Beloved Castlevania Game Is Officially Doomed To Become Lost Media
Castlevania: Grimoire Of Souls Is Being Taken Offline For The Second And Final Time
Key art provided by Konami.Konami Asia has confirmed that Apple Arcade exclusive Castlevania: Grimoire of Souls is going to be taken offline for the second time in just under a month.
With Castlevania: Belmont’s Curse fast approaching its October release and bringing the franchise back after a very long rest, I’m betting that a lot of you are doing the same as me and going through the whole series. Thankfully, that’s pretty easy to do for most games, as Konami has made nearly all of them playable through remastered collections.
Those remasters sadly only go up to the DS games with the Dominus Collection, making the 3D Castlevania games a lot harder to come by. There’s also one other Castlevania game that bucks that trend and would be fairly easy to access, if it wasn’t for the fact that it’s about to have its services terminated for what is technically the second time.
A Surprisingly Great Mobile Castlevania Game Is About To Disappear For Good
Hopefully There Are Some Easy Emulation Fixes
The Castlevania game in question is Grimoire of Souls, which originally had a soft launch in 2019 before being taken offline a year later and then brought back properly as an Apple Arcade exclusive in 2021. The unique mobile take on Castlevania may be one of the series’ most obscure games, but it’s become quite popular over the years, especially with all the iconic characters it lets you play as.
That popularity was even referenced by Konami Asia in a Facebook post that sadly reveals that the game’s service is being terminated on September 3. Konami Asia noted that Grimoire of Souls has been “supported by many players” since it launched, which apparently isn’t enough to stop the game from being shut down.
Konami Asia’s post was brought to my attention by Redditor sprumpo on the Castlevania subreddit, who said the announcement was a shame since the short warning doesn’t leave them with enough time to finish the game before it goes away for good. I imagine a lot of people are going to feel that, especially if you’re like me and only now wanting to play it before it’s too late.
With Grimoire of Souls about to be taken offline, it means we’re losing a pretty interesting part of Castlevania’s history, one that was well-liked by a whole bunch of players. There do seem to be some emulation methods out there, but it’s not an easy task with a mobile game, so it might be better to hope for some kind of inclusion in a future collection instead.