In its latest round of fiscal results, 505 Games parent company Digital Bros appeared to reveal that a Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night sequel was in the works. But when reached for comment, the publisher was surprisingly aloof.
The original Digital Bros document included a bullet point in its Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night slide that mentioned a “second version” is in development. While that’s not rock-solid evidence of a sequel, the presentation used similar language when referring to the announced Ghostrunner sequel, distinguishing the confirmed sequel from the first Ghostrunner’s upcoming next-gen port.
Kotaku reached out to the publisher seeking confirmation on the potential Bloodstained sequel.
“505 Games doesn’t have any further information to share on Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night at this time,” a company rep told Kotaku via email.
Sometime after the original document was published, Digital Bros updated its investor page with a new results presentation that removed any mention of a “second version” from the Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night section. If this were simply an error, I would expect 505 Games to be up front about that to squash any speculation rather than remain mum about the whole situation.
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As longtime Castlevania producer Koji Igarashi’s first project after his 2014 departure from Konami, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night garnered a ton of attention leading up to its 2019 release. It raised over $5.5 million in crowdfunding, promising a return to the classic action-RPG style popularized by Igarashi in Castlevania games like 1997’s Symphony of the Night and 2003’s Aria of Sorrow. Despite some delays during development, the game largely delivered on that promise, and even spawned a 2D spin-off series in Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon and its sequel.
That’s all to say that a Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night follow-up isn’t entirely out of the question. While Igarashi’s name might not attract the same level of hype as it did in the past, he remains one of gaming’s most legendary creators. He’s also been very vocal about wanting Bloodstained to become a franchise rather than remain a one-off release, telling Game Informer in 2019 that the game was meant to be a “starting ground” for future projects.
In any case, it’s difficult to suss out what’s really going on here with any confidence. Video game companies are known to make mistakes, but this feels different than a simple error in copy editing. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.
(h/t Gematsu)