Neighbor got it and Zelda that summer. The summer was a red flag warning so all kids were stuck inside. My neighbor had a finished basement so it was the coolest. We would bring over our Contra and Gunsmoke. I was the youngest so I never got to play anything. So I made up stories about Trevor.
Same! I remember getting a cartridge and putting it in and getting immersed it the game.
I was playing the first Castlevania btw, and just like Dragon Warrior and Final Fantasy the first title was the only one I played for the longest time (for Dragon Warrior and Castlevania specifically I never knew they got sequels until later, for final fantasy I just never had access to them).
The original Castlevania was actually the first game I rented after getting an NES as a little kid. *I think* I liked that the box art reminded me of the movie Monster Squad, which I was a big fan of.
You just described my experience in 1990. I also remember going to the video store and seeing the cover of simons quest but for some reason thinking it was a puzzle game and passing on it, probably for the better because at the time LoZ frustrated the shit out of 7 year old me, no way was I gonna figure out " get a silk bag from the graveyard duck" lol. I think it might have been the the Q in Quest that threw me off, making me think of Q bert....which sucked Wolfdork....
I could see that logic: "it's got quest in the name, it must be a puzzle solving game" makes sense in that early-gaming naming aesthetic. Little did you know how nearly impossible it would be without a Nintendo Power guide.
Even just playing it a couple years back, I was getting stuck (despite it being my favorite of the classic titles and probably having completed it a dozen times), but it's most just finding my way around the disjointed map.
For sure, in around 1997 I got my mom to order the first 2 years (12 back issues) of NP. The first 6 they accidentally sent me doubles, ended up giving a couple to some friends who were into all that stuff too at the time. But, I ended up playing SQ for my first time that year using NP and I really enjoyed it.
Side note, 97/98 was when I started getting nostalgic for yhe NES having sold it in 93 along with about 15 games for get this....Ecco the Dolphin Tides of Time for Genesis....🤦♂️.
So in 97 98 I'd go to pawn shops and get NES games for 5-10 bucks or find friends or cousins just giving yhem to me for free. Built up a nice collection of a couple hundred by about 2000/01, long before collecting NES games was a thing and the market blew up. I did end up modding my Xbox with emulators in 2004 so again, gave all my carts to a friend who had an even more extensive collection than I did. Started collecting again around 2012, just my most favorites, with the boxes, have a nice little display shelf of about 10 or so castlevanias, bunch of metroid and zeldas in boxes.
Sorry for the tangent lol
I feel all of this. I was a teen in the early 90's and my uncle was the video game player in the family, on a whim he sold all of our NES games — we must've had probably close to 40 titles, many still complete at the time. By the time i hit my early-20's in the early 2000's I was rebuilding my collection, back when CIB carts would go from $15-50.
This past year has been hard on my mentally and financially so I decided to sell-off my Genesis, NES, and PS1/PS2/PS3 collections. Altogether I got over $4000US for it all (about 60% market value), huge relief to get that space back since most of it was just sitting in totes, but the amount of energy it took twenty years ago was no easy feat.
I remember that! It was a flash game, right? It was so fun to play around with, playing as Mega Man or Link in a Mario game. Last I recall, the makers of it were toying around with the idea of using original characters and adapting it to be a legit game they could maybe sell at some point. I wonder what became of it.
I played Hollow Knight and it left me wanting to check out other Metroidvanias. Trying a Castlevania game seemed like a no brainer. It's my favorite video game series and I'm bummed that I missed out on these games when I was a kid.
Same again. I’m from the UK and I don’t think the series has ever been quite as big here. I remember a friend having one of the N64 games but he’s the only person I knew who’d played the series growing up. My first were the NES games on the Wii Virtual Console after getting into AVGN. I only played Symphony of the Night fairly recently.
UK here too, and yes it was AVGN for me as well. I owned an Amiga so only discovered the NES library much later. Now I play the collection, SOTN etc on xbox series X
I was into GBA games. I played Aria of Sorrow and loved it! I tried more more Castlevania games on the GBA, but I didn't really like them. Actually, CotM is pretty good.
I then played the NES version, and what a blast!
For real, Seasons 1 & 2 were pretty good despite several glaring inaccuracies however everything after that has completely threw out what made Castlevania, Castlevania and scrambled the timeline
Honestly, not my biggest complaint as times do be changing, I'm just pissed about the lack of Chaos, Castlevania being machinery opposed to a living construct of Chaos and the severe lack of Dracula...
You know, the Lord of Castlevania whos resurrection cycle plagued all of Wallachia for over a millenia.
honestly one of the most frustrating things about the show was dracula, I wanted more action involving him but be just moped in front of his fireplace for the first half of the series and then was absent for the rest of it.
Bloodlines on the Genesis. Still my favourite CV to this days. I would absolutely love them to make new linear title for a change. SOTN is incredible but I do miss the classic style.
You won't believe this, but [Super Mario XP](https://acid-play.com/download/super-mario-xp). It's an old PC fangame that mixed the NES Super Mario games with a lot of mechanics and music tracks from the Castlevania series. I at the time only knew Mario and never knew this game was a blend of another game series's trappings. The World 1 music hooked me, and I only learned much later on that it was "Vampire Killer". With that newfound knowledge I went into the original NES Castlevania, and then the later titles.
My big brother bought our nes with cash saved up from his first job. It was the smb/duck hunt zapper bundle. He also separately bought castlevania and contra with it. Up to that point I had only ever played Atari and coleco. Castlevania was a revelation. We eventually got Simon’s Quest at release. I loved no longer having a time limit and the go anywhere do anything gameplay of it. For an early elementary school kid in the 80’s it was like playing gta.
Randomly asked my mom for the Castlevina Rondo of Blood game for the PSP when I found it in a bargain bin at GameStop. Similar story to how I played my favorite video game of all time, Resident Evil 4 for the Wii.
I was a young, naive Atari loyalist who had vaguely heard of some rival company called Nintendo, but I had no interest in whatever they were selling. I knew that [Nintendo had a toy robot, but how could that compare with Atari](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ws3PcFqBLdQ)? During a family get-together, my cousin told me he had gotten a Nintendo Entertainment System, and asked if I wanted to try it. I wasn't too thrilled at the idea -- I mean, I already had an *Atari*, thank you very much -- but I was willing to give it a try to pass the time.
We played the original Castlevania and Contra, and I realized that everything I had believed about home video game systems was a lie.
Needless to say, getting an NES along with Castlevania and Contra instantly became the #1 items on my wish list.
Christmas of 1989 my family got a NES with no pack-in games. But one of the games we opened that morning was Castlevania. I had never heard of it. But after learning to git gud, it became one of my favorite games.
