The just-released DS-era Castlevania collection offers more than you may have realised: developer M2 saw fit to not only throw in an emulated version of the extremely slipshod, barely-a-CV arcade game Haunted Castle but also a brand-new remake, titled Haunted Castle Revisited, that's very similar in tone and feel to their WiiWare game Castlevania Rebirth from back in the day. (fifteen years ago now, jesus)
The word "remake" is being used very loosely, of course: just as Rebirth was only nominally based on the first Game Boy game, Revisited borrows some of the basic motifs from the arcade game and uses them as a veneer for a very traditional and conventional console-style classic CV game. As always, I lament seeing games with jagged edges being treated as aberrations that need to be replaced by games that are only broadly similar, and that nobody seems to want to step up to the challenge of fully realising, or at least fully internalising, the true nature of older games in lieu of just glancing in their direction occasionally, but I'm not going to front like Haunted Castle's a game worthy of rehabilitation, either, and they are at least including the original alongside the remake, which doesn't happen nearly as often as it should.
I'm mostly bringing this up because the homie chibi-tech handled the arranges for the remake! they've been working for M2 for damn near two decades now and I really don't think they're being utilised to their full potential, so I'm always happy to see them given the spotlight. How about letting 'em write some originals next time, eh?
