What the fuck is this: Castlevania SOTN is now going for like $70?!!

I was disappointing that Iga's ____ of Sorrow games referred to a battle in the year 1999 that finally killed Dracula for good... and then that game never got made.

"aren't obliged to follow the story and don't have to have Dracula in the game" you mean like Lords of Shadow? just kidding

Games rarely return to 2D. There hasn't been a genuinely new 2d Capcom fighting game since Capcom Fighting Evolution/Jam (2004) and that game was made of more recycled character pixels than most fighting games. SNK hasn't really made anything new in ages and even they might not have 2d in their future if they continue to make new games at all.

I haven't seen that Mortal Kombat game's story mode, maybe it's fun but surely you don't thrill to "Oh no! Ken Masters (or Jill Valentine) has been radicalized with PSYCHO POWER and has to fight our hero!" or some dumb rivalry with the angst pumped up to maximum?
Cutscenes with emotional drama rarely do anything other than face imploding cringefests.

I'd love it if someone made more 2d games like Ghosts N' Goblins/Ghouls and Splatterhouse. I love scrolling 2d horror games.

the recent MK games are a lot more tongue-in-cheek (well, i guess they always were compared to SF/KOF). MK9 has a Butterfly Effect-eque plot involving Raiden sending a message back in time to undo the events of MK1-8, only to have things go catastrophically wrong with each timeline alteration. even Injustice constantly brings up how ridiculous the whole plot is, with SUPER SRS EVIL ALTERNATE UNIVERSE SUPERMAN as the villain. but really, it's a clever way to get you to play most of the characters on the roster for single player story mode, and it's fun and goofy universe stuff

i love touches that (and, no i don't think they need to apologize at all for being completely B-movie level) show there's a degree of care or love for the universe. The King of Fighters series started off putting little pre-match animations between distinct characters to highlight friendships/rivalries and other relationships in the '90s. MKX does a fantastic job with this, every single combination of characters has unique voiced banter entering a match. Injustice did his too with the clash events

are for 2D vs. fake 3D/2D, yeah, I would prefer if we got more Guilty Gear/Arcsys/Persona-style hand-drawn games too, but today they're pretty confined as "anime niche" even inside the sadly niche genre of fighting games. The SFIV series and MK series made distinct returns to 2D gameplay this past generation, especially compared to that dire early '00s period

Well those MK scenes are far wittier than anything in the tedious KOF13 faceoffs. But in Snk Vs Capcom Chaos there was this gem from Akuma: "Beating you was easier than smacking a baby. Not that I would ever do that."
I would generally prefer arcadey games avoided story and dialogue or kept it to a bare minimum unless they knew it was something they could do especially well.

I'm talking about stuff like this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8qG4AlK1qk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYTPWAavALg

Even Guilty Gear is going 3d, but it has impressively maintained the 2d look more any 2.5d game I've seen but I'm not really into it anymore. But yeah, I'm really not into the style Blazblue, Arcana Heart, Under Night In-Birth, Persona 4 Arena, Aquapazza amd Chaos Code has. After all these games you really appreciate how well animated games like Streetfighter 3rd Strike, Darkstalkers 3, KOF13 were.

The SFIV series and MK series made distinct returns to 2D gameplay this past generation, especially compared to that dire early '00s period

Actually I'd say that was one of the best times for fighting games. Capcom vs Snk 2, Marvel vs Capcom 2, Virtua Fighter 4 Evolution, Neo Geo Battle Coliseum, King Of Fighters 2003, Project Justice, Street Fighter Ex3 (I liked it, but the previous game was probably better), Guilty Gear X2, Soul Calibur 2, Tekken 4 and Samurai Shodown 6. Those were some of the best instalments of each series.

heh, that DMC clip is really the "miserable pile of secrets" for its generation

sorry, realizing that I got way off track here since this is the Castlevania thread. to sum up quickly i agree and disgaree with your various opinions here; but basically to me there's everything up until about '98 and the Dreamcast era, upon which there were the endless sprite rehashes that you mentioned with a few bright spots here and there (like Project Justice! loved that game) while the mainstream releases were "dominated" by things like generic 3D SFEX/MK/Tekken sequels. i want to put time into modern 2D fighters like Xrd, BlazBlue, P4A and Skullgirls and see if they're worth it but, you know, time and age means i'm going to sway towards the ones with bigger player bases

back to the subject at hand tho, IGA forever

General fighting games thread

Just cut and pasted our fighting game conversation in a new thread to continue.

It was predictable that people who grew to hate Iga would miss his Castlevania after Konami tried to make it appeal to a wider audience. Not many important games got to continue that long in full 2d and I think people started to take it for granted that it would stay that way. Once a company loses a team with old school creative skills it's seemingly really difficult to get people who can do that again.

One major complaint about Iga was that the rpg elements were just getting tiresome and relying on "artificial" length with all the added fetch quests. He seemed to acknowledge this and he said that the remakes and reissues he was involved with was partly to test the waters and see if people wanted to go back to more linear levels, which indeed many long term fans were yearning for (and I guess a less complex map wouldn't be so exhausting for the team).
I used to think all these fans were full of shit but by the time of Portrait Of Ruin I did indeed get pretty tired of the complex maps and collectable quests.

What I respected about Iga is that he always said he was committed to value for money but the ways of extending the hours were sometimes a bit too grindy and laborious.

I wonder if his new game will be linear or complex?

http://swordorwhip.com/

Intriguing.

It's interesting hearing what Konami is going through. They seem to have got rid of Kojima and the new eagerly awaited Silent Hill was killed off. They want to make more Metal Gear games but aside from an apparently healthy pachinko income, there's nothing promising on the horizon to keep them afloat as a videogame company like Capcom has done despite their losses.

