Somewhere, there’s an alternate universe where we were blessed with many more video game-based cartoons. Some promotional material for a number of video game adaptations have surfaced on the internet, giving us a moment to think of what could have been. Shuttered animation company DiC Entertainment, known for such classics like The Super Mario Bros. Super Show and The Legend of Zelda animated series, had proposed series based off of iconic video games Metroid, Double Dragon, and Castlevania, as well as California Games, for some reason. These projects never made it past the conceptual stage, but it’s a fascinating look at the world of video game adaptations.
Holy shit. Someone just put up promo art for The Super Mario Bros Power Hour on eBay! These were concepts for other video game based cartoons to run along side Super Mario Bros 3. None of these ever got past the concept phase. pic.twitter.com/eIFft21T3u
— Tanooki Joe™️ (@TanookiKuribo) May 7, 2019
It’s not entirely unexpected, but it’s almost comical at how wildly different these concepts were from their source material. The most notable is that Samus (if it’s even actually Samus) in the cartoon is a male. However, the Castlevania series shows what appears to be a completely different tone from the game, which isn’t unsurprising. Based on the image alone, it doesn’t appear to share anything in common with the Castlevania games, save for the appearance of some choice monsters. There doesn’t even appear to be a single Belmont in place (unless the two in the image are supposed to be Belmonts of some kind). Castlevania did have a presence in the timeless Captain N: The Game Master, so we did get a taste of what a full series likely would have comprised of. At least the Double Dragon one looked relatively faithful.
While these are a fascinating look at what could of been, it’s probably for the best that none of these were made, considering the quality of the aforementioned shows. We did end up getting a Castlevania animated series, though thankfully the one we’ve gotten is much more faithful. In fact, we recently got the announcement that season three is a go at Netflix.
We also have more Castlevania coming to our consoles soon, as Konami has unveiled the Castlevania Anniversary Collection, featuring a group of titles from the early days of Castlevania. It joins the Castlevania Requiem collection that released in 2018.
What do you think? Are you glad we never got these adaptations? Let us know!
