RETRO – In a reboot to the well-known action hack ‘n’ slash series a new Davil May Cry game is born with a black haired Dante, who is still bratty, bad-ass and macho as always. DMC was the biggest fucking surprise of 2013, while it was just started it: find out why!

I must confess that I never really got into the Devil May Cry series so far. I missed the first too, because I never had a PS2, then tried DMC3 on PC, which a disaster for me. I liked DMC 4, but I missed Dante, did not liked with the whiney main brat, and also got bored after a while because of the old gameplay mechanics. So DMC was a fresh start for me I was curious and did not have any bad feelings against the new style as old diehard fans might have.  Without any preconceptions, I must admit at once, that the game is fucking awesome. Let’s elaborate why…

This devil (=me) may CARE

While I never really like the old Dante, I cared a lot about the new one. He may be half angel half demon, but he is more human than ever, with inner conflicts, a shady and strange past which masterfully revealed throughout the game. “Son of Sparda” here is meaningful in the story: we will gradually know about the history of Sparda and Eva (Dante’s parents) what happened to them and their twin sons. Dante’s bratty and “devil may care” attitude is very well shaped up and explained in the story, it’s not like he just he is like it was in the old series.

He will also have other “friends”: the mysterious Virgil and the sexy Kat: two agents, who are working against the demons. Oh, and let’s not forget the bad guys, the main demons themselves either: they are not just disgusting, like they used to be, but also well-acted and shaped up in the excellent story.

Devilish levels

The game has two kind of levels: the real world, and “Limbo”, which is a place between the real world and Hell. While the reality is a little drab and not interesting, the Limbo is extremely well designed, with devilishly creative level design, and a fantastic artistic flair. It’s a little bit like the world of Bayonetta, but it’s somehow more consistent and more interesting. You must jump, fly and grapple you way through this fantastic world with always more hair raising enemies and challenges before you.

Fight!

Ninja Theory never really nailed the combat in its former games: in Heavenly Sword it was all right for a while, but became repetitious after a while, and in the still good Enslaved combat itself was bare-bone, and uninteresting. Here they got the help from Capcom Japan, and it shows: Combat is fast, furious, exciting, but still extremely well designed and can be mastered by European hands as well.

You got a plethora of combos, brutal and fantastic weapons and weapon modes and a well-designed skill system as well. All of this can be updated by skill points, which you receive gradually and you can spend demon skulls as well for different items, which mostly fills up your health meter. The combat animations are incredibly satisfying as well, you jump, slash, and fire you way with a furious, extreme, yet realistic movements.

The devil may like!

DMC is not only an excellent reboot but also a perfect combat TPS action game in itself. Awesome graphics, which are still pretty good today, an exciting, “must know what happens!” story, well-shaped up characters and incredibly fun and furious combat are the main elements of this excellent game. So many demon hunters missed the mark lately for whatever reasons (Shadow of the Damned, NeverDead and Blades of Time comes to my mind…) but DMC nailed it this time perfectly.

-BadSector-

Editor: Capcom

Developer: Ninja Theory

Genres: 3D, action, adventure

Publication: January 2013