathias was just potentially dangerous to the humanity (as he later proved) than I will be perfectly OK with LOI setup. But by now, LOI origin looks really melodramatic and somewhat incomplete. At least to me.

And in the current timeline, Leon ultimately comes as no less insane than Mathias himself. One decided to mock god out of spite and for that ruined life of his best friend, the other - threw life of his children into trash and put them into constant danger. And both did it because of the same reason. Now, do I spot a bit too many similarities between the two?

Of course, maybe it was IGA's grand plan all along and then I will be totally on board with this idea, since its ultimately very ironic and ingenious that the greatest threat to the humanity and the greatest hope of it, were both born by madness, caused essentially by the same reason. If it was the plan, than I will take all my usual IGAbashing back, though I doubt it. And even if it was the core idea, it was still rather poorly conveyed.

As for designs - I don't have absolutely nothing against them. I think LOI characters are one of the best works of Kojima in the series.

[Nagumo]

I always viewed the incident that occured between Mathias and Leon as negligible as far the Belmonts feud against Dracula is concerned. It's not like Leon's motivation directly affects that of later Belmonts anyway. Dracula threatens the world and they are the only capable to destroy him. You could say IGA retconned this to be their motivation when he wrote the story for LoI, but it makes far more sense if this was only a secondary reason at best. So I don't think it's correct to think that what Mathias did to Leon is THE reason why the Belmonts fight against Dracula. It's more like a prelude than an actual cause, I think.

[Thomas Belmont]

A couple of things that really disappointed me, from what I can remember, are that the Vampire Killer was just given to Leon by Rinaldo and the game didn't mention much about Matthias'/Dracula's and Death's first encounter. Dracula controls Death because he has a magical stone? Pretty lackluster, in my opinion.

[TheCruelAngel]

I personally haven't beatin' LoI yet, so cut me a little slack on this opinion but here are my 2 cents.

Dracula has had a few "origin" stories and interpretations over the years (Judas, Vlad who condemns and rejects God, etc.) and for the CV lore I appreciate Iga trying to do his own thing for it, kind of have everything mesh better with his idea of how the continuity and timeline played out. However, I was also perfectly fine imagining Dracula was a 15th century prince of Wallachia who rejected God and died, only to come back and blanket the world in darkness and evil, powered by nothing but spite and hatred.

I think that makes for an awesome setup, since from what I'm reading stones are the key to Dracula's power in LoI? I don't know, I agree with some of the sentiment here and that it leaves me wanting more. Heck, the origin of Dracula in the LoS timeline seems better (again haven't finished it yet, kinda slow at this stuff guys!), though I still prefer my Wallachian prince. 

IMO, I think LoI should of focused on Leon dedicating his lineage to hunting evil/night/vampires in general instead of this grudge match against Mathias. I mean, if the grudge is over a girl, his one true love or whatever, then how realistic would it be to assume Leon would propagate his line to train the next in line for no other reason than grudge? No love there folks, just pure breeding for war, and I think that's unfair to the lady that would eventually bear Leon's children.

Thinking about it...it really does paint Leon in a negative light...maybe Iga should of thought about the post game consequences for his characters in this universe. Though, some have said this already I think Kojima's work in LoI is indeed some of her best as well. I especially love her crusader Leon outfit.

[darkwzrd4]

I'm with most of you.  This should NOT have been the origin of Dracula.  In my opinion, Mathias should not have existed as the antagonist.  Instead, it should have just been everything minus the Mathias and Death things. 

• Walter kidnaps Sara
• Leon tracks Walter down
• Leon is greeted by Rinaldo
• Rinaldo explains everything and gives Leon the Whip of Alchemy
• Leon defeats the 5 guardians
• Leon tries to harm Walter
• He fails but gets Sara back
• Leon and Rinaldo discover that Sara was bitten
• They go through the ritual that turns the Whip of Alchemy into the Vampire Killer at the expense of Sara's life
• Leon fights and destroys Walter

The End

That is what LoI should have been.  An origin of the Vampire Killer whip the Belmonts use.  As far as their war against Dracula, it could be said the they have the skills needed and Leon started a tradition to training in case such a threat ever emerged.  The only reason they fight Dracula is that he is a threat to the world and they have the skills and power to fight him so they do.  No blood feud.  Just plain and simple good versus evil.

[TheouAegis]

Well if you look at the timeline and compare it to history (some historical differences aside), LOI's isn't all that bad as you guys make it out to be.

Mathias becomes Dracula... 400 YEARS LATER. Leon's vendetta has nothing to do with how he raises his kids, as it's never his kids nor his grandkids who fight Dracula. By the time Trevor meets Dracula, Leon's been worm food for over three centuries.

If you look at the history of Wallachia, it's a family feud, but a powerful alchemist like Mathias could easily forge himself a new identity and try to rule Wallachia (Vlad Tepes), only to be constantly harassed by the legitimate heirs (Grant, et al).

The Crimson Stone makes perfect sense as a faux-Philosopher's Stone. Mathias would give his most powerful minions a stone that they think are imbuing them with more power, but really the crystals are drawing out each monster's latent strengths and storing that power inside. When the monsters die, Mathias would hope to retrieve the crystals (brought to him conveniently by Leon's descendants) and harness the powers stored in each one.

The whole alchemist Dracula story makes perfect sense, since an alchemist as adept at the art as Mathias after 400 years would be condemned by the Church as a sorceror. Dracula doesn't summon demons when he dies, he transmutates. He's an alchemist through and through. How is he brought back to life? Alchemy. Why do humans keep wanting to bring him back? He's one of the greatest alchemical minds in history. He knows the secrets of alchemy long since discarded by the Church as heresy.

