{"id":57878,"date":"2026-02-18T20:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/?p=57878"},"modified":"2026-02-18T18:38:24","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T09:38:24","slug":"viral-indie-horror-game-welcome-to-doll-town-reveals-castlevania-inspired-easter-egg-to-honor-the-passing-of-shutaro-ida","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/viral-indie-horror-game-welcome-to-doll-town-reveals-castlevania-inspired-easter-egg-to-honor-the-passing-of-shutaro-ida\/","title":{"rendered":"Viral indie horror game Welcome to\u00a0Doll\u00a0Town\u00a0reveals\u00a0Castlevania-inspired\u00a0Easter\u00a0egg\u00a0to honor\u00a0the passing of\u00a0Shutaro\u00a0Ida\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>The&nbsp;Silent Hill-inspired indie&nbsp;<strong>Welcome to Doll Town<\/strong>&nbsp;has its fair&nbsp;share of nods to classic Konami games. On top of references to the psychological horror&nbsp;franchise (props to the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/indie-games\/silent-hill-inspired-horror-game-welcome-to-doll-towns-first-episode-to-release-for-free-in-february\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">\u201cIt\u2019s Bead.\u201d Easter egg based on Silent Hill 3<\/a>), solo dev D42mon revealed another hidden surprise based on the classic Konami code.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">I wanted to keep this a secret for you to find but&#8230;<br><br>After the &#39;Castlevania&#39; developer and &#39;Bloodstained: The Scarlet Engagement&#39; director Shutaro Ida&#39;s sad passing, I felt like showing how much of an influence this has been in my horror game:<br><br>If you punch in the Konami code\u2026 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/AgZO8P5dEE\">pic.twitter.com\/AgZO8P5dEE<\/a><\/p>&mdash; Welcome to Doll Town (@lifeindolltown) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/lifeindolltown\/status\/2023460095707812303?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">February 16, 2026<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The code in question appears to work anywhere&nbsp;in-game&nbsp;and unlocks a&nbsp;Castlevania-inspired outfit for the main character, Yumi.&nbsp;The Gangnam Style-like emote that Yumi does at the end&nbsp;of the above video&nbsp;isn\u2019t&nbsp;tied to the&nbsp;outfit, and&nbsp;can&nbsp;even&nbsp;be executed in&nbsp;Welcome to Doll Town\u2019s&nbsp;free&nbsp;demo.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While&nbsp;D42mon&nbsp;wanted to keep the code a secret for players to find, the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/longtime-castlevania-and-bloodstained-developer-shutaro-ida-passes-away-at-52-after-battling-cancer\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">recent passing of&nbsp;Castlevania&nbsp;and Bloodstained developer&nbsp;Shutaro&nbsp;Ida<\/a>&nbsp;prompted them to&nbsp;unveil it before the game\u2019s release.&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/lifeindolltown\/status\/2023347284667498624?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">According to them<\/a>, Ida was one&nbsp;of their biggest inspirations and a key influence in the development of&nbsp;Welcome to&nbsp;Doll Town.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Welcome to Doll Town - Official Trailer\" width=\"1160\" height=\"653\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/qKofVf7Eyi4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The&nbsp;atmospheric exploration and puzzle game is set in the&nbsp;titular&nbsp;Doll Town.&nbsp;Once known for its handmade dolls,&nbsp;the cursed village&nbsp;was abandoned following the unexplained deaths of some&nbsp;students&nbsp;years before. After taking a part-time job in the town\u2019s only open convenience store (she must have really needed the money), young student Yumi must uncover the truth behind the deaths, the lifelike dolls haunting the town,&nbsp;and the tragic love story at the heart of it all.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After some brief pre-launch trouble with Valve, Welcome to Doll Town will\u00a0release\u00a0on\u00a0February 20 for Windows (<a href=\"https:\/\/store.steampowered.com\/app\/3204320\/Welcome_to_Doll_Town\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Steam<\/a>). A free demo is also available.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After some pre-launch trouble with Valve, the game is set to launch on February 20.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":67,"featured_media":57885,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[62,3],"tags":[17],"class_list":["post-57878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-indie-games","category-news","tag-japan-related-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Viral indie horror game Welcome to\u00a0Doll\u00a0Town\u00a0reveals\u00a0Castlevania-inspired\u00a0Easter\u00a0egg\u00a0to honor\u00a0the passing of\u00a0Shutaro\u00a0Ida\u00a0 - AUTOMATON WEST<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The\u00a0Silent Hill-inspired horror indie\u00a0Welcome to Doll Town\u00a0hides a surprise based on the classic Konami code.\u00a0\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/viral-indie-horror-game-welcome-to-doll-town-reveals-castlevania-inspired-easter-egg-to-honor-the-passing-of-shutaro-ida\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Viral indie horror game Welcome to\u00a0Doll\u00a0Town\u00a0reveals\u00a0Castlevania-inspired\u00a0Easter\u00a0egg\u00a0to honor\u00a0the passing of\u00a0Shutaro\u00a0Ida\u00a0 - 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