Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse

Akumajō Densetsu, released in North America as Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse, is a gothic side-scrolling platform game developed by Konami and released for Famicom on December 22,1989. It concludes the Famicom Castlevania trilogy and serves as a prequel set in 1476, centuries before the first Castlevania. The protagonist is Trevor Belmont, ancestor of Simon Belmont, summoned by the church to defeat Count Dracula. Abandoning the open-world RPG mechanics of Castlevania II, it returns to the classic tough platforming style of the original game and introduces branching stage paths and multiple endings. Trevor can recruit three allies along the journey, and only one companion may travel with him at a time. The playable partners are Grant DaNasty, a pirate able to cling on walls with agile movement; Sypha Belnades, a sorceress wielding powerful elemental spells; Alucard, Dracula’s dhampir son who can transform into a bat for flight. Each character has unique stats and special abilities. Classic sub-weapons including axe, holy water, stopwatch and cross return. The Japanese cartridge uses the VRC6 sound chip to deliver richer background music, while the NES US version removed the extra audio channels and rebalanced enemies for higher difficulty. Multiple endings are unlocked based on which ally accompanies Trevor in the final battle. Widely regarded as one of the best games on Famicom, it is also the source material for the first two seasons of the Castlevania Netflix animation.

These are the default keys. Click the gamepad icon 🎮 in the player’s bottom toolbar to rebind them. Gamepads are detected automatically. On phones you get on-screen buttons.

1P

2P

The NES was always two-player — 2P uses the numeric keypad, and NumLock does not matter. No numpad? Rebind 2P to other keys in the 🎮 panel.