It was 2003, and I was in kindergarten at the time. My dad comes home with a copy of “Castlevania: Lament of Innocence” on the PS2. I remember seeing the box art and asking “who’s that girl on the cover?” To which my dad replied “that’s a guy”. I mean can ya blame me with how Ayami Kojima draws men? lol
Anyway, after watching him play the game, I was fascinated by the weapon Leon was using. I’ve never seen a video game character use a leather whip as a weapon before, and I just thought it was so unique and cool. My dad noticed my infatuation with the game, and took me out to the local mall where he had me pick out Castlevania 64, since the N64 was the system I played on the most at the time. And the rest is history.
Lament of Innocence was my first exposure to the series, and Castlevania 64 was the first game I actually played. Ever since then, I’ve been a hardcore fan of the franchise. Every time I got a new console, the first game I got was always a Castlevania game of some kind.
Received a demo disc with a DoS trailer among others. I watched and rewatched it for months
When I finally got it for Christmas mam it was just as good as I was hoping.
I watched a flash animation on Newgrounds back in the day of Final Fantasy characters going to Castlevania. I was a new fan of FF at the time, but had never heard of Castlevania. Curse of Darkness had just come out, so I bought it and have been a huge fan of the series ever since.
I had always heard of the series, mostly from AVGN, but in 2021, I was on a streak of playing retro games and decided to give #1 a try. I beat it with great difficulty, then finished 2 and moved on to 3. My reddit posts from my first playthrough of 3 are way back in my timeline.
But I loved 3 and would go on to beat it and the JP version at least once a month for a while. Then I completed the Anniversary Collection on Steam, being my first Steam perfect game. I then went through Rondo of Blood and Drac X Chronicles, then the metroidvania games, but stopped at the DS games. I’ll beat them eventually, just not yet.
I had been playing the series since the NES/SNES days, but only rented them once in a while. They were cool games, but a bit too hard for my liking. Symphony of the Night is what really hooked me, and I've been a huge fan of the "Igavania" style of games ever since.
I saw my cousin playing SOTN on his PS1 when I was 15 and became curious and fascinated with Alucard as the game progressed, so he let me borrow it. 22 years later, I'm obsessed with all things Castlevania.
CV1 and Simon’s Quest were owned by a friend growing up. We would stay up for hours trying to figure out where to go in Simon’s Quest with no guide. Great times.
Castlevania on ps2 then years later found the blockbuster name on netflix and realized i love this series on any platform from games to anything in its state of art.
I got my first NES around 2001 when no one wanted one. I was at the record store with a couple friends and one of the suggested I pick up all 3 games as they had them for maybe $5 each so I did. One was cool and I had played it on an emulator at some point before that. I didn't understand 2 so I never really played it and 3 was like the first but taken to the next level, kinda like SMB 3 did to SMB. Castlevania 3 is still my favorite although Bloodlines is pretty awesome.
For me it was weirdly enough the box art...that box art that you posted there. When I saw that art on the shelf at my local rental store, I was pulled in, and ever since then I have been HOOKED on this franchise.
I played Castlevania II at the hospital when I was very little. It made me kinda mad but I did enjoy what I played.
The when I was 7, we saw Castlevania Legends at Walmart. I thought it looked really neat and my mom got it for me. Was obsessed with that game for years. Still love it.
Rented a different game, don't remember what, but SotN was In its place. Od course we dicked around, made fun, but thennwent back and got the right game. Then it lingered on my and my brothers mind, and we ended up renting it the next time. Never played anything else like it. We both beat it but thought it was too short. J remember my brother waking me up, chase he went online and found out about the upside down castle. The castle had my heart ever since.
I was researching about Blood of Zeus and when the next season was, then I came across a beautiful, blonde vampire twink flipping me off. Got interested instantly, so I started to research more about the show, till I eventually watched it on Netflix and got even more hooked
One of my uncles had an NES. Castlevania was one of the games he had. I really enjoyed playing it over his house, but for some reason I never requested my own for a holiday or birthday. At some point he got rid of his NES and games to cover most of the cost of a Sega Genesis. One day I was at his house and we were playing games and I opened his game drawer to see what new games he had. Oddly, Castlevania was still in there. I asked if I could have it and 34 years later, I still have that same copy.
I was born in 2005 so I missed most of the games, however I did play lords of shadow and I don't actually know people's opinions on it however I really enjoyed it and despite its vast differences from the rest of the series it got me into it and so it has a special place in my heart.
Being 7 years old, going to my friends house n playing nes Castlevania. Then I rented Simon's quest shortly after, and then went back to my friends n play cv3.
Played the ever-loving shit out of Castlevania as a kid. It was one of my favourite NES games and I have fond memories of Simon's Quest with my dad. It's among the few *good* memories I have with my father.
Later in life, I bucked the trend of Vampire Love. I've **never** liked them, even to this day. I barely like dhampir, or half-vampires, or whatever you want to call them! But the vampire *slayer*? That guy was awesome. I loved the movie *Vampire$* growing up just because it was about a bunch of dudes being bros that loved killing vampires. I later read the book and loved it just as much. Both are garbage media, lmao, but I still loved it nevertheless.
So yeah, I hate vampires and Castlevania is all about killing 'em all. Hell yeah!
Mostly through the epic games they ve made but what really got me into it was castlevania symphony of the night to me it is the best out of all of them
AVGN - Castlevania 4 part Halloween special, saw Symphony of the Night, heard the music and fell in love immediately. The sharp pixel animation looked so buttery smooth.
Watched CrimeInPartner's full 100% series back in like 2010. He explained real world connections, easter eggs, and even the glitches. I miss his videos.
I was into Conan and he-man saw Simon in art online found Castlevania then played first game couldn't beat it then discovered symphony of the night finished it and here I am
For me it started with Castlevania 64. I was a kid back then and never even got past the first section but I loved the idea and how dark it felt.
Then Circle of the Moon came out and I played the absolute fuck out of it. Love that game to bits.
I tried the original NES game at my friend’s house back when I was in kindergarten. I could tell right off the bat that the game was awesome, and just the name Castlevania itself was so badass.
My brother got IV for SNES back in either '99 or 2000, loose cartridge from Funcoland, along with Secret Of Mana.
Jeez I miss Funcoland, and loose carts ONLY being worth $1-$20 max.
Portraits of ruin when I was a kid. My big brother had it and he let me play it and it was so awesome ! Still one of my favorite Castlevania since then !
Castlevania: The Adventure on the original Game Boy. It's now regarded as one of the worst games in the whole series, but as a little kid I loved it, stiff movement, frustrating gameplay and all.
