Well, now here's an unexpected surprise.  Konami is apparently putting the finishing touches on a remake of the 1989 Game Boy title Castlevania: The Adventure (What?  Not The Castlevania Adventure?  Well, that finally settles that.) for Nintendo's WiiWare service.  The ESRB seems to have let this one slip, as it has a T-for-Teen rating listed for Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth following in the footsteps of other retro revivals, Contra ReBirth and Gradius ReBirth.  In case you missed the original game all those years ago, here's the updated synopsis geared for concerned parents:

This is a side-scrolling action game in which players battle against monsters in Dracula's castle. Players use a chained whip to fight their way through halls and dungeons filled with zombies, skeletons, flying eyeballs, and bats. The enemy creatures frequently shoot projectiles and attack players in hand-to-hand combat. If players sustain too much damage, they keel over and emit a burst of red blood. Some rooms in the castle also have spikes or spears stained with red, blood-like splotches.

The original Castlevania: The Adventure wasn't... oh, how do I say this?... wasn't very good.  It was an early Game Boy effort from a development team that didn't quite understand how best to make a portable Castlevania perform properly, leading to an extremely sluggish hero trapped in a world of unfair enemy tactics and frustrating platformer environments.  Here's a taste of the game's first level courtesy of a YouTube video from Kafei2006:

It's not a bad game at heart though.  There's a great little game cowering under the weight of inexperience (and the music is fantastic), so if this new ReBirth can fix those issues, then we may be in for a great little tide-me-over Castlevania treat.  Here's hoping this one hits the WiiWare service in late October.  It'd only be seasonally appropriate, after all.

(via Kotaku)