Aluminum Christmas Trees: Multiple games have either Bowdlerised the "Cross" weapon into a "Boomerang", or referred to it as such due to inertia. But, cross-shaped boomerangs actually do exist.
Animation Age Ghetto: Castlevania producer Koji "IGA" Igarashi attempted to sway younger audiences to the series with simplistic anime-style artwork for Dawn of Sorrow and Portrait of Ruin. IGA went back to Ayami Kojima for the box art of The Dracula X Chronicles, suggesting that the anime approach didn't go too well.
Archive Panic: To get the complete Castlevania experience requires at least 12 different consoles and multitudes of games, some of which only came out in Japan, as well as remakes or alternate versions of games, like Rondo of Blood's many variations.
Awesome Art: Ayami Kojima's gothic art must be one of the most recognizable and gorgeous video game art styles out there.
There are fans of the original set of games who dislike the 2D maze castles, and younger fans who only know the IGA titles and dislike Lords of Shadow and the original games.
Most fans (i.e. fans of both) seem to hate Lords of Shadow, or vice versa. Reasonably, Lords of Shadow fans hate the original timeline (both original and IGA titles) for confusing storylines and not deep-enough plot.
Should the battle of 1999 be shown proper in a Castlevania game? Proponents argue that this peak of Belmont history deserves its own game, while opponents feel that no depiction of Dracula's true death at the hands of Julius would do it justice (a sentiment that has gained far more supporters and has intensified immensely ever since Iga left).
Whether or not Castlevania deserves to be part of the namesake Metroidvania. Some fans feel that since Metroid came first, games in the subgenre should just be called "Metroid-inspired". Others feel that Castlevania has refined the formula in its own way to be unique from Metroid. Since then, the term "Igavania" has come into use to some degree, mainly as a more accurate (IGA was the one to make the subgenre) and lawsuit-safe term.
Debates regarding the franchise's difficulty can get pretty heated. Some feel that a Castlevania game should be Nintendo Hard and the later games, which are generally much easier, miss the point of the series at best or are legitimately awful at worst due to the lack of challenge. Others feel that the older games are too hard, verging on Fake Difficulty, and the fact that series has gotten easier over time has made it more accessible to all but the most diehard gluttons for punishment, and that the newer games are genuinely more fun because a new player has a better chance of actually making progress in them.
Grimoire of Souls. As usual, Konami's fickle reputation when the game was released didn't help the game's reputation, with many believing that merely releasing the game on mobile devices is another death knell to the franchise, combined with solid controls ruined with touch-pad and the gacha system for weapons and equipment. Those who played it were actually surprised and saw it that Konami was actually being more faithful to the original timeline (without all the unnecessary Fanservice elements in the latest Pachinko game), with the game being considered fun on its own, the 2.5D graphics allows nice representation of the 2D heroes like Simon, Alucard, Shanoa or Charlotte. And it has a controller support for those who still can't get over the touch pad problem and the gacha system was MUCH more generous at least for its first run. It's not the exact comeback Castlevania needed so badly, but even the pro-camp was impressed at how much Konami could do for the franchise after the departure of Koji Igarashi. The announcement of its resurrection is another contention too: Some are glad that Konami revived it after closing it and somewhat does away with the gacha system (it'll be one of the first attempts of a former gacha-game running without its core gacha system, not to mention shedding light about the possibility of closed down gacha to be revived), hopeful for the conclusion of the story. Some are just baffled that of all platforms Konami chose to put it in, it's Apple Arcade.
Castlevania Advance Collection is held in high regard by many players due to being fantastic ports of the GBA Castlevania trilogy by M2, a team that put in the extra work to include quality-of-life features like gadgets, savestates, and rewinds. However, a good section of the fanbase is a lot more cold about these ports, seeing them as a distraction from all of Konami's misdoings that they have not made amends on and that it's morally wrong to purchase it because doing so gives money to a company widely perceived as corrupt and antagonistic towards its staff and fans, to which some fans readily counter that they haven't been doing anything ridiculously bad or corrupt as of late during the release of the game, meaning the cold camp was holding a grudge for a past thing that they thought to be still ongoing without proofs.note Bottom line, whatever Konami did, for good or bad, some fans will just never let them live down their 2015/2016 controversy, whether that makes them look good or not is a whole new different can of worms, but this will definitely affect the reception of every future games/rereleases of Konami.
