Why did the Castlevania games sell so pooly?

[Sinful]

These are like the most acclaimed action & platforming sidescrolling games by both the fans & critics of gaming mags, up to the days of the internet. And many actually say it's like their fave game series of all time (Videogame Nerd, that awesome guy from Turboviews, HG101's Kurt Kalata, etc.) Cause I recalll reading an interview or something that mentioned these games never really were a hit sale wise. Really blew my mind when I read that. And the biggest seller in the series was Circle of the Moon, probably due to the massive help of being a GBA launch lineup game?

So yeah, a game is constantly praised in gaming mags/net since day one, superb word of mouth due to everyone loving these games so much, yet these games never became a hit sale wise? What gives? Are true gamers really that few in number, even ever since back in the day? Cause this series should of become a huge Mega Hit & seller at one point... well, I guess not so much during the 32-Bit 3D era? But come one, during the tail end of the 8-Bit, all of the 16-Bit era and the GB/GBA era, it should of been huge, no?

[evil_ash_xero]

I always heard it was a bigger seller in the West than in Japan. I don't know exactly how much they sold.

[BryanM]

Same problem shm'ups have. Platformers are saturated as hell and your options are to make a children's game (thus breaking your neck against Mario and licensed dreck) or make ever-more complicated and expensive to produce games for a niche.

SotN
North America: 0.58m
+ Europe: 0.40m
+ Japan: 0.21m
+ Rest of the World: 0.08m

Which is about what they move at their peak. Modern day and the N64 bunch moved half as many.

The market is divided into 3 main blocks, Fantasy - Realism (Doodies/Sports/NasCar crowd) - RPG (3DS)... The fantasy action crowd are the only ones in its market...

I dunno how to articulate how it's failing to become a mindcancer franchise beyond the fact that it's in a dead genre. It does fall into that twilight zone of "not for kids" and "is not metal" that might be costing it more people than it gains them. Give me a platformer with a Diablo style skill tree and item system and gorn and speed it up considerably, and I might play it until the sun burns out. But it wouldn't be Castlevania.

And always remember that gamers are the absolute worst people on earth. Worse than Hitler Stalin Zombie Devil Jesus.

Anyway, 600k sales is really really good. That it's a franchise that's still alive is better than almost everyone can say. Remember when Road Rash was a thing? lul, us

[Pretas]

Give me a platformer with a Diablo style skill tree and item system and gorn and speed it up considerably, and I might play it until the sun burns out. But it wouldn't be Castlevania.

What is your opinion of Castlevania: Harmony of Despair?

[KalessinDB]

I never thought they sold poorly, but I may be prejudiced as I adore the games.

The new Lords of Shadow arc is shaping up to be probably their bestseller yet.

[GSK]

The 3D ones have never been particularly good, and the 2D ones have mostly been relegated to the handheld ghetto for god knows how long. (It probably doesn't help that GBA and especially DS piracy was huge, either.)

[AntiFritz]

Maybe because copies are too difficult to find. At least here in aus they are.

[LEGENOARYNINLIA]

And always remember that gamers are the absolute worst people on earth. Worse than Hitler Stalin Zombie Devil Jesus.

How could I ever even forget?

[Ed Oscuro]

Well, I don't know about those VGCharts numbers (what BryanM is using above). Overall it seems right though, and so does BryanM's analysis. VGCharts puts DOOM at 2.85 million (eh). Original Halo? 6.4M. A couple Castlevania games nearly hitting a million is pretty good, especially back then when they were reaching about 1/10 to 1/20 of the people who bought the average Mario game, and when costs were much lower.

According to VGCharts, plenty of the CV games have made over half a million - like the first N64 game. The original game sits at about the same sales figures as the average Mega Man game for the NES.
Myst, 8M. Final Fantasy VII, 9.7M. (Interesting drop-off in sales numbers for the Compilation of FF games Crisis Core and Dirge of Cerberus.)

[shmuppyLove]

Samey same lack of variety, probably.

