1) I like both the old and new so I while I don’t think that the LOS is bad, I also think that the metroidvania and classic styles were awesome. I do admit that the metroidvanias on DS were getting a little bit stale, but that could had been fixed with a controlled re-design a.k.a making it better, but without losing its depth and exploration factor. Also the promo/advertising for any metroidvania that came after Dawn of Sorrow was shoddy at best. It wasn’t as much a decision based on sales than a decision made on a creative stand point. They wanted to change it, period. It is sort of like Square Enix has admitted that they sometimes change things even if they are doing well, just because they feel like it (from the top down).

In my humble opinion the best design for a Castlevania game right now would be a mix of LOS and CV64. Why you ask? Because A beautiful gothic world with the exploration elements of the so hated N64 CV game, spliced with a good in-game camera and tight and stylish battle systems would be a match made in heaven. Of course they would never do that because a modern version of the design of old is expensive.

2) Sprites (and low poli 3d models) and compressed sounds will always be cheaper than modern 3d models and orchestrated soundtracks. That alone sets a gap between generations in terms of costs, not including the size of the teams (past and present) among other things. About Silent Hill well…The modern efforts with the franchise were good, but it little by little lost a chunk of what made the game famous, by trying to cater to west a little bit too much. Let’s just call this one (SH) a casualty of the whole “we need to be like the west” fiasco of last gen. It could had been revived with the Silent Hills one, but they decided to let it go.

On MGS I believe that both gameplay and story have to be there. Kojima did a lot of cool stuff, but I guess not even he can save a game from the “we know it all syndrome” which is when the story of a franchise becomes so well known that the game loses the ability to surprise us anymore (same thing happened with Resident Evil). On MGS we came up to a point where we could not be surprised anymore like we did with the vintage and PS1-PS2 games.

3) From a logical point of view is makes sense, yes I know, but sadly it doesn’t work like that from a gamer’s perspective. No matter how we try to look at it, it is the same game. At some point even newcomers realize it and stay away because they are too busy playing the new stuff.

4) The market is now a lot more demanding. It is bigger so obviously companies set higher milestones in terms of sales. We cannot treat the whole industry of gaming past and present as if they were the same thing. The scope of the past was a lot smaller.

5) I understand your point of view, but in terms of RE I would mix the styles of 4 and the old ones (1,2,3, Code veronica). I could make another long paragraph about how survival horror should stop trying to be an arcade game, but that’s a topic for another day.

1) “that popular opinion”…Konami clearly gave no shits about the core fanbase and popular opinion. As they decided that continuing IGA’s games was not profitable (which after Bloodstained, which I’m a backer off, I feel is correct for them to do). Which it wasn’t according to IGA’s own words in the Kickstarter kick off on Kinda Funny Games. And also as Mercerysteam clearly wanted to do 2 main titles and then were clearly done (which Lords of Shadow 2 ends in a very “THE END” way) I’m not sure if it’s relevance has gotten times to be noticed as you can find that Lords does have it’s fan base.

2) While they had different production bugets it’s clear what did garner enough interest to continue (Lords) and what didn’t (OoE, which was the 2nd to last nail in IGA’s coffin as that was the worse selling IGA title though again it was on the mega popular DS). Again I’d point to the fact that Silent Hill still kept going and infact found more success after team silent was disbanded then when they were together near the end. MGS was always never fully just Kojima’s vision as it was always Konami’s money and producers overseeing it with Kojima . Kojima has a big head and imo not a lot of his story twist and messages land as more than preaching and ‘bet you didn’t expect this'(though I did like from the second I found out Zero made that patriots I knew Sigint was Donald Anderson) , I more like the gameplay of MGS and am glad Kojima’s craziness won’t be too big a part of 6’s story if they continue after Survive.

