It's extremely invigorating to see the pioneer of the hack and slash genre come back and completely do away with the worst trappings of the genre.
Quick time events? Pffft what are you on about? Walking sections? Rule of thirds camera angle? Nowhere does it touch the combat, which is my opinion is the fastest and tightest feeling string of combos and weapons across the entire series.
Nero from DMC4 is back with some add variety in the form of new Devil Breakers that give him new abilities to chain into your Exceeds and grappling hooks. He feels exceptionally good in this game, so much fun to hack and/or slash away at demons and I've no doubt merely scratched the surface with him. And spoiler alert, you're not even halfway through with Nero's mechanics until the very end of the game, getting his old Buster moves and Devil Trigger. His moveset is cleverly delivered to you piecemeal as not to overload you on mechanics.
Newcomer V is a bit of a letdown. An interesting concept, Pikmin reworked into a hack and slash character unfortunately leaves the most of V's interesting mechanics and enemies to simply button mashing. V himself is a cool character and it can be fun to chain kills together, but if the game has a lull at any point, it would be him. Props for originality, but relying on wonky AI assist characters to kill wonky AI enemies isn't the most fun.
Nero is fantastic, V is..interesting, but the real star of the show here would have to be old series standby Dante (from the Devil May Cry franchise.) No shitty behavior and screaming about killing "demon bitches," no awful "hold the trigger to use your other weapons" just Dante at his core. Styles, and weapon switching, taunts (now with air taunts!) and Devil Trigger. Every weapon has its intricacies and nuances to master and is prime for many different circumstances. Like Nero, Dante can honestly feel a little bloated, but the game's generous loadout customization and accessibility features deliver these mechanics to you when you feel ready for them. It's so validating to see such a mechanically rich character step out of an action game in the current generation.
New to Special Edition are the additions of the approaching storm Vergil being fully playable, Turbo Mode (which was on the entire time of my playthrough,) and Legendary Dark Knight difficulty, alongside some added bells and whistles. Some of these features, probably should've been in the game at launch, and it does feel like Capcom forced the developers to withhold them for a special edition rerelease as has been series standard by now, but you can access Vergil in the original release via DLC and mods on PC have already implemented most if not all of SE's additions so you're not out of luck if you didn't have a house to mortgage just to get your hands on a PS5 or Series X.
Speaking of tech, this game looks stunning, and runs at a solid 60 fps even on base PS4 and Xbox One. The RE Engine the game is built on really comes into its own here, bringing the monsters to life in such a way they never were before. Keeping that gay cowboy flare was clearly extremely important and I'd say they succeeded.
Through its ups and downs, Devil May Cry introduced a whole new genre back in its heyday, a genre given new life by Devil May Cry 3 and games like Kingdom Hearts and Bayonetta. And now here, in the current era, it delivers what's perhaps the gamiest game I've ever fucking played. Few games can match the satisfaction of a stylish combat encounter like Devil May Cry, but while the combat is what's most important to a game like this, don't let that take away from a really touching narrative that warps the thesis of the previous games on its head: we don't have to kill each other. We can move past this petty rivalry. Bringing in Nero from DMC4 and Vergil (spoilers) from DMC3 brings the whole series together in such a way that is incredibly poignant for this big franchise return, and the final two encounters feel as though the entire series, hell, MY PLAYTHROUGHS of the entire series was always leading to. Devil Trigger is a fantastic main theme and, hell no, the entire soundtrack fucking rocks. Bloodpumping and energetic but also quiet and moody when they need to be.
I think what was most telling for me about this game's quality were Nico's Reports. She's the mechanic who builds all of Nero's equipment, a fun character in her own right. The logs from previous games that detail characters, enemies,, and items, are now entirely written from her perspective. That's such a lovely detail they didn't need to do, but it speaks to how much everyone behind the scenes cared about this project. Hell, even the MENUS have loads of easter eggs to look out for. They clearly put a lot of love into this project, and it shines across the entire game. No game is perfect, but few other games make me feel as perfect as when I land a stylish triple SSS combo. I'm so glad to have triggered these devils.
