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No, the world's most famous vampire wasn't judged unsuitable for families. Rather, it's a long-awaited hint of a localized Virtual Console release for Dracula X: Rondo of Blood. The legendary PC Engine Castlevania game came out in Japan in April 2008, but never made it to the Virtual Console elsewhere. Now, the Australian OFLC ratings board has classified the game, listing Nintendo as the publisher.

The impact of this development may be dulled somewhat by the game's availability in both original and remade form on the PSP Dracula X Chronicles disc, but we would enjoy the opportunity to play this game without first purchasing another system, and then unlocking the game somewhere in its remake.

[Via GoNintendo]

Depressed about the lack of availability (as of right now) of Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth in North America? Then you'll be crying Bloody Tears over this Japan-only CD collection, releasing March 24. The Akumajou Dracula Best Music Collections BOX contains nineteen discs of Castlevania music.

The collection includes soundtracks for Castlevania games ranging from NES, Game Boy, and MSX releases to more recent games on Game Boy Advance, PS2, and the arcade. Even the spin-off, Kid Dracula, is included on Disc 2! Disc 18 is an "arrange" album, with covers Castlevania tunes by Symphony of the Night composer Michiru Yamane, and disc 19 is a DVD featuring recording studio footage and interviews with Yamane.

It's very unlikely this collection will be officially made available outside of Japan, and if an importer does carry it, you'll have to whip a bunch of candles to scrounge up the coins: Konamistyle prices the collection at ¥21,000 ($232).

[Via Original Sound Version]

So here's a mixed blessing for PS3-playing twin-stick shooter fans: Assault Heroes is coming to PSN, as announced by Konami today. It's exciting, because Assault Heroes is pretty darn good, but it's also weird, as the direct port of the XBLA game is practically a retro release at this point. Heck, the sequel was on XBLA a year and a half ago!

We're not sure why Konami didn't decide to release a bundle of both titles or something, but at least you've got until 2010 to decide if you're going to meet them halfway on this.

Here it is! If you can't access the PlayStation Store on your PSP, you can download the English language demo of Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker right here. Make sure you have the latest firmware update on your PSP and at least 103MB of free space on your system. Connect your PSP via USB, extract the ZIP file and copy the NPUH90066 folder to your PSP's Memory Stick, under PSP/GAME.

No matter how often you play it, you won't be able to understand the Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker TGS demo unless you know Japanese. Thankfully, all that changes today with a brand new English language demo for your PSP. Based on our calculations, the English translation makes it about 15% more comprehensible than before. Excellent!

The demo will be available on the PlayStation Store and here on Joystiq (via BigDownload) later today. To ensure a problem-free experience, make sure you have the latest firmware update and have at least 103MB of free space on your PSP.

In a survey of (presumably) eBay prices for rare and collectible games, MTV Multiplayer's Jason Cipriani illustrates what re-releases of these games do to their resale value -- and, by association, to the people who hoard these game for profit. As it turns out, re-releasing rarities like Dracula X affects game collectors negatively in the same way it affects normal people positively -- by making the games more easily available, thus driving down the cost of copies in the original format. Won't someone please think of the jerks trying to make a profit from their rare games?

To use another Castlevania example, Castlevania Chronicles: Cipriani found a three-year high price of $70 for the 2001 PlayStation release in 2007. Two years later, after the game's release on PlayStation Network, physical copies dropped to a low price of $26.93. The people who just wanted to play the game could now get it for six bucks, leaving the PS1 discs for collectors only.

It's not as simple as a re-release dropping the value globally, however: the data shows some weirdly fluctuating prices, like Persona 2: Eternal Punishment on PlayStation, which seems to have gone up in price significantly following a reissue. Perhaps interest rose when buyers got the idea that it was even possible to buy an old Atlus game.

Much like the Joystiq staff when the DJ plays our jam, prices on Konami iPhone games have once more gotten low, this time to mark the release of utterly bizarre platformer Tomena Sanner. All Konami's games are value priced at 99 cents until January 4, 2010, when all the games will return to their usual prices. That included Tomena Sanner, which will run you $1.99. Konami spokesman Robert Santini warned us that future price drops aren't necessarily a sure thing: "This will not be something that will happen every time a new mobile title is announced," he said. "Konami just wanted to do it during the holiday season."

