Castlevania Inspired by God of War

When Konami revealed that Hideo Kojima would be taking control of the upcoming Castlevania: Lords of Shadow title for the Xbox 360 and PS3, many assumed it'd be the best 3D Castlevania game in recent years. While the 2D incarnations have been stellar, the 3D titles haven't done well in terms of gameplay and exploration or in sales.

[kratos123]

here is hoping fore koijma to turn this game into gold
this is one of my antcipated games of 2010

[Noctis Aftermath]

The gamescom trailer shows that this game is one to watch, and with kojima helping it a little i'm sure it will be much better then previous castlevania 3d games.

[SolidAhmed]

the game will be great

if they do the right formula:
Presentation
Upgrades
Boss fights
Story
Visuals

[beans]

I really hope to see more on this game very soon. Definitely one of my top ten games for 2010 that will be a must buy.

[The_Savior]

No need to worry. Anything that man touches is GOLD.

[FACTUAL evidence]

gotta love inspiration of developers....only good happens when other good titles inspires other devs to do great....can't wait for castlevania Hideo!

[HolyOrangeCows]

PLEASE be better than the N64 castlevania 3D game :/

[Giant_Chibi]

that's the thing, kojima is in no way involved with this project. Konami just put his name on it so it would garner some hype.

http://www.1up.com/do/newsS...
if you read the 2nd to last paragraph in the link above, kojima explains that he's nothing more than an advisor to them. Kojima Productions are not the ones planning the game or creating it.

The real development team behind this is Mercury Steam, the guys who created Jericho, one of the worst games this generation. I really don't have any faith in them after that monstrosity.

Let's be honest, any real castlevania fan will agree that god of war is not something castlevania should follow. From what i've seen so far they focusing alot on the whip gameplay, but in recent years it's been more about weapon variety. In symphony of the night and onwards, you had a wide array of weapons to choose from. And it was also nice that they introduced some rpg elements as well.

It's also worth noting that before they announced lords of shadow as a castlevania game (before it was simply named lord of shadows), Koji Igarashi, the producer of Symphony of the Night and an experienced developer of castlevania games, announced a castelvania game that featured the return of Alucard for ps3/360. All of a sudden this project is dropped from the limelight and out of nowhere kojima announces his support for lord of shadows and reveals that it was actually a castlevania game.

It just seems odd that konami dropped support for koji igarashi's game, a developer who clearly knows more about castlevania. Instead they chose a developer like mercury steam, who only knows how to make crap games. I call foul. This is exactly like when konami outsourced silent hill to double helix.

[rockleex]

One thing I'm worried about is that Kojima Productions might have come too late into the project.

[Giant_Chibi]

in the video interview i've embedded in this comment

the producer dave cox explains two things people should be aware of

1) He explains that kojima is not creatively involved in the project in any way. Skip to around 3:52 in the vid.

2) He also expresses that castlevania 64 had an influence on the development of lords of shadow :[ that's not a good thing. Skip to 0:24 in the vid.

So mark my words folks, this game is destined to fail.

[iamtehpwn]

How even legendary men inspired each other through their works.

[hardmetal]

You're right about what you wrote there. However, do you think that Kojima would let Konami slap his name and his studio's name over Castlevania : Lords of Shadow box art and ruin his reputation ? you may need to realize that some programmers from Kojima productions are working with Mercury Steam on developing Castlevania. At the end. Kojima is involved as an advisory to assure to us that this game being developed by MS will be a big hit.

Yousef
CastlevaniaX

[Giant_Chibi]

I believe kojima has no say in whatever konami decides to do.

Let's say, hypothetically speaking of course, that if kojima had refused to put his name on lord of shadows, konami would decrease his payroll or possibly place restrictions on his development team. In the end, Konami is run by businessmen, whose sole purpose is to make alot of money in the cheapest way. In this case, outsourcing castlevania to Mercury Steam, because for some delusional reason they believe that allowing western developers to develop their game will make it more appealing to western audiences and at the same time they make x amount of profit without having to do any of the labor.

So, hypothetically speaking, in that situation kojima is at the mercy of his employer and he has no choice, but to agree.

A good example is how mgsr is being made for ps3/360. I personally believe that kojima was not the one who made the decision to go multiplatform, it was konami.

Two consoles + more potential consumers = profit.

To kojima, he wants to make a great game, but to konami they just want more money.

So, it is in my opinion that kojima really has no control over his own studio's name nor his established ip's or future projects. Therefore, this whole thing with kojima's name on lord of shadows just doesn't seem right to me. Konami had a hand in things, because kojima's wise enough to know a bad development team when he sees one, but he's also wise enough to not bite the hand that feeds him.

[Myze]

@1.12

Kojima is FAR more important to Konami than Konami is to Kojima. Directors like Kojima can be counted on one hand, and Konami knows this. You say they are about making money, which is exactly the reason they would listen to whatever he has to say. Unless he decided to do something completely off the wall that made no sense, Konami is not gonna dismiss what he says. That being said, just because Kojima is not creative director on the project does not mean the game is gonna fail. It's not like the only good games Konami has ever made are all by Kojima (Suikoden series, as one example).

