Castlevania Judgment

Castlevania: Judgment is the first Castlevania game on the Wii, and is also the first in the series to be a one-on-one versus fighting game. It will be released in November 2008 in the United States, January 2009 in Japan, and Q1 2009 in Europe.

Story
See also Judgment Timeline Although the story for Judgment is largely unkown at present, each character has been confirmed to have his or her own role in the story. Due to the presence of characters from different time periods, it is possible that the story will involve time travel of some kind, or this may simply be left unexplained. On the other hand, with the introduction of Aeon, an original time-controlling character, it is likely that the story revolves around time travel. The trailer shown at the TGS 2008 implies that Aeon might be traveling through time, taking various characters throughout Castlevania history, and making them fight each other for reasons that likely only exist to convenience the fact that this is a fighting game. Or possibly the game will simply go down Castlevania history like a chronology.

Gameplay
As of June 26th, it was unofficially announced that Castlevania Judgment has evolved into a 3D fighting game, complete with subweapons, hearts and generation bending characters.

Playable characters:
 * Simon Belmont
 * Alucard
 * Death
 * Dracula
 * Maria Renard
 * Eric Lecarde
 * Carmilla
 * Golem
 * Cornell
 * Grant DaNasty
 * Trevor Belmont
 * Sypha Belnades
 * Shanoa
 * Aeon

Simple enemies (not playable):
 * Zombie
 * Merman

The story mode will also feature unplayable bosses. The confirmed bosses (so far) are:
 * Minotaur
 * Iron Gladiator
 * Time Reaper (Final Boss)

The game features several modes: Connecting Order of Ecclesia to Judgement unlocks
 * Story Mode (personalized stories for each character)
 * Arcade
 * Survival
 * Versus
 * Wi-Fi
 * Castle (travel through Dracula's castle)
 * Viewing Mode (music and art)
 * Accessories (enables you to customize the appearance of your fighters with your retrieved items)
 * Hard Mode level cap raises to 225 in Order of Ecclesia
 * Queen of Hearts item in Order of Ecclesia
 * Aeon and Shanoa in Judgement
 * New accessories in Judgement

Development
Shortly after a patent for the game Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia for the Nintendo DS was found, a patent for another game called "Castlevania: Judgment" was found. In late 2007, Iga had indicated that the next game Konami was planning on releasing after their third Dual Screen game would be a next gen game. At that time Konami was leaning towards making the game an Xbox 360 exclusive game due to the success of that platform in the United States, which is where the majority of sales for Castlevania games come from. However, the July issue of Nintendo Power revealed that Castlevania: Judgment was a fighting game for the Wii, with character design by Takeshi Obata, famous for his work in Hikaru No Go and Death Note. About the decision to make a fighting game, Igarashi says, "I guess some fans may worry about the game quality, but I am confident that we can achieve a very high-quality game. I think that fans…will see that it stays true to the Castlevania series. Even though this is a fighting game I can guarantee that it will be fun.”

Criticism
The largest forms of criticism for Judgment so far stems from two things: the first, that it is a fighting game and is completely alien to the rest of the series; and the latter, that the artwork seems even more alien to the Castlevania series.

Although Koji Igarashi has so far done a meritable job of explaining why they would develop the game as a two-player fighting game, skeptics still persist that the formula will not work. However, it still stands to reason that playing a long adventure game on Wii using the motion controls would be very tiring; and therefore would probably be better enjoyed in smaller amounts anyway. Additionally, it can also be said that Castlevania Judgment is perhaps the most original Castlevania since Symphony of the Night for PlayStation; and a breath of fresh air what the series needs.

The artwork. Drawn by Takeshi Obata, artist for manga such as Hikaru no Go and Death Note, the overall artwork of Judgment has drawn much criticism from longtime fans of the series. Complaints such as that none of the characters look like how they did originally can't really be argued against. Another complaint about the character art is that they seem to resemble Death Note characters far more than they resemble the Castlevania characters they are supposed to represent. Another piece of criticism stems from the fact that the characters themselves no longer appear in attires that'd match the fashion of the times (Simon Belmont sporting purple tattoos on his groin is considered one of the worst offenders).