Sink your fangs into the Castlevania Anniversary Collection
11.20.2024
By Lucas White, Contributor
The first wave came in 2019 with the Castlevania Anniversary Collection. Fast-forward a few years later, and this collection is now making its appearance on the Epic Games Store.
The games included in the Castlevania Anniversary Collection are foundational to the series. Included in this set are several entries considered all-time greats and others that are influential to the series and its generational lore that would eventually be gathered up by the famous Koji Igarashi and his team into an official timeline. Each game has something special that serves as a building block for what Castlevania is today, and each one is worth your time.
Castlevania
It’s not uncommon to see retrospectives on the original Castlevania refer to it as a “perfect” game. And when you actually sit down to play it, it’s easy to see why. Buckle up for a challenge, but also one of the most thoughtfully designed action games of its era. There’s an efficiency to this small set of stages that makes every screen feel important, and every challenge feels designed carefully around the rules the player character has to follow.
From the arc of Simon Belmont’s jump to the reach of his Vampire Killer whip, there’s a sense of purpose to each piece of Castlevania. Kinuyo Yamashita’s legendary soundtrack tops things off as a bonus worth its weight in gold. Just watch out for the final fight with Dracula: it's quite difficult, which established the standard for the series moving forward.
Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest
Castlevania II: Simon's Quest is emblematic of how the rules were still being written in the NES era, which meant that a sequel didn’t always mean more of the same. It’s fascinating both as a blueprint for the future as well as how it playfully misleads the player and finds novel ways to challenge them beyond raw difficulty. With RPG mechanics and individual stages exchanged for a large connected world the player can explore, you can see one of the early building blocks for what we now call the "Metroidvania" subgenre. Some of the puzzles might be a bit tough to figure out, but overall, this is an intriguing entry in the series.
Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse
Fans of the anime will definitely want to play Dracula’s Curse, as it’s where that story starts. While the open world-like structure of the previous game was left for a return to traditional stages, Castlevania III found new ways to offer players choices and exploration. Alternate paths through levels could lead to different playable characters and multiple endings. Alucard, who is one of the most important characters in the overall Castlevania timeline, is introduced here as well. There's no denying that Dracula's Curse is not only one of the toughest Castlevanias, but one of the hardest notable NES games in general, but you shouldn't let that stop you from checking it out, as it's one of the best in the series.
Castlevania: The Adventure
Konami’s first attempt at Castlevania on the Game Boy is still known for its rather punishing difficulty, but it’s an interesting showcase of what developers had to consider when shrinking their flagships down to a smaller size. Player character Christopher Belmont only carries a whip that can be upgraded with power-ups, but downgraded when the player is damaged. With most of the action confined to a single weapon and a single castle, it relies on mastery even today. It's an oft-forgotten curiosity that fans will definitely want to check out.
Castlevania II: Belmont’s Revenge
The second Game Boy title proved to be a more fulsome experience. Belmont's Revenge elevates the experience with smoother controls, more refined level design, and the welcome return of sub-weapons like the ax and holy water. It also introduces a non-linear stage selection, allowing players to choose between themed castles. The result is an excellent portable Castlevania that's worth a look.
Super Castlevania IV
As a retelling of sorts of Simon Belmont’s story from the original, Super Castlevania IV doesn’t add much to the series’ bigger picture. What it does do, however, is flex its ripping, leather-clad muscles as a showcase of what the Super Nintendo was capable of. Huge sprites capable of contortion made the Vampire Killer whip a deadlier weapon than ever, and even more of a tool with some added utility. Simon can now whip in more than one direction, and he can use it to swing across gaps like an acrobat; he can also flail it around his head to dispel projectiles with ease. As a result, Super Castlevania IV is appreciated as one of the easier to complete entries in the series. With more space to relax, it’s easier to absorb the dense visuals and heavy soundtrack, making this perhaps the most “vibes” entry as well.
Castlevania: Bloodlines
It’s almost fitting that when Castlevania finally showed up on Sega, things immediately got weird. Bloodlines is where the storyline got both more detailed and a lot sillier, and ended up being a huge part of the later lore as a result. The biggest reason is this: For the first time, neither of the playable heroes is a Belmont. What could the apparent disappearance of the legendary Belmont clan mean? What happens when other forces try to revive Dracula ahead of schedule?
The rules are challenged in Bloodlines, and that opened the door for the mythology to really go places. One of those places is a slight connection to Bram Stoker’s Dracula lore, which is also just funny. On a gameplay level, this is a quite solid Castlevania side-scroller that ranks up with the best of the genre. It's sometimes lost in the shuffle, so it's nice that every fan can easily experience it today.
Kid Dracula
There aren’t any novel connections to deeper Castlevania lore here, nor are there really any gameplay similarities or evolutions. This is just Kid Dracula, a fun side-scroller that came from Konami’s habit of self-parody, with a lot of gags and weirdness to run through in a very classical Famicom platformer kind of way.
What’s really notable here is that this is the first time Kid Dracula was ever translated into English and released in North America! If anything, Konami established a tradition within the Castlevania Collection format of including a game that doesn’t quite fit the rest on the list, but has its own historical value.
Castlevania is a legendary series, but there’s an argument to be made that, pound for pound, Castlevania Anniversary Collection comprises the most legendary parts of its history. From foundational building blocks of lore that made the anime a sure bet, to gameplay ideas and evolutions that continue to impact games today, the volume of magnitude in one package here is absurd. And there couldn’t be a better time than now to check it out for yourself if you haven’t.
Castlevania Anniversary Collection is now available on the Epic Games Store.