We've made no secret of the fact that we really want to see Castlevania: Symphony of the Night come to Switch. It's arguably one of the greatest games ever made, and, alongside Super Metroid, is one of the true innovators of the 'Metroidvania' genre. Originally released in 1997 on the Sony PlayStation and later ported to the Sega Saturn, SotN has since found its way onto the PSP, PS4 and (annoyingly) smartphones, but a Switch version remains frustratingly out of reach.
Amazingly, it might be the case that a console released in 1988 gets its own version of SotN before Switch does – albeit a port that is drastically altered and not in any way officially sanctioned by Konami.
YouTuber Pigsy has taken it upon themselves to back-port the 32-bit epic to a 16-bit system, namely the Sega Mega Drive / Genesis. Pigsy has previously ported the Game Gear Shinobi title to the Mega Drive, and felt like taking on a sterner challenge.
As you can see from the video, impressive progress has been made, and while the Mega Drive is clearly no match to the PlayStation in technical terms, it's impressive how well the visuals hold up.
Those of you expecting the full SotN experience on Sega's 16-bitter should note that the intention is not to port the entire game to the console, but use it as a basis for a traditional, level-by-level experience more akin to the old-school Castlevania titles.
Pigsy intends to use a combination of assets from both the PlayStation and Saturn versions (the latter features Maria as a playable character and contains extra levels), and the game will showcase two modes: one with Alucard and one with Maria. They will, according to Pigsy, play very differently from one another with different routes through the castle, split into around eight levels each.
Given that Pigsy is a self-proclaimed newbie when it comes to this kind of thing, it's perhaps wise to expect this project to take a while, and it remains to be seen if Konami will take a dim view of such efforts and request the work to be stopped – something fellow industry veteran Nintendo has been rather fond of recently.
Whatever happens, it will be interesting to see how this classic title can be reimagined for humbler hardware – but man, what we'd give for a legit Switch version, seriously.
Comments 61
so is Sony holding up re-releases of SotN, or? it's maddening that a third-party game only been released twice outside a Playstation platform.
I mean if we're including unofficial methods then SotN is already playable on Switch
Konami, what more is there to say?
@CharlieGirl It was released on Xbox 360 too, in 2006 or so. Not to mention iOS and Android last year
Love those projects! I hope this in not shut down like many others!
@CharlieGirl No, it's just that Konami don't really care to port it, to other systems, which is strange 'cause almost all the Castlevania games are on Nintendo's systems, but we know the Konami of these days.
I'll double-dip on SotN if it eventually comes to Switch BEFORE I finish the PSP version which I expect to suffice otherwise. The game may be one Castlevania classic not on Nintendo hardware yet, but the franchise has been arguably dominant on the latter turf anyway, including pretty much the entire legacy of SotN successors and particularly the magnificent Sorrow dilogy. And with abundant portable options for SotN itself... hard to complain, really.
Hopefully we get an Igavania collection, Rondo of blood, Sotn, all 3 GBA games, the DS games need a bit of work to port proper due to their dual screen but none use it more than just a map screen.
@CharlieGirl Jim Ryan era Sony has tightened their grip on 3rd party exclusivity for stuff that was once known for PS exclusivity like how FFVII Remake (launched April 2020) can't come to any other platforms until December 2021 at the earliest.
@Grumblevolcano ugh, the Jim Ryan era is killing all the creative weird of Playstation's legacy, in addition to the IP strangleholds.
@khululy I think you need the touch screen to kill bosses in Dawn of Sorrow, but I don’t think anyone would be sad if they just skipped that, it’s easily the worst part of that game.
Something called ”Castlevania Advance Collection” has been rated in Australia and South Korea by their equivalents to PEGI/ESRB, so it seem like we are getting the GBA trilogy at least.
@CharlieGirl No Sony just have the rights for the latest PS4 port. They funded it and it uses the in house created PSP emulator (strange that they didn't release any other games on this emulator though). This version will obviously never be released elsewhere. Konami have to port the game them themselves it they want to release it elsewhere.
"Metroidvania" is such a dumb description for a genre and calling a Metroid game a "Metroidvania" is even dumber.
