It seems that despite the amount of resources and effort put into the essential reboot of Castlevania by Mercury Steam, fans are still clamoring for a return to what made the series a household name. The series’ success is mostly due in part to the efforts by one man, Koji Igarashi.

Igarashi-san was a producer on the series for a number of years, only to see the Castlevania series be handed off to Western developers Mercury Steam, who rebooted the franchise as an amalgamation of mechanics from other popular game series. Naturally, this got a lot of long-time fans of the “Iga-era” Castlevania games upset, so it’s nice to see that he’ll be talking about the series, and his part in it, at GDC this year.

The talk, dubbed “There and Back Again: Koji Igarashi’s Metroidvania Tale”, sounds quite intriguing:

From its beginnings with 8-bit classics like Metroid, through its rebirth in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and several games in the series since — right up to the current generation of hardware — “Metroidvania”-style games’ mix of action/adventure and exploration/backtracking has stood the test of the time. Join long-time Castlevania-producer Koji Igarashi for an exploration of his experiences and methodology in creating some of the most popular and influential games in the genre over the last 15 years.