Castlevania Dominus Collection: How Konami remade DS and arcade games for Xbox

The Castlevania Dominus Collection has been released on Xbox Series X|S. This massive package brings together three classic Castlevania entries originally created for Nintendo DS – Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin and Castlevania Order of Ecclesia – as well as a redesigned version of the original arcade game Castlevania, haunted castlewith the title The haunted castle revisited. All of this is complemented by modern quality of life features, brand new graphics to look at, and more. It’s a true tribute to the series.

As part of this celebration, we spoke with Tsutomu Taniguchi, producer of Castlevania Dominus Collection. From the excitement of working on Castlevania again to adapting nearly two-decade-old gameplay mechanics for modern consoles, find out why the developers wanted to honor Castlevania’s legacy for beloved fans while also attracting new players to the series.

What feelings or memories come to mind when you replay these classic Castlevania games from the Dominus collection?

Since most of the original games in this collection ran on a 3-inch LCD screen, it’s surprising to see these games now on a TV or monitor and see all the attention to detail you may have missed before. The carefully crafted details in the backgrounds, the attention to detail in the character animations, and more.

All of the titles have incredible soundtracks, and when we heard the music, it immediately reminded us of the fun we had when we first played the titles on the DS.

As you say, several of these games were developed for Nintendo DS, which has a very different visual format than traditional gaming on TV. How did you adapt them?

The Nintendo DS has two 3-inch LCD screens with a 4:3 aspect ratio. The pixel count (resolution) is quite different from modern home screens. To match this with the current 16:9 Full HD display, we have prepared five different screen modes to choose from. We hope users will find the screen layout that works best for them.

We recommend the three-screen layout, with the enlarged game window as the main screen and a smaller status window and map window as sub-screens. This layout allows you to see three different screens at once, which was not possible in the original game. This allows you to comfortably keep both your map and character status screens open while playing, which we think will improve the overall gaming experience.

Of course, two-screen layouts are also available for those who want the same experience as the original version. We also have a screen mode specifically designed for optimal magnification (dot by dot) when the screen resolution differs from the original pixel resolution.

What do you find the most exciting and challenging part of bringing such a collection to life as a developer?

Firstly, we are honoured to be working on the series and just the fact that we were able to help create this collection is so exciting. Being able to re-offer players these titles that weren’t available on current consoles was also a huge motivating factor. It’s so satisfying to know that with the collection, players will be able to relive all the fun that Castlevania has to offer.

We read comments online saying, “I wish I could play the three DS titles on the current consoles!” This always made us happy and motivated us to bring these titles back as soon as possible! We were really grateful that players were still interested in the games.

We hope this collection helps any players who have fond memories of these titles to relive the time they enjoyed with Castlevania. And for those new to Castlevania, we hope this is the perfect opportunity to try these titles out.

Why do you think now is the perfect time to bring back these titles?

Around 2019, we heard people online saying, “I love action games that involve exploration! But I’ve never played a Castlevania game…” That gave us the idea to bring Castlevania back to current consoles so people could have a chance to discover it.

At the time, there were no ported versions of the “exploration-action” style Castlevania titles for current consoles, and all of the originals available on the market were priced at premium prices, making it difficult to get into even those people who wanted to play the games.

We have several of these exploration and action style Castlevania titles, so it was difficult for the team to decide in what order we wanted to adapt them to the current consoles. But in the end we decided to follow the order in which they were released, so we started with the 3 GBA titles in the Castlevania Pre-Collectionreleased in 2021. We were pleasantly surprised that it was received so well by even more players than we expected.

Since this was the thought process from the beginning, it was easy to follow through and reach a consensus within the team: “If we ever do anything next, it will be the three DS titles!”

What do you hope new players will learn about Castlevania through this collection? Are there any aspects of the games that you think will surprise them?

Firstly, we hope this collection will help returning players rediscover Castlevania and relive the moments they enjoyed in the past. Additionally, this collection includes features such as “Gallery Mode” where you can view concept and design documents, a newly added encyclopedia, and a music player mode that will give you a deeper look into the world of Castlevania. Have fun and check out this additional content!

And for players who have never played Castlevania, we hope this is your chance to get to know the series. Finally, we have added a bonus title, The haunted castle revisitedan adaptation of the arcade game, haunted castle. We hope you have fun!

For new players: Of the 4 titles in Castlevania Dominus CollectionIn what order should you play these games?

Even within the development team, we don’t agree on which of the three we’d recommend first, so we think players will likely enjoy them no matter what order they try them in.

But if we had to say, perhaps the order in which they were published would be the right choice.

In addition to the DS remasters, you also developed a completely remastered version of the original Castlevania arcade game. Why did you return to that game and how did you improve it?

The bonus title was determined together with M2 Co. Ltd. after reviewing all available options. [the collection’s co-development studio]. A little secret: It was so hard to choose between the titles that we had many, MANY discussions just to narrow down our best options. I had decided early on that the bonus title should be an action game where you have to complete levels, something different from the three NDS titles featured. We thought that the bonus title should either be a port of a game that isn’t compatible with the current consoles, or a small remake of a previous title.

Still, I somehow knew it was going to be a “port,” just like Castlevania Advance Collection. We ended up narrowing down the possible “port” and “remake” titles, but none of them felt “right.” That’s when the director of M2 suggested, “How about taking an arcade title that’s super difficult and remaking it so you can play it on console?” and that’s when we all had the “Aha!” moment. After that, deciding which title to include was a no-brainer.

I think we managed to create beautiful graphics while maintaining the original feel of the pixels, and I believe the game design is such that people can have fun with it.

I really hope that many people will play and enjoy this game! Originally, it was only planned to be a small remake, but when we realized it, it was a full-fledged remake. This is all thanks to the dedication and work of M2.