Can't Un-Hear It: Despite having voiced the character only once, Robert Belgrade is arguably Alucard's most remembered voice among fans and the former's most famous role. This is in part due to delivering a relatively good performance next to Maria's (who was clearly phoned-in) and Dracula's (who takes Evil Is Hammy to a whole new level), on top of having a very classy baritone. His replacement from The Dracula X Chronicles onwards is still seen as good (and we're talking about Yuri Freaking Lowenthal), but Robbie is pretty much the fan-favourite.
Character Rerailment: The third Pachinko series is based on Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse, which gave Konami chance to characterize Sypha Belnades when Trevor already got Curse of Darkness and Alucard already got Symphony of the Night. Rather than refitting her Judgment characterization, which was not that well received, they returned her to a slightly more expanded rendition of her Dracula's Curse personality: less colorful, not at all extremist but at core a nice, amiable and helpful lady. Even those who dislike Pachinko series in general think that this is an improvement over Judgment. And happily, the Netflix adaptation also makes her more amiable if a bit rougher because of being the closest thing of the Only Sane Woman.
Death. He's generally considered harder than Dracula and is very popular among fans.
A few other of Dracula's followers have a bit of this going for them too, such as Carmilla and Slogra. Galamoth from Kid Dracula and SotN is pretty memorable too, but mostly due to his status as That One Boss in the latter.
Epileptic Trees: It's commonly speculated that Maria convinced Alucard not to return to his eternal sleep after the events of Symphony of the Night. It's also thought that he stayed with her during her lifetime and fathered children, whose eventual descendant generations later would be Eric Lecarde. Although the radio drama sequel, Nocturne of Recollection, does show them living together, Konami has stayed silent about the possibility of them having children.
Fanfic Fuel: The Belmont family tree has more than a few blank spaces that the games never delved into, leaving plenty of interpretations of what happened during the lore at those points. Any number of other Belmonts may have existed and faced Dracula.
Fan Nickname: There's a whole lot of them, mostly listed in their game-specific Trivia pages. But fan nicknames that apply to multiple installments, or the franchise itself are:
The Belmont Walk; the Pimp Walk - A peculiar stride that all of the members of the vampire hunter clan Belmont use. This most likely originated from the four frames of animation use for Simon's walk from the original game, but other 2D Belmonts used it too, leading to the nickname.
Fleaman - Originally called Hunchbacks, people started calling them Fleamen because of their erratic jumping, and the name kinda stuck, to the point that it's the official name in-game for them.
They're also called Humpers due to their unfortunate limited animation.
IGAvanias - For all the Castlevania games produced by Koji Igarashi, almost all of which were "Metroidvanias". Also used for his spiritual successor Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.
Classicvanias - For all the classic stage-based Castlevania games prior to Symphony of the Night.
Metroidvania - For the post-Symphony of the Night installments in the series for their sprawling world map and wide open exploration. It has also become a nickname for an entire sub-genre of 2D action games offering similar mechanics (for better or worse)
3Dvanias - For all the 3D-based games in the series.
The Butler - Death, given his fanatical devotion to Dracula and enthusiastic work ethic (he's shown up in more games than the Dark Lord himself!)
Wall Meat, for the mysterious healing items (usually some sort of roast) that drop when walls are whipped.
Fanon: Most fans insist that Legends did actually happen within the series' lore, regardless of the revised timeline.
Fetish Retardant: While the mainline games had plenty of sexy stuff to go around, CR Pachinko Akumajo Dracula ramps up the "fanservice" to seriously tasteless and uncomfortable degrees, and the amount of woman parts, orgasmic noises, and flashing lights shoved in your face from the trailer alone doesn't help in the slightest. Even its original tagline/working title(?) "Erotic Violence" was widely considered to be off-putting.
First Installment Wins: Symphony of the Night is near-universally regarded as the best Metroidvania in the series, despite it having been released in 1997 and with many games following after that attempting to emulate its style, and some actually making improvements.
Fans of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure and Castlevania tend to get along very well, if not be one in the same, considering the similarities between the two (with the basic plot of both being able to boil down to "a family dedicated to killing a single vampire") and how JoJo is often referenced in the games.
Likewise, Metroid fans happily coexist with the Castlevania fanbase, due to both franchises being the sources of the Metroidvania genre thanks to Super Metroid and Symphony of the Night. Some slight debates may pop up as to which franchise does it better, but for the most part, both fandoms respect and admire each other's atmospheres and gameplay innovations.