Also, a miserable little pile of secrets.

[Sinful]

Samey same lack of variety, probably.

Also, a miserable little pile of secrets.

I never hate lack of variety. I think if a game series nailed a perfect formula, it should stick with it instead of messing around with it (I want more of the same Gradius & Darius right now!!). Man, how I still wish the Castlevania series never went Metroidvania style. Cause as is, this series basically died with Dracula X for SNES, then Castlevania Rebirth for WiiWare. ... Wish that 32x Catlevania was never scrapped. And maybe this whole Metroidvania mess would of been avoided too? ... I hear things from the 32x game got salvaged for the SotN.

But yeah, to me the perfect Castlevania games are the one that stick to the first & third NES games. So Bloodlines for Genesis, Dracula X for SNES, and first two GameBoy games (the third it total trash, lol). PCE CD one breaks away from the classic mold quite a bit with the enemies it uses, it's placement, pacing, difficulty, etc. Which the last SNES one fixed. Still good enough classic vania game. Only too bad both these games don't have the best of both worlds.

The only Metroidvania game that seems alright and sticks very close to it's routes despite being a Metroidvania, is the first GBA one. ... My fave game overall is the third NES one for US release. Wish all of them followed that formula non-stop till this game. Don't care if it's the same old thing. As long as they provide new levels/paths & different extra charecters beside the main Belmont to pick up along the quest. I'd never tire of these rehashes. And gameplay wise they shouldn't stray away from the formula more then what Bloodlines did (which I think is the best example of how to do a 16-Bit Castlevania while sticking to it's routes gameplay wise... just wish it had a more detailed map & way more alternate routes for both characters... & more characters too, why not, lol. More of everything! As long as it's more of the same ).

[Xyga]

For most people the stiff controls and relatively high difficulty of the 'classic' Castlevanias are not very appealing, I think...
If you put yourself in the shoes of someone who doesn't knwow shit about the series, someone who will experience several game-overs in the very early - often austere and bland - parts of the game, most Castlevanias will give an 'outdated', 'boring', 'not worth the effort' kind of feeling.
Maybe that's why it became a somewhat niche series.

[drauch]

Might be the only person in the world who prefers SNES Drac-X to the PCE version... interesting.

[EmperorIng]

I think we're accustomed to think that a game needs to sell at least a million copies to be a good seller, but that's never really been the case. A game to sell half a million copies is actually quite good, if the developers have budgeted things correctly. This is especially so in the earlier days of Castlevania when it was probably a lot cheaper to make the games with smaller teams and resources.

If you want to talk about nowadays, not only have costs risen to make them "HD Visuals", but a glut of samey mediocre games (GBA and most of the DS CVs*) reusing the same assets probably burned some people off. Still, each handheld platform was lucrative enough to warrant three Castlevanias on each!

Though, I have to wonder if people ever really wanted the series to change like it did back then. Maybe the market slowly but surely rejected SOTN-style Castlevania?

While I personally think SOTN probably ultimately turned a lot of 'casual' fans off the series (since it was nothing like the earlier CVs), I think something will happen similarly to these newer Shadow-spinoff CVs, since they aren't like Castlevania at all and are trying to be some cross between God of War and Devil May Cry.

*Order of Ecclesia fo' life.

[Ed Oscuro]

This is especially so in the earlier days of Castlevania when it was probably a lot cheaper to make the games with smaller teams and resources.

Not "probably," it was. The only real thing stopping early Castlevania and Mario games from being almost all profit was the distribution medium - cartridges ate up a fair amount of that profit (and of course, in the case of Castlevania, Nintendo was still getting a slice of that pie due to its basically unethical business practice of taking a cut no matter its actual investment in the game). Of course, the existence of Mario and Castlevania games (all three) on disk allowed the profit margins to expand, so Konami should have seen more profits in Japan per copy even with Nintendo's licensing scheme.