3) Actually it’s rather smart, especially as the market has changed significantly since the original games (which ZOE didn’t sell originally which is why they tried to change up things in 2nd runner narrative and gameplay wise a bit.) and it isnt’ investing the cost and development of fullly making a new game just for it to flop . Also to point out something funny, ZOE’s HD collection nearly sold as much as the original release of ZOE 1 (ZOE 1 750k, ZOE collection 620k) and more than ZOE 2 on release (410k) …. And as Kojima made it clear “If you want ZOE3 you should buy this” and those people who love ZOE as well as the ones who want the Rising Revengence demo still were less than even the 700k mark it’s clear that a brand new Fox engine or whatever engine they used before for ZOE3 would cost wouldn’t cover that. Just because you don’t like the idea doesn’t mean it’s stupid.

4) So if it’s bigger than how come more silent Hill games not by team slient have come out than under team silent? How come ZOE2 was the end of ZOE for nearly 10 years ? Same with Iga’s games ending? I’m doing the numbers in my head and that doesn’t add up if the market has changed that much in terms of production budgets and what is vs what isn’t a success.

5.) And that’s exactly why it got a bullet to it’s skull after Order and Judgement, cult classics don’t make money and both of those games SUCKED ON SALES. Castlevania to me lost it’s flair with IGA took over, I felt like it was too easy and each time I died it was simply because I didn’t grind enough, not because I failed to commit to an action fast enough, because after 10 minutes of grinding I could go back with the exact same plan of attack and come out on top. So to me Lords was putting that 3 point shooter back on the line instead of having him sit out and he brought new tricks from a guy who was inspired by him . As I like the idea of a guy with a whip like weapon who doesn’t have level ups or get infintiy sword +1 equipment and by the end of the game it’s still possible for a first level grunt to kill you if you’re not careful regarding your attacks and timing. I want the Igavania style to go else where, which is the reason why I backed Bloodstained because it means it won’t have me waiting for another Dracula’s curse/Rondo or Lords style of Castlevania if Konami announces something.

Capcom experimented with RE in many forms in the past year and a half…don’t you realize? It was always their idea to branch out with RE:Rev 2 being classic stuff in an episodic form, quirky stuff like Umbrella Corps being the more RE6 and with 7 it’s clear they went and said “hey lets look at what is popular now in horror and bring that into RE.” especially after the warm reception to the original Kitchen demo which has become the basis of RE7. Unforutnately ,that means first person view but with slow tank controls again and I know I won’t be picking up 7 mainly because I have no interest at all in the story and gameplay based on the demos including the last demo which does have notable gun and melee play. I’d rather have something close to 6 in terms of gameplay freedom of movement and monster variety and 4 in terms of story. Square lost me on BD as it chooses to censor it’s own games and I don’t like the lead characters or the indivual classes being storyline progression based, unlike FF4 where you’d get several classes at once. I prefer FF dimensions over BD . Konami doesn’t care…Konami is making more money now that they’re NOT focused on game dev then they did when they focused on game dev.

1) The lifespan and survival of a game is not entirely reflected in sales. It also takes into account how much time a game remains relevant for it continue as a franchise and while I liked LOS, its relevance faded quickly. Been the first game the one who had better performance. This means that popular opinion is a strong factor even if it comes from the core fanbase of the game.

2) Comparing sales of games that had different production values is not exactly accurate. The old CV games had lesser production values compared to LOS so their numbers are just right and justified a lot of sequels coming out (even an online CV game for gods sake). Silent Hill died off when the original team was disbanded and the overall style of the game changed and MGS took a lot of damage of the company not wanting to fully invest into Kojima’s vision. Castlevania was going the same way with Konami giving crappy budgets to IGA (CV Judgement) or just keeping him on the sidelines to the point of cancelling an almost completed project of his without giving it a chance.

3) Testing a game’s fanbase with HD versions of it is stupid. They expect a game to have big sales even when it is just a slightly prettier version of an old game (not to mention the brand new bugs they sometimes carry). Then if it doesn’t sell like hotcakes they cry failure and can the franchise without even taking into account how successful it would had been if they had let it continue, rather than test the waters with a game everybody played or at least saw before (like Konami did with Zone of the Enders).

4) The number of units that have to be sold in order for a game to be successful has been growing ever since the industry started. So yeah it is quite obvious that numbers now will be bigger because we now have a lot of factors that are not related to how good the games are. Besides, gaming is a bigger thing now compared to the days of the old games. Your numbers just reflect that the market has gotten bigger, but the scope in terms of success is a different story.