In almost all of the pre-Metroidvania games, every major enemy and every boss had the universal weakness of the Triple Boomerang Spam; that is, getting a Cross/Boomerang and a III icon, which lets you throw up to three at once.
Also the triple Holy Water spam in the Classicvania games, especially in the first. It can outright paralyze many bosses, including Death and Dracula's second form.
Sypha and Maria are playable examples. The former's lightning and freeze spells are very powerful, and the latter with her double jumps, slide, fast attacks, and animal friends can rack up a lot of damage. The fact that both take double damage compared to the typical Belmont does little to round out their advantages.
Medusa Heads and Tin Men, but only for Shanoa, since it wasn't that hard for Alucard.
The avian species in Castlevania, especially older titles, rival their Ninja Gaiden kin for being pains in the ass. Just askDeceasedCrab.
Flea Men, thanks to their erratic movement patterns and tiny hitbox. They have Palette Swaps in Aria of Sorrow that are elevated to Demonic Spider status, thanks to their throwing knives. They also come in Armored flavor, giving them a giant battleaxe to swing around.
Harsher in Hindsight: Similar to the Mega Man series, critics in the mid 2000s were quick to criticize the series for sticking to a formula that seemed to be producing game after game with no end in sight. Come The New '10s, and both series have been left to languish by their companies with no new games made in years.
The fact that Iga believed that Sonia and Alucard settling down in Legends and having a child believed to be Trevor from III would ruin the Belmonts' family history by making them descendants of Dracula could definitely be seen in a different light thanks to Order of Ecclesia.
Even more so since, according to Lords of Shadows: Mirror of Fate, that timeline's Trevor Belmont is the son of Gabriel. Yes, the same Gabriel that not only became a vampire, but Dracula himself.
Patrick Seitz playing Dracula (from The Dracula X Chronicles and beyond) in a series that heavily references JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. He was later cast in the 2012 anime adaptation as Dio Brando, JJBA's main vampire antagonist. What a horrible night to be a Joestar...
Mainstream Obscurity: This is an incredibly well-known franchise, with an acclaimed adaptation and an influence such that it helped name an entire subgenre, with the original NES trilogy being probably the most well-known games on the console not made by Nintendo or Capcom. However, it's also never been a particularly strong seller. Only three games in the franchise have ever sold more than one million copies, and the highest of the bunch, Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, only ends up at 1.5 million and is also not particularly popular in the fanbase. Though many people do know about the franchise, and even certain details and characters from it, like the Belmonts, Dracula, Alucard, and Death, comparatively few have actually played any of its games, especially not to completion.
IGA: "It's possible I guess. Although, I purposefully left the Sonia Belmont character (from Castlevania: Legends for GBC) out of the official Castlevania chronology. (laughs) Usually, the vampire storyline motifs, females tend to be sacrificed. It's easier to come up with weak, feminine characters. I'll think about it more in the future, though."
Moe: Maria, especially in her younger portrayals. Check out her introduction as proof.
My Real Daddy: The Igarashi-Yamane-Kojimanote Not to be confused with Hideo Kojima, who worked on a different Konami series. trio, all of whom began contributing to the series when it was roughly a decade old, are far more well-known than the developers who came prior:
Koji Igarashi only came on board the series starting with Symphony of the Night as assistant director, but his role as producer starting with Harmony of Dissonance and most Castlevania games from that point until the Castlevania: Lords of ShadowContinuity Reboot would forever redefine the franchise's image as an exploration-based Metroidvania series as opposed to the more action-and-stage-based "Classicvania" games.
Michiru Yamane is easily the best-known of the Castlevania soundtrack composers when she started scoring the games with Castlevania: Bloodlines, even if she didn't compose the iconic "Vampire Killer" and "Bloody Tears" themes.
Ayame Kojima's painterly artworks and designs, again a defining trait of the games from Symphony of the Night onwards, are so iconic that when Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow switched artists and adapted a more anime-like look for its cover and character artwork, the change was met with considerable backlash.
Carmilla, according to Judgment. The game's version of Sypha comes from before 1476, and while Dracula was alive back then, she doesn't know him and treats him like a generic vampire that needs to be vanquished. Meanwhile, she knows Carmilla by name and Carmilla knows enough about Sypha's life to taunt her about it. The logical conclusion is that Carmilla was doing her thing even before Lisa's death. Truth in Television; the book Carmilla is older than Bram Stoker's novel by 25 years. Doubles as a Genius Bonus.
