So about the sprites...

[SeraF]

Saw a youtuber I follow play this game today. They absolutely gushed over it. And I agree! The core game-loop looks fantastic, and it's got quite a great art style.

However, I'm a huge fan of the castlevania series. I'm also a pixel artist that learned a lot about pixel art when they first started out by studying the castlevania series.

I'm not trying to create drama or anything like that, I'm sure the dev or devs are cool people, and this is mechanically a cool game and I want to see it succeed.

However, many of the level up powers appear to just be recolored or mildly edited sprites of subweapons from the castlevania series. I suspect the other power ups are weapon and armor icons from the series, but I'm not quite such a megafan to be able to easily identify such a thing.

I initially thought that maybe the devs had taken a little too much inspiration from sub weapons in the series, because at least the main screen used an overhead style that looked good and original. After all, the Castlevania series has never had an overhead view, so it couldn't have been ripped from it.

I was eventually pointed to a fan game called CastlevaniaRL, an old fan project with monster sprites that look like this one's. The character sprites look like that game's as well.

I have the ask, as respectfully as possible, are these game sprites ripped from the Castlevania series of games, as well as CastlevaniaRL?

[Virgil Infernas]

The sprites used to be sold as an asset pack by Oryx Design Lab, so it's possible they're also present in other projects.

I don't know why they've stopped selling the asset pack, but a polite guess would be because it actually used to contain some item sprites that were an exact copy of the Castlevania ones. They were probably used as study material and left in there by accident.

Anyway because I've noticed those copies, all the item sprites have been reworked, but from what you're saying it looks like they need even more work

[SeraF]

I'd say if they're your own work now, then there's nothing to worry about. Konami doesn't own the concept of a pixel art bible or a pixel art bottle of blue water.

Thank you so much for the response, and I hope this didn't come across as accusatory

[Virgil Infernas]

No worries, was expecting someone else to notice :)

It's a hobbyist game with basically zero budget, so I've just used what I had, but would love to replace all the sprite work later down the road

[DIOciraptor]

I think the only sprite that I've seen that may be an issue is the boss of the exceptionally long library. You changed the name, but the design is very clearly Olrox, which might actually be a Konami-owned asset.

[Undare]

Yeah, I suggest to be ready to change the sprites if needed.
The Gameplay is already perfect, and the size of those sprites are not a big deal (I as a pixel artist can say that). So it should be easy to make original ones.

I have seen companies complaining of the use of "words" (Like Bethesda suing games with the name "Scrolls" in it.)
It won't be a surprise to see konami complaining about the high similitude with Castlevania sprites.

I am more concerned about new content btw, i am at 90%achievements in 4 hours. So i am happily waiting for more

[edison gauntlet appreciator]

Thank God someone else said something, I thought I was having a stroke. My thought process jumped from
"Is that Alucard's Head?" to "IS THAT JUST THE SOTN ARMOR SPRITE" to "WAIT THAT PLAYABLE SKELETON IS JUST ANOTHER SOTN ASSET". I feel so validated.

Looking more at this, there's also a FRIGHTENING amount of other sprites directly copied. The Heaven Sword uses SoTN's Crissaegrim almost verbatim, for example.

[Blattdorf]

The Castlevania-inspired art style is definitely a big draw here, so it's better to keep your bases covered just in case.

[kagypoo]

Was curious to see if this had been brought up by others yet. I love the game and have a blast playing it, but I'm also a huge fan of Castlevania and still play the crap out of the various 2D GBA and DS titles now and then, and SotN is an all time favorite game, so it was immediately apparent that practically every sprite used in this is taken from one of those games.

As others have said, I'd hate to see Konami cause the devs any problems over this, even if all they seem to care about these days is using their IPs to make pachinko games.

[R2-D2]

If the sprite artists for SOTN/earlier games are on residuals then it might be a big problem.

[OBB]

Like Konami give a flying ♥♥♥♥ about Castlevania lol

[Blattdorf]

Publicado originalmente por obb:

Like Konami give a flying ♥♥♥♥ about Castlevania lol

They sure as hell give a ♥♥♥♥ about milking everything dry.

[R2-D2]

If you ever watched The Simpsons you can get a taste of what all lawyers are like.

[Dead Joe]

stealing Konami's intellectual property is always morally correct

[TheSoupSpecial]

Yeah, there are many similarities, maybe some a little too close. However, this is a big factor for the popularity and it's obviously a lot of fun to play. I hope it's possible to add more content in the future since I would love to keep playing without it getting too stale, practically did all there is already. As others probably said this would be great with coop play or challenge modes.