F4F Castlevania Simon Belmont

[gomur]

Belmont looks awesome!

I'd love an Alucard as well.

[DeadGhostKnight]

Alucard has to be coming. SOTN is forever.

[Valkyrie]

I honestly thought Alucard would be up next due to this poll they ran on FB a few months ago.

http://strawpoll.me/4707210/r

Simon came in a distant second. I'm perfectly fine that they opted for Simon since he's the first protagonist in the series.

[ZenLogikos]

Originally Posted by BLADES OF STEAL

We need Dracula next and then "Armored" Simon from "Simon's Quest" aka "Belmont's Revenge".

You want another Dracula, followed by another Simon?

I'm all for multiple incarnations of these characters, and F4F is a good company to be doing just that, but I'd rather some others next.

I'd take multiple Deaths, but I've mentioned before that I'd love Castlevania IV Death most of all. Translucent blue cloak. Pulsing red LED.

[Gyro Zeppeli]

Dracula would be a fair next statue since the one from LoS is irrelevant and I'm surprised they even consider Simon to be part of the same line as that statue.

Alucard is most likely the next one though. I wonder how they will handle his outfit. That's the sort of piece one would expect to be mixed media and going by F4F history, I would imagine his cape would be fabric and the rest of the outfit would be sculpted.

The order I'm hoping for is Alucard -> Shanoa -> Dracula -> Richter -> Death

I think it would be foolish to do Death this early. Part of why it took so long for Ganondorf to sell out, in my opinion, was that there was no Link companion piece already out. It is best if they establish a lot of characters, especially Dracula, to give people incentive to pickup Death to complete the line.

[ReplicantSavior]

Anyone know what else the sculptor worked on? This Simon statue is amazing work. He's definitely someone I'll follow in the future. I've been listening to Castlevania music ever since they put Simon up for pre-order. I cannot wait.

Originally Posted by EnShinNoi

I don't think Castlevania is ever going to be a game I'll immortalise with a statue. It was always about the pixel art, music and adventure. A statue can never capture that.

This statue isn't bad, it just doesn't mean much to me. There's a tonne load of statues that don't mean anything to me that are a hell of a lot better than this. I love the various dark-fantasy creatures that fill Castlevania and their many origins of inspiration, which is why I'm better off focusing on Court of the Dead.

But this captures Simon from the original NES Castlevania cover and the Super Castlevania 4 artwork. It's perfect for old school Castlevania fans. The cover art was the selling point back then. HappyConsoleGamer has an episode where he talks about this aspect. I remember seeing the cover and thinking the game would be awesome. And it was. This is the perfect representation of Simon to me.

Originally Posted by qz33

Yeah this would have more widespread popularity right now.

I'd be totally down for a an entire line of accurately rendered figures inspired by Ayami Kojima's art.

Statue collectors would go nuts.

I prefer the original Simon art to the new version even though I like the art style. But I would be interested in a statue line with Ayami Kojima's artwork starting off with Shanoa. Has First4Figures made anything in that style? Seems more suited to a Japanese company. I would get a statue of Richter too. But he's drawn in an anime style. I don't think they've done that either.

Originally Posted by AlizAbef

He did use the short chain in the first Castlevania, so the short chain used on the statue is legit. Don't you guys remember? The whip could be twice upgraded. Belmont starts with his regular leather Vampire Killer. Then it could be upgraded to boost it's attack damage (making it into a short chain Vampire Killer). Then it could be upgraded one last time to lengthen it.

Yep I think some here are younger or getting too old...

I guess they went with the short version to contrast because we are getting the long version of the whip.

Originally Posted by Valkyrie

Don't mean to derail the thread from the statue, but has anyone here been following the upcoming game by former Castlevania series producer, Koji Igarashi? It's called "Bloodstained:Ritual of the Night" and it's going to be a spiritual successor to the Castlevania series. He also recruited some of the series' veterans to work on the game. It was one of the highest funded games in Kickstarter history.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloods...l_of_the_Night

Considering Konami is a shadow of its former self, it may be a long time before we see another true Castlevania game so I'm looking forward to this.

I'm looking forward to Bloodstained. I'm hoping that it's Iga's masterpiece. The castle artwork is beautiful.

Konami is pretty much finished. I won't even mention the next Castlevania "game" they teased. It doesn't deserve mentioning.

Originally Posted by Gyro Zeppeli

I never trust those spiritual successor sob story kickstarter games. If it turns out great, I'll pick it up. Otherwise, I can do without it. Igarashi acts like he is the sole reason why Castlevania is legendary, but in reality he was only a part of the SOTN and the games after it, and was of course part of much bigger teams filled with great people.

Castlevania is my favorite franchise and my favorite thing about it is that it had an incredible run from NES all the way to Nintendo DS with something like a 90% amazing game track record. No other franchise lasted that long with that many games and had them all be great like that. A lot of people constantly beg Konami for new Castlevania games, but the franchise has so many I don't see the point.

I do like the art style for Bloodstained and the character design though.

Are there many spiritual successor Kickstarters though? I can only remember a few. And with Bloodstained, Iga did look around for publishers. It's not like he went straight to Kickstarter. There is a good developer play video with him on youtube where he talks about how the Symphony of the Night designers added stuff on their own. I found that interesting. Also what parts he worked on.

