Dracula: Dark Reign has moved into pre-orders for its physical Game Boy Color release, giving retro handheld collectors a boxed version of the Bram Stoker-inspired action-adventure to lock in ahead of launch.
Incube8 Games lists the physical edition at $49.99, with launch expected next month. The package includes a sealed box, a clear red cartridge, a clear cartridge protector, an instruction booklet, a sticker sheet and a silkscreened PCB with artwork on the back side.
A digital edition is also available to pre-order for $14.99 and is expected to launch this month. Both versions are aimed at Game Boy Color hardware and the modern homebrew audience that still follows new cartridge releases for Nintendo's late-1990s handheld.
Dracula: Dark Reign is developed by Spacebot Interactive and published by Incube8 Games. The store page describes it as a Castlevania-style game about Jonathan Harker's escape from Castle Dracula, mixing storytelling, exploration and action inside Bram Stoker's vampire world.
The game also carries an unusual licensing hook. It is an Official StokerVerse product, developed under license from The StokerVerse Project, and is being billed as the first Dracula video game authorised by the Stoker family.
That gives the project a different angle from most retro-inspired vampire action games. Dracula: Dark Reign is still clearly speaking to classicvania fans, but its pitch is tied directly to Stoker's novel, the author's notes and the wider StokerVerse project created by horror writer Chris McCauley and Dacre Stoker, Bram Stoker's great-grand-nephew.
The result is a small but notable release for the Game Boy Color homebrew scene: a new cartridge game with a literary horror license, a physical collector's edition and a digital version arriving on a slightly earlier schedule.