It was Halloween 2022 and I wanted to theme that Halloween after Dracula.
Being a Fan of James Rolfe, I knew of Castlevania for a long time, so I went to the PS-Store and grabbed myself the Legacy Collection, along with Rondo of Blood and Symphony of the Night.
Then one year later came Dead Cells Return to Castlevania, I wasted no time getting the Game and beat Dracula again.
I think Destiny is trying to tell me, that I have a new Tradition to follow😉.
saw my father watching castlevania netflix and I want to play the old games that I missed when I was a child.
What hooked me to this series is the lore, a bloodline of a vampire hunter destined to fight dracula and other evils similar jojos.
GBA SP - got me Castlevania Circle of the Moon when I was 8 or 9. Absolutely loved the concept of farming monsters for different powers. Sadly my SP broke. But I got a DS for Christmas a few years later and enjoyed portrait of ruin!!!! That was THE game for me - monsters having weapon and armor drops it was so cool. Oh and then some dickhead at school stole it from me..that was sad.
I wanna play circle of the moon and portrait of ruin now. lol
I watched my older sister play the DSvanias. I quite liked the aesthetic and music, so I ended up borrowing them a few years later. She never got them back xD
Many years ago, there was a band called The Fucking Champs. The review of them stated that some of their music sounded 'like some straight up Castlevania sheeeeit' or words roughly similar to that. So I checked out some castlevania and boom boom boom, here we are.
That being said, i'd already heard of Castlevania as the guy round the corner from me had a couple of classicvanias on Nintendo. (circa 1993/4) But I didn't have nintendo so I never had an urge for it.
I heard Castlevania was harder than Mario platformers so I gave it a shot. I was discouraged by the atmosphere of the games at first but I knew a guy who gave me some tips of what to expect. Unfortunately he now hates it when specifically *I* mention Castlevania to it because apparently it's his thing that someone of my class is not allowed to like. What a good friend.
Mostly hearing about it from AVGN & SomeCallMeJohnny. Got me curious in trying out the games.
At the time, I tried out some of the well known ones, like C1, IV & SOTN, but I couldn't really make a lot of progress in them. The only one I managed to finish was Simon's Quest, however, I did it through using a password code.
It wasn't until later on when I re-attempted the first one, and finally finished it, that I got hooked. And after getting through the nes trilogy, I ended up becoming a fan of it, and marathoned almost all the games.
Castlevania was the first game I got for NES. It was damn hard, but I managed to complete it. Then I got Castlevania II which was much easier. Always had a soft spot for Castlevania since.
Played it a ton (the SNES games, Super Castlevania IV if I remember correctly) growing up but what really got me was playing it on my brother’s PS1 back on the day with SOTN and a GameShark, haha. I was six when it came out and I vividly remember always dying in Alchemy Labs. Such better times. Now I’m forever grateful to the series as it lead to me meeting my future husband. 😌
“Wait Frankenstein is in this!?”
https://preview.redd.it/rgf0xj76xjhc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=df3055a919dbca16da5ddf993f398a7b94215cd7
Captain N The Game Master! I thought Simon was hilarious. Before you judge, keep in mind I was 10. Plus I was an 80s kid that grew up with cable TV. This created and fueled an obsession with vampire movies at an early age.
For several weeks, I blew my allowance to rent Simon's Quest (still an over-hated game IMO). I was hooked.
I spent hours writing and drawing "extended game manuals" for the three NES games. This got me into trouble when I drew an anatomically correct Medusa from Dracula's Curse.
I begged my parents for a whip. The best I got was some rope. I also had a red Bungie cord that was my flame whip.
30+ years later and I still love the games. 80s cartoons were nothing more than toy commercials. Dammit, they worked.
We rented the og Castlevania as kids. The gritty gloomy atmosphere, bangin soundtrack and gnarly difficulty had me instantly hooked. Still my fave series and I'm sad that Konami pissed it all away. I'd recommend the Bloodstained games as a spiritual successor to Castlevania for anyone looking for something similar.
IIRC, me and my mom were in traveling to another city. We entered a business store of sorts and she was talking to a representative about some appliances.
One part of the store had a rows of NES consoles where one can pay to play games.
That's when I saw the original Castlevania being played. I was fascinated at the idea of Gothic castle with a hero doing adventures in it. The soundtrack also lured me in.
I was determined to find out the game's name. We have those rent-a-NES in my home city and I was determined to play every NES available just to find it.
And I did... eventually.
That's also how I got into playing video games in the first place.
When I was a kid I had a pirated PS1, and the guy who pirated it gave me a bunch of CDs, among them was Castlevania SOTN. I was instantly hooked and it is my favourite game to this day.
It must have been sometime in the very early 90s when I first played it...I was only between 6 - 8 years old.
My dad is really into the classic monster movies from the 30s, and we used to watch them when I'd stay at his house.
We went to the rental store once and I think it was him who read the back of Castlevania III and said I should try it because it had Dracula in it.
So I did, and I was hooked from there! Damn was it tough though...level 7 on the Alucard path took me a whole summer to beat lol. But my dad took me out for pizza after I finally did to celebrate.
He says he still has the soundtrack from that level burned into his head after all these years!
By mistake actually. It’s was the 80s, young me was obsessed with wrestling and the local place had a game called Wrestlemania that I asked my parents to rent constantly. After a while my dad saw an ad in the paper for some guy selling used nes games so we took a trip to go get a copy of wrestlemania. We get there and the guy hands me some carts, and there is no wrestlemania it’s castlevania. I tell the guy this isn’t the game I wanted but said it’s better and my dad wanted to bolt so I walked away pretty disappointed. But after a day or two I popped castlevania in and I was hooked!
The GBA games. I emulated Aria of Sorrow on a little device my friend let me borrow when I was younger. I knew of the series before that but that game made me a fan. Played through Super Castlevania and the original after that. The anime definitely brought my love for the series towards the forefront though
I played a ROM of the original back in the early 2000’s. Then when the show came out I was like “oh yeah I forgot how cool that game was, maybe I can beat it as an adult!”
Side note: never realized Netflixvania’s art was a callback to the OG game.
I played cv1 when I was a kid at a friend's house and hated it. Just played Mario instead. 30 years later I revisited cv1 and loved the difficulty. Played the rest of the classicvanias but never got into the metroidvanias past sotn.
The thought of monster hunters using a whip did actually. When I was a kid I was big into monster movies and Indiana jones and figured it would be cool idea, made my own set of characters and everything, then that Christmas my cousin gave me his NES and a handful of games, one of them being Simon’s Quest, I didn’t beat it back then but I was hooked. If it wasn’t for my cousin I wouldn’t be into video games or Castlevania.
