Chapter 434: Castlevania II

Knowing of the potential that Castlevania has, how could Alexander not work on the next?

As a matter of fact, he already had his "GameDev" people working on them.

Not just on 'Castlevania II: Simon's Curse' but also on the next Castlevanias after that.

Obviously, not in a true game developmental sense. Having all his current Creed Games manpower work on just one game series is really impractical, after all.

It's actually more in the sense of a designated team having the foreknowledge of what they're headed towards.

Instead of dumping them a request out of nowhere to make this certain sequel due to popular demand, he gave them insight and direction through his usual "drafts" of what's going to happen next.

In a way, they're not just going to be working with a one-track mind on this one part of the series... they're kind of working on all of them as they sort of have a bigger picture of the whole of Castlevania.

For that, Alexander had to bring forth all his stock vampire-whipping knowledge out.

From YouTube chronological timelines, the full Belmont family tree, even Dracula's family tree, and then his own personal fiddling with corresponding gameplay coding.

To that end, the people he assigned to it realized the depth and expansiveness that this will go for.

Like... how the gameplay and its mechanics will evolve? How this two-dimensional game will jump to the 3rd dimension? How Simon is just one Belmont from a whole slew of Belmonts? Their origins and just how twisted their fate is with Dracula?

And there's even an Alucard.

The effect of this move is still yet to be determined but Alexander can expect improved synchronicity and better connective atmosphere from one game to the following.

It's not going to be as disjointed or be the forced mishmash that the old timeline was and had.

Of course, this was always going to be a given with Alexander being in this plundering helm.

As another matter of fact, this practice is practiced by those GameDev groups that he has assigned with games that had series potential.

With what they could input, together with his own, the output should be something to look forward to.

Although those are ultimately something to be found out in the future.

As of present, his attention and everyone else's was still Castlevania part I.

For the portmanteau of castle and Transylvania that it is.

Without the detracting Vampire Killer combo game for some computers like the MSX, plus the 16-bit graphics akin to the PS1 remake, it pretty much soaked up the attention... of the usual Creed crowd.

Some of them even considered it to be the spiritual successor of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.

Buff-built Simon and the whole vampire nemesis really just call back to Phantom Blood. Along with the fact that this game is bizarrely released during this March.

It's poignant as that comment pertaining to a potential Hotel Transylvania.

Even Alexander had to laud these types of customer feedback and observation.

Since Dio's fate with the JoJos really was somewhat the same as Dracula and the Belmonts.

What a bizarre coincidence and what a fitting other reason for this not-so-October release.

His Castle in the Sky jump-off and his whole spiel about it fitting the 13th-game spot wasn't really cutting it.

Besides, the Halloween slash Day of the Dead slash All Souls Days season was not even the most opportune opportunity.

May, specifically the 28th, should have been.

That day is the 90th anniversary of Bram Stroker's Dracula-making Dracula book from 1897, after all.

He remembered Miss Consigliere being in the movie version of that, but it's really beside the point.

Oh well...

What's done is done.

At the very least, he has now completed the other portmanteau that he was aiming for.

Nintendo wasn't making much fuss, neither was Konami... not yet, at least.

And before they even could, this, along with Metroid, was already under Creed's umbrella. Making it so that the two separate pieces of Metroidvania are secured.

All that was left is for someone else to coin it... and it'll come naturally...

Not that he'll get some reward from it but it is something.

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Of course, if a certain someone ruminated on Castlevania, someone else will do so as well.

They'll even do it someplace else. Like in Japan.

At the very headquarters of Konami. Which is a portmanteau of Kozuki, Nakama, and Miyasako... the company founders.

The founders aren't exactly the ones to place one's attention though.

It's more on an employed programmer that goes by the name of Trans Fishers. Inspired by Terrence Fisher, known for his 60s Dracula filmography.

There's also Vram Stroker. Who else but a credit to Bram Stroker?

Then there's James Banana, a video game music composer. Trying to relate to James Bernard, the film composer for The Curse of Frankenstein and Dracula.

And it's pretty much a whole video game development team from there, with names such as Christopher Bee, Belo Lugosi, Boris Karloffice, Love Chaney and Love Chaney Jr., Barber Sherry, Mix Shrecks, Green Stranger, Cafebar Read, Andre Moral, Jone Candies.

More or less just scrapped-up names of notable celebrities from old-timey monster films.

Then again, as this is Konami and this is Japan, these scrapped-up names are really just made-up names to maintain their anonymity.