And no, I will not stop complaining about it! 😤
Oh, and I want Castlevania: SotN for Switch.
After reading this I just went ahead and bought it on the Google Play Store, I can play it with the Razer Kishi. Will definitely get it if it ever comes to Switch too, such a great game, I remember picking it up on the day of release back in '97.
@JoakimZ
I wonder when this will be announced.
@belmont Yeah so basically the version the PS4 has Sony paid for and Konami are just Konami and won't fund a port for Switch?
@Don Yeah, I wonder the same. I think it’s pretty strange that that haven’t announced it officially yet, since the cat has been out of the bag for months.
Maybe they are saving it for Tokyo Game Show?
I would love to see both Rondo and Symphony on Switch!
@MichaelP Never stop!! Same with roguelike.
It is a little baffling SotN has still not come to the Switch.
This is a dang shame. I would easily spend some money on that game for Nintendo Switch since I have never played it before. Maybe someday it will be released again.
@CharlieGirl i doubt Sony can hold anything related to the PS1 era, if it's not a first party title of course. I think it's all in Konami's hand at this point...
Having Symphony of the Night AND Super Metroid on one system is a very tantalizing prospect.
The one thing that tees me off is when people get history wrong. Symphony was on the Saturn first in Japan. Then ported to the PS1. The reason was fan outcry was Soo big that Konami did it. But they had to submit it to Sony 1st because Sony was very paranoid about the performance of a PS1 on side scrolling titles. So what Konami did in a feat of technical genius was instead of using sprites, the game used flat polygons with the sprite images overlaid on top. Once Sony saw the awesome job Konami did, they approved the game. That's why the Saturn version is the best.. Because of it's unique hardware it had no trouble juggling sprites and polygons simultaneously.
@Tanithgaunt If SOTN was originally made for the Saturn why are the graphics distorted??? Tees me off when ppl call out others for being wrong when they are wrong themselves. It was originay made for the PSX which has a lower horizontal resolution than the Saturn so when it was PORTED to the Saturn the graphics were stretched to the higher horizontal resolution causing some graphical inaccuracies (many ppl point to the stairs in the library). Nice try at your revisionist SOTN history....
@Tanithgaunt Checking the release dates on GameFAQs, the PS1 version was released in Japan (March 20, 1997) over a year before the Saturn version (June 25, 1998).
I know GameFAQs isn't the greatest source for release dates, but Japanese release dates are usually much better documented.
@Tanithgaunt
not sure where you got that info but it seems to be incorect. the game was made for psone and ported to the saturn and the saturn version had some noticable issues as a result such as the image being stretched leading to distorted sprites, longer load times, slowdown and issues regarding transparency.
the saturn did handle 2d really well but in this case the game wasnt built with the saturns capabilities in mind and IGA himself was apparently disappointed with the port.
I always like seeing another demake. I remember that one of the criticisms of SotN by the gaming press at the time (before they actually played it) was that it looked like a game from the previous generation. From these videos, it’s surprising how much could be done on the Genesis. Of course, the biggest loss in the transition would be the music; CD quality music simply wasn’t possible on the Genesis.
I'm pretty darn impressed by that Megadrive conversion!
@JoakimZ Yeah i'd be happy to atleast get the GBA collection on switch.
@CharlieGirl Seems more like it's just Konami's management is getting more and more disconnected from what gamers are asking for, and ignoring them.
Can't blame them--the older generation that grew up during the economic boom still think they know better than the current generation who actually play the games these guys sell.
They could make another Compilation with Rondo of Blood, Legends (GB), the Playstation Versions (Chronicles?) and maybe the Advande/DS Games.
Removed - inappropriate language
@WallyWest Yes. The PS4 port is basically the PSP version on an emulator and Sony funded and owns it. Konami must port the game themselves from the PS1 version or fund someone to do it.
@CharlieGirl The last time SotN got re-released on console was the Requiem bundle with Rondo of Blood, and Konami specifically cited that Sony collaborated with them on the port so yeah it might be
@Severian You're right and you should say it. It's a problem seen in all decades old publishing companies, even Nintendo.