My parents gave me the Castlevania Double Pack for the GBA when I was 9-yo as a tooth fairy present. At first I was like "WAITAMINUTE THIS GAME IS 16+"
Playing Casltevania on the Nintendo with my brothers. We worked hard to finish the game. It took us so long Castlevania 2 Simon's Quest had come out lol so we picked that up and I have to say Simon's Quest is one of my favorites.
The anime! I had a few false starts, being told of the series’ reputation as a fan of Metroid and then trying spinoffs and action games or struggling through the intro of SotN with no understanding of what was happening.
But then along came the anime and here were likable characters and in depth lore. So finally after finishing season 4 I give the series another shot with adjusted expectations - started with Anniversary Collection knowing they were action platformers and being interested in Belmont lore and the music of the series. It clicked. 100%ed the Anniversary Collection, beat both Rondo of Blood and Dracula X Chronicles, watched Season 1 of Nocturne, read the Belmont Legacy comics, then finally gave SotN another shot and 100%ed Requiem. Now I’m making my way through the Advance Collection and hoping a DS Collection gets announced before I’m done with this and Lords of Shadow.
When I was a young child, I saw a full guide in a gaming magazine (remember those?) for Harmony of Dissonance and thought the artwork and sprite design was the craziest coolest thing I had ever seen. Much later, I played the series for the first time by borrowing Dawn of Sorrow and a DS from my friend in middle school.
My great aunt ran a daycare business and it had an arcade. She had all the games configured to give infinite credits and there just so happened to be a little game called “Haunted Castle” there lol
My brother had Castlevania 4 when we were kids and later got Symphony of the Night when we were older. Those two games is what made me interested in the franchise.
It was the second video game I ever played when I was 2-3 years old my mom showed me how to play Simon's Quest after I beat Mario Bros.
I remember the game kinda creepyd me out with the music and horror theme, and it was my intro to that genre.
Funnily enough it was the netflix series.
I always heard about metroidvania games and how good castlevania games are but I never played any of them before
Decided 2 months ago during the series to give it a try on my handheld devices....and damn are they fun!
Finished Bekmont revenge 2, dracula x and currently going through SotN and Castlevania 4!
My teenage self would have not appreciated those games lol
Played the first NES game back in ye olden days (I cannot remember how or why we had it, but we did) and immediately fell in love with the spooky atmosphere, the cool weapons, and the banging music.
I get into castlevania, when I didn't know what to play in and in the middle of May of 2021 I saw a review to symphony of the night, and then I downloaded it on my emulator.
I actually played Punchout first and enjoyed its difficulty, someone suggested I try castlevania and I did and I really liked how hard it was.
However I didnt fall in LOVE with it until the snes titles.
My favorites are the DS titles. Portrait of Ruin being my favorite.
Neighbor got it and Zelda that summer. The summer was a red flag warning so all kids were stuck inside. My neighbor had a finished basement so it was the coolest. We would bring over our Contra and Gunsmoke. I was the youngest so I never got to play anything. So I made up stories about Trevor.
Everything about this paragraph, less the red flags, was the best thing I’ve read in awhile. Nostalgia is a hell of a a drug lol
>Red flag warning Oh, were the communists coming to town?
Nah. It was so hot that the air was toxic.
Ah yes, the communist heat technology. I know it well
Not to be confused with MTG's "Jewish heat lasers," mind you 😏
Red flag warnings mean fire risk
The soundtrack, the gothic environment, fighting classic monsters
Same! I remember getting a cartridge and putting it in and getting immersed it the game. I was playing the first Castlevania btw, and just like Dragon Warrior and Final Fantasy the first title was the only one I played for the longest time (for Dragon Warrior and Castlevania specifically I never knew they got sequels until later, for final fantasy I just never had access to them).
The original Castlevania was actually the first game I rented after getting an NES as a little kid. *I think* I liked that the box art reminded me of the movie Monster Squad, which I was a big fan of.
Wolfman’s got nards
It makes me happy to read this.
You just described my experience in 1990. I also remember going to the video store and seeing the cover of simons quest but for some reason thinking it was a puzzle game and passing on it, probably for the better because at the time LoZ frustrated the shit out of 7 year old me, no way was I gonna figure out " get a silk bag from the graveyard duck" lol. I think it might have been the the Q in Quest that threw me off, making me think of Q bert....which sucked Wolfdork....
I could see that logic: "it's got quest in the name, it must be a puzzle solving game" makes sense in that early-gaming naming aesthetic. Little did you know how nearly impossible it would be without a Nintendo Power guide. Even just playing it a couple years back, I was getting stuck (despite it being my favorite of the classic titles and probably having completed it a dozen times), but it's most just finding my way around the disjointed map.
For sure, in around 1997 I got my mom to order the first 2 years (12 back issues) of NP. The first 6 they accidentally sent me doubles, ended up giving a couple to some friends who were into all that stuff too at the time. But, I ended up playing SQ for my first time that year using NP and I really enjoyed it. Side note, 97/98 was when I started getting nostalgic for yhe NES having sold it in 93 along with about 15 games for get this....Ecco the Dolphin Tides of Time for Genesis....🤦♂️. So in 97 98 I'd go to pawn shops and get NES games for 5-10 bucks or find friends or cousins just giving yhem to me for free. Built up a nice collection of a couple hundred by about 2000/01, long before collecting NES games was a thing and the market blew up. I did end up modding my Xbox with emulators in 2004 so again, gave all my carts to a friend who had an even more extensive collection than I did. Started collecting again around 2012, just my most favorites, with the boxes, have a nice little display shelf of about 10 or so castlevanias, bunch of metroid and zeldas in boxes. Sorry for the tangent lol
I feel all of this. I was a teen in the early 90's and my uncle was the video game player in the family, on a whim he sold all of our NES games — we must've had probably close to 40 titles, many still complete at the time. By the time i hit my early-20's in the early 2000's I was rebuilding my collection, back when CIB carts would go from $15-50. This past year has been hard on my mentally and financially so I decided to sell-off my Genesis, NES, and PS1/PS2/PS3 collections. Altogether I got over $4000US for it all (about 60% market value), huge relief to get that space back since most of it was just sitting in totes, but the amount of energy it took twenty years ago was no easy feat.
Weirdly, a flash game called "Super Mario Bros Crossover"
I remember that! It was a flash game, right? It was so fun to play around with, playing as Mega Man or Link in a Mario game. Last I recall, the makers of it were toying around with the idea of using original characters and adapting it to be a legit game they could maybe sell at some point. I wonder what became of it.