It's a requirement as the company fears that talents like them would be stolen and recruited by others.

A really prevalent problem here but it didn't seem to trouble the Americans.

Especially this Alexander Creed, who's here and there when it came to these Creed Games that are taking over the gaming space here in their home country.

Which really just brings forth Trans Fishers' or Vram Stroker's, or truly just Hitoshi Akamatsu's frustrations...

Since he and his "nakamas" are still retaining these names yet didn't have "Akumajou Dracula" or Devil's Castle Dracula to show for it.

He was the one who liked the Universal movie monsters, he also very much liked the whip of Dr. Indiana Jones.

Combine that together, then they could have a very, very good game.

Instead, their team was settled and segregated for the more cutesy Kid Dracula, yet to be released.

Brought about due to the pressure of Sega's Alex Kidd, Nintendo's Super Mario Bros., and Creed's back-to-back Sonic and Mega Man.

Which is really just a shame for Hitoshi and his team.

As they studied what could have been... Castlevania!

Supposedly not yet available in Japan but secretly expedited from America for the purpose of study.

Since that's pretty much what most of them had done for the past year. Studying Creed Chaos Systems and Creed GameKeys.

It's uncanny how this could have been the one that they had, albeit with more picturesque pixels that's hard to match.

It's really uncanny how Creed is also ahead of many things... and stalled everyone else entirely.

Even Hideo-san's interesting military stealth concept had to be put on hold. As their company's other military game was upended when Creed's Contra was released.

It's really, really uncanny!

Unfortunately, they just didn't have many explanations for the accusations they could go for.

So, this Kid Dracula team could only pine for their Devil's Castle Dracula, the Castlevania that could have been...

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Granted, ruminating like that about the implications of Castlevania isn't exactly universal.

Yet in a surprising turn of events, Universal Pictures was about to do so.

The whole of MCA Universal actually as Sidney Sheinberg was at the helm, with a lingering grudge to settle.

Which is why, in this very meeting, he asked. "How are our relations with Creed Entertainment?"

A subordinate took some time to compose but he still replied. "It's more or less alright, sir. Even though Creed mostly keeps to themselves and despite their increasingly explicit alignment to Fox, they're never really trouble to us. Except for maybe how they've claimed box office championships for two years in a row now and the effects it has on our own releases."

"What about that Back to the Future? Shouldn't that have been ours?" Sheinberg imposed.

"Uhm... they've actually just used one of our filming studios and most of its accessories like the others. It's not necessarily ours since we've skipped it over after Director Spielberg seemed to have skipped it over." The knowledgeable subordinate shared. "If anything, it's actually Columbia that should have a problem with how the ownership is being handled. More so with the sequel coming up and how they've been left out of it."

Sheinberg inwardly scorned at that. Outwardly, he skimmed it over. "How about our endeavors towards video games? Anything to note of that?"

Another man in the meeting propped up, as he reported. "Well, we've not been able to secure another partnership with Konami... or with establishing talks with the truly notable game development companies like Nintendo and Creed... but Jaws has been handed to LJN of New York."

Sheinberg twitched a bit when Nintendo was mentioned but he soldiered through with a question. "And... is this LJN and this Jaws game any good?"

"..." The game-reporting man didn't really know how to say it properly, so he said promptly that. "It's no Goonies video game, sir. It's more of a repeat of the E.T. game."

Making some people sigh at that fact. Really just goes to show how imbalanced Spielberg's movies are when translated to a different medium.

No matter, Sheinberg's interest was in other things.

Not really on some made-up grudge with Creed. It's specifically on the grudge that he had with Nintendo and the fiasco that was King Kong and Donkey Kong.

It was one of his greatest shame. Boasting about profiting from litigation and being lambasted in court.

This is why he used a lot of resources to make it hard for the NES to gain ground here in America when they were trying.

This is also why he wanted another shot... on a different target.

"I guess that brings us to what recently caught my attention and what I want your attention to be caught up on."

He proclaimed as he had someone brought up photocopied manuals of a certain Creed game.

"If you look into it, Creed Games just intruded on our own Dracula... so, I hope you get what I'm aiming for..." He heavily implied.

To which, everyone in the room gave a knowing look to each other.

Because this is probably going to be another King Kong and Donkey Kong fiasco.

Too bad, who made Sidney Sheinberg the boss?

Lew Wasserman, their other boss probably.

And since he's shooting for Creed with Dracula, they'd have to indulge...

So it would seem that they'd also have to read up more on what this Castlevania game is all about!