Topic: What if they made CV1, 2, and 3 a seperate continuity?

[Lelygax]

Thats a good call, maybe no one did that and shared information yet, someone with time and knowledge should try.

[TheouAegis]

Well we can all translate the Japanese manual however we want, but if you look at the most significant line in question...

この方法でしかドラキュラを永久に消滅させることはできません。
Kono hōhōde shika dorakyura o eikyū ni shōmetsu sa seru koto wa dekimasen.

The simplest English translation is, "Only in this way can Dracula be annihilated for good." Semantically though, that's not quite right. Semantically, a closer translation would be, "Except by such method, there is no way Dracula can be annihilated for good."

It's tempting to jump to the assumption that both translations are essentially the same, but semantically they are quite different. The former translation has a slight connotation that the end result will be Dracula's annihilation. The latter translation has the slight connotation that if and only if such method is used can there be any hope of annihilating Dracula.

In either case, the most important aspect is that the woman never once said Dracula will be defeated. She would have otherwise said:

この方法でしかドラキュラを永久に消滅させません。
Kono hōhōde shika dorakyura o eikyū ni shōmetsu sa semasen.

"Except by this method, Dracula will not be annihilated for good."

She didn't say that. She said, "Except by this method, Dracula cannot be annihilated for good." So nowhere in the game (manual or otherwise) does it say Dracula was finally annihilated. There never was any guarantee that even if Simon assembled the parts and defeated Dracula again that D would be gone for good; all that was said was unless Simon did that, no one would ever be able to defeat Dracula once and for all. If anything that suggests that Dracula was either possessing Simon or that he tried to curse the Belmont bloodline. Maybe Simon had spinal cancer and that would have prevented him from fucking some girl, but by defeating Dracula's spirit Simon was cured of his cancer.

[Nagumo]

I'm pretty sure you're incorrect. The Castlevania Realm has a translation of the manual story as well, and there's a special note by someone who I know is Japanese (JPCVFAN) that says  "Only in this way can Dracula be annihilated for good." is the correct translation.

I'm more inclined to trust a native Japanese speaker.

Also, there is this:

http://www.oocities.org/nec43xkq3/diinfmst.html

Koutei can affirm what I'm saying.

[Koutei]

It is not good at English translation at JPCVFAN(JP??FAN) and me. Nobody is skillful in English in my Akumajo Dracula fan team. hehe.

But, Mystery woman says that Dracula will disappear permanently.

[uzo]

That's very interesting. I never really made the connection with those inconsistencies.

Though, even if it wasn't a rewrite of the original continuity, ti could be the basis for a reboot / remake of that segment of the timeline. A definite beginning and end point for the reboot series. Give it a solid reworking, but keep everything true to the spirit of the original franchise. Castlevania II being the end point, perhaps give it a post original ending special finisher to the reboot series. Blow our minds with some crazy twist or event.

[Intersection]

The simplest English translation is, "Only in this way can Dracula be annihilated for good." Semantically though, that's not quite right. Semantically, a closer translation would be, "Except by such method, there is no way Dracula can be annihilated for good."

It's tempting to jump to the assumption that both translations are essentially the same, but semantically they are quite different. The former translation has a slight connotation that the end result will be Dracula's annihilation. The latter translation has the slight connotation that if and only if such method is used can there be any hope of annihilating Dracula.

The connotation of the statement doesn't matter.
It's actually simple logic. No matter how you translate the statement, this proposition remains true:
"Dracula can be annihilated for good using that method".
Yet Simon did manifestly use that method.
Ergo, Dracula was annihilated.

There never was any guarantee that even if Simon assembled the parts and defeated Dracula again that D would be gone for good; all that was said was unless Simon did that, no one would ever be able to defeat Dracula once and for all.

That isn't true. The statement clearly describes a method that results in the destruction of Dracula, not a condition for his annihilation.

[Inccubus]

Very interesting info! In the back of my mind I always thought the "best" ending seemed odd somehow, just never connected the dots.

As for the issues with CV3 and CVA being alternate versions of each other, then I guess we can stop blaming IGA for screwing up the timeline since it's quite obvious that it's always been a bit of a disaster from nearly the beginning!

[TheouAegis]

"Only in this way can Dracula be annihilated for good."

Still essentially what I said. And connotations aside? Nowhere did she ever say Dracula will be destroyed for good. How would she even know? "Can be" and "will be" and "could be" are not the same thing at all. They never have been the same thing until the education systems failed in recent decades. And how do you know Simon did exactly what the woman told him to? Because you played as Simon and you know you did everything right because you're infallible and because Simon -- as the protagonist of the game -- is infallible? If you or Simon were infallible, why were there multiple endings? By the very nature of the existence of multiple endings, the fallacy of infallibility is apparent.

