Lords of Shadow 2 has been promoted in trailers as the end of the “Lords of Shadow” story arc, but today it was revealed that it’ll also mark the end of developer Mercury Stream’s time with the series. In an interview with Destructoid, producer David Cox revealed that Mercury Stream would be moving on to different projects following Lords of Shadow 2’s completion.
“I’ve always thought that this was a torch being passed down,” Cox said. “Nobody on the team ever felt like we owned Castlevania. We always felt it was our responsibility now but it wouldn’t be ours forever. Let’s do what we’re going to do, tell our story, and move on.”
“”So we’ve told Japan headquarters that this is the last one for us… there’s nothing worse than when somebody’s got something to say, and when they’ve said it, they just keep talking. We’ve got a beginning and end, and it’s a cool ending and a cool story. Once we’ve done that, it’s time to say to somebody else, ‘now it’s your turn.’ Maybe it will be a young producer in the company looking for his first break. I think you’ve got to bring in fresh blood.”
I played Lords of Shadow 2 at E3 and really enjoyed it — as far as playable games went, I think it was one of the best games on the E3 show floor.
I loved the original Lords of Shadow and I’m hyped for the sequel (despite the disappointing 3DS “interquel,”) so I’m sad to hear that LoS2 might be the end of the series, but its refreshing to see a developer commit to telling a single story instead of dragging things out with an endless number of sequels. Of course, no video game franchise ever truly ends if its still profitable, so the Castlevania series will definitely continue in one form or another; it’s currently unknown if Konami plans to continue the Lords of Shadow continuity without Mercury Stream at the helm, but perhaps they’ll return to the original timeline from the classic games (what’s IGA been up to the last few years, anyway?,) or maybe they’ll even end up rebooting the series once again.
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 will be released for the PS3, Xbox 360, and PC sometime this holiday season.
