I personally find LoS Dracula far more compelling than Classic Dracula.
This guy became a monster in the name of God, all for a bogus prophecy and a bogus payoff. He got played, and ended up being the death of his wife, and an innocent girl that was trying to help him.
Not to mention he discovers that by defeating said Lords from the prophecy, he weakened the seal they held over a powerful demon, requiring him to renounce his Humanity solely to be able to enter it's realm.
Sounds a lot more contrived in writing, but in-game, it works. he got manipulated and played by everyone around him, (EVERYONE) which led to his becoming the kind of things he hunted. (As well as a killer)
Hell, better than classic Dracula who's wife dies of Illness while he's away, and so because of something that happens to no doubt many people, loved ones who die while you are far away- he contrives a plan to become a vampire by using alchemy to steal a Vampire's soul, by [tornado fang]ing over his best friend and his Fiance. Then expecting him to be totally okay with him when offered immortality as well.
Then despite the overwhelming grief that it caused him, he re-marries anyway.
His rampage against Humanity for killing Lisa feels much more justified, but his origins are totally screwed.
As far as LoS1 goes, I personally felt plenty of classicvania influence within it. As far as derivative gameplay... the Titan battles are pretty blatant, yeah. The combat feels good though.
MoF definitely falls flat compared to it though. It's got plenty of problems, the biggest, (and possibly a contributor to it's framerate issues) is that it was developed as an HD console game, then scaled down for the 3DS. Second, it tries too hard to please critics of LoS by throwing classic elements in there, and suffers for it. The LoS gameplay just does not work well in 2D. Not NEARLY as well as it does in 3D. Thirdly, the story. It's fine in it's own right, and personally, the very obvious reveals are not a problem, they work, but the backwards gimmick for telling the story was just stupid. They could have told it in order and still left the big reveals for the last story.
On LoS2, I feel it will likely be pretty good. i hope MS doesn't fall into the same trap as MoF though, where the game was kind of over-hyped... LoS was really hyped up. Personally, I think it totally delivered. (well- except for the part where they tricked the audience into thinking Dracula would be a villain who says "DIE, BELMONT!", when it turned out to be an edit of a cutscene from the epilogue along with Satan's dialogue. ) MoF however, was hyped, and just sort of fell flat compared to what it could have been. (especially if it had been a console game) It will most likely play like LoS with added gimmicks, such as a sword to use, aside from the shadow whip, and whatever vampire powers MS gives you to use.