What more can be said about Castlevania? For those who are not familiar, Castlevania is a side-scrolling platformer that was one of Konami's flagship titles. In the game, you play Simon Belmont, a whip-wielding nobleman who enter's Dracula's castle with no other mission but to destroy Dracula and break his curse. Along the way, you encounter every cliched horror monster conceived: bats, mummies, zombies, creatures from the Blue Lagoon, dead knights, Frankenstein, and Igor... Or, at least, a bunch of leaping hunchbacks. All the while, you whip candles and walls to get upgrades to your whip (which ultimately becomes a rather elastic ball-and-chain morning-star-like weapon), special weapons like holy water, cross-shaped boomerangs, axes, and daggers, as well as hearts for ammunition, pork chops for health, and treasures for extra points.
As with many NES games, each level of Castlevania is capped with an end boss, whom you must fight to proceed to the next level. After traversing the first level of the castle, you encounter a giant bat who swoops down at you repeatedly. It is defeated somewhat easily, but then an entire castle awaits with more levels and bosses. At the end of the game, you are challenged by Dracula, but he's not the last boss; after you behead Dracula, an immense leaping rock monster attacks you, knocking you around as your life meter decreases to a dangerously low point...
...and, then, you die. At least, that's what always happened to me because I was never able to beat Castlevania -- not as a teenager and not in recent history.
Castlevania is a game about which I used to be quite conflicted. On the one hand, all of the horror film and literature conventions are in the game: ghouls, monsters, Dracula, torches, skeletons (both animated and as piles of bones), holy water, crosses that clear away the undead, and the like. My Christian radar often blipped at every demonic image on the screen I encountered when I played recently. I thought about what kind of influence this game would have on my boys: would they develop an interest in horror films? Would they pursue knowledge of the occult? Would they pretend to be Simon Belmont or Dracula?! All of the stereotypically Christian concerns crossed my mind as I considered the implications of a horror-themed video game. On the other hand, you are Simon Belmont, who was sent to vanquish evil, armed with holy water and crosses. These are Catholic elements to be sure, but one cannot deny even a slight Christian influence on the protagonists of some horror movies and themes. After all, who is a more frightening adversary than Satan and his minions? In that sense, Castlevania is spiritual warfare played out on-screen: it's good versus evil presented in a blatant and obvious way. In addition, Castlevania is an excellent platformer with fine graphics, a memorable soundtrack, and gameplay that challenges you and gives you some freedom of movement. Except for some cheesy villains, Castlevania plays rather smoothly for an NES game and has replayability, even after you defeat Dracula and his winged beast.
Despite how well-crafted the game is, I sold Castlevania and Castlevania II as a bundle on eBay, along with their original retail boxes and instructions for the first Castlevania. Once again, a personal conviction led me to rid myself of something I didn't think would be a positive influence on my boys. As a teenager, I didn't live a life pursuing Christ, so I did what I wanted to do. At the time, Castlevania seemed harmless to me, but I looked at the game with renewed eyes and determined that it was games like Castlevania that did affect me as a younger person. If anything, like magic, I may have looked at horror themes and demons as entertaining and fun. Even though demons and supernatural monsters were villains, there was always an implied coolness to them; today, with the proliferation of zombie and vampire TV shows, that seems to be Hollywood's opinion. However, I see things differently: in most, if not all horror-influenced TV shows and movies, God rarely plays the role of vanquisher; instead, it is often through human ingenuity and perseverance that supernatural evil is defeated. In this way, what I find as a negative influence in horror-themed entertainment is not the imagery or storylines as much as the insidious idea that we don't need God to vanquish evil; we'll just do it fine on our own, thank you very much. "We don't need Jesus; we just need each other." It's a perspective that infects the mind, convincing us that we are better than we think we are.Thus, is playing or owning Castlevania a sin? I don't think so, but it's one of those things that plants a seed of doubt in one's mind. For an adult, it may not be so dangerous, but to plant such a seed in the mind of a child could be spiritually damaging. Not everyone else is the same when it comes to the effects of horror themes in entertainment, but when it comes to my boys, since I'm accountable to God for them I shouldn't risk exposing them to the idea that we can conquer Satan and his demons just fine on our own.
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