The Game Boy Color has received a ton of excellent homebrew games over the years, and Dracula: Dark Reign looks to be another to add to that growing pile.
Developed by Spacebot Interactive and published by incube8 Games (the duo behind the Game Boy Color RPG Dragonyhm), the title is an upcoming 'classicvania' that will let you relive Jonathan Harker's dramatic escape from Count Dracula's castle before moving the action forward to the time of World War 1.
It will dive deep into Bram Stoker's iconic novel and the author's notes, and promises to be an interesting new action-adventure for the Game Boy handheld. If nothing else, it will give Castlevania fans something to get excited about, as Konami seems to have forgotten about its vampire-killing franchise.
What's more, it is also an officially licensed product of the StokerVerse project, the brainchild of horror writer Chris McCauley and Bram's great-grand-nephew Dacre Stoker. That means that it will be the first-ever video game explicitly authorized by the Stoker family.
A store page for the game is currently up on incube8 Games (with a price of $59.99), but the title is not expected to be finished and released until 2024.
A demo link is also listed on the website. We've had a quick go on this, and we have to say, it's amazingly polished already and really nails that Castlevania vibe. Harker controls brilliantly, and there's some fantastic environmental animation on the swinging chains and doors.