no desire to work on a sequel to Tokimeki Memorial, and requested a departmental transfer. The strong sales of the game prompted his boss to agree, and Igarashi asked to join the Castlevania development team. Igarashi began working on a Castlevania game set for the Sega 32X. However, the game was cancelled as Konami shifted its focus away from the unsuccessful 32X and towards the PlayStation. Igarashi's next project was the PlayStation game Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, where he worked on scenario writing and programming. Halfway through the game's production, director Toru Hagihara received a company promotion, which promoted Igarashi to assistant director to complete the game. The game was well received critically, later serving as an influence on the "Metroidvania" genre, though it did not translate into strong sales. After the release of Symphony of the Night, Igarashi was director for the 2000 PlayStation role-playing game Elder Gate. Igarashi says that he was motivated to create the game because he had played other heavy story driven games and after a long break had lost motivation to continue. He says he wanted to make a game that could be played at any time, and could feel fresh every time you played it. He wanted each player to have their own unique experience when playing the game. The game received a 22 out of 40 score from the magazine Famitsu. Following that, Igarashi served as the producer for Castlevania Chronicles, which was a PlayStation port of a 1993 Sharp X68000 game. From there, he was the producer and writer for Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance, the second Castlevania title for the Game Boy Advance. The goal was to attempt to create a game similar to Symphony of the Night. This included bringing back artist Ayami Kojima as character designer, who had previously worked on Symphony of the Night. Igarashi felt that the previous title, Castlevania: Circle of the Moon, was too dark on the Game Boy Advance's screen, so he felt the need to make the game brighter. During his time at Konami, Igarashi is often seen wearing a cowboy hat and brandishing a leather whip which he brings along with him to media events such as the Electronic Entertainment Expo. In March 2007, writer Warren Ellis announced that he was working on a straight to DVD animated film adaption of Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse along with Koji Igarashi. Ellis explained