One of the biggest Kickstarter successes fulfills its last promise after 9 years – at least partially

Almost a decade after funding, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night finally gets the promised multiplayer – but in a different way than initially thought

With Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night former Castlevania developer Koji Igarashi has created an absolute Kickstarter superhit. Nine years after the funding campaign and five years after its release, the Metroidvania is now entering its final phase.

The last open promise made as part of the funding campaign is now finally to be fulfilled. A release date is also already known – and it’s only a few days away.

Multiplayer at last – but not as expected

When the Kickstarter campaign for the Metroidvania Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night was launched in 2015, nobody would have expected that the target amount of 500,000 US dollars would be pulverized and collected more than eleven times in the end

However, the enormous sum of over 5.5 million US dollars also ensured that almost 20 interim targets were reached. These are linked to certain promises and thus entail a certain responsibility. Since its release, almost all of them have gradually been implemented or at least realized in a modified form. Only the PS Vita port has been completely discontinued

Now the last promise is to be kept. The interim goal of 3.25 million US dollars was an asynchronous multiplayer, similar to Dark Souls. There, for example, players can leave messages that other players can find and read. The developers have not revealed exactly how this was to be implemented in Bloodstained.

Coop and PvP: In the meantime, however, the original plans have been thrown overboard. Bloodstained will still have multiplayer and thus the core of the interim goal, but in the form of two completely different modes:

• Chaos Mode: You run alone or in co-op through randomly generated rooms and fight everything that gets in your way.
• Versus Mode: You defeat monsters and unlock souls. You can use these to buy upgrades for your abilities or to put obstacles in the way of your opponent. But watch out, they can return the favor in the same way.

When will the new modes be released?  The new game modes will come with the free update 1.5, which will be released on all platforms on May 9, 2024 – with one exception. Switch users will have to wait a little longer and will not be able to play together with their friends until May 16th.