Okay let’s actually review the game this time
I was looking forward to Bayonetta 3, all the way since it was announced. But the long radio-silence form the developers, the constant deflection from them in interviews, the short-lived controversy with Bayonetta voice actress Hellena Taylor, and overall the game just… Not looking very polished eventually dampened any excitement I would’ve had for it. But looking at a game and playing a game are two separate things, with that said, how do I feel about it?
I’m very disappointed saying I did not like the game very much and consider it a very, very, very big step down from the first game. What exactly went wrong here? There’s a lot to go over but I’ll just say I was left very disappointed with the end result and how I ultimately felt about the game.
Let’s start with the gameplay. Whereas the previous two games had you managing your magic meter usually to pull off finishing blows in the form of Torture Attacks, Bayonetta instead supplements this by using a new system called the Demon Slave. I found this mechanic incredibly intrusive and clunky, not to mention the game basically expecting you to use it as if combat is designed around it. Another big drawback is the areas in this game are fucking HUGE no doubt because they designed them for Demon Slave. There’s also Demon Mascarade which I have very little to say about since it’s just an alternative means of traversal replacing Panther within. The game doesn’t even explain it in continuity so why should I give a fuck?
The game juggles a bunch of alternative play styles and different systems, honestly it makes me miss the mini games from the first two games just because of how intrusive these are. In one you do a clunky as fuck kaiju battle. Another is a random rhythm game. You do these 2D stealth missions as Jeanne where you can’t use magic. If this is making your head spin I don’t blame you because the game keeps shifting styles on a constant basis and there’s just a general lack of consistency.
Then we come to… Viola… I like her as a character in the story (I will get to that though) but her gameplay sucks, like it just sucks. Basically she sorta plays like Nero in the recent DMC games where she uses a sword to fight and has a grapple gun as well. The problem with her comes with her parry mechanic. It’s triggered by holding it down as soon as an enemy strikes but it’s so precise and hard to land you’ll constantly miss. It makes combat with her really awkward and in general she just doesn’t feel as good to play as Bayo. She’s only in four levels so it’s not a dealbreaker but when you have to play as her it is not fun.
Music is not as good as the previous games, I love the game’s rendition of Moonlight Seranade and they even got the license for the Frank Sinatra cover in the credits, outside of that I can barely remember a single track in the game, which is crazy to me because the first two games had some bangers in them so the fact I can barely remember this game’s soundtrack really speaks volume. The only track I remember is Viola’s theme which is basically just Paramore. Isn’t she like some punk person why is it Paramore?
Then there is the story… You know what I’m just gonna say it this is probably the worst aspect of the game bar none. It made me feel secondhand embarrassment for being a fan of the series. Everyone is mischaracterized, it has very little if anything to do with the previous two games (you don’t even fight angels), it takes itself way too seriously, and the ending… What were they even thinking with that? The writing is also really bad, Bayonetta barely feels like herself and is just spouting quippy one-liners like this is an MCU film. You made her feel more like Gex than Bayonetta. Jennifer Hale does a great job with what she was given the material just sucks. I do like Viola and I think she’s an excellent inversion of a typical action game protagonist but her backstory sucks and what they do with her in the ending just comes out of left field. It feels like they wanted to do a DMC5 but just had none of the time or effort to pull it off in a satisfying way.
All-in-all I was left very disappointed with Bayonetta 3 and I’m not sure if I’m looking forward to the future of the series. I can see why this game ended up the way it did, with multiple staff leaving during development, including losing the director, Hellena Taylor’s tantrum, and the fact they reworked the game from being an open-world game, and the game having four different screenwriters and likely going through drastic rewrites during development, it’s honestly not surprising how the game ended up how it did. But it does suck thinking about what could’ve been.
I was looking forward to Bayonetta 3, all the way since it was announced. But the long radio-silence form the developers, the constant deflection from them in interviews, the short-lived controversy with Bayonetta voice actress Hellena Taylor, and overall the game just… Not looking very polished eventually dampened any excitement I would’ve had for it. But looking at a game and playing a game are two separate things, with that said, how do I feel about it?
I’m very disappointed saying I did not like the game very much and consider it a very, very, very big step down from the first game. What exactly went wrong here? There’s a lot to go over but I’ll just say I was left very disappointed with the end result and how I ultimately felt about the game.
Let’s start with the gameplay. Whereas the previous two games had you managing your magic meter usually to pull off finishing blows in the form of Torture Attacks, Bayonetta instead supplements this by using a new system called the Demon Slave. I found this mechanic incredibly intrusive and clunky, not to mention the game basically expecting you to use it as if combat is designed around it. Another big drawback is the areas in this game are fucking HUGE no doubt because they designed them for Demon Slave. There’s also Demon Mascarade which I have very little to say about since it’s just an alternative means of traversal replacing Panther within. The game doesn’t even explain it in continuity so why should I give a fuck?
The game juggles a bunch of alternative play styles and different systems, honestly it makes me miss the mini games from the first two games just because of how intrusive these are. In one you do a clunky as fuck kaiju battle. Another is a random rhythm game. You do these 2D stealth missions as Jeanne where you can’t use magic. If this is making your head spin I don’t blame you because the game keeps shifting styles on a constant basis and there’s just a general lack of consistency.
Then we come to… Viola… I like her as a character in the story (I will get to that though) but her gameplay sucks, like it just sucks. Basically she sorta plays like Nero in the recent DMC games where she uses a sword to fight and has a grapple gun as well. The problem with her comes with her parry mechanic. It’s triggered by holding it down as soon as an enemy strikes but it’s so precise and hard to land you’ll constantly miss. It makes combat with her really awkward and in general she just doesn’t feel as good to play as Bayo. She’s only in four levels so it’s not a dealbreaker but when you have to play as her it is not fun.
Music is not as good as the previous games, I love the game’s rendition of Moonlight Seranade and they even got the license for the Frank Sinatra cover in the credits, outside of that I can barely remember a single track in the game, which is crazy to me because the first two games had some bangers in them so the fact I can barely remember this game’s soundtrack really speaks volume. The only track I remember is Viola’s theme which is basically just Paramore. Isn’t she like some punk person why is it Paramore?
Then there is the story… You know what I’m just gonna say it this is probably the worst aspect of the game bar none. It made me feel secondhand embarrassment for being a fan of the series. Everyone is mischaracterized, it has very little if anything to do with the previous two games (you don’t even fight angels), it takes itself way too seriously, and the ending… What were they even thinking with that? The writing is also really bad, Bayonetta barely feels like herself and is just spouting quippy one-liners like this is an MCU film. You made her feel more like Gex than Bayonetta. Jennifer Hale does a great job with what she was given the material just sucks. I do like Viola and I think she’s an excellent inversion of a typical action game protagonist but her backstory sucks and what they do with her in the ending just comes out of left field. It feels like they wanted to do a DMC5 but just had none of the time or effort to pull it off in a satisfying way.
All-in-all I was left very disappointed with Bayonetta 3 and I’m not sure if I’m looking forward to the future of the series. I can see why this game ended up the way it did, with multiple staff leaving during development, including losing the director, Hellena Taylor’s tantrum, and the fact they reworked the game from being an open-world game, and the game having four different screenwriters and likely going through drastic rewrites during development, it’s honestly not surprising how the game ended up how it did. But it does suck thinking about what could’ve been.
TG_GolemJephson
1 year ago