Konami announces two new downloadable content packages for Castlevania: Lords of Shadow. The Castlevania: Lords of Shadow DLC features all-new areas, monsters, and brand new story lines.

In Reverie players return as Gabriel in a quest to help Laura (the former servant of vampire Carmilla) destroy an evil force left unchecked after the queen’s demise.

The second DLC pack, Resurrection, continues the story directly after the end of the game. This DLC gives players insight into the epilogue seen at the end of Lords of Shadow. Konami claims that Resurrection “will be larger in scope” than Reverie, because it features a final showdown with a “very notorious enemy.”

Castlevania: Lords of Shadow – Reverie releases for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in February. Castlevania: Lords of Shadow – Resurrection releases on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in April. Pricing for each pack was not revealed at press time.

Update: The story was edited to correct an error in the last paragraph referring to the DLC as “Revelation” instead of “Resurrection.”

Let’s get something out of the way first: I enjoyed Sly Cooper on the PlayStation 2 and I enjoy Sly Cooper now. The Sly Collection for PS3 combines PS2 classics Sly 1, 2 and 3 onto a single Blu-Ray disc for your platforming pleasure. While Sucker Punch developed the originals, Sanzaru Games handled the PS3 port. No worries, it’s still the same game you—as in the two or three of you who bought it the first time—fell in love with, but formatted for HD screens.

Much like Ico and Shadow of the Colossus, the Sly series is one of those well-loved, yet under-appreciated gaming adventures that made it’s way to Sony’s platform so many years ago. Those who play it will often love it, but it never seemed to get noticed in the tidal wave of fill-‘em-with bullets action games. Asking most friends (even the gamers) if they have played Sly Cooper will often get you the “what the hell is that?” look. If you decide to show them the box with a cartoon raccoon, turtle and a big pink hippo, and most of them will lose interest immediately.

While the first game in the series, Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus, feels rough and very old-school by today’s standards, it’s still a decent platformer. However, this is definitely not the game you should be playing if it’s your first run with The Sly Collection. It’s actually not a great representation of the awesomeness of its sequels. The game was released in 2002, so it had to show it’s age sometime…turns out it was sometime before this collection hit stores.

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