DmC: Devil May Cry

[IamLEAM1983]

Since the HD collection released last March, we haven't seen much of Dante, Vergil and the rest of their excessively Japanese and incredibly stylish third-person actioner. If you've followed the buzz around the series for the last few years, however, you probably are aware that Capcom's expert Nippon hands aren't touching this series knobs and handles, this time around. After four generally well-received titles that portrayed the protagonist as a breezy, innately stylish and utterly careless slayer of Hellspawn, we're off to Ninja Theory's vision of the IP. This Dante is certainly more bitter and cynical than his predecessor, but expect to see just as many ludicrous action shots out of nowhere. Also, expect plenty of jaw-dropping moments, as the British studio has taken the series' trademark "Modern Gothic meets Fantasy on Steroids" feeling and cranked it to eleven.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is the Spinal Tap of Devil May Cry. Prepare for bruised hands and busted controllers.

Since this is a reboot, we get an entirely new setup. The entire thing takes place in Limbo City, something that's equal parts a Grindhouse design metrpolis and a bit of a Dark City homage. People aren't exactly alive around here; they're all already dead. They're just stuck repeating the overall style and substance of your average mortal life. It's Purgatory, in essence, and it's governed by a demonic media tycoon named Mundus, who keeps his ranks and citizens swelling by making sure they're overweight, despondent and depressive. We're quickly made to understand that this isn't what the Powers That Be had in mind for souls awaiting judgment.

In comes Dante. This slightly more masculine take on the series' eternal protagonist is a Nephilim. He's the son of an unnamed angel and of a demon named Sparda. Mundus apparently doesn't really like that, as Dante is one of the lucky few who has the ability to potentially overthrow him and restore the balance. Unluckily for Dante, Limbo itself is a thinking entity. When it isn't that, then it's something Mundus' various lieutenants can twist around the way Architects mess with the sleeping mind in Inception. You might be on a fairly successful streak when all of a sudden the surrounding streets will go Non-Euclidian on your ass. Therein lies the game's bulk of platforming challenges and some of its more oddball level designs. The reaches of Hell can apparently be anything their natives want them to be, from a horrific newscast gone wrong to a fractured cathedral caught in mid-explosion, jagged chunks of masonry and architectural details floating in the middle of a tormented void. It's pretty impressive stuff. It's never scary, as this isn't the game's intent, but your Style meter will more than likely drop while you'll stop a combo chain to go "Whoa" at the level design being put out in front of you. Each level in the rather linear sequence feels like its own beast and has a very distinct flavour, but still manages to sell the fact that you're looking at fragments of Limbo or of the demonic plane. It's just tough to take a few moments to appreciate the effort that's obviously been deployed.

As you're not exactly meant to stop. DmC is a Score Attack game through and through. Killing enemies isn't as simple as pulling the trigger or swinging your sword. You have to do both very quickly and in various combinations in order to earn the best Style rating possible. Why do that? Because your Style rating acts as an influence on the amount of Red Orbs you pick up throughout the levels. Red Orbs are your main currency for upgrades, weapon purchases and character modifiers. Sooner or later, survival indirectly rests on your ability to prolong the suffering of oftentimes hapless demons in as stylish a manner as you possibly can. Some bosses demand specific techniques to be vanquished, and some environmental puzzles can rest on your ability to perform certain moves. Practice enough, and you'll find that the wealth of tactical options that characterized the earlier games are still there. Airborne exploits, animation cancels, hair-trigger dodges and other such classic tricks are all there to be used. Exploration incentives are there, but this obviously isn't an open-world title. There's a few forks in the road, but they're mostly there to serve as incentives for compulsive collectors or people who really are concerned with maxing out Dante before the game's final stretch.

Also, the game isn't any easier. In most cases, fans weren't worried about the complexity of this title; the brouhaha rested on how Dante's design had been changed. That's a pretty pithy complaint to make, isn't it?

Really, my only gripes with this title are as follows: the bossfights showcase some amazing character design and overall conceptualization, the kind of stuff you hadn't exactly been seeing in the later classic Devil May Cry titles. It's just too bad that most of them depend on the same tactics and the same learned behaviours. You dodge a few attacks, close in, land a few hits, dodge back. Wash, rinse, repeat. I would've appreciated a little more of that good old variety in the boss fights, of the need for the player to adapt on the fly. After that, I'd mention some elements of Dante's redesign. Not so much his appearance, actually, as his character.

New Dante is careless, self-centred, crass and vulgar, while retaining the fairly androgynous and innately "Too Cool for School" aspect the character always had. Imagine Orlando Bloom's Legolas and how almost insufferably awesome he'd become by The Two Towers, multiply that a few times, and add in an odd amount of profanity-laced world-weariness. It's unapologetically adolescent, and that can come across in zingers as much as it can induce groaners.

Just wait until you see Dante swap insults with some sort of vaguely polyp-shaped Lovecraftian horror.

"Fuck you!
- FUCK YOU! FUUUCK YYYOOOUUUURRRGGGLLLHHHH- *insert gross retching sounds implying that you've just burned a demon by trading slurs and that he/she/it is now mutating into something clearly designed to kill you in as horrible a fashion as possible*

That was probably Chtulhu's idea of Junior High, to be honest. That kind of thematic adolescence can be as invigorating as it can get on your freaking nerves in no time flat.

Apart from that? It's awesome. I'd forgotten how having sore hands and wrists felt like, Dante. Thank you ever so much for reminding me. I've been typing this whole thing with the "gamer claw" syndrome I hadn't experienced since Bayonetta.