As for why Dracula looks different from incarnation to incarnation, read H.P. Lovecraft's "The Thing on the Doorstep".

[Inccubus]

I always viewed the incident that occured between Mathias and Leon as negligible as far the Belmonts feud against Dracula is concerned. It's not like Leon's motivation directly affects that of later Belmonts anyway. Dracula threatens the world and they are the only capable to destroy him. You could say IGA retconned this to be their motivation when he wrote the story for LoI, but it makes far more sense if this was only a secondary reason at best. So I don't think it's correct to think that what Mathias did to Leon is THE reason why the Belmonts fight against Dracula. It's more like a prelude than an actual cause, I think.

This. And seriously people, don't underestimate the loss of a beloved as motivation for just about anything in the heart of a human being.

[crisis]

Too further clarify TheouAegis' post, lettuce examine the established canon details of games prior to IGA's involvment:

4rom CVIII,

15th century Europe. During the Dark Ages, there was a man who was feared by all. A man who has stopped being human. His name was
Count Vlad Tepes, otherwise known as Dracula. His territory was located at the outskirts of Transylvania, at the Wallachia territory, where he
used a taboo art to resurrect an evil deity. The deity granted him power and in exchange, he summoned several apparitions from the spirit
world in order to scorch and massacre the entire nation of Wallachia with darkness.

Adventure Time with Chris & Drac,

Transylvania, a small country in Europe, is associated even today with a demon's legend. With his powerful evil power, the legacy of
Count Dracula has been dreaded by the people. However, no matter how many times Dracula comes back, he never manages to fully
change the world into darkness as he is always put away by Simon, a descendant of the Belmont clan. However, the devil Dracula has
existed long before his first confrontation. Not as the devil Dracula, but as an evil sorcerer. Count Dracula was a fanatical demon worshipper,
who built a dark castle at the outskirts of Transylvania and conducted evil rituals every night. He has summoned several demons from the
other world to serve him and he himself has been trying to get eternal life by becoming a demon king possesing evil powers. With each
day, Count Dracula's evil powers became more frigtening, as he spread fear and terror to the people of the village. Until one day, a man
stood up. It was Christopher, an ancestor of the Belmont family. Christopher rushed to the dark castle. Many demons and traps layed out
are waiting for him at the castle. Will he be able to defeat the transformed devil, Count Dracula, as expected?

Stake those bolded tidbits into account, and they match perfectly with the events that took place in Lament. Mathias, descending from a family of alchemists, used his family's knowledge & own skills to summon Death, the evil deity that was first mentioned in CVIII.

The deity granted him power..

Death: This power... I offer to the king who wields the Crimson Stone!

I needed a powerful vampire's soul. That is all.

The Belmont Clan, inheriting the burden of finding Mathias, continue to hunt down vampires.
For this reason, all members of the Belmont Clan are bestowed with the title, Vampire Hunter.
Feared for their powers, they are shunned by society. To further their troubles, each slain
vampire only adds to the growing power of Dracula.

The developers behind CVA decided to take it a step further, by making him into something that goes WAY beyond Vlad III's origins,

he himself has been trying to get eternal life by becoming a demon king possesing evil powers..

IF limited life is God's decree, then I shall defy it!! And within that eternity, I shall curse Him forevermore!

the devil Dracula has existed long before his first confrontation. Not as the devil Dracula, but as an evil sorcerer.

(note that IGA says Dracula was living quite peacefully during that unknown period, yet CVA's manual says he was busy summoning demons. This may seem contradictory, but this just means Dracula was going uninterrupted for an extended period of time, no Belmonts/other heroes tracking him down. Besides, it wasn't until he met Lisa, Elisabetha's "incarnation," that things for him started to unravel, so to speak (laughs)




So, as you can see, Lament of Incense' Dracula origin jives quite well with the established canon of the CV universe, and I think people just have their own preconceived notions on what Dracula SHOULD be, rather than what he was ESTABLISHED to be since the very beginning, so they react negatively to what IGA/game content/other developers have done. In the CV universe, he was never Voivode of Transylvania and waged war against the Turks. Konami wanted him to be something more than what history gave us.


also,

And seriously people, don't underestimate the loss of a beloved as motivation for just about anything in the heart of a human being.

This is 100% true. "mathias lost his wife, what a baby." Mathias was stricten with grief & was bedridden for quite some time. His life was devoted to God, he though He could do no wrong to him. I'm sure his anger was building as he felt powerless in his bed, after all he's done in God's name, he felt betrayed.

If you were to lose a loved one, be it significant other, child, etc. I wonder how YOU would react. You probably wouldn't go to work/school/wherever the next day, you'd be in an entirely different state of mind. Like Mathias.

[Lelygax]

Well in my opinion they dont fight Dracula because of this, I think that the first kid of Leon trained because of that, but after they other descendents have forgotten why they do that and simple continues to fight monsters, lets remember that in CV3 that the Belmonts returned to Wallachia, before that they have been banned because they feared they super-human powers. The major error starts here: Why in LoI they didnt shows NOTHING about this "super strength", they only show things about the whip.

If you were to lose a loved one, be it significant other, child, etc. I wonder how YOU would react. You probably wouldn't go to work/school/wherever the next day, you'd be in an entirely different state of mind. Like Mathias.

Since my grandmother died my faith in God has fallen considerably, since she started to sleep minutes before of I leaving the hospital and never awaked again (Yes, she didnt are sleeping, she died). The only thing that I asked for God is to her get better, and that what I received. Mixing that with things that happened before only worsened my case. So yes, Mathias motive not is impossible in our world, its more easy than you thought.