Castlevania games in order: Story and release orders explained

radiotimes.com:

With the first game coming out in 1986, the almost four-decade-old Castlevania series has oodles of games.

And we’ve got them in order of story and release, as well as the multiple timelines explained to make sense of the convoluted titles.

There’s been renewed interest in the series owing to the animated Netflix Castlevania series, as well as Castlevania: Nocturne and its upcoming season 2.

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Despite the popularity of these series, we haven’t had much in the way of new games other than Grimoire of Souls, which is exclusive to Apple Arcade.

Fortunately, there is a veritable wealth of Castlevania games to dive into. Read on for all things Belmont, vampires and confusing millenia-spanning story arcs!

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Below are all of the Castlevania games and their spin-offs (excluding slot, medal and pachinko games) by release order, if you would like to play them in the same way that they came out.

We also have every platform they were released for, but the first listed is the initial platform it came out on.

As with many longstanding series with many entries, there are multiple timelines in Castlevania: the main, alternate and Lords of Shadow.

The latter two are not considered to be canon, making Dawn of Sorrow or Grimoire of Souls the last canonical point of the Castlevania main timeline – depending on who you ask.

Below all are the titles that are considered the «mainline» entries in the series in their chronological order. Some of the remakes aren’t considered to be completely canon but the plots are largely the same.

Coming out back in 2003, Lament of Innocence – the first PS2 Castlevania title – explores the origins of the feud between the vampire-hunting Belmont clan and the Dracula family, as well as how Dracula came to be.

Set during the First Crusade in 1094 AD, Leon Belmont races home from the Holy Land upon discovering his fiancée has been kidnapped by Lord Walter Bernhard – a powerful vampire.

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