I can jump off a skyscraper roof and live.
I could jump off a skyscraper roof and live.
I will jump off a skyscraper roof and live.

If you actually think those three statements are identical, then please, go jump off a building.

[C Belmont]

How's this for a different way of interpreting the endings.
The normal ending was the one you were expecting the one the manual set you up for, the middle ending introduced a surprise twist, & the best ending blew all your expectations out of the water.

when you look at it that way there isn't much reason to question their order, the best ending has the biggest payoff.

[Nagumo]

@TheouAegis

The best ending says Simon defeated Dracula permanently also. It doesn't matter if the mystery woman said "can be" or "will be" (Koutei says it's "will be", though), so that argument is moot. Or are we seriously going to question the credibly of the game's narration?

Besides, for what possible reason would it NOT make sense for the mystery woman to say "Dracula will disappear permanently" and not be correct about? From a story telling POV, something is clearly being foreshadowed or alluded to. The only reason for this not being the case would be just to support your argument.

Two things are set up in the storyline:

1.) Dracula will be destroyed forever.
2.) If Simon dies of the curse, Dracula will be revived (source is PoR timeline).

If the ending texts truly are combined with the wrong visuals, both points would be adhered to. In the middle ending Simon dies, so Dracula comes back, in the best ending Simon overcomes the curse, so Dracula stays dead. Otherwise, it makes no sense at all.

Tell me to jump of a building as many times as you like, but there is no way I'm wrong about this.

[Koutei]

I translated newly again.

Only in this method, Dracula can be permanently eliminated.

oocities cannot be renewed.

[Intersection]

"Only in this way can Dracula be annihilated for good."

Still essentially what I said. And connotations aside? Nowhere did she ever say Dracula will be destroyed for good. How would she even know? "Can be" and "will be" and "could be" are not the same thing at all. They never have been the same thing until the education systems failed in recent decades. And how do you know Simon did exactly what the woman told him to? Because you played as Simon and you know you did everything right because you're infallible and because Simon -- as the protagonist of the game -- is infallible? If you or Simon were infallible, why were there multiple endings? By the very nature of the existence of multiple endings, the fallacy of infallibility is apparent.

I can jump off a skyscraper roof and live.
I could jump off a skyscraper roof and live.
I will jump off a skyscraper roof and live.

If you actually think those three statements are identical, then please, go jump off a building.

My dear friend, there's no need to be so aggressive. Trust me, telling me to jump off a roof won't help.
Without a doubt, "can" and "will" are entirely different. But then, if you hadn't yet realized it, "could" is the conditional tense of "can". So, technically, they do have the same meaning. Tsk, tsk, those educational systems nowadays...

Yet if you'd actually taken the time to follow my reasoning, you'd realize that both sentences use "can":

The simplest English translation is, "Only in this way can Dracula be annihilated for good." Semantically though, that's not quite right. Semantically, a closer translation would be, "Except by such method, there is no way Dracula can be annihilated for good."

So your approach is absurd.

What I was asserting, however, is that both sentences imply the same thing. Let me explain:
"Only in this way can Dracula be annihilated for good." Let's have fun and translate it mathematically. Let "Dracula can be annihilated for good" be proposition p. What the sentence says is: "There exists a unique 'method' x such that p is true."
Now, for the other sentence.
"Except by such method, there is no way Dracula can be annihilated for good". Let "Dracula cannot be annihilated for good" be proposition q. What the sentence says is: "There exists a unique 'method' y such that q is false." Yet what does "q is false" mean? It means "not q" is true. And what is "not q"? Well, it's p: "Dracula can be annihilated for good".
So to conclude, we've found both sentences include one, unique case in which Dracula can be annihilated for good. So, you see, the connotation didn't matter. That was my point.

Now, to be absolutely rigorous, I must admit that "can" expresses a possibility, not a certainty. So, to your credit, it is possible that the method in question was used against Dracula, but failed to work.
Yet we need to look a bit further here: why on earth would Konami bother to explain that only one, unique method can be used to permanently defeat Dracula, adding that Simon did use that method, if it didn't want to imply that Dracula was, in the end, permanently defeated?
Here lies that little jump in logic you have to make to understand Nagumo's point. It's not perfectly rigorous, but it makes more sense than anything else.

As for your "infallibility" argument, I don't understand it. Why would it matter whether Simon or the player were fallible or not? We're talking about a video game that has a set story to tell. The fact that the game has multiple endings means nothing: every game in the series has had a single, canon ending. Or are you telling me that DoS actually isn't possible because Soma turned into Dracula before it?