@Daniel36
Sometimes, when I read about a rougelike game, I have to look up what it means. And every single time, I've forgotten about it the next day at the latest. 🤷♂️
@Tanithgaunt
Saturn version, best? Umm.... No.
@JoakimZ
TGS would be the best time to announce this since it will be right around October/ Halloween. Keeping my fingers crossed.
@CharlieGirl This is why it's sad when Iwata died...he was a gamer before he was a businessman or a programmer. Still a bit disconnected at times when he said "Customers do not want online games." Though it could also have been a mistranslation..
@Tanithgaunt that is completely untrue and it is common knowledge that the Saturn version came after. Even the developers also admit the Saturn version isn't as good and runs slower because it doesn't take advantage of the systems 2D capabilities. Looks like you are the one that has history wrong here.
@Zenszulu Ok here's why I said what I said and this has 0 to do with faqs and the internet. Back in the 90's when malls actually existed there was Lynhaven mall in VA Beach, there was a store in there with a Japanese Saturn with an 8 meg cart being used and lo and behold there was symphony in all it's glory.. They even had another Saturn next to it playing samurai showdown 3. Above the symphony unit was a sign that said coming to playstation and then next to the unit was a gaming mag that had an article all about it.. Talk about a brilliant display.. So that's why memory may be a bit different..
Really bites that this game will probably never make it to a Nintendo system. I once thought that about rondo then the VC happened which I really miss Btw.
Still got my original PS1 copy!
God d*mnmit! Where are all the frikin' SNES homebrew creators making stuff like this for SNES!
The SNES was a far more popular and beloved console than the Genesis--even the SNES Classic Edition outsold the Genesis Mini by more than 5 to 1--and it's actually more suited to recreating the look and feel of a game like Symphony of the Night too, having more colours and background layers and proper transparency, additional capability for more orchestrated music and proper voice samples, more buttons on the controller for easier mapping, and so on. And yet, SNES homebrew developers are doing very little of true worth with that console right now.
Enough! I'm going to make a frikin' SNES game!
It’s strange that the Switch is basically a tablet and does not have the mobile port of Symphony.
One of my most treasured backward compatible is SotN on my Xbox and PS-Vita. It's the original voice and dialogue. Ps4 has the Requiem version but I still play thru it once every couple years.
"What is man? But a miserable pile of secrets!"
Not that NL shies away from the topic, but under risk of a flame war, wonder if anyone with a hacked Switch has ever gotten it to play, emulated or otherwise?
I'd love to have it on switch. Id buy it again, lots of people would. And im sure Konami knows that. They love free money so im willing to bet Sony is holding this release up.
@impurekind there are very few SNES hombrew games outside of rom hacks. You say the SNES was more popular and beloved but that isn't true in Europe where homebrew games are far more common and the Megadrive was the preferred system for many. Also most of the newer games released on the system tend to be from Europe if not all of them so probably explains why.
The PSP game "Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles" contains both Rondo of Blood and Symphony of the Night. Having that, I don't need a Switch port.
@Zenszulu And the Genesis/Mega Drive is more familiar for people to program for with it's Motorola x68000 architecture.
@Zenszulu The SNES outsold the Genesis in every single major territory, North America, Japan and Europe, ergo, it was more popular all round. And the official figures back this up (not the ones edited and distorted in recent times to manipulate the figures so Genesis looks to have sold more units in certain territories than it actually did, which usually take into account stuff like the even the Sega CD and 32X sales along with crappy nigh-clone versions sold in Brazil like the Mega Drive 4 and the like--and only genuine fools or total fanboys would seriously count any of those things).
Not a big deal but you guys forgot to mention that it also found its way over to the Xbox 360 console and because of BC, can be played on Xbox One & Series X/S.
@impurekind Not true. The Megadrive outsold the SNES in Europe, South America and Australia, which is where all these projects are coming from.
In fact, if you remove Japan's sales, you'll quickly come to the conclusion that the SNES and Megadrive sold roughly the same worldwide.
Maybe it's time to accept that the Genesis is more popular than you think?
