Castlevania: Symphony of the Night

It’s almost Halloween once again. Costume parties, trick-or-treating, and scary movies/games are all part of this festive season. Of course, the game series that I think embodies the spirit of Halloween the most would definitely be the Castlevania series. It’s got all the classic monsters: werewolves, skeletons, witches, mummies, Frankenstein’s monster, ghosts, and, of course, vampires. So the Operation Rainfall Retro Commercial Research Team (in other words, me) will be bringing you a bunch of old Castlevania commercials for your enjoyment in this week’s Retro Wrap-Up.

Here are the highlights of this past week.

Want to share your love for Bravely Default via artwork, short stories, or videos? Submit them to us and we’ll share it on the site.

Tales series producer Hideo Baba explains why not every Tales game is released internationally.

Tyler Lubben gives his impressions on the preview build of the upcoming Freedom Planet and reviews Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon for the N64 in this week’s Retro Review. In addition, we have two different impressions on Pokémon X and Pokémon Y—Crystal Baltimore comes to Pokémon X as a newcomer to the series, while Josh Speer comes to Pokémon Y as a veteran trainer.

Persona team director Katsura Hashino teases an upcoming announcement that is supposedly a real fan pleaser.

In addition, SEGA has released a new teaser site roughly translating to “Action X Simulation X Card Battle”. This likely won’t anger anyone at all!

We take a look at one of the biggest anime distributors in the business, Aniplex, in the latest Publisher Spotlight.

Toonami has officially changed the schedule for its line-up in order to accommodate FLCL.

Jeff Neuenschwander charts the history of Sonic’s 3D adventures in the newest installment of Jeff’s Musings.

Mugen Souls Z is officially coming to North America in 2014. Get excite!

EA has announced the official release date for Titanfall, as well as what will be in its collector’s edition.

We’ve updated our PS4 and Xbox One pre-order guide with some additional bundles.

NIS America has announced that Hyperdimension Neptunia PP will be coming to North America and Europe in 2014. Get excite!

Justin Graham examines Vampire Princess Miyu: The TV Series in this week’s Anime of the Past.

Nintendo of Europe has revealed the collector’s edition for the upcoming Bravely Default. Hopefully, North America will get a similarly epic collector’s edition… Right, NOA?

Finally, the Downpour Podcast team discusses all the Kingdom Hearts info that came from D23 and Jonathan’s progress in Pokémon X and Y since its launch in this week’s episode of the Downpour Podcast.

Kyle Emch
Kyle has been studying music at college for about three years now. He's played the piano since he was 6 years old and has been recently been learning how to write music. He has followed the Operation Rainfall movement on Facebook since it started and was happy to volunteer for the website. Just don't mention Earthbound or the Mother franchise around him.