Captain Ersatz / Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night

...so the original creator behind the series' success - in this case, Koji Igarashi - broke off and went to Kickstarter saying, "Hey, come and fund my new game (wink)! It's a totally new IP (wink)!" And then, of course, it's the Castlevania: Symphony of the Night remake with a finger under its nose, going, "I can't be Castlevania; Castlevania doesn't have a mustache!"

— Yahtzee Croshaw, Zero Punctuation

Being a Spiritual Successor to the Castlevania games, many enemies (and to some extent characters) are ersatz versions of classic Castlevania characters, but with legally distinct trappings:

Lesser enemies

• The basic Morte enemy, being a weak enemy from early in the game that rises from the ground, is a clear stand-in for the Zombie enemies.
• The Cannon Morte, which is a Morte possessing a cannon, functions identically to the Bone Pillar enemy. Both are early enemies that function as stationary guns and can be used as platforms.
• The Bone Morte, with its skeletal design and ability to throw a bone at an upward angle, is the Skeleton enemy in all but name.
• The Seama enemy functions the same as the Fishman/Merman enemy: early game foe who rises up, wanders back and forth, occasionally jumps, and shoots a weak water attack. They just swapped out the fish attributes for jellyfish.
• The Dullahammer enemy's attack patterns are almost identical to the Heavy Armor/Plate Lord enemy, both using a flail to keep the hero at bay. In both cases, exploiting the fact the chain doesn't hurt the hero allows players to stay in close and deal heavy damage. The only difference here is that the flail is actually the Dullahammer's head.
• Speaking of the Dullahammer's head, free-floating Dullahammer Heads are this game's version of everybody's (least) favourite invokedGoddamned Bats, the Medusa Heads, flying in the distinctive wave pattern that has traumatized gamers for generations.
  • Keeping up the similarity, there's gold-colored Dullahammer Heads, called Maledictions, that petrify you.
• The Aello is basically a less Cute Monster Girl version of the Harpy enemy, both being flying human/avian hybrids with identical attack patterns.
• The hopping Simian enemy takes the role played by Fleaman, being a small, hopping enemy designed to harass the player.
• Moco Weed is just a more graphically impressive Une. They're both basic plants who do nothing but sit in the players way on the ground.
• The Axe Outsiders are basically the game's take on Castlevania's classic Axe Armors, being large armored enemies that throw axes that function like boomerangs.
• The Gieremund are these for the Black Panthers of the original Castlevania. Dark skinned enemies that aren't easily spotted and quickly make a beeline towards you the moment they take notice.
• The Lili enemies seem to fill the same niche that the Persephone did in the later Metroidvania games; the fanservicey enemy that attacks with martial arts moves. Just replace the maid motif with a Playboy Bunny, and you've got them. She also strongly resembles the equally fanservicey Werebat and Black Panther from Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, as Miriam can steal a shard from her that allows her to adopt her form and move set.
• The Seeker is the Floating Eye enemy, an Original Generation ambulatory eyeball whose soul is used to identify breakable walls. The only difference is that it floats through the ground, not the air, and it has a petrification attack.
• The Zagan and Haagenti enemies behave identically to the Catoblepas and Gorgon, being bovine enemies that move slowly, have petrifying breath in the latter's case, and can be stood upon.
• Gaap is a late-game enemy that behaves identically to the earlier gargoyles. However, its name and added ability to start glowing red with increased strength, complete with carrying the shard that offers Miriam the same buff, evoke some of the signature traits of the Castlevania gargoyle Gaibon.
• Kunekune in Classic Mode behaves like red/bloody skeleton. Neither fast nor durable, but will simply reform in a few seconds after you smack them.

Bosses and characters

• The boss Andrealphus is a stand-in for Malphas, in particular the one in Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, being a bird-like Goetian demon who gives the Double Jump ability.
• The boss Revenant is pretty much an undead Belmont warrior, like the Shimon skeletons and Fake Trevor. He has animations traced from the NES games like the particular pimp walk, and wields a whip and three subweapons. Jumping out of the Doppelganger's portal from Symphony of the Night is a bonus.
• Orlok Dracule (or O.D for short) is virtually Alucard in all but name, down to sharing the same English and Japanese voice actors.
• Gremory is an obvious analogue for Death, as the right-hand (though in Gremory's case, she's the one with the strings this time in a similar manner to Shaft) of the resident Dracula expy who uses crescent moons in the exact same way Death uses his mini-sickles in battle.
• And in case you thought Dracula wouldn't be putting in an appearance, the IGA's Back Pack adds a fight against IGA himself in Dracula cosplay, with Dracula's classic teleport and projectile spam move set.
  • And those who want a fight against Dracula's One-Winged Angel form can find this game's take on that at the end of the 8-Bit Nightmare area (with that fight featuring a couple new moves as well).
• Miriam herself is one of Shanoa, who was the protagonist of the last "IGAvania" Castlevania game. In fact you can literally do a find-and-replace on Miriam's story with terms from Order of Ecclesia, and turn it into Shanoa's story: An Aloof Dark-Haired Girl wearing a Sexy Backless Outfit who was given the ability to wield shards/glyphs embedded into her skin by the evil demon/dracula-worshipping organization that raised her, who also tried to use her to summon said demons/dracula to the world unsuccesfully. She also has shades of Soma Cruz with the idea that the more shards she gets, the closer she is to doing a Face–Heel Turn and forcing Zangetsu/Julius to put her down. Soma likewise had to deal with villains encouraging him to bring this transformation about.
  • In relation to the above, Gebel is also very similar to Albus, the primary central antagonist for most of Shanoa's game, both being members of the same organization and thus having the same powers, a close relationship (formerly) with the protagonist, and Dying as Themselves while telling their respective female opponents that they're glad to have seen their smile one last time.
  • And finally, Zangetsu is one to the Belmont family, being a Legacy Character down to wielding the same weapon across the ages: the Zangetsuto. The same item description that reveals this also reveals that "Zangetsu" isn't the man's real name either, it's a name that comes with ownership of the Zangetsuto. By this logic, Miriam receiving the sword at the climax of the game makes her a "Zangetsu" as well, but it's never confirmed in dialogue.
• The bosses in the Classic Mode are faithful recreations of bosses from the first Castlevania game, often with exactly similar boss room layouts: The giant bat is obvious, the giant Dullahammer head is the giant Medusa head, the Miriam and Zangetsu doppelgangers are the two mummies, the werewolf and simian are Frankenstein's monster and Igor, Gremory is again Death, while Gebel is still Dracula.

