Castlevania: Judgement

Rumours of the existence of Castlevania Wi have been circulating for months and Igarashi had teased us about the possibility of wii version in several interviews and we all know sooner or later there will be an announcement for Wii version of Castlevania.. Many fans are hoping that the Wii version will return to the form of 2d side scrolling action games instead of 3d versions of Castlevania that have not been successful in capturing the magic and essense of Castlevania series.

Finally, the curtain has been lifted and the recent article found in the latest issue of Nintendo Power reveals the recently registered "Judgement" trademark turns out to be the Wii version of Castlevania. But guess what, at the same time this announcement surely shatters the hearts of many fans. It turns out this latest iteration is neither 2d nor 3d action game, instead Igarashi decides to take a big risk to turn the side scrolling series into a fighting game!(yeah, you see it clearly, it is a fighting game)

Initially I was shocked too when I read this news and it made me wonder whether the risk will pay off since the change is too drastic and the stake is definitely higher than ever. The venture into the 3d realm has not been well received critically and commercially, so I dont know what makes Igarashi decide to create this game.

This news reminds me of another game on Wii which is Sould Calibur Legend. Like Castlevania Judgement, Wii version of Soul Calibur Legend is unlike the previous versions of the main series and well, it was ill received and this flop certainly serves as a reminder for those who are willing to take bold moves to try something diffferent. Ironically, Soul Calibur is a fighting game series while Soul Calibur Legend is an action game.

This game will include a roaster of protogonists from previous games like Simon, Dracula(finally we can manage to use this character. Oh please, controlling the feminine Soma is very different than controlling Dracula itself!) and shockingly, this game will feature motion controls. It is daring for the team to take another bold steo as it is certainly important to make the control spot on for a fighting game or the game will end up unplayable. For more info, kindly check here and here.

So what do you guys think of this latest Castlevania? Happy that it has taken a big step forward(backstep if it turns out to be horrible......) or upset that it does not stay to its root? Please drop your comments.

Missing from my collection....

Recently I browsed through my Gba collection and to my dismay, I still havent got hold of some favourites games that I used to play on my GBA(those are pirated versions which are not eligible to be included in my collection)

GBA games that I am really keen to own are Breath Of Fire, Breath Of Fire 2 and Tactics Ogre Knight Of Lodis. Breath of Fire series is one of my favourite RPG series and I have played for more than 2 times and I am still interested to revisit the series. On the other hand, Tactics Ogre is an interesting SRPG game that I have been looking forward to as it is created by Quest which is responsible for FFT series. This game has a cool feature which allows us to control monsters! How cool it is that we can use monsters to attack another monsters?(nah, beast masters in FFTA dont possess the same "coolness" as being the monster itself).

The only thing that holds me back from getting them is the exorbitant of the games circulating at ebay now. Perhaps the games are limited release from Capcom and Atlus, one could hardly find a complete version below usd30 at ebay, which is quite steep for a used game. Anyway, I guess one day I will be getting them too especially Breath Of Fire series. I am hoping that Capcom will bring Breath of Fire 3 and 4 to NDS but it is unlikely because of the limitation of NDS hardware. Maybe the next NDS will do? Who knows but I am certainly hoping for it.

Those games mentioned are high-want games and the low-want games are Castlevania series on GBA. I have been a Castlevania fan since I first played Castlevania Dawn of Sorrow, I also got myself the limited version of Castlevania Portrait of Ruin and I am certainly looking forward to the release of Castlevania Order of Ecclessia.And that is where the problem lies... Since i first started playing Castlevania series on NDS, I find it hard to be getting back to Gba and play the Gba series since I enjoy the convenience that NDS brings(dual screens ftw!) where I can just view the map without pausing the game. This is very important since I dont have to switch between the menu and game screen itself. This happened a lot when I played Metroid Zero Mission and that is why till now I still havent managed to beat it.

So mind to share what games you have been interested in but still havent manage to get hold of a copy? Leave your comment here.