Anyway, I base my opinion on what we know so far, and that is the trailer, which was completely awesome. Sure, it's obvious they were inspired by GoW, but it doesn't look like a blatant rip-off like Dante's Inferno does either (although I think that game will be good as well...afterall, ripping off GoW means you are starting with a good formula =P ).

[Giant_Chibi]

im not saying lord of shadows is going to fail because kojima is not attached to it, it will fail because mercury steam is developing it. And mercury steam is not that great at developing games.

And about kojima and konami, if they ever feel the need to do without him, konami can very well do so. I'm not saying they should, I think it would be a bad idea. But, they already own the rights to mgs and they're going to milk that franchise either way. Even right now mg:rising is being made and kojima is not involved. If the game becomes successful, Konami may be confident enough to continue making games with or without kojima, not that they will. I'm just hypothetically speaking of course :]

How about taking team ninja and tomonobu itigaki, for example. Itigaki created well established franchises like doa and ninja gaiden and one could naturally assume that if he were to be replaced, then these games would not succeed or tecmo will just not survive without him. But, in fact, after Itigaki's departure, Yosuke Hayashi took on the reigns and now ninja gaiden is doing just fine without him.

Just look at how successful resident evil 4 was, and then clover was shut down and shinji mikami left, but capcom didn't fret, they made resident evil 5(though not my fav) and still did well without him.

My above comment was only making a hypothetical reason for why kojima may have felt obligated to put his name on a game that is coming from a poor developer. Again, how can anyone trust a developer that made jericho! :o

And castlevania is already a great franchise, it's not like it's horrible or anything. So it shouldn't follow god of war, it should follow castlevania.

[hay]

No sh*t! I'd never noticed by the trailers and chainy and grabby weapons Gabriel uses. /sarcasm

It's quite obvious it's inspired by GoW. That's one of the reasons Lord's of Shadow looks promising.

[Tony P]

QTEs is about all it's emulating. That's all GoW added to the genre.

I don't know why people say the game gave us all the other stuff like leveling weapons and XP mechanics when other great action games refined that formula before and daresay better than GoW.

[nycredude]

You have to be a retard if you didn't see GOW in this trailer. And Tony P why don't you enlighten us ignorant gamers on which games before GOW did it better, because I've been gaming a long time and GOW 1 and 2 pretty much is the pinnacle of Hack and Slash action games! Go ahead make a list, I need a good laugh today

[I_LOVE_MYSELF]

"GOW 1 and 2 pretty much is the pinnacle of Hack and Slash action games!"

As far as story goes I agree. But Ninja Gaiden and DMC have far superior combat systems. And gameplay is the most important thing in my opinion and thats why I cant rate GodOW higher than these 2 hack and slash franchises. Bayonetta will destroy them all (my prediction)

[Unicron]

Halo invented the FPS too according to most fanboys.

[LordMarius]

GamerTime
you are too delusional

[Trevorthenerd]

but the super castlevania on snes will still be the best!

[Bodyboarder_VGamer]

The trailer looks really nice: http://www.youtube.com/watc...

[MattyF]

Awesome.

[i3eyond the Circle]

The Chain weaponary is straight from Castevania not GoW.

If anything the QTEs and cinematic gameplay is what Castlevania gets from GoW.

[schommerc]

and reinvents this timepiece

[SpinalRemains138]

Did the guy who wrote the article even play all the 3D Castlevania games? It wasn't that they were a failure. A lot of people just couldn't seem to let go of SOTN for some reason. Personally, I thought Lament of Innocence was better than Curse of Darkness. Lament was a great 3d intro to the series. Also, it did include weapon upgrades, and more moves learned with experience. Why does this article state that the past 3d games did not include this? They did, and there are also many people who loved the 3D Castlevania games. Not every gamer is a sheep.
Anyone who says that Castlevania looks like God of War wasn't playing Castlevania 7 years ago when it was the first game to employ that 3d type action on a console. God of War actually followed suit after Castlevania and the Dante games. I think it's merely a byproduct of younger gamers having not played the older games and the fact that God of War became a gigantic hit series and is way more recognizable. That said, we have to remember where it was played first. It was in Draculas castle, not in Greece.

[execution17]

i personally like the game, had me thinking WTF when i first seen The Forgotten One

[The real killer]

You know, i fear the PS3 version will still holding back by the 360 version in order to equal it was always by a multiplatform.

[Lord_Ranos]

Kojima will probably make both version identical.

[King Hippo]

Kojima won't make anything identical. He's just there to probably view the art or w/e and tell them to redo it if it doesn't look good to him. Mercury Steam are the people making this game (the same devs who made Clive Barker's Jericho).

[steck67]

So excited about Kojima making this game. He will undoubtedly turn this game into a AAA title, judging by his past releases with MGS being my favorite franchise ever.

[AriesFury]

I really hope this one works out a lot better than the other failed 3D Castlevania games prior to.