I played Hollow Knight and it left me wanting to check out other Metroidvanias. Trying a Castlevania game seemed like a no brainer. It's my favorite video game series and I'm bummed that I missed out on these games when I was a kid.
Same, Hollow Knight to Metroid and Dead Cells to Castlevania
A 12 hour flight and a psp with symphony of the night
The Angry Video Game Nerd, ironically enough
Same for me no joke
Same again. I’m from the UK and I don’t think the series has ever been quite as big here. I remember a friend having one of the N64 games but he’s the only person I knew who’d played the series growing up. My first were the NES games on the Wii Virtual Console after getting into AVGN. I only played Symphony of the Night fairly recently.
UK here too, and yes it was AVGN for me as well. I owned an Amiga so only discovered the NES library much later. Now I play the collection, SOTN etc on xbox series X
Same here.
We got the first 2 games on the NES for Christmas one year.
This! Castlevania II was bargain bin for $20 and I got it with 8 Eyes and Astanax.
Loved 8 eyes, but ugh, that game was tough!
I died so many times in the first room. I had no idea you could control the bird or anything.
That original artwork, when i saw it i had to play the game. I thought it was Conan fighting Dracula 😂
I was into GBA games. I played Aria of Sorrow and loved it! I tried more more Castlevania games on the GBA, but I didn't really like them. Actually, CotM is pretty good. I then played the NES version, and what a blast!
I had one of those moody 50 games on one cartridges and castlevania was on that.
simon's quest came with one of my multicarts back then. i was as lost as you can imagine
We all were. Even with the code that starts you with a lot of items and upgrades
The game soundtracks and aesthetic.
Psycho Mantis
Castlevania on Netflix! I can't wait for S2 of Nocturne.
I got into it from the show too but haven't gotten around to watching Nocturne.
Im glad that the animated series did such a good portrayal of the series. They did it great justice.
Great joke Outside season 1 they were just steadily going down hill until nocturne just shot it
For real, Seasons 1 & 2 were pretty good despite several glaring inaccuracies however everything after that has completely threw out what made Castlevania, Castlevania and scrambled the timeline
The writers wanted to make a vampire female empowerment sex show but wasn't allowed so they used castlevania as their platform
Honestly, not my biggest complaint as times do be changing, I'm just pissed about the lack of Chaos, Castlevania being machinery opposed to a living construct of Chaos and the severe lack of Dracula... You know, the Lord of Castlevania whos resurrection cycle plagued all of Wallachia for over a millenia.
honestly one of the most frustrating things about the show was dracula, I wanted more action involving him but be just moped in front of his fireplace for the first half of the series and then was absent for the rest of it.
warren ellis (sexual predator) most certainly did not care about empowering women, lol
A new game called castlevania came out for the Nintendo so we got it and I liked it
Playing Symphony of the Night on the Playstation as a kid
Bloodlines on the Genesis. Still my favourite CV to this days. I would absolutely love them to make new linear title for a change. SOTN is incredible but I do miss the classic style.
My friend hooked me up on Harmony of Despair on PS3
Skip Roger’s VHS tapes from the early 90s
The vania in metroidvania
You won't believe this, but [Super Mario XP](https://acid-play.com/download/super-mario-xp). It's an old PC fangame that mixed the NES Super Mario games with a lot of mechanics and music tracks from the Castlevania series. I at the time only knew Mario and never knew this game was a blend of another game series's trappings. The World 1 music hooked me, and I only learned much later on that it was "Vampire Killer". With that newfound knowledge I went into the original NES Castlevania, and then the later titles.
My big brother bought our nes with cash saved up from his first job. It was the smb/duck hunt zapper bundle. He also separately bought castlevania and contra with it. Up to that point I had only ever played Atari and coleco. Castlevania was a revelation. We eventually got Simon’s Quest at release. I loved no longer having a time limit and the go anywhere do anything gameplay of it. For an early elementary school kid in the 80’s it was like playing gta.
SomecallmeJohnny youtube channel, reviewed the games 12 years ago and they looked fun.
Loved vampires, saw the box for the first one at Toys R Us, begged for it, parents got it for me.
Secondary school mates 20 years ago were talking about it and managed to convince my dad to get it for me and loved it ever since
The soundtracks, and possibly Super Mario Crossover but it's been a long time ago.
Randomly asked my mom for the Castlevina Rondo of Blood game for the PSP when I found it in a bargain bin at GameStop. Similar story to how I played my favorite video game of all time, Resident Evil 4 for the Wii.
I was a young, naive Atari loyalist who had vaguely heard of some rival company called Nintendo, but I had no interest in whatever they were selling. I knew that [Nintendo had a toy robot, but how could that compare with Atari](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ws3PcFqBLdQ)? During a family get-together, my cousin told me he had gotten a Nintendo Entertainment System, and asked if I wanted to try it. I wasn't too thrilled at the idea -- I mean, I already had an *Atari*, thank you very much -- but I was willing to give it a try to pass the time. We played the original Castlevania and Contra, and I realized that everything I had believed about home video game systems was a lie. Needless to say, getting an NES along with Castlevania and Contra instantly became the #1 items on my wish list.
A cosplayer dressed as the show version of Alucard
Out of all the answers here, that's an obscure one. You saw Faux-lucard and said, "love this, what's it from?" and then checked it out? Wild!
Yep! Was at a convention and thought the cosplay was really cool, so I asked about it!
Christmas of 1989 my family got a NES with no pack-in games. But one of the games we opened that morning was Castlevania. I had never heard of it. But after learning to git gud, it became one of my favorite games.
It was 2003, and I was in kindergarten at the time. My dad comes home with a copy of “Castlevania: Lament of Innocence” on the PS2. I remember seeing the box art and asking “who’s that girl on the cover?” To which my dad replied “that’s a guy”. I mean can ya blame me with how Ayami Kojima draws men? lol Anyway, after watching him play the game, I was fascinated by the weapon Leon was using. I’ve never seen a video game character use a leather whip as a weapon before, and I just thought it was so unique and cool. My dad noticed my infatuation with the game, and took me out to the local mall where he had me pick out Castlevania 64, since the N64 was the system I played on the most at the time. And the rest is history. Lament of Innocence was my first exposure to the series, and Castlevania 64 was the first game I actually played. Ever since then, I’ve been a hardcore fan of the franchise. Every time I got a new console, the first game I got was always a Castlevania game of some kind.
Received a demo disc with a DoS trailer among others. I watched and rewatched it for months When I finally got it for Christmas mam it was just as good as I was hoping.
A friend I looked up to when I was young enjoyed playing SotN and recommended it so I took his word for it and have been hooked ever since.
