Castlevania Advance Collection News

Konami's Japanese classic finally gets its fan translation

When you're not making jokes about pachinko machines, Konami is best known as the company behind the likes of Contra, Silent Hill, Metal Gear, and Castlevania. But among the company's classic old games is one of the most influential ever made - a game so popular that an entire genre followed in its wake, and a game that's never been playable in English before.

That game is called Tokimeki Memorial, and while it wasn't technically the first dating sim, basically every entry in the genre that followed took its cues from this 1994 PC Engine game. You play as a high school boy aiming to earn the affections of a female classmate, managing your time over the course of a few school years as you build your relationship. It's an entirely earnest take on young romance, too, with essentially no sexual content to be found.

And now it's playable in English thanks to a fan translation romhack from the folks at Translated.Games, under the translated title Heartthrob Memorial: Under the Tree of Legends. The volume of text in the game and the technical constraints of its best versions have prevented a fan translation from arriving for a long time. This translation patch applies to the Super Famicom version of the game, which is a bit more limited than the earlier releases on PC Engine and PlayStation.

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Konami says Castlevania won't work on Steam Deck, is wrong

Super Metroid and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night are the one-two punch that made the Metroidvania such beloved game form in the first place, but you could argue that both series were just as good on the GBA - especially on the 'vania side. Since there's a great portable Castlevania collection on Steam, you might think that it would be a perfect fit for Steam Deck.

But as Konami says in a Steam message for the Castlevania Advance Collection: "Before purchasing this software, please be advised that it cannot be played on Steam Deck as it does not support SteamOS." (The same message appears on the Steam page for the Castlevania Anniversary Collection, too.)

The thing is, it seems Konami is absolutely wrong on that point. As demonstrated by the folks at GamingOnLinux, the Castlevania collection boots just fine on Steam Deck thanks to Steam's built-in Proton compatibility features. The games play just fine, too, and save states appear to function without issue.

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This software cannot be played on Steam Deck

Before purchasing this software, please be advised that it cannot be played on Steam Deck as it does not support SteamOS.

Castlevania Advance Collection out now on consoles and PC

Konami has released the Castlevania Advance Collection for consoles and PC.

First outed by the Australian classification board and pretty much confirmed by Korea’s ratings board, the collection is made up of three classic Gameboy Advance titles and one SNES title.

These games areCircle of the Moon, Harmony of Dissonance, Aria of Sorrow, and Dracula X, respectively.

Dracula's back from the dead again and so are four Castlevania games from the aughts. Three different vampire stomping adventures originally hailing from the Game Boy Advance—and one SNES—have made their way into a new collection on PC via Steam. Two Belmonts, a Graves, and a Cruz all get their time to shine against those undead baddies in Castlevania: Circle Of The Moon, Harmony Of Dissonance, Aria Of Sorrow, and Dracula X. Konami launched the Castlevania Advance Collection yesterday, complete with some modern conveniences for us PC players in the year 2021.