Christopher Belmont was mentioned as being a legend as far back as the Japanese manual for the original Castlevania.
Erotic Violence isn't the first time a pachislot game has been made that's based on Castlevania; three had already been produced at that time.
The DS titles weren't the first to use a bishoujo-influenced art style, that honor goes to Rondo of Blood. The reception was different due to Rondo being pre-SotN and looking to be the start of a new generation of the series.
Sequel Difficulty Spike: The transition from the Classicvania era to the Metroidvanias. While the RPG Elements became a core mechanic that allows you to strengthen your protagonists, the enemies also have leveled-up versions a.k.a. Elite Mooks in those games' later areas, which means that you can't just simply kill them with a few hits if you're unprepared. The worst offender is perhaps Order of Ecclesia, which essentially serves as a Nintendo Hard, but for the entire game!
Signature Scene: The staircase climb to Dracula's room. It's one of the most iconic locales of the series, and whenever the game takes place at Dracula's castle (or a copy of it in the case of Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow), there's a good chance you'll eventually run into that outside staircase with the crescent moon and clock tower in the background. Even if you don't face Dracula at the top or if the boss fight that takes place there isn't the Final Boss, if you face a boss up there it will almost certainly be a challenging fight, one that's either a plot-pivotal one or what looks like the final boss at first.
Signature Song: Ask any one who at least has some familiarity with the Castlevania series what song they feel represents the series the best. They will typically respond with "Vampire Killer" from the original or "Bloody Tears" from Simon's Quest. It helps that those two tracks have been remixed for many subsequent games.
Sophomore Slump: The general reception to Circle of the Moon and Harmony of Dissonance is that they are competently made, but uninspired rehashes of the Symphony of the Night formula, which was then revitalized from Aria of Sorrow onwards.
Spiritual Adaptation: People who are into Dungeons & Dragons may find these to be the best Ravenloft video games. Even the title style and font is similar.
That One Level: In most games, the Clock Tower serves as a Difficulty Spike where the player is bound to die multiple times. In at least a couple games, the previously mentioned Death serves as the boss there.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Much mention has been made of a battle in 1999 that rendered Dracula as he was traditionally known Deader than Dead, with Julius Belmont as the star of the fight. However, much to the consternation of the fanbase, there has never been any depiction of it, much less a game that centers around it.
Tough Act to Follow: Rondo of Blood and Symphony of the Night are the most consistently praised, both by critics and fans. The latter for codifying the Metroidvania style the series would adopt as the standard, and the former for perfecting the stage-based progression with alternate paths and bosses, many secrets, a second playable character, and introducing the Item Crash mechanic. While Classic-style games all but ceased after Symphony's release, it's understandable it's considered the peak of linear gameplay. Symphony, on the other hand, despite having many followup entries that improved its formula and gameplay over time, can't seem to get out of its shadow. Critically, only the two Sorrow games managed to come close.
Alucard. Forced to watch the death of his mother, who then tells him to not hate humans despite having every justifiable reason to do so. Forced to fight his own father when no one else can. Forced to go on despite the loss of his companions because of his immortality. The man will never waver in his fight against evil, but damn does he deserve at least a hug for enduring for centuries.
The series is known as Akumajō Dracula ("Demon Castle Dracula") in Japan. Likewise, "Belmondo" was changed to "Belmont" in Western releases, "Ralph" to "Trevor,"Explanationwhile Belmondo is a real name, it's Italian despite the family always being originally from France. Ralph is also not a region-accurate name, with Trevor being at least more plausible. Kurusu Sōma the Japanese high school student to transfer student Soma Cruz, among other things.
Even with the Official spelling pinned as "Belmondo" in Japan, there were still a few instances in Japan where the name was rendered as "Belmond" or "Belmont". With the former, this shows up in the ending of Akumajou Densetsu when it lists "And starring Ralph Belmond 'Hello, [Insert Name Here]'". The latter appears in a few games, most notably the English text for the opening of Symphony despite the narrator saying "Belmondo", the Good Ending of Simon's Quest, and even promo fliers and the manual for the original and its MSX port, all saying "Belmont".
The skull-kicking skeleton enemies were originally named "Soccer Boy," but the English translation gave them the much more amusing name of "Yorick."
, Nocturne of Recollection, does show them living together, Konami has stayed silent about the possibility of them having children.