Quick time events? Pffft what are you on about? Walking sections? Rule of thirds camera angle? Nowhere does it touch the combat, which is my opinion is the fastest and tightest feeling string of combos and weapons across the entire series.
Nero from DMC4 is back with some add variety in the form of new Devil Breakers that give him new abilities to chain into your Exceeds and grappling hooks. He feels exceptionally good in this game, so much fun to hack and/or slash away at demons and I've no doubt merely scratched the surface with him. And spoiler alert, you're not even halfway through with Nero's mechanics until the very end of the game, getting his old Buster moves and Devil Trigger. His moveset is cleverly delivered to you piecemeal as not to overload you on mechanics.
Newcomer V is a bit of a letdown. An interesting concept, Pikmin reworked into a hack and slash character unfortunately leaves the most of V's interesting mechanics and enemies to simply button mashing. V himself is a cool character and it can be fun to chain kills together, but if the game has a lull at any point, it would be him. Props for originality, but relying on wonky AI assist characters to kill wonky AI enemies isn't the most fun.
Nero is fantastic, V is..interesting, but the real star of the show here would have to be old series standby Dante (from the Devil May Cry franchise.) No shitty behavior and screaming about killing "demon bitches," no awful "hold the trigger to use your other weapons" just Dante at his core. Styles, and weapon switching, taunts (now with air taunts!) and Devil Trigger. Every weapon has its intricacies and nuances to master and is prime for many different circumstances. Like Nero, Dante can honestly feel a little bloated, but the game's generous loadout customization and accessibility features deliver these mechanics to you when you feel ready for them. It's so validating to see such a mechanically rich character step out of an action game in the current generation.
New to Special Edition are the additions of the approaching storm Vergil being fully playable, Turbo Mode (which was on the entire time of my playthrough,) and Legendary Dark Knight difficulty, alongside some added bells and whistles. Some of these features, probably should've been in the game at launch, and it does feel like Capcom forced the developers to withhold them for a special edition rerelease as has been series standard by now, but you can access Vergil in the original release via DLC and mods on PC have already implemented most if not all of SE's additions so you're not out of luck if you didn't have a house to mortgage just to get your hands on a PS5 or Series X.
Speaking of tech, this game looks stunning, and runs at a solid 60 fps even on base PS4 and Xbox One. The RE Engine the game is built on really comes into its own here, bringing the monsters to life in such a way they never were before. Keeping that gay cowboy flare was clearly extremely important and I'd say they succeeded.
Through its ups and downs, Devil May Cry introduced a whole new genre back in its heyday, a genre given new life by Devil May Cry 3 and games like Kingdom Hearts and Bayonetta. And now here, in the current era, it delivers what's perhaps the gamiest game I've ever fucking played. Few games can match the satisfaction of a stylish combat encounter like Devil May Cry, but while the combat is what's most important to a game like this, don't let that take away from a really touching narrative that warps the thesis of the previous games on its head: we don't have to kill each other. We can move past this petty rivalry. Bringing in Nero from DMC4 and Vergil (spoilers) from DMC3 brings the whole series together in such a way that is incredibly poignant for this big franchise return, and the final two encounters feel as though the entire series, hell, MY PLAYTHROUGHS of the entire series was always leading to. Devil Trigger is a fantastic main theme and, hell no, the entire soundtrack fucking rocks. Bloodpumping and energetic but also quiet and moody when they need to be.
I think what was most telling for me about this game's quality were Nico's Reports. She's the mechanic who builds all of Nero's equipment, a fun character in her own right. The logs from previous games that detail characters, enemies,, and items, are now entirely written from her perspective. That's such a lovely detail they didn't need to do, but it speaks to how much everyone behind the scenes cared about this project. Hell, even the MENUS have loads of easter eggs to look out for. They clearly put a lot of love into this project, and it shines across the entire game. No game is perfect, but few other games make me feel as perfect as when I land a stylish triple SSS combo. I'm so glad to have triggered these devils.