JBoc924Tonight I bring you guys another one of my theory articles, which are of course, backed by facts seen in a particular series’ past. The series I’ll be tackling today is Castlevania, or more specifically, Castlevania Lords of Shadow. I’ll be looking at the franchise’s previous commercial performance and theorizing how Lords of Shadow will fare in the market upon it’s,American, release next Tuesday. So sit back and enjoy! A little side note: I won’t be throwing any numbers or anything statistical your way, everything will be purely as general as possible.
Before delving into the more modern releases and Konami’s way of marketing them, it’ll be wise to first pay respect and take a look at the franchises’ primal years. Let’s do just that.
Konami’s Castlevania franchise debuted originally on the NES. That platform was eventually graced with a trilogy of Castlevania games. The orginal 8-Bit classic which saw Simon Belmont take on Dracula for the first time, a sequel starring recurring character Simon as he was pit in a different type of game in which he had to rid himself of the curse Dracula had placed on him. And lastly, a prequel to the original Castlevania title which saw players take the role of of Trevor Belmont, who was at the time, chronologically the the first in the Belmont line of vampire hunters.
These three titles proved to be each a sucess and garnered not only good sales, but a rapidly growing fan-base as well. A fan-base that is made up of loyal followers that to this day continue to follow the series in their recent installments. Before making the time jump, it’s important to note that the SNES, Sega Genesis , and the PC Engine:Turbo Duo each received an entry in the franchise with Super Castlevania IV(as well as Dracula X), Castlevania Bloodlines, and Castlevania Rondo of Blood, respectively. Each of these titles were commercially sound just like their NES precursors. Now time to take a look at the series in a more recent light.
The year is 1997, while not exactly recent, it’s a year worth noting because it brought gamers what is now considered to be one of the greatest games of all time: Castlevania Symphony of the Night. A title that is not only important for the reason mentioned, but also because it served as an evolution for the already proven franchise. It borrowed gameplay cues from the SNES classic Super Metroid by placing players in a huge castle, prompting exploration as the key to beating the game. As aforementioned, the game was a critical success, commercially though, it wasn’t as noteworthy, initially at least.
At the time of it’s release, the game just didn’t stack up in sales to other titles released around that same window. It was only after a loyal cult following, something that mainstream gamers refer to the Vania-faithful as, that the game started to see a reasonable amount of sales. The reason for this being the shift in graphics, coincided with that gamers now expected at that time, lush 3d visuals with their games. Symphony of the Night could be considered as a step-back when compared to other titles released at the time seeing as how it was a side-scrolling 2d affair. That didn’t damage the game’s reputation though, and as previously mentioned, it continues to top multiple ‘Greatest games of all time’ lists, and will undoubtedly continue to do so. Time for another time-jump , this time to Castlevania’s handheld era.
Nintendo’s Game Boy Advance and DS were each home to a trilogy of Castlevania titles. The former receiving Circle of the Moon, Harmony of Dissonance, and Aria of Sorrow ,and the latter receiving Dawn of Sorrow, Portrait of Ruin and Order of Ecclesia. Not only did these games share the same gameplay style, that of Symphony of the Night’s, but they also shared somewhat of a curse place by Konami themselves. Allow me to elaborate.
Each of these game’s were rather well-received by critics all across the board, for the most part. Sales was another story though. This example won’t work with the GBA titles seeing as how those games are obviously harder to find new nowadays due to it being a more dated hardware, but the DS Vanias will suffice.
Walk into a game-store today and odds are that you won’t be able to find a brand new , sealed, copy of any of the DS trio of Castlevania titles. Even the most recent one, Order of Ecclesia takes a lot of effort to get your hands on, new that is. Used is another story, but new games signifies the amount of units that publishers actually ship to the different outlets, whether they’re specialty shops like Gamestop or an entertainment juggernaut like BestBuy. New-comers to the franchise will have to rely on Amazon to be able to purchase an actual new copy of these great titles. Which is a shame, because prices reach an almost unreasonable level for some of these games. To put it quite simply, it seems that Konami ceases shipment to stores for these titles, disabling gamers in terms of allowing them to experience the game at a later date post-launch. Will this hold true for the latest entry in the long-running franchise, Castlevania Lords of Shadow? Or will they hold-true to their main goal of obtaining new fans to their classic franchise?
The above pictured Limited Edition version of the game will obviously be hard to fins post-launch. Unfortunately, the same could be said for the standard edition of the game on both platforms. Honestly speaking, is there really any exposure being made for this on outlets outside of gaming websites? I could be wrong, but thus far there are no TV spots for Lords of Shadow. This leads to another one of Konami’s, unfortunate, habits: their tendency to rely on the franchise’s loyal followers and that with it’s storied legacy people will see Castlevania on the cover and automatically give up cash for the game. This is further proven by Konami adding the Kojima Productions logo on the cover.
Don’t get me wrong, I respect Kojima-san and all he’s done for the industry, and in turn for us gamers. But him and his team are quite simply just over-seeing the project, offering input as they see fit. Mercury Steam, in the end, should receive all the gratitude once gamers delve into this new title. To the uninitiated though, they’ll just link the game’s sure-to-be critical success to the Kojima logo right on the game’s cover.
Let’s just hope Konami doesn’t set a premature limit on the amount of copies sent to stores. It’s be a shame to see such a critically acclaimed title, judging by all the initial reviews, receive no deserving compliment in its sales. Also, the lingering fear of Castlevania and 3D still holds a spot in gamer’s minds. Konami must also overcome this, which actually, they have, with everything they’ve shown thus far. Now it’s time for the last-minute final stretch and get us much promos aired on television as possible. This is a reboot after all, one that is meant to gain the franchise new followers, let Konami do just that by spreading the word outside of their safe zone.
Hope you all enjoyed tonight’s installment of DailyVania! I may have come off as kind of angry towards Konami, but the truth is, i’m far from that emotion. I respect Konami , I just hope that this game sells enough to warrant some sort of continuation. The last thing we want to see is Castlevania warm Konami’s benches and not re-surface for years. You can help in avoiding this, spread the word and get people talking about Lords of Shadow, especially if you’re a Castlevania fan. The fear brought about by previous 3D efforts is reasonable, but let’s all just put that behind us and experience Gabriel Belmont’s journey in all it’s glory!