"What do you do when you find yourself without a castle? You build another."

Iga plays SOTN
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqheYYeA4k4

www.nintendolife.com/news/2015/05/koji_igarashis_castlevania_successor_teased_by_comcept_set_for_11th_may_reveal

"In any case all should become clearer at 11am Pacific / 2pm Eastern / 7pm UK / 8pm CET."

The runes on the chair have been decoded as "What a wonderful night to have a KS"

The suspense is killing me!

Also wading through Neogaf threads for rumors/new info (It might be the whiniest place I've ever seen on the internet/entitled nadir of consumerism). Rumors from anonymous inside source:

"There may be plans for "social" elements and "freemium" content. Hopefully tomorrow shows otherwise."

"- 2.5D
- Story takes place during Industrial Revolution, church worried that demons will invade if science prevails
- NotShanoa, NotJonathan and NotAlucard are the characters I saw."

"Yamane is in. So is the main programmer from the GBA/DS games. I believe he directed Harmony of Despair."

"Miriam's hair is dark brown. Shoulder length. Don't recognize the artist, but reminded me of OoE. Miriam is the protagonist."

"From what I've seen, it looks like OoE in 2.5D."

"From what I was told, drops are used for crafting skills and items. Seemed like Aria/Dawn with a middleman step."

"Okay, I'm done for the night. Last bit of info is that Fangamer is doing the merch."

it's up
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/iga/bloodstained-ritual-of-the-night

hooray!
i'll wait a little bit before they sucker me out of $28

Nice that the basic goal is secured already. Wonder how much further it will go.

2.5D -- hopefully it won't look as bad as Mighty No. 9

Hopefully more like Ultimate Ghosts N Goblins or Ori And The Blind Forest.

what is up with those old Mad Magazine style cast portraits though
They've already passed $1M, so Hayter guaranteed (as if this wasn't happening)
xp yeah I'm hoping it'll look better too...
i almost, almost want to pull the trigger on that $60 physical disc option but damn, two years...

$28 is a solid price point for this.

Seems like they need a tier for handhelds, tho.

I'm a little sad it won't be pixel art because they'll probably never go back that way and it would have been nice to see an pixel Igavania created from ground up because that never happened before.

I am fully willing to pay $28 for whatever game Iga makes (I bought Harmony of Despair and DLC, despite it sucking), but I think I'll just buy it when it comes out.

Did you get Judgement and Adventure Rebirth?

Adventure Rebirth is really good

whatever Igavania Iga makes. (I might buy Adventure Rebirth at some point, but then I'd have to plug in my Wii again.)

I didn't even know that game existed...

Yeah, it's just the whole KS "never knowing when a game is ever gonna come out" thing. And I'm not sure Iga has actually ever produced anything
independent of Konami... but in all likelihood it'll come out eventually.

Also wish there was a handheld tier, but I don't own a Vita anyway, which is probably the platform it would come out for

Isn't the original Wii shop dead now? Or are they still selling WiiWare?

Still selling Wiiware on Wii and WiiU. All of the Rebirth games are worth a look, M2 developed them.

LOL also completely unaware of the Wii fighting game. i just completely ignored that system after a certain point since I never picked it up. I'll remember them if I pick up a secondhand Wii at some pt...

I YouTube linked cut scenes from it last week.

Don't know if you guys have been hearing the news and rumours about Konami but right now it looks like they might stop making most of their videogame franchises.

ohhh i thought that was one of the N64 games

So I put down $60 for a physical backer edition. I hear they are implementing a 2D Classicvania version as well.

I was playing OoE earlier today. I was jumping from tree to tree, shooting lightning out of my hands at killer crows that were swooping in. I ran across bigfoot, who jumped off a bridge into the distant mountains. I thought, hell yes, I want more of this stuff!

New music sounds GREAT! I can't believe Michiru Yamane is involved!

I also bought the book they are basing the monsters on, the Lesser Key of Solomon. It's the more popular OTO translation by Macgregor Mathers with an intro and illustrations by Aleister Crowley.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lesser_Key_of_Solomon

some of those monsters are straight outta SMT/Persona. Ha.

https://ksr-ugc.imgix.net/assets/003/824/226/0cc31003258a1e01ec3eaf1d93fe2a8b_original.png?v=1432076642&w=700&h=&fit=max&auto=format&lossless=true&s=3f675dc571d2688de7214046603a211f

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TU-NF6SJxps

This is a super early animation test but it's kind of amazing how quickly they were able to pull this together. This game may turn out to be really really special.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=waAsGYKptqI

Watch for the third advert. It's really funny.

ha

The CV4 beta was very different! It even has a boss that isn't in the finished version. "Through a room!"

good god the commercial with the SCIV beta was so long. as long has HUMANLY POSSIBLE

punk rock dracula was nice

yes japanese punk dracula ftw

http://www.twitch.tv/ffstv

Iga's playing through Shantae right now. They are celebrating the biggest video game kickstarter ever, ending tonight, with $5.5 million right now.

So insane. This couldn't have happened at the right time, with what's happening with Konami and all. Every time someone bashed 2d gaming, everyone that bailed after 3d started and uglied up and sold out games, all that karma is getting funneled into this project.

Now they are interviewing Michiru Yamane, who composed "SOTN".

Even though I haven't played any games that I've actually Kickstarted, what the hell... fine. In for the $60 physical edition. Maybe by the time it comes out I'll have finished playing the DS games.

I'm glad they managed to get there without me.

That's great that it did so well. I wonder how many backers are long-term fans, how many are very recent fans. I wouldn't have thought it normally but maybe Lords Of Shadow did introduce the series to a much wider audience?