Originally Posted by ZenLogikos

Yup, I participated in funding. Just $60 tier, as it was my first and probably last venture into kickstarter. It doesn't seem to be a flaky prospect like kickstarter can be, but still, I didn't want to chance getting screwed out of a lot of money.

I haven't had a bad Kickstarter experience yet. It seems to be the new thing for people & news sites to attempt to question Kickstarters. I don't know why. Yes Kickstarter is like an interest free investment with little if no protection. But the ones I've donated to have all been fine. Maybe I've just missed the bad ones. Mighty Number 9 seems to have upset a lot of people. Honestly I didn't understand why the guy that was almost at the top of Capcom would need to have a Kickstarter. Or at least I can't remember his reasoning in the Kickstarter video.

Originally Posted by BLADES OF STEAL

Surprised the ex isn't sold out yet. 299 is a pretty low edition size.

And it's a real exclusive like exclusives should be. Not like the Sideshow and other recent exclusives. Who doesn't love the cross weapon and want the occasional chain whip switch out?

[ZenLogikos]

Originally Posted by Gyro Zeppeli

Dracula would be a fair next statue since the one from LoS is irrelevant and I'm surprised they even consider Simon to be part of the same line as that statue.

Alucard is most likely the next one though. I wonder how they will handle his outfit. That's the sort of piece one would expect to be mixed media and going by F4F history, I would imagine his cape would be fabric and the rest of the outfit would be sculpted.

The order I'm hoping for is Alucard -> Shanoa -> Dracula -> Richter -> Death

I think it would be foolish to do Death this early. Part of why it took so long for Ganondorf to sell out, in my opinion, was that there was no Link companion piece already out. It is best if they establish a lot of characters, especially Dracula, to give people incentive to pickup Death to complete the line.

This seems to imply that Death is unwanted/not that desirable. Is that true? I dunno. He's certainly one of my favorites. I probably just want Draculas, Deaths, and the Belmonts.

Which depiction of Dracula do you want?

[Gyro Zeppeli]

I'm not saying he is unwanted. I am just saying that people would want him more if they had other pieces alongside him. I would imagine Death is going to be less popular than the protagonists or Dracula.

As for which version of Dracula, it is a hard call. Most will say Symphony of the Night Dracula and that one is cool. The Dracula x Chronicles one looks awesome, but my personal favorite is the Order of Ecclesia Dracula. I think that one is a nice combination of the two and captures the best elements of both (the intimidating look of the Rondo one + the classy attire from Symphony of the Night).

One problem with Dracula and Death however is that F4F has yet to actually do much mixed media and I can't imagine either character's outfit would look nearly as good if done fully sculpted. Then again, Death's design from IV would probably lend itself to being sculpted. Symphony of the Night Dracula especially would seem like a waste of mixed media potential and I guess that's fine since Simon is fully sculpted.

It's weird as I have Sideshow's Dracula and I think a lot of the charm of that piece is the fabric attire. If F4F made a mixed media Dracula, I could pose the two together and have them facing off against Simon and whoever else they release. Would be awesome.

EDIT: Then again I thought Ganondorf's Wind Waker design wouldn't translate well without fabrics and they made it work just fine. I've heard many people say mixed media is inferior and just a gimmick, and I think I'm starting to agree with that so maybe F4F should just go for it and make the whole line fully sculpted.

I'm down for pretty much anyone though. The hardest sell for me would probably be Soma, but if they sculpt it based on Kojima's art then it would be an easy buy for me. Kojima is one of my all time favorite artists.

[Swordsman]

statue of these 2 characters please.

[ZenLogikos]

Originally Posted by Gyro Zeppeli

I'm not saying he is unwanted. I am just saying that people would want him more if they had other pieces alongside him. I would imagine Death is going to be less popular than the protagonists or Dracula.

As for which version of Dracula, it is a hard call. Most will say Symphony of the Night Dracula and that one is cool. The Dracula x Chronicles one looks awesome, but my personal favorite is the Order of Ecclesia Dracula. I think that one is a nice combination of the two and captures the best elements of both (the intimidating look of the Rondo one + the classy attire from Symphony of the Night).

One problem with Dracula and Death however is that F4F has yet to actually do much mixed media and I can't imagine either character's outfit would look nearly as good if done fully sculpted. Then again, Death's design from IV would probably lend itself to being sculpted. Symphony of the Night Dracula especially would seem like a waste of mixed media potential and I guess that's fine since Simon is fully sculpted.

It's weird as I have Sideshow's Dracula and I think a lot of the charm of that piece is the fabric attire. If F4F made a mixed media Dracula, I could pose the two together and have them facing off against Simon and whoever else they release. Would be awesome.

EDIT: Then again I thought Ganondorf's Wind Waker design wouldn't translate well without fabrics and they made it work just fine. I've heard many people say mixed media is inferior and just a gimmick, and I think I'm starting to agree with that so maybe F4F should just go for it and make the whole line fully sculpted.

I'm down for pretty much anyone though. The hardest sell for me would probably be Soma, but if they sculpt it based on Kojima's art then it would be an easy buy for me. Kojima is one of my all time favorite artists.

Dracula X, Order of Ecclesia - excellent choices for Drac. Less nostalgia for them, but they are arguably superior designs. My only problem is I haven't spent nearly as much time with them as I have with the earlier games.

But, I just received my Dracula Ex today, and while I was reconsidering the purchase due to not loving LoS2, I think I'm in to collect all the Dracs and Deaths they produce.