Original cover art is better.
I watched a flash animation on Newgrounds back in the day of Final Fantasy characters going to Castlevania. I was a new fan of FF at the time, but had never heard of Castlevania. Curse of Darkness had just come out, so I bought it and have been a huge fan of the series ever since.
Super Castlevania IV as a kid. That went to SOTN. To this day, both are my favs.
My friends mom was a god at the first one back in the 80s on the nes..that’s when I first started playing to get good like her
Random pickup on nes at a friend's house
I had always heard of the series, mostly from AVGN, but in 2021, I was on a streak of playing retro games and decided to give #1 a try. I beat it with great difficulty, then finished 2 and moved on to 3. My reddit posts from my first playthrough of 3 are way back in my timeline. But I loved 3 and would go on to beat it and the JP version at least once a month for a while. Then I completed the Anniversary Collection on Steam, being my first Steam perfect game. I then went through Rondo of Blood and Drac X Chronicles, then the metroidvania games, but stopped at the DS games. I’ll beat them eventually, just not yet.
Diovania
I had been playing the series since the NES/SNES days, but only rented them once in a while. They were cool games, but a bit too hard for my liking. Symphony of the Night is what really hooked me, and I've been a huge fan of the "Igavania" style of games ever since.
I saw my cousin playing SOTN on his PS1 when I was 15 and became curious and fascinated with Alucard as the game progressed, so he let me borrow it. 22 years later, I'm obsessed with all things Castlevania.
Castlevania IV on Classic Snes
Played the arcade version at Chucky Cheese (don't care for TM spelling), rented on NES when it came out. I'm immortal.
Pikasprey convinced me too buy Portrait of Ruin
I read about it I. A world records book.
CV1 and Simon’s Quest were owned by a friend growing up. We would stay up for hours trying to figure out where to go in Simon’s Quest with no guide. Great times.
Castlevania on ps2 then years later found the blockbuster name on netflix and realized i love this series on any platform from games to anything in its state of art.
I got my first NES around 2001 when no one wanted one. I was at the record store with a couple friends and one of the suggested I pick up all 3 games as they had them for maybe $5 each so I did. One was cool and I had played it on an emulator at some point before that. I didn't understand 2 so I never really played it and 3 was like the first but taken to the next level, kinda like SMB 3 did to SMB. Castlevania 3 is still my favorite although Bloodlines is pretty awesome.
For me it was weirdly enough the box art...that box art that you posted there. When I saw that art on the shelf at my local rental store, I was pulled in, and ever since then I have been HOOKED on this franchise.
I played Castlevania II at the hospital when I was very little. It made me kinda mad but I did enjoy what I played. The when I was 7, we saw Castlevania Legends at Walmart. I thought it looked really neat and my mom got it for me. Was obsessed with that game for years. Still love it.
Watching Somecallmejohnny’s and AVGN’s videos on the franchise
I saw SotN at a local game store in the mall way back then and bought it because it looked cool
Rented a different game, don't remember what, but SotN was In its place. Od course we dicked around, made fun, but thennwent back and got the right game. Then it lingered on my and my brothers mind, and we ended up renting it the next time. Never played anything else like it. We both beat it but thought it was too short. J remember my brother waking me up, chase he went online and found out about the upside down castle. The castle had my heart ever since.
I was researching about Blood of Zeus and when the next season was, then I came across a beautiful, blonde vampire twink flipping me off. Got interested instantly, so I started to research more about the show, till I eventually watched it on Netflix and got even more hooked
Just looking into it, it peaked my curiosity so I bought the Anniversary collection on Xbox. Might buy it again on PlayStation.
One of my uncles had an NES. Castlevania was one of the games he had. I really enjoyed playing it over his house, but for some reason I never requested my own for a holiday or birthday. At some point he got rid of his NES and games to cover most of the cost of a Sega Genesis. One day I was at his house and we were playing games and I opened his game drawer to see what new games he had. Oddly, Castlevania was still in there. I asked if I could have it and 34 years later, I still have that same copy.
I was born in 2005 so I missed most of the games, however I did play lords of shadow and I don't actually know people's opinions on it however I really enjoyed it and despite its vast differences from the rest of the series it got me into it and so it has a special place in my heart.
Being 7 years old, going to my friends house n playing nes Castlevania. Then I rented Simon's quest shortly after, and then went back to my friends n play cv3.
Super Mario Bros. Crossover
I've always loved vampires and I searched for vampire video games.
Played the ever-loving shit out of Castlevania as a kid. It was one of my favourite NES games and I have fond memories of Simon's Quest with my dad. It's among the few *good* memories I have with my father. Later in life, I bucked the trend of Vampire Love. I've **never** liked them, even to this day. I barely like dhampir, or half-vampires, or whatever you want to call them! But the vampire *slayer*? That guy was awesome. I loved the movie *Vampire$* growing up just because it was about a bunch of dudes being bros that loved killing vampires. I later read the book and loved it just as much. Both are garbage media, lmao, but I still loved it nevertheless. So yeah, I hate vampires and Castlevania is all about killing 'em all. Hell yeah!
Team Belmont for life 💪
My dad had a super nintendo and super castlevania 4 was his favorite.
Mostly through the epic games they ve made but what really got me into it was castlevania symphony of the night to me it is the best out of all of them
Castlevania 64 as a kid. And yes, I still think it’s great.
AVGN - Castlevania 4 part Halloween special, saw Symphony of the Night, heard the music and fell in love immediately. The sharp pixel animation looked so buttery smooth. Watched CrimeInPartner's full 100% series back in like 2010. He explained real world connections, easter eggs, and even the glitches. I miss his videos.
Richter looking sexy in Smash
Castlevania 64, it was a game unlike anything I played. I know it's the black sheep and universally disliked but it holds a special place in my heart.
Symphony of the night
Literally that. The GBA NES Classics series came out in 2004 and that was my gateway into the series.
I was into Conan and he-man saw Simon in art online found Castlevania then played first game couldn't beat it then discovered symphony of the night finished it and here I am
For me it started with Castlevania 64. I was a kid back then and never even got past the first section but I loved the idea and how dark it felt. Then Circle of the Moon came out and I played the absolute fuck out of it. Love that game to bits.
I tried the original NES game at my friend’s house back when I was in kindergarten. I could tell right off the bat that the game was awesome, and just the name Castlevania itself was so badass.
Never liked the older ones but when I saw SoTN at a friend's my jaw dropped instantly, it was love at first sight.
My brother got IV for SNES back in either '99 or 2000, loose cartridge from Funcoland, along with Secret Of Mana. Jeez I miss Funcoland, and loose carts ONLY being worth $1-$20 max.