Castle locales

• The Church of Dian Cecht is a throwback to chapels that appear in a few Castlevania games, complete with stained glass windows and Ominous Pipe Organ galore.
• The Twin Dragon Towers stand in for the recurring Clock Tower area. Complete with rotating gears for platforms, exposed clockwork, and of course, plenty of Medu-er, Dullahammer Heads.
• Hall of Termination is basically Castle Keep, including the final stretch of the level where you climb up a long flight of stairs to fight the Dracula stand-in. There's even a breakable section of the final staircase matching the missing section of the staircase from Castlevania: Symphony of the Night.
• Hidden Desert is a massive callback to the two desert paintings in Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin. Even the music is similar to the stage theme for Sandy Grave, Hail From the Past.
• Inferno Cave may remind Symphony players of the Catacombs, being a deep underground level full of lava.
• Livre Ex Machina is basically a machine-themed Long Library, and even includes two areas where a chair on the left side of one room can be knocked into the air from a room underneath.
• Garden of Silence feels like a mix of the Garden of Madness from Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow and a few other "central courtyard/garden" motifs seen in several versions of Drac's crib.

Others

• Not a character per se, but Shards are simply more dramatic versions of Souls from Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow and Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow of the Castlevania canon. Like Souls, each enemy has a unique Shard they may drop upon their death (which is automatically collected by the character if dropped), they can be powered up by collecting more of the same, they fill the same uses (though there are new Shards, like the Directional use), and they can even be found laying about the castle.
• To Symphony, Aria of Sorrow and Dawn of Sorrow fans, there was no mistaking what the Rhava Velar and the Rhava Bural were supposed to be, especially considering they use the exact same animation and sound effect as Symphony's Crissaegrim and function identically compared to the Crissaegrim/Valmanway and Vorpal Blade respectively.
• Some of the Shards and what abilities they have can also be seen as similar to ones in Castlevania games.
  • Tis Raiff and Tis Rozaïn are light attacks that home in on enemies and shoot a beam of light respectively. Compare to Portrait of Ruin's Spirit of Light and Piercing Beam, which are very similar to the aforementioned shards.
  • Teps Oceus and Teps Salrenda are lightning attacks that chain across different enemies and create a barrage of bolts from high. Compare to Portrait of Ruin's Chain Lightning and Thunderbolt spells.
  • Welcome Company is something of a combination of Harmony of Dissonance's Bible + Wind Tome combo and Cross + Wind combo, where Miriam surrounds herself with multiple objects that protect her and attack enemies. Welcome Company has the bible combo's horizontal rotation effect, and the cross combo's "hit points" aspect (as in, they last only until they hit enough enemies).
  • In Bloodless Mode, the flight path of her thrown parasols is more or less identical to the Paper Airplane Lethal Joke Weapon Jonathan can likewise use in Portrait of Ruin.
• Familiars:
  • Moving away from Castlevania references for once, Silver Knight is essentially the Stand Silver Chariot, being an armored silver Fighting Spirit that sticks near its summoner.
  • Bloodbringer is just the Sword Familiar from Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, albeit with more annoying growls rather than Large Ham comments. They're both floating sword familiars and even become an Equippable Ally when sufficiently leveled up.
  • So similar that it likely didn't register to players as even being a different character, the Carabosse is a stand-in for the Faerie Familiar in both design and utility. They both point out breakable walls, both rest on the hero when idle, they both use items to heal the character (with Carabosse even using "Faerie" items to do so) and both of them can be made to sing a song under specific conditions.
• Shovel Armor drops an armor that turns Miriam herself into a blue Shovel Knight who wields his namesake shovel. This is reminiscent to a few Castlevania games such as Symphony of the Night and Portrait of Ruin where you can play as Old Axe Armor, a blue armor who exclusively uses axes.
• The "special abilities" you can acquire in Classic Mode are clear substitutes for the original Castlevania Subweapons. The Bone subs in for the Axe, the Ruinous Rood subs in for the Cross, the Standstill Shard subs in for the Stopwatch, and the Holy Water and Knife function identically to their Castlevania counterparts.