Topic: Who came up with the name "Castlevania"?

[LuxKiller65]

I'm really curious to know. Does anybody know who came up with the name?

As it's not a direct translation of the original Japanese title "Akumajo Dracula", was it a Konami employe From the US? Europe? Somebody in Konami Japan?

And how do we know if Akumajo Dracula came first? Maybe they had Castlevania in mind first, and then came up with Akumajo Dracula to fit with the Japanese language.

And what is Castlevania anyway? Is it just Castle + Translyvania, or is there more to it?

[Dremn]

I always assumed "Castlevania" was the name of the castle itself. SotN's intro refers to it as such.

[Ratty]

I don't think anyone outside Konami really knows, though I'd be happy to be proven wrong on that one. At the time not only were game credits poorly kept, but in many cases they were purposefully obfuscated. As I understand this happened for several reasons. One was that game companies in Japan didn't want other companies to poach all their talent, so they forbade development teams from putting their actual names in the credits, or so I've heard. It would explain the prominence of nicknames and such in the credits sequences for many old Japanese games. Such as the credits for Castlevania 1 being made up of puns on famous horror movie actors. Another reason is that working in games wasn't very prestigious, and some Japanese devs might have even been ashamed of it back then. Plus just the sad fact that corporations usually like to keep any ideas of creator credit and ownership to a minimum.

If I had to guess though, I'd say the name Castlevania probably came from someone on a localization team or a marketer. As for which came first well, the MSX game "Vampire Killer" (just called "Akumajo Dracula" in Japan as well iirc, though it was a very different game with many of the same art assets) was released in Europe in the same year that "Castlevania" was released in the west, though last I heard there was some disagreement about which was released first. Meanwhile the "Akumajo Dracula" arcade game that came two years later was released in the west as "Haunted Castle". So I think it's safe to assume you had several different English language localization/marketing teams coming in after the fact, and not really talking to one another.

I always assumed "Castlevania" was the name of the castle itself. SotN's intro refers to it as such.

Yeah that's got integrated into series canon to some extent even if it wasn't the original intention I think. And it makes sense when translating text from Japanese to English since Akumajo Dracula means "Devil's Castle Dracula" or "Demon Castle Dracula". I seem to recall IGA tried to have some of the less Dracula-centric handheld games branded as "Castlevania" in Japan for this reason, and some of the hardcore Japanese fans gave him hell for it.

[GuyStarwind]

I thought it was just a clever play on words

[crisis]

[Aridale]

I thought it came from vania meaning woods so castlevania is castle in/of the woods

[LuxKiller65]

"Castlevania 3: Curse of Darkness"? lol nice one

Anyway I guess we will never know who came up with the name.

Also, the "creator" of Castlevania can be a different person from the guy who came up with the name, hmmm

[X]

And what is Castlevania anyway? Is it just Castle + Translyvania, or is there more to it?

I thought it came from vania meaning woods so castlevania is castle in/of the woods

Both of these sound plausible, but maybe all it was just a play on words. It might have sounded strange back in the day but now it's a infamous franchise title.

[Charlotte-nyo:3]

Might be something interesting for an enterprising journalist to try to track down but I somehow doubt we'll ever know who came up with it.

[Morning star]

If i posted something here it would probably get shit bombed or deleted. But i can answer some of these questions to some extent.

[Ratty]

If i posted something here it would probably get shit bombed or deleted. But i can answer some of these questions to some extent.

Why do you think you would be shitbombed or deleted? Also how did you come by this information?

[ganonfloyd]

Trans Fishers maybe?

[darkwzrd4]

I don't know who came up with the name, but I'll assume that it was someone in the west (likely on the localization team). Considering that most of the religious stuff was being played down during the 90s, I guess someone didn't like the Japanese name nor did they like the English translation of the name (Devil's/Demon Castle Dracula). Might have kept people from buying the game because of the title. So, they probably thought: the takes place in a castle. the castle is in Transylvania. How about Castlevania?

[Abnormal Freak]

Whoever it was deserves heaps of oral pleasure, because they came up with a name that while ridiculously cheesy is also beyond cool and not something to be laughed at. That's a hard thing to do.

[crisis]

transylvania has been associated with dracula an vampyre and castles

the name literally wrote itself, as they say