[TheouAegis]

And the game was told from the viewpoint of a narrator like any story. Was the narrator omniscient? You just assume so. When have seemingly omniscient narrators said something like, "And the world lived happily ever after," or "and the evil menace was gone for good," only to be proven wrong in the sequel? Of course the narrator is going to tell the reader/viewer something like, "And the evil dark lord was finally destroyed forever and the people of Romania lived in peace once again." If the narrator didn't tell you that, you'd be like, "Well then what the fuck was all that for anyway? Why the fuck did I listen to all those retarded villagers that didn't know what they were talking about?" You put too much stock in the narrator.

"The game ending said--"
Epilogue narrators are rarely omniscient. A good twist is set up by a narrator that fools you into thinking it's omniscient.

"The game manual said ... and they wouldn't say that if--"
Sure they would, otherwise you'd have no reason to do all that crap. Simon could die like any other normal human and the world could wait 100 years for Dracula to come back as normal. Instead, we have this odd request from a mysterious figure that tells Simon to...

RESURRECT DRACULA.

Has nobody even questioned her motives? Sure, Simon feels better after beating Dracula, but did Dracula really place the curse on him? How do you know? Because the manual/game told you? Because the narrator told you it was Dracula? Simon doesn't know this woman. You don't know this woman. How do you even know it was really a woman? Because the manual/game told you it was a woman? Oh yeah, books and movies have always told you right up front the gender of someone. Was it human? Was it spirit? Was it angel? Was it demon?

Dracula only comes back every 100 years? SQ was the part of the story where the narrative spat in the face of the other narratives and explained how Dracula could come back before 100 years. Sure, he wouldn't be very powerful right then and there, but to be fair with Drac, Simon was standing right there when he woke up. In the other Castlevanias he did have a few months to recuperate, or at the very least a couple days.

So Simon and you believe Dracula will come back after 100 years just like when Ralph/Christopher defeated him and D came back after 100 years to fight Simon, but a woman straight up tells him that's not necessarily the case and then Simon goes and resurrects Dracula. What if Simon, crippled with a bad back as he was, failed to kill Dracula? Then Dracula would be free to take over the world and there would likely be no one to stop him. He would have played right into the mystery woman's nefarious plot.

How did Simon know she wasn't one of the gypsies that served Dracula? Because she mysteriously disappeared? Batman mysteriously disappears. He pays with hearts because she took all his money! If she was human, why would Simon believe a woman knew how to beat Dracula once and for all? If she wasn't human, Simon talks to ghosts? How would this one ghost know and none others?

Was she an angel because he was a holy man? It hasn't always been good angels that confront holy men. Also, that's not really in the realm of God's doing. Jesus was the only time I'm aware of "God" told humans how to defeat an evil -- and he said to do so in his name, not with a whip. With the rise of Dracula, Romania is overrun by ghosts and demons and zombies. An angel telling Simon how to defeat Dracula is much less plausible than a demon cursing Simon and disguising itself as a woman and telling Simon how to bring Dracula back back under the pretense that by his own actions could Dracula be destroyed forever. It's much more plausible that a demon or gypsy was trying to trick Simon into resurrecting Dracula wholly expecting Simon to be unable to defeat even a groggy Dracula in his accursed crippled state.

But if any of that was the case, why didn't the game just tell you? Because the narrator didn't know. The narrator is only truly omniscient in shitty literature. Also, you wouldn't resurrect Dracula either if you knew one of his minions told you to.

[Intersection]

TheouAegis -- You know what? I really like your idea. It would make for a very interesting twist to the original game's storyline.

Blow our minds with some crazy twist or event.

Well, there you are.

But let's move back to reality. A game isn't a book, especially not a 1987 Castlevania. When you're told that "the evil dark lord was finally destroyed forever", you take it for face value. Especially when the game manual confirms it.
And I assume the narration to be omniscient because it is. If you read "the world lived happily ever" in an epilogue, and cannot attribute it to any single or subjective voice, then you know that by definition it's omniscient. Even the statement itself is far too general to come from a more limited point of view.
And do you honestly believe that the developers actually planned for their very own narrative to be misleading? "Hah, we'll slyly deceive the gamers by deliberately lying in the game and make them think Dracula was actually dead," they thought... Eh, I don't think so.

[Nagumo]

@TheouAegis
Don't be ridiculous. Video game narration told in third-person is always omniscient. There's no reason why it shouldn't be. Condradictions still occur, but that's always because of oversights, not because it's an aspect of that specific narration voice. There's no way you can refute my first argument, so my point still stands.

As for your second point, I think I can safely say that a rule of thumb in fiction is that you're supposed to take everything what is told in a story at face value, unless the story gives you a reason not to. So, I don't think your argument amounts to anything.