Don't understand your comment about SotN turning "casual" gamers off the series...that model makes the series far more accessible than it was, and this alone probably accounts for more recent installments in the series nearly reaching the sales of the NES trilogy (Circle of the Moon's unique situation has been addressed earlier). People can buy and enjoy those games where the original would have only kept their attention for a handful of levels before they got frustrated with the difficulty curve.

One of my fondest wishes is to find out how much time people spent with NES-era games, how often they actually completed them, and how large their libraries were. Even with small game libraries, the challenge was enough that I bet a lot of people simply didn't play them to the finish. No doubt this is true of SotN too but the reasons would be slightly different.

[drauch]

Order of Ecclesia was the game that I basically called it quits with. I enjoy the Metroidvanias, and games of the style, but the DS games really only differentiate themselves with the gimmicks (draw the symbol with a wand, switch players, etc.) I bought Ecclesia day one and maybe sunk an hour into it before I found myself bored, which was a very saddening realization. Very much suited to the casual gamer, really. I just can't see myself replaying most of them compared to the higher difficulty of the classic games which require much more skill and adaptation with a much higher sense of accomplishment and satisfaction.

[hecheff]

I bought Ecclesia day one and maybe sunk an hour into it before I found myself bored, which was a very saddening realization. Very much suited to the casual gamer, really.

I can certainly say so for Dawn of Sorrow, but I didn't feel the same way about Order of Ecclesia, or at least said gimmicks felt relatively subtle.
It also felt a notch more difficult than the other two DS titles, but that too is subjective.

[Sinful]

For most people the stiff controls and relatively high difficulty of the 'classic' Castlevanias are not very appealing, I think...
If you put yourself in the shoes of someone who doesn't knwow shit about the series, someone who will experience several game-overs in the very early - often austere and bland - parts of the game, most Castlevanias will give an 'outdated', 'boring', 'not worth the effort' kind of feeling.
Maybe that's why it became a somewhat niche series.

The funny thing is that there's nothing wrong with the controls for the so called "stiffer" NES style gameplay. It's just very simple and not overly complex. Thus balancing & designing these games was a breeze with such a solid system in place. VS say SotN where it's so overly complicated that it's impossible to balance & design properly.

Folks always wonder why the multi-direction whiping never came back from SC IV? It's not that hard to figure out.

Might be the only person in the world who prefers SNES Drac-X to the PCE version... interesting.

Hah. Well, there is another... >_>;;


And for me it's more like they both have their flaws, so I basically like them equally. But on the gameplay balance & design, the SNES follows the gamplay standard/design/rules set by the NES games best. And thus plays more like the classic Castlevania style I prefer & love best. Rondo starts things in this area that SotN pick up from. Don't like, but still pretty close to NES style. It sucks both of these games have no extra difficulty or loop(s). Really, really, REALLY sucks. >_< Hoped PSP remake would of addressed this. But nope, nothing at all toward replay via extra challenge. What a load of BS. Thanks to pussy IGA (he even made Otomedius way, way, way too easy. Lol, someone needs to teach that guy how to play games if he's gonna work on them).

But yeah, both these games have their flaws alright. But generally all the Castlevanias before SotN I love very much. Even GB Adventure, which is fine enough, especially for like a first GB gen game too. Legends it total & utter trash. Like the guys behind it had zero clue as to what Castlevania gameplay & just videogame gameplay/design meant. Like it was handed down to train Konami guys that just joined or something? So whenever I hear folks say Legends is better then Adventure it just breaks my heart + assume they just didn't play the game & maybe even classic vania games enough to get it or something?

My fave vania game are;

#3 - Castlevania 1 (NES/Famicon/FDS) - shocked at how good looking it still is. Solid gameplay.
#2 - Bloodlines (Genesis) - how 16-Bit Castlevania gameplay should be evolved + still feels enough like classic NES style. Wish it had a detailed map & way more multiple paths to match CIII's extra routes.
#1 - Castlevania III (NES) - which music I prefer is back and forth, but the added difficulty & further refinements of the US NES version is prefered. Ditto for knifeless Grant. But yeah. This is like the best game ever?


