Watched seasons 1 and 2 more or less straight through with a friend cause it was new to both of us. It was either this or Dragonball Super. In any case, it's definitely some quality animation and so forth, but I wasn't super into it as a Castlevania series veteran.
Tone was all over the place, too much current year "church is evil" and "men don't understand the plight of women" stuff. Godbrand seemed to exist for no other purpose than to be dominated by that one female general who was way smarter and better at everything than all the men, and complained about this in every scene she was in.
Anyway I hope S3 and S4 have better character interactions. Also I hope they're moving forward in the timeline and covering CV1(4), 2, Rondo, and SOTN with the rest of this show. That would be pretty incredible.
S1 they set up to have /true good/ Church people, such as the monk etc. making holy water and what not helping the village - also in that ending segment I swear they were hinting at Grant showing up (completing CV3's cast) but they didn't.
Then it was a hard shift to just, CHURCH = BAD and they used an undead bad priest, that died because he was NOT truely good, but then could just turn the entire darn river into holy water?
I always get S1 and 2 mixed together and forget its 4 seasons not 3.
They are going into Rondo and most likely SOTN - CV1 and 2 would have past chronologically between CV3 (and CoD) -S1,2,3,4 of the Anime, although it does not contain the events of CoD, it contains the characters and some thematic elements- it kinda is just doing CoD w/o rezzing Drac as the baddie.
S5 teaser shows Richter so its Rondo most likely- skipping over CV1 and CV2 and HoD- and they most likely will blend it together w/ SOTN as they did with CoD and CV3.
If you follow the story of SOTN, Drac really should be "done" with his battle against humanity after Alucard finally gets it through his thick skull that Lisa (Drac's wife) would not want him to do such things - but that would have to ret-con in the anime that Alucard was witness to her death as he was in SOTN lore.
Further backing that line of thought up- was that there is no cannon CV game chronologically after SOTN until AoS/DoS and its preceding 1999 "events" and no "natural" Dracula resurrection (the every 100 years is considered a natural rez by his own power/will and his continued fight against humanity) while there are in-between ones where he is resurrected by a minion/follower/cousin etc. CV1 was a natural rez for example, CV2 "You" rez him etc.
So the Dracula being done w/ stamping out humans out of spite should end in SOTN, but in the Anime, they imply - so I wonder what is going to trigger him doing off again and starting the events of Rondo... if I remember, Rondo he is resurrected (twice?) by Shaft, not a 100 year cycle rez.
Lord of Shadows Series, IS FUCKING AMAZING. Not part of the main series lore, but works. just sucks you have to play all the DLC, and across platforms to make sense of the story
Lords of Shadows 1, is like 3 games, and masterfully put together, until you step into the DLC. The way they tell the story and the world around you fits everything - Patrick Stewart for the VO is amazing, but after the witches house events, the game turns, and it makes sense, the events that have been "being told" have caught up to the narrator. After that the game thematically turns with the story and you are pushed through to the climax ending, not as masterfully done as the first part of the game, but still well enough for keeping it together with such a shift.
Then you are teased with an epilogue and a mess of a DLC that should have been A) an entire game segment of a sequel like the 1st half of the first game - or B) told in a narrative completely. Because the DLC is meant to explain a yuge plot point and done quickly and ham handled it really botched their reputation they gained from the main part of the game, as remeber this was essentially a new dev studio.
Mirror of Fate was a great "classic CV game" in the LOS "timeline" or universe that set up a franchise sequel machine like the OG CVs...
then they came out with 2... I never played it, read a few reviews and story bits and called it.