Let me tell you about one of gaming’s most gloriously tangled webs of storytelling: the Castlevania timeline. If you’ve ever tried to make sense of when exactly each game takes place in relation to the others, you’ve probably ended up with a headache and a newfound appreciation for aspirin. What started as a straightforward tale of vampire hunters versus Dracula has evolved into something that would make even the most dedicated conspiracy theorist’s bulletin board look organized.

But here’s the thing – this beautiful mess of a timeline is actually part of what makes Castlevania so fascinating. It’s like archaeological layers of gaming history, each era adding its own interpretation of the eternal struggle between the Belmont clan and the forces of darkness. So grab your whip (or your reading glasses), and let’s dive into this wonderfully convoluted chronicle.

The Simple Beginning

When Castlevania debuted on the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1986, things were blissfully straightforward. You played as Simon Belmont, a vampire hunter with a legendary whip called the Vampire Killer, storming Dracula’s castle to defeat the Count and save the land from his evil influence. The year was 1691, and that was pretty much all you needed to know. Simon fought through six levels of gothic horror goodness, defeated Dracula, and called it a day.

The sequel, Simon’s Quest, picked up seven years later in 1698, with Simon dealing with a curse Dracula had placed on him. Still simple enough, right? We had a clear protagonist, a clear timeline, and a clear mission: whip monsters, collect hearts, save the day.

But then Konami did what Konami does best – they started getting creative with their storytelling.

The Timeline Expands

Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse, released in 1989, threw us our first curveball. Instead of continuing Simon’s story forward, it jumped backwards to 1476, introducing us to Trevor Belmont, Simon’s ancestor. This was our first hint that Castlevania was building something bigger than just a series of sequential adventures. The game established that the Belmont clan had been fighting Dracula for generations, with the Count resurrecting every hundred years or so to terrorize humanity anew.

This prequel approach opened up fascinating storytelling possibilities. We learned about the origins of Alucard, Dracula’s half-vampire son who sided with humanity against his father. We met Sypha Belnades, a powerful sorceress who would marry Trevor and help establish a lineage of magic users who would aid the Belmonts in future battles.

Throughout the early 1990s, Konami continued filling in different time periods. Castlevania: The Adventure (1989) and its sequel Belmont’s Revenge (1991) introduced Christopher Belmont in the late 1500s. Castlevania: Bloodlines (1994) jumped forward to 1917, showing us John Morris wielding the Vampire Killer during World War I. Super Castlevania IV (1991) retold Simon’s original adventure with enhanced graphics and gameplay.

By the mid-1990s, we had a nice, sprawling timeline that made sense if you didn’t look too closely at it. Different Belmonts and their allies fought Dracula across the centuries, each victory temporary but necessary. It was like a gothic version of Groundhog Day spread across generations.

Symphony of Complexity

Then came 1997, and with it, Symphony of the Night – not just my personal favorite entry in the series, but a game that would revolutionize both Castlevania‘s gameplay and its approach to storytelling. Set in 1797, it starred Alucard returning to investigate why his father’s castle had mysteriously reappeared when Dracula wasn’t due for resurrection for another hundred years.

Symphony of the Night didn’t just flip the script by making us play as Dracula’s son – it introduced deeper lore about the nature of Dracula’s resurrections, the magical forces at work in the castle, and the complex relationships between various factions fighting for and against the forces of darkness. The game’s massive success meant that its more elaborate storytelling style would influence nearly every Castlevania game that followed.

This is where things started getting interesting – and by interesting, I mean complicated.

The Igarashi Era and the Great Retcon

Enter Koji Igarashi, who had worked as assistant director on Symphony of the Night and would become the series’ primary shepherd for the next decade. Under his guidance, Castlevania games became increasingly interconnected, with recurring characters, bloodlines, and plot threads weaving through multiple entries. The Game Boy Advance trilogy – Circle of the Moon (2001), Harmony of Dissonance (2002), and Aria of Sorrow (2003) – each added new layers to the mythology.

But in 2002, Igarashi made a decision that would fracture the fanbase: he officially removed several games from the series canon. Castlevania Legends, which had introduced a female Belmont named Sonia as the clan’s founder, was out. The Nintendo 64 games – Castlevania 64 and Legacy of Darkness – were gone. Circle of the Moon, despite being well-received, was also excluded from the official timeline.

His reasoning varied. Legends apparently contradicted story elements he wanted to establish. The N64 games didn’t fit his vision. Circle of the Moon had been developed by a different team at Konami without his involvement, and he felt it should be considered a side story.

You can imagine how well this went over with fans who had invested time and emotion into these “non-canon” games. It was like being told that your favorite episodes of a TV show didn’t actually count – sure, you could still enjoy them, but they weren’t part of the “real” story anymore.

The irony is that Igarashi’s attempt to clean up the timeline arguably made things more confusing. Now fans had to keep track of which games “counted” and which didn’t. Some retailers and publishers seemed unaware of the retcon – the 20th Anniversary bundle for Portrait of Ruin included a timeline poster that featured the supposedly non-canon games. The official Japanese website excluded them, but Western marketing materials sometimes included them.