For some reason I've tried to play SotN several times now & failed every time... these games lack replay for others too, unlike say the classics?

[Obiwanshinobi]

Castlevania wasn't very well known in countries where NES didn't make it big (and on famiclones, it had to compete against Contra and Mario). I think even Green Beret rings more bells in Europe. PlayStation's got a good selection of CV games released in all regions, but the crowd wanted to play new-looking stuff on the thing, whereas Castlevania looked old.
I see Devil Dice on this list, but not a single Mega Man game. What chance do you think 2D Castlevania stood?

[soprano1]

Castlevania wasn't very well known in countries where NES didn't make it big (and on famiclones, it had to compete against Contra and Mario). I think even Green Beret rings more bells in Europe. PlayStation's got a good selection of CV games released in all regions, but the crowd wanted to play new-looking stuff on the thing, whereas Castlevania looked old.

Anyone i knew who had a Mega Drive loved Castlevania: The New Generation (Bloodlines in US).
Funny enough, some asked where the "old generation" was (Since it wasn't in the Master System...)

[Sinful]

Castlevania wasn't very well known in countries where NES didn't make it big (and on famiclones, it had to compete against Contra and Mario). I think even Green Beret rings more bells in Europe. PlayStation's got a good selection of CV games released in all regions, but the crowd wanted to play new-looking stuff on the thing, whereas Castlevania looked old.
I see Devil Dice on this list, but not a single Mega Man game. What chance do you think 2D Castlevania stood?

Yep, I can fully relate to this as I was like this during a large chunk of the 32-Bit era too. Where all I wanted was something new & different, which usually always meant 3D. Unless sprites where super huge & Arcade like, since we couldn't exactly have that in the 16-Bit era.

But I also wa one of the lucky few that started collecting game mags since I could afford them since 1994. So I always new what came out and read these mags like from front to back within a day then starving for more for an entire month, lol. Thus I never really missed on much & at least have a very good idea of a lot of games even if I didn't play them. Seen SotN in GameFan, and new I had to have it ASAP. Was very happy with it the first time & it was worth it, just can't replay it at all though?

Back then thanks to 32-Bit era I was getting lazy with old school gaming challenge too, lol. So when I found and bought Bloodlines finally after SotN, I never played it past level 2 when I gave up. SC IV which I think I played just before SotN I did manage to beat eventually thanks to password system. But even back then, playing through SC IV in one sitting wasn't possible even if I can breeze through it. As it don't hold my interest for entire game, only short bursts. Bloodlines I can do for an entire game... well, up tp Dracula, as I never beat him yet.

So yeah, I can see it not being popular in 32-Bit era very easily. But, how do you explain the NES & 16-Bit era? And I guess even GBA era?... Well, CotM was the best selling one, not sure about the other ones? Know not enough, otherwise they wouldn't of rehashed to much by the 3DS era, no?

PS. - which Metroidvania have an effort to be somewhat balanced? CoTM, the only non-IGA made castleroid seems like the most balanced the bit of it I played last. Was kinda shocked and impressed cause when it was new I though it was a major step back, but now I see it as a major step forward, lol. How I've grown.

[To Far Away Times]

One of my favorite series in gaming. I like both the classic style and the metroidvania style.

[Xyga]

I was reading Kulata's review of Bloodlines and he writes

The American release was also made a little bit more difficult

Anyone knows what part is actually a bit more difficult or is it unnoticeable ?

[BIL]

Ya, I know! I grew up with Bloodlines and moved over to VK recently, so trust me mang.

short version: Bloodlines Expert is a bit harder than Vampire Killer Expert due to a few alterations in stages 1, 5 and 6, along with a slightly harsher damage scale. If you can ace VK the increase won't be very noticeable - if you can barely survive VK, it'll probably be enough to finish you off.

super hardcore version:

stage 1 - Infinitely spawning turbo bats in the final area of the entryway, and the penultimate dungeon area. Absent in VK.

stage 5 - Bomb chuckers in John's route don't seem to ever throw health, where they randomly will in
VK. Evil Pillar gets triple fireballs (double in VK), making him a bit tougher for John if you're low on subweapon ammo.

stage 6 - biggest alteration by far. No health restores in this stage whatsoever (Death gives one in VK), adding additional pressure to ace the opening areas.