The list of bargain games (with iTunes links) includes: Dance Dance Revolution S+, Dance Dance Revolution S, Frogger, Metal Gear Solid Touch, Silent Hill: The Escape, Krazy Kart Racing, Power Pros Touch, Silent Scope, and Field Prowlers Police Rush!
Which, if any, will you be picking up?

Konami appears to be daring enough to localize Ninety-Nine Nights 2 -- which, we suppose, isn't too much of a surprise since it showed the courage to publish the sequel to the mediocre action title in the first place. While Konami hasn't said anything official, an OFLC rating has appeared for N32, outing at least a tentative plan to publish the game in Australia. Speculation: Konami's not going to localize the game just for Australia.

Whether the announcement is good news or not depends on your faith in Feelplus (for whom this is the first action game) to deliver a better Dynasty Warriors-type game than Phantagram did.

I'm a big fan of Silent Hill. I've played every game in the series and a few years ago you might even have caught me defending the Silent Hill movie. When I first heard that Climax was re-imagining the first game in the Silent Hill series, and putting it on the Wii, I was a bit nervous. When the company revealed the logo and announced that the rust laden, nightmarish Otherworld was being brushed aside for an ice world, I was downright scared. After gathering some more info and trying the game at E3, all fears were assuaged. This was to be the great hope of the Silent Hill series.

Having spent two evenings with the game and completing the story for the first time, I'm conflicted. Was it good? Yes. I'm just not sure it's Silent Hill.

While playing through Silent Hill: Shattered Memories for review, our very own Richard Mitchell stumbled upon a pretty neat thing: classic Konami coin-op arcade cabinets. Sadly, you can't play the cabinets in-game, but it's a nice Easter egg for fans, if we may say so. There's Contra, Rush'N Attack and -- our personal favorite -- Gradius. Check 'em out in the video above.

We're not sure what makes a franchise a good fit for unconventional adaptations, but Silent Hill certainly has it. First it was transformed into a haunted house, now a group of fans in Sweden has put together a stage play based on the second game in the series.

Though the play will be subtitled and put on to YouTube eventually, we don't have any details about the production just yet. We assume, however, it'll basically be like Miss Saigon if everyone in Miss Saigon had a pyramid for a head. Sure, the critics will say it's unorthodox, but they also said Babs was too young to play Dolly Levi and we all saw how that turned out.

[Via GoNintendo]

Though we still don't know much about Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker's cast of characters, Konami sent out a batch of glamour shots for a few of the assumed super spies you'll be cavorting with during your time with the game. Our personal favorite? Definitely Chico. It takes a special breed of man to pull off an Ascot that expertly.

Check out all the portraits, as well as a bunch of new screenshots, in the gallery below.

A Konami press release, laden with the heft of a UK release date for Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, landed in our laps this morning. We don't think it had enough force to do any serious damage to -- what? Oh, right. Potential FOXHOUNDs living in the United Kingdom can get their hands on the co-op portable stealth title on May 28, 2010; or, as they'd likely call it, 28 May, 2010.

For those of you keeping score, now the UK and Japan both have release dates for the game. Who does a guy have to hide behind in a box and then put in an unrelenting sleeper hold to get a North American launch date around here?

Konami has released a new trailer for Silent Hill: Shattered Memories and ... it kind of rocks. Literally. Rather than flooding the senses with creepy atmosphere, rusted metal and sexually confusing nurses, the trailer opts instead for a montage of the game's characters and some rock music, specifically "When You're Gone," a new theme composed by the series' longtime (and recently departed) maestro, Akira Yamaoka.

Sharp-eyed viewers will also notice that Cybil, the friendly police officer from the original Silent Hill, appears in two different variations in the trailer. The version of Cybil encountered will be different for each player, depending on the player's actions prior to meeting her in the game. Also featured in the video: Monsters. Lots of 'em.

Shattered Memories releases December 8.