The Future Arrives

Just when we thought we had a handle on the timeline (canonical or otherwise), the series threw us another curveball with the Aria of Sorrow (2003) and its sequel Dawn of Sorrow (2005). These games jumped forward to 2035 and 2036 respectively, introducing Soma Cruz, a Japanese exchange student who discovers he has the power to absorb the souls of monsters he defeats.

The twist? Soma is the reincarnation of Dracula himself, struggling against his destiny to become the new Dark Lord. This added a whole new dimension to the series mythology – Dracula could actually be permanently defeated, but his death would create a power vacuum that someone else would need to fill. The eternal cycle of resurrection wasn’t just about Dracula; it was about the fundamental balance between light and darkness.

These games raised fascinating questions about the nature of good and evil in the Castlevania universe. If someone needs to be the Dark Lord, what happens to the Belmont clan’s purpose once Dracula is gone? The series was evolving from a simple good-versus-evil narrative into something more philosophically complex.

Lords of Shadow: The Reboot Reboot

If you thought things were complicated before, 2010’s Lords of Shadow entered the chat with a sledgehammer labeled “alternative continuity.” MercurySteam’s reboot, produced with input from Metal Gear‘s Hideo Kojima, threw out everything we knew and started fresh.

In this new timeline, Gabriel Belmont was a holy knight in 1047 who sought to resurrect his murdered wife. Through a series of tragic events (and I mean genuinely tragic – this game didn’t pull punches), Gabriel himself becomes Dracula. The Belmonts hunting Dracula across the centuries? They’re actually hunting their own ancestor.

This was a bold reimagining that split the fanbase even further. Some loved the darker, more cinematic take on the mythology. Others felt it betrayed everything that made Castlevania what it was. The game spawned two sequels – Mirror of Fate and Lords of Shadow 2 – that further developed this alternative timeline, showing how Gabriel’s descendants struggled with the knowledge that they were fighting their own founding father.

The Lords of Shadow timeline exists completely separate from the original series. It’s not a prequel, sequel, or midquel – it’s a complete reinterpretation. Imagine if someone decided to retell Star Wars but made Luke Skywalker become Darth Vader instead of being his son. That’s the level of reimagining we’re talking about here.

The Netflix Factor

And because we didn’t have enough timelines already, Netflix’s animated series (2017-2021) added its own interpretation to the mix. While the show initially adapted Castlevania III‘s story of Trevor, Sypha, and Alucard fighting Dracula in 1476, it quickly evolved into its own beast with original storylines and character developments that diverged from game canon.

The show was followed by Castlevania: Nocturne (2023), focusing on Richter Belmont during the French Revolution. These series exist in their own continuity, picking and choosing elements from the games while creating something new. They’re simultaneously faithful adaptations and complete reimaginings – Schrödinger’s canon, if you will.

Making Sense of the Madness

So where does this leave us? Depending on how you count, we have:

The “official” Igarashi timeline, running from Lament of Innocence (1094) through Dawn of Sorrow (2036), carefully curated to maintain internal consistency (mostly).

The “extended” timeline that includes the retconned games, which some fans still consider legitimate parts of the story regardless of official declarations.

The Lords of Shadow timeline, completely separate but officially part of the Castlevania brand, telling its own version of the Belmont/Dracula conflict.

The Netflix timeline, which adapts game stories but isn’t beholden to game canon.

And honestly? Maybe that’s not a bad thing.

The multiple timelines mean there’s a Castlevania for everyone. Purists can stick to the Igarashi-approved canon. Fans of darker, more mature storytelling have Lords of Shadow. Those who want to see the stories reimagined for a modern streaming audience have the Netflix series. And completionists who want to experience everything can dive into all of it, contradictions and all.

The Beauty of the Chaos

The Castlevania timeline situation reminds us that video game narratives are fundamentally different from other media. They’re collaborative experiences created by different teams across different decades, each bringing their own vision to a shared mythology. The inconsistencies and retcons aren’t bugs; they’re features that reflect the organic, sometimes messy evolution of a creative property.

When I fire up Symphony of the Night today, I’m not worried about whether Circle of the Moon “counts” or how the Netflix series interprets Alucard’s character. I’m just enjoying the experience of exploring that castle one more time, finding secret rooms and collecting an absurd number of swords I’ll never use. The game stands on its own merits, as does each entry in the series.

The timeline confusion has become part of Castlevania‘s charm. It’s a series that takes itself seriously enough to craft elaborate mythologies but not so seriously that it can’t throw everything out and start over when creative inspiration strikes. In an industry increasingly concerned with cinematic universes and rigid continuity, there’s something refreshing about a franchise that says, “You know what? Let’s just tell another version of this story and see what happens.”

Whether you’re a newcomer trying to figure out where to start or a veteran attempting to reconcile decades of conflicting lore, remember this: every Castlevania game is someone’s entry point, someone’s favorite, someone’s definitive version of the eternal struggle between the forces of light and darkness. The timeline might be a mess, but it’s our mess, and that’s what makes it beautiful.

So pick your timeline, grab your whip, and remember – no matter which version of history you’re playing through, the castle’s layout is still going to completely change when you flip it upside down. Some things, thankfully, remain constant across all realities.