LIKE THIS:



The BL damage scale amounts to one less hit allowed, iirc. Either way, unless you're getting biffed all the time, it won't be very significant.

[Xyga]

Wow ! Thanks for the detailed explanation.

That's one the top-tier games still missing in my MD/Gen collection. Been wondering fo a while if the price diff was worth the $, but looks like BL is okay since I don't mind the poorer US packaging.

[BIL]

Oh yeah, I was actually going to say - as lovely as the Japanese presentation is, I consider Bloodlines the better version, if only for that extra bit of pressure. I still have my weathered old Genesis cart, heh.

Same goes for its companion piece Contra Hard Corps. Marginally harder in US format*, but that combined with the rather high JP price puts it over the top.

*well, played from scratch a lot harder with its one-hit kills, but since the US and JP versions are identical in terms of level design and patterns, a no-miss clear will ultimately be the same difficulty. But I greatly prefer the US version's brutal "GAHHH!" instant deaths. JP's like "ouch! oh wellz."

[Obiwanshinobi]

So yeah, I can see it not being popular in 32-Bit era very easily. But, how do you explain the NES & 16-Bit era? And I guess even GBA era?... Well, CotM was the best selling one, not sure about the other ones? Know not enough, otherwise they wouldn't of rehashed to much by the 3DS era, no?

I have not heard of any GBA game not published by Nintendo that would sell anywhere near as well as the best selling games published by them. This is begging for a digression I'm not gonna unfold here as it would be rather off-topic.

[Oniros]

Because the general public believes that the series peaked with SotN and never gave the newer releases a chance. Everyone dismissed the 3 GBA and 3 DS games as "SotN clones" and didn't buy them; when in reality every single one of those games has something distinctive going on for them. Finally, Konami fucked IGA over by having him release Castlevania Judgment on a extremely tight schedule (it was critically panned) and turn Harmony of Despair into a DLC fest (which fans really disliked).

The funny thing is that after that, Konami Japan handed the franchise to Konami Europe. Dave Cox (the guy in charge of the franchise now) handed the IP to Mercury Steam, a Spanish developer that up until that point had only released some mediocre unknown games. After they messed with the new game for a while, Hideo Kojima felt that he should give those guys a hand (probably because they had no clue what they were doing) and between Mercury Steam and KojiPro they came up with Lords of Shadow. It was a reboot that mashed elements from God of War and Shadow of the Colossus, plus it was not connected to previous games, so probably people who had never played CV before liked that. LoS went to become the best-selling Castlevania ever and now its sequel is releasing on February.

The moral of the story: if you like your games put your money where your mouth is. Classicvania and now Metroidvania are now dead to give pass to God-of-Colossus-vania.

[RegalSin]

Most Castlevania fans, do not own any game system pass the Dreamcast.

Then when the PS2, NDS, and etc, games came out, people were downloading them all, just to be fair. SONY said it a long time ago, the reason why they are not making enough money is because of the internet?

No the reason why nobody is buying your games is because, nobody has a job, and your fans were trying to find out, where to go after highschool, and their was a war that made everybody sad, and then their is that chemical spill Japan, that is affecting US shoreline, as well as the entire Pacfic Ocean ( which includes Oceania ).

In generaly most of Konami Castle fans are just not feeling it.

Personally after seeing Dracula merdge with an Alien, on the PSX, I kinda just not wanted to play or replay the game anymore. I Mean it is Alien, how not original they could have been, to make things worst they just took sprites from the PCE game, which gave Ritchet, three appearances, until they killed off his not-girlfriend, animal friends, which also kinda sucks. Plus their is another game that was not shown.

[drauch]

I have no idea what you are talking about.