@st1ka Official figures say the SNES basically outsold the Genesis in every major territory: North America, Japan and Europe. See a bit further down the linked post:
https://inceptionalnews.wordpress.com/2021/08/21/the-16-bit-war/
Note: The part where the third sales figures link tries to list how many units the SNES sold in North America, and actually comes in with a lower number than Genesis, is not in line with official numbers from Nintendo that put the SNES at 23.35 million in North America by the time they discontinued it, so that's dodgy right out the gate. And Nintendo lists "other" as including Europe yet possibly not stuff like Brazil, which doesn't seem to be counted anywhere from what I can see if that third link it to be believed, with a figure at 8.58 million, which is higher than any official figures for Genesis in Europe, but a bit contentious. Most of the Genesis figures are a bit random and certainly not officially released Sega numbers, but even taking the highest number available it would still only put the Genesis at just over 9 million in Europe, so a really stretching-it win there.
Either way, the SNES outsold the Genesis by quite some margin overall, even if you literally take the highest possible available numbers for the Genesis, and you'd have to be a bit of biased Genesis fanboy to automatically do that imo.
And, let's not forget, the Genesis even had a two year head start on the SNES to build up a substantial initial worldwide lead, quite a bit over 4 million units before the SNES even started selling from what I can see, and still lost overall.
Also let's be blunt here, no one really cared about South America and Australia until nowadays, when it maybe suits the Genesis fanboys agenda just a little bit to suddenly make those territories a big deal.
It's only now, decades after the fact, that desperate Genesis fanboys have started to look for random figures to try and skew the information to fit their own agenda of not crying so hard that the SNES just obliterated the Genesis in total sales. They often count the likes of Genesis 2/3/4 and sometimes even Sega CD and 32X in the numbers to try and inflate how many units the "Genesis" sold, or the Nomad at a reeeal push, and other dodgy stuff like that--which is just absurd and reeks of desperation.
Basically, by the time both consoles stopped their official runs, as in they were no longer being manufactured and sold by Sega and Nintendo respectively, the SNES had outsold the Genesis in every major territory--and certainly overall, by a large margin--at least that I could find.
Oh, and just a little bit of trivia, with the recently release SNES Classic Edition and Genesis Mini, the SNES sold nearly five and half million units, and the Genesis apparently didn't even break a million, so that puts modern SNES appeal and indeed sales figures at more than five times that of the Genesis--just saying.
@impurekind you're going to have to give me a better source than an INCREDIBLY biased wordpress link.
@st1ka No, the Genesis has 6 official sound channels (the 4 other crappy legacy ones were only intended for Master System backwards compatibility). Stop spreading biased fanboy bull-crap by adding the legacy and utterly crappy Master System sound stuff in there, which almost no developer ever used because it is literally a bunch of crappy blips and bleeps and wasn't worth the effort. This is so typical of someone manipulating the specifics to serve their own ends, usually utterly biased Genesis fanboys in modern times who just can't accept getting their butts handed to them by the SNES back in the day.
If you think trying to manipulate the facts by saying "the Genesis has 10 sound channels"--and some accounts I've read even put it up to like 14 these days via whatever totally niche hacking methods--that this somehow indicates the Genesis is technically more capable than the SNES in the audio department, or even close to it, you're living in dream land:
https://youtu.be/OHmhcUGieOE
https://youtu.be/WSZ4UuWl-h8
https://youtu.be/uaSzPReU2_E?t=79
https://youtu.be/1LnnxaOh18U
https://youtu.be/ojf0b3wDTYo
https://youtu.be/UT4uMVdZ4nU
https://youtu.be/d7bmXBT22PI
https://youtu.be/_LKMQuARkDw
https://youtu.be/wi-NxM1EaXM
https://youtu.be/U3goV80bj_Y
https://youtu.be/nLVfEouzuIU
https://youtu.be/YWrAvF33jUU?t=15
https://youtu.be/x9uAiDxwbGI
https://youtu.be/iyx8xEGPg9A?t=23
https://youtu.be/FCKBZg84XwE?t=159
https://youtu.be/p_60V8UdYEY?t=13
https://youtu.be/1PKKPVj7loQ
And, just to really hammer the point home, not only does the SNES actually have more sound channels than Genesis based on the official documentation for each system (that doesn't try to cheat using really stretching-it hacks with outdated backwards compatibility Master System blips and bleeps to skew the data), 8 vs 6 (and, as I recall, only one of those can even use PCM at a push on Genesis), it was also capable of both proper stereo and even proper Dolby Surround Sound too. The Genesis certainly wasn't capable of proper/official surround sound and, in fact, couldn't even do stereo output via the TV on some models as I recall (at least not without some really convoluted cable setup that uses the headphone jack as one of the connection points and so on, which I guarantee you 99.9999% of people never even knew about at the time, let alone used). I can only imagine having to sit right next to the console with the headphones plugged in just to get stereo sound, which presumably some Genesis gamers actually did back then--what it must have been like at the time if you knew the SNES could even output Dolby Surround Sound too (and a bunch of real games actually used it back then too, great games)--LOL
The SNES sound capabilities crap on the Genesis--get over it.