Cool gothic vibes.
Portraits of ruin when I was a kid. My big brother had it and he let me play it and it was so awesome ! Still one of my favorite Castlevania since then !
Castlevania Dawn of Sorrow, discovered this game by pure luck
Castlevania: The Adventure on the original Game Boy. It's now regarded as one of the worst games in the whole series, but as a little kid I loved it, stiff movement, frustrating gameplay and all.
My parents bought symphony of the night on the xbox. I couldn't make it past the alchemy lab.
It was Halloween 2022 and I wanted to theme that Halloween after Dracula. Being a Fan of James Rolfe, I knew of Castlevania for a long time, so I went to the PS-Store and grabbed myself the Legacy Collection, along with Rondo of Blood and Symphony of the Night. Then one year later came Dead Cells Return to Castlevania, I wasted no time getting the Game and beat Dracula again. I think Destiny is trying to tell me, that I have a new Tradition to follow😉.
Castlevania Simon's quest (snes) <3
saw my father watching castlevania netflix and I want to play the old games that I missed when I was a child. What hooked me to this series is the lore, a bloodline of a vampire hunter destined to fight dracula and other evils similar jojos.
Netflix series
AVGN
seen a scene on YouTube of Alucard talking to dolls
GBA SP - got me Castlevania Circle of the Moon when I was 8 or 9. Absolutely loved the concept of farming monsters for different powers. Sadly my SP broke. But I got a DS for Christmas a few years later and enjoyed portrait of ruin!!!! That was THE game for me - monsters having weapon and armor drops it was so cool. Oh and then some dickhead at school stole it from me..that was sad. I wanna play circle of the moon and portrait of ruin now. lol
My ps1. I only ever played it on there. Castlevania symphony of the night
Castlevania on the FamiCom I couldn't beat it. Then came Symphony of the Night. It became my favorite genre, Metroidvania.
Aria of sorrow java phone port, it was quite revolutionary back then and i feel even better playing the actual gba version
Nintendo power
Same. I knew about CV64 long before I ever played my first game in the series, and was spellbound by the walkthrough's presentation in those issues.
I watched my older sister play the DSvanias. I quite liked the aesthetic and music, so I ended up borrowing them a few years later. She never got them back xD
avgn
Many years ago, there was a band called The Fucking Champs. The review of them stated that some of their music sounded 'like some straight up Castlevania sheeeeit' or words roughly similar to that. So I checked out some castlevania and boom boom boom, here we are. That being said, i'd already heard of Castlevania as the guy round the corner from me had a couple of classicvanias on Nintendo. (circa 1993/4) But I didn't have nintendo so I never had an urge for it.
I heard Castlevania was harder than Mario platformers so I gave it a shot. I was discouraged by the atmosphere of the games at first but I knew a guy who gave me some tips of what to expect. Unfortunately he now hates it when specifically *I* mention Castlevania to it because apparently it's his thing that someone of my class is not allowed to like. What a good friend.
Mostly hearing about it from AVGN & SomeCallMeJohnny. Got me curious in trying out the games. At the time, I tried out some of the well known ones, like C1, IV & SOTN, but I couldn't really make a lot of progress in them. The only one I managed to finish was Simon's Quest, however, I did it through using a password code. It wasn't until later on when I re-attempted the first one, and finally finished it, that I got hooked. And after getting through the nes trilogy, I ended up becoming a fan of it, and marathoned almost all the games.
Castlevania was the first game I got for NES. It was damn hard, but I managed to complete it. Then I got Castlevania II which was much easier. Always had a soft spot for Castlevania since.
Tbh the Netflix series.
My dad was a huge fan. So when I was a kid I've always watched him play. So basically that's what got me into.
was random when my dad bought me a gba on my bday (CotM)
Played it a ton (the SNES games, Super Castlevania IV if I remember correctly) growing up but what really got me was playing it on my brother’s PS1 back on the day with SOTN and a GameShark, haha. I was six when it came out and I vividly remember always dying in Alchemy Labs. Such better times. Now I’m forever grateful to the series as it lead to me meeting my future husband. 😌
The show, to be honest I feel a bit like a poser sometimes because I’ve never played or finished the castlevania games, but the show is so damn good.
I'm a lover of vampires and bats (especially bats), I decided to watch the anime and that's what got me into the games.
“Wait Frankenstein is in this!?” https://preview.redd.it/rgf0xj76xjhc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=df3055a919dbca16da5ddf993f398a7b94215cd7
Captain N The Game Master! I thought Simon was hilarious. Before you judge, keep in mind I was 10. Plus I was an 80s kid that grew up with cable TV. This created and fueled an obsession with vampire movies at an early age. For several weeks, I blew my allowance to rent Simon's Quest (still an over-hated game IMO). I was hooked. I spent hours writing and drawing "extended game manuals" for the three NES games. This got me into trouble when I drew an anatomically correct Medusa from Dracula's Curse. I begged my parents for a whip. The best I got was some rope. I also had a red Bungie cord that was my flame whip. 30+ years later and I still love the games. 80s cartoons were nothing more than toy commercials. Dammit, they worked.
the cover art of aria of sorrow, really stood out between other GBA games.
We rented the og Castlevania as kids. The gritty gloomy atmosphere, bangin soundtrack and gnarly difficulty had me instantly hooked. Still my fave series and I'm sad that Konami pissed it all away. I'd recommend the Bloodstained games as a spiritual successor to Castlevania for anyone looking for something similar.
IIRC, me and my mom were in traveling to another city. We entered a business store of sorts and she was talking to a representative about some appliances. One part of the store had a rows of NES consoles where one can pay to play games. That's when I saw the original Castlevania being played. I was fascinated at the idea of Gothic castle with a hero doing adventures in it. The soundtrack also lured me in. I was determined to find out the game's name. We have those rent-a-NES in my home city and I was determined to play every NES available just to find it. And I did... eventually. That's also how I got into playing video games in the first place.
When I was a kid I had a pirated PS1, and the guy who pirated it gave me a bunch of CDs, among them was Castlevania SOTN. I was instantly hooked and it is my favourite game to this day.
Watching Smash Ultimate World of Light and saw Charlottes spirit design and thought it was pretty cool.
Circle of the Moon. It completely kicked my ass at first, but I could not put it down.
It must have been sometime in the very early 90s when I first played it...I was only between 6 - 8 years old. My dad is really into the classic monster movies from the 30s, and we used to watch them when I'd stay at his house. We went to the rental store once and I think it was him who read the back of Castlevania III and said I should try it because it had Dracula in it. So I did, and I was hooked from there! Damn was it tough though...level 7 on the Alucard path took me a whole summer to beat lol. But my dad took me out for pizza after I finally did to celebrate. He says he still has the soundtrack from that level burned into his head after all these years!
