Castlevania is a gothic horror video game franchise created by Hitoshi Akamatsu and published by Konami. Its heroes, most famously the Belmont clan, fight their way through Dracula’s castle with whips, sub-weapons and holy relics, and the series is known for its gloomy atmosphere, its monsters drawn from horror cinema and European folklore, and music that refuses to leave your head.

The series began in the 1980s, and in the 1990s it reinvented itself by opening the castle to exploration, letting players wander the corridors and uncover its secrets at their own pace. That style, sometimes called Metroidvania, became a lasting influence on independent developers. From wall chicken to crumbling staircases, few series have built so much out of one haunted house.