5) Some game franchises like CV are what we call “cult classics” meaning that because of that cult following, the strength of the franchise lies on its core, the fans. They can try to expand it, but if they attempt to disassemble the core it all falls apart. That my friend, is not “cowtowing the fan base”, it’s called been smart. If you are a Basketball team manager and you have a player who is good throwing from the 3pt line, you can train him to expand his abilities and score even more. You don’t put him at another position just because you feel “he needs to change”.

Konami used to be my favorite gaming company ever since the NES days. Heck even on modern times I used to say that they were the only Jap company that was doing the right thing while others like Capcom or Square were messing up. Sadly, now it is the complete opposite.

Capcom decided to be Capcom again when they saw that Resident Evil was slowly going down (although they still aren’t at 100% shape), Square did the same thing when Bravely Default taught them that the Square Enix of old was still appreciated. Maybe one day Konami will be taught their lesson too.

And I disagree because I don’t think the “good games” were profitable which I’ll use castelvania as an example of:
Funny you say Lords underpreformed because by itself it preformed better than any other IGA title and castlevania title beside the one your icon came from (with most IGA games not selling half a million copies, though they were on the DS which was the hottest selling system of last gen with over 153 million units sold in it’s life time, more than the Wii and PS4 as of today combined). Also IGA screwed up because he didn’t tackle 1999 though he established 1999 as the final battle of Dracula, all the players there but never pushed the button instead only doing all those games between Dawn of Sorrow and his depature from Konami. And as someone who is a huge Dracula’s Curse fan I like Lords better than any Iga game, mainly because it felt closer to that game than Iga’s.

Except they were low sales before the bad decisions let’s go with another famous franchise: Silent Hill 1 according to NPD data sold 1.6 million units, 2 sold 1.56 million acoss both Xbox and PS2, 3 sold 710k units, 4:The Room sold 690k units t. THOSE WERE THE GOOD GAMES, but they were selling LESS and LESS every time. Hell even with the HD collection it sold 190k million units. Shattered Memories, ended up selling 1.06 million, Origins sold 590k… and ready for a big suprise: Downpour sold 780k while Homecoming sold 830k…. putting them in the top 5 selling of the franchise.

Even Metal gear solid since MGS2 hasn’t preformed better than MGS1 (though they all preform super well). but yeah lets blame Konami’s creative choices as why sales sucked.

And I respect Konami more than ever mainly because they’re actually not cowtowing to the fan base. They’re doing what they wish and are attempting things outside that.

Its not the pachinko itself what’s wrong with Konami. It’s the fact that Pachinko became pretty much everything in the company vs all the good games they used to make. BTW Lords of Shadow under performed (even though it was not a bad game) because Castlevania fans never asked for a reboot, we wanted to keep on with the old saga, moving on to the so called demon castle war of 1999 and not to start over again.

Gaming in Konami waned not because of low sales. Low sales came by because of bad decisions so their bad decisions and changes for the sake of change are the things that killed gaming in the company. Can they bounce from it? Yes, but they need to be the Konami of old, nobody is going to once again respect them in the shape they are now.

The company itself is alright, and very profitable (their last year was huge in terms of profits). everyone tripping over Pachinko of Castlevania and metal gear didn’t pay attention to to the fact they’ve been making pachinko off their ips for a decade now with the first pachislot game for castlevania coming out back when iga was still making games. Thyere just not making the games the hard core fans want, which is understandable as the past few Castlevania games before lords of shadow made less than 500 thousand units.

More than the president, the stock holders are the ones who screwed up the company with their ridiculous moves and demands.

Actually not really as this guy was out of a job between march and november…meaning Konami probably dropped him .

This guy was president of both Konami America and Europe during the last 10 years before last year…HE WAS PROBABLY THE REASON FOR SEVERAL OF THESE MOVES including castlevania

well it was the presiddent fault to go mobile, so why make him president?

you know what came to my mind when i saw that excalamtion…https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNJ1B_2b17s…i know u did that on purpose….ll

LOL

LMAO

Its an interesting turn of events. Wonder what else will come up in the months leading up to Death Stranding being released.