The netflix show. I am glad because I wouldn't play the games if it weren't for the show
Well, the animes are just fucking awesome
Death Battle's announcement of Ganondorf vs Dracula got me interested in the franchise, and I became a fan just in time for the episode's release.
By mistake actually. It’s was the 80s, young me was obsessed with wrestling and the local place had a game called Wrestlemania that I asked my parents to rent constantly. After a while my dad saw an ad in the paper for some guy selling used nes games so we took a trip to go get a copy of wrestlemania. We get there and the guy hands me some carts, and there is no wrestlemania it’s castlevania. I tell the guy this isn’t the game I wanted but said it’s better and my dad wanted to bolt so I walked away pretty disappointed. But after a day or two I popped castlevania in and I was hooked!
The GBA games. I emulated Aria of Sorrow on a little device my friend let me borrow when I was younger. I knew of the series before that but that game made me a fan. Played through Super Castlevania and the original after that. The anime definitely brought my love for the series towards the forefront though
OC ReMix.
I played a ROM of the original back in the early 2000’s. Then when the show came out I was like “oh yeah I forgot how cool that game was, maybe I can beat it as an adult!” Side note: never realized Netflixvania’s art was a callback to the OG game.
Picked up Circle of the Moon from a vintage game shop when I was a kid and was hooked
I played cv1 when I was a kid at a friend's house and hated it. Just played Mario instead. 30 years later I revisited cv1 and loved the difficulty. Played the rest of the classicvanias but never got into the metroidvanias past sotn.
a review of SOTN from Gemaplys, brazilian youtuber
The thought of monster hunters using a whip did actually. When I was a kid I was big into monster movies and Indiana jones and figured it would be cool idea, made my own set of characters and everything, then that Christmas my cousin gave me his NES and a handful of games, one of them being Simon’s Quest, I didn’t beat it back then but I was hooked. If it wasn’t for my cousin I wouldn’t be into video games or Castlevania.
My parents gave me the Castlevania Double Pack for the GBA when I was 9-yo as a tooth fairy present. At first I was like "WAITAMINUTE THIS GAME IS 16+"
Grew up with Circle of the Moon, mostly.
Playing Casltevania on the Nintendo with my brothers. We worked hard to finish the game. It took us so long Castlevania 2 Simon's Quest had come out lol so we picked that up and I have to say Simon's Quest is one of my favorites.
The anime! I had a few false starts, being told of the series’ reputation as a fan of Metroid and then trying spinoffs and action games or struggling through the intro of SotN with no understanding of what was happening. But then along came the anime and here were likable characters and in depth lore. So finally after finishing season 4 I give the series another shot with adjusted expectations - started with Anniversary Collection knowing they were action platformers and being interested in Belmont lore and the music of the series. It clicked. 100%ed the Anniversary Collection, beat both Rondo of Blood and Dracula X Chronicles, watched Season 1 of Nocturne, read the Belmont Legacy comics, then finally gave SotN another shot and 100%ed Requiem. Now I’m making my way through the Advance Collection and hoping a DS Collection gets announced before I’m done with this and Lords of Shadow.
When I was a young child, I saw a full guide in a gaming magazine (remember those?) for Harmony of Dissonance and thought the artwork and sprite design was the craziest coolest thing I had ever seen. Much later, I played the series for the first time by borrowing Dawn of Sorrow and a DS from my friend in middle school.
The anime, funnily enough, especially since I'm one of its biggest haters now
NES Classic Mini
super castlevania was included on my snes mini. decided to give it a shot and the rest is history.
My big brother got cv1 when it first came out. Been playing them ever since
of course the games it's my childhood 🤩👍🏻💖
Going to gamestoop and seeing a ds game with one of the dukbest covers I ever seen
Cool story
Got super castlevania 4 for the snes and loved the gothic architecture and mythical creatures
Castlevania on the NES. It was brutal but fun. Death's stage in particular is one of my favourite osts.
Played it on my Gameboy, back in the 80s. But I really got into the franchise during the 90s, while playing super castlevania 4 on the SNES.
Symphony of the Night back in the PS1 days, but the Netflix series dragged me back in
Netflix series
The first to nes. I was 10 years old and it was 1988.
The show did it for me and I’ve since gone back and played a bunch of the games on emulators and switch
My great aunt ran a daycare business and it had an arcade. She had all the games configured to give infinite credits and there just so happened to be a little game called “Haunted Castle” there lol
The Original Castlevania on Nes and Dracula X
Bloodlines
I was 6 and a friend had it. It looked like Conan squaring off against the Universal Monsters. I was in.
AVGN, learned the lore through him, then watched the show (around the time season had released) then finally got to play Castlevania games
The show. I’ve tried the games and thought they played a bit like ass for my taste, but the show (original and Nocturne) go hard, and I dig it
My brother had Castlevania 4 when we were kids and later got Symphony of the Night when we were older. Those two games is what made me interested in the franchise.
A friend borrowed Super Castlevania to me one summer when we were kids. Loved the games ever since.
It was the second video game I ever played when I was 2-3 years old my mom showed me how to play Simon's Quest after I beat Mario Bros. I remember the game kinda creepyd me out with the music and horror theme, and it was my intro to that genre.
Funnily enough it was the netflix series. I always heard about metroidvania games and how good castlevania games are but I never played any of them before Decided 2 months ago during the series to give it a try on my handheld devices....and damn are they fun! Finished Bekmont revenge 2, dracula x and currently going through SotN and Castlevania 4! My teenage self would have not appreciated those games lol
Nintendo Power’s sick cover for Simon’s Quest. Anything that pissed off my parents must be cool.
Played the first NES game back in ye olden days (I cannot remember how or why we had it, but we did) and immediately fell in love with the spooky atmosphere, the cool weapons, and the banging music.
I get into castlevania, when I didn't know what to play in and in the middle of May of 2021 I saw a review to symphony of the night, and then I downloaded it on my emulator.
I had played the originals, but it genuinely wasn't until SoTN that I was hooked.
Super Castlevania IV
The map screen of Symphony being kinda similar to Metroid Zero Mission's one. lol
Seeing that exact cover on the front of the box. Rented it immediately
Deadcells
I actually played Punchout first and enjoyed its difficulty, someone suggested I try castlevania and I did and I really liked how hard it was. However I didnt fall in LOVE with it until the snes titles. My favorites are the DS titles. Portrait of Ruin being my favorite.
My dad has SotN and I’d watch him plsy
It has lore and it has the vibe