The Castlevania Dead by Daylight Crossover is for Curse of Darkness Fans Like Me

When the Castlevania and Dead by Daylight crossover was announced, I wasn’t all that excited. And I’m a pretty big Castlevania fan. I mean, I dressed in the stylings of a Castlevania character for an entire year, and even the middling Castlevania: Lords of Shadow series has grown on me after being starved of content for so long. Some of you are probably reading this thinking, “Kazuma! The Netflix series exists!” and I know that, and I don’t like it.

So when Behaviour Interactive announced that it would be collaborating with Konami to bring Castlevania into the fold, I immediately assumed it would be versions of the characters that appeared in the popular Neftlix adaptation. Color me surprised when it was not. In fact, the version of Trevor and Dracula that appear in the crossover are actually two of my favorite designs. One could argue that Dracula has more or less looked the same across generations, with the version he appears as clearly being more akin to Symphony of the Night. But Trevor, oh Trevor Belmont, he’s ripped right out of Castlevania: Curse of Darkness, and I love that.

While I might have lost some of you at Lords of Shadow, Curse of Darkness is actually my favorite Castlevania game. I love it for a lot of reasons; for Hector and Isaac, and the weird Digimon-esque Devilforging system. I just think it’s a lot of fun, and I love the character designs and the sort of theatricality of it all. It’s Castlevania through and through, even if you’re not immediately playing a Belmont.

Castlevania: Curse of Darkness was a maligned entry in the series. Almost all Castlevania fans just wanted that classic 2D platforming experience, and while Konami was desperately trying to make 3D stick for the series, it just wasn’t taking. But it had all of the flavors, all of the visuals, and was a deeply satisfying game. At least to me. I’m just one of those weirdos that actually likes a lot of the less loved entries in the series, but I’ve always loved Curse of Darkness. This is probably why I don’t care for the Netflix series, even if it has arguably done a lot more for Castlevania than Curse of Darkness has.

That’s why I was totally surprised it was Curse of Darkness Trevor that made it into Dead by Daylight. Not that I’m complaining. I’m absolutely going to slap down the dollars to purchase this Chapter, even if I don’t play Dead by Daylight all that much anymore. (I’m extremely casual, and have only popped in for the Silent Hill and Resident Evil Chapters.)

So I just wanna thank whoever at Behaviour Interactive and Konami came to the decision to incorporate one of the less-liked Castlevania entries into Dead by Daylight. Because Dead by Daylight is a behemoth of a game and seeing one of my favorites designs from the Castlevania games over something that’s just generally popular, is awesome.

Dead by Daylight is available for PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, and Xbox Series X. The Castlevania crossover Chapter will come to Dead by Daylight on August 27, 2024.