Because of that one bull-crap point alone you just made, I honestly can't even be bothered responding to the rest of your gibberish points.
I think I've already crapped on your fragile fanboy delusions enough.
@impurekind
The Genesis has 10 sound channels, in fact here's a link from the videogame music preservation foundation: http://www.vgmpf.com/Wiki/index.php?title=Genesis#Music_and_Sound
" In total, the Sega Genesis contains 10 channels which was 2 more than the SNES's S-SMP"
Not only that, but the genesis runs games at a higher resolution and pushes more sprites.
It's okay, I get it, you've been watching too many early 00s youtubers spouting findings like "nintendo saved the gaming industry", "atari created a worldwide videogame crash" and "The Sega Genesis hardware is inferior to the SNES in everything except the CPU"
But I regret to inform you, all of those are myths. Nintendo did not save the industry, the game crash was only in north america and the genesis has quite a few advantages over the SNES in terms of hardware like resolution, sound channels, number of sprites and overall versatility.
@st1ka It has 6 official Genesis sound channels, and there's 4 legacy Master System sound channels intended for that purpose (playing Master System games via the plug-in Master System adapter).
Almost no one used the legacy Master System channels in Genesis games back in the day because they weren't intended to be used as such (and are ultimately just some very limited extra blips and bleeps), and people using them now are only doing so as part of some demo scene, which is cool, or to desperately try and win a war they lost a long time ago, which is sad.
Claiming "the Genesis has 10 sound channels" now is desperate, and has only become popular in more recent times because that's exactly what Genesis fanboys are--desperate.
Look, link me to one Genesis tune that sounds more like an actual piece of real music than this (rather than it sounding like something played on a '90s electric keyboard): https://youtu.be/OHmhcUGieOE or this https://youtu.be/1LnnxaOh18U or this https://youtu.be/YWrAvF33jUU?t=15
Did you even bother to listen to any of the tune links I posted above? The Genesis doesn't even come close to producing the sheer range and quality of music the SNES is capable of in the right hands (be it classic, dance/techno, horror, rock 'n' roll, actual singing, whatever). The Genesis is basically a '90s electric keyboard--whoop!
Also, the SNES can push up to 128 sprites on screen at once and the Genesis 80--and they can go up to 64x64 max size on SNES vs the Genesis 32x32 max size, with up to 32 sprites per scanline vs the Genesis 20 per scanline--SNES wins again.
Most typical Genesis games do indeed run at a higher resolution (Genesis 320x224 vs SNES 256x224)--a genuine win to Genesis there--but the SNES is technically capable of a higher max resolution (Genesis 320x448 vs SNES 512x448), and not via some cheat like the "10 channels of sound" but officially available in two of it's eight normally selectable background modes (not that many games actually used it).
Blah, blah, blah about the rest.
You lost the 16-bit console war--and you can't turn back time, no matter how hard you'd probably like to--get over it.
@impurekind oh wow I forgot about this arguement
Anyway, you DO realize that out of the entire SNES library only ONE game runs at 512x448, right?
Man, poor Super Nintendo just can't catch a break. Fewer sound channels, lower resolution. Is there ANYTHING the snes does right?
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