| Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night | |
|---|---|
 Cover art by Mana Ikeda | |
| Developer(s) |
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| Publisher(s) | 505 Games NetEase |
| Director(s) | Shutaro Iida |
| Producer(s) | Koji Igarashi |
| Designer(s) | Shutaro Iida |
| Programmer(s) | Shingo Tate |
| Artist(s) |
|
| Writer(s) | Koji Igarashi |
| Composer(s) |
|
| Engine | Unreal Engine 4 |
| Platform(s) | |
| Release |
|
| Genre(s) | Action role-playing, Metroidvania |
| Mode(s) | Single-player, multiplayer |
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is a 2019 action role-playing game developed by Japanese indie studio ArtPlay and published by 505 Games. The game's development was led by former Castlevania series producer Koji Igarashi and is considered a spiritual successor to the series. The game was released for PlayStation 4, Windows, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch, in June 2019, for Amazon Luna in October 2020, for Android and iOS in December 2020, and for Stadia in July 2021.
Igarashi conceived the game after his departure from Konami in 2014, prompted by numerous fan requests to continue making games in the style of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. He used the crowdfunding platform Kickstarter to demonstrate the demand for the game to potential sources of funding for it in 2015. The campaign successfully raised more than $5.5 million from backers, eleven times its original goal, making it one of the most successful video game campaigns on the platform. Ritual of the Night received generally positive reviews upon release, with many describing it as a worthy successor to the Castlevania games that inspired it. Most of the stretch goals from the Kickstarter campaign were distributed as free content updates, with a few additional items as paid downloadable content.
Ritual of the Night was the second game to be released in the Bloodstained series; a retro-style companion game, Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon, was developed by Inti Creates as a stretch goal and released earlier in May 2018. It received a sequel, Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon 2, in July 2020. A sequel to Ritual of the Night was announced to be in early development in June 2021.
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