You'll probably remember Devil May Cry 3 for the
PlayStation 2 as being an unfairly difficult game, yet one that rewarded
your patience with a slew of high-quality action. If playing it gave
you tears of frustration, you'll be happy to learn that although this
sequel is a challenge, it's by no means an extreme one. In fact, you're
given an excellent number of gameplay choices that help you tailor the
challenge to your preferences. You can initially choose one of two
difficulties (and if you want to cry like a little girl, you can unlock
several more), and you can even choose whether you want the game to
perform some combos for you automatically. No, you aren't apt to find
Devil May Cry 4 to be excessively tough on your first play-through,
though it is no walk in the park either. However, it is generally
excessive--not that that's a bad thing. Stylish action, terrific boss
fights, and beautiful, melodramatic cutscenes will inspire you to push
forward, and they serve as an appropriate reward for a well-played
sequence of demon slaying.
You wanna piece of me?
It isn't surprising that a game featuring the charmingly insane Dante
would be so over the top, though the series' famed antihero is not the
real star this time around. Don't worry; you'll still get to play as
Dante, and he brings with him a good selection of weapons and fighting
styles, just as Devil May Cry fans would expect. But you'll spend the
majority of the game as newcomer Nero, who has a selection of impressive
and elegant moves of his own. Nero is an excellent character, capable
of delivering a few wisecracks, a brooding glance, and a heartfelt plea
of love to his beloved Kyrie in a few moments' time. He's clearly cut
from the same cloth as Dante, though it's a bit disappointing that the
game doesn't explore this connection in more detail. Nevertheless,
you'll want to follow Nero's exploits as he struggles to learn the truth
about his own religious organization, The Order of the Sword, and
Dante's apparent murder of its leader.
The story
doesn't offer up a whole lot of surprises, but it embraces a certain
attitude of self-indulgence. Cutscenes are overwrought, visually
stunning affairs, and are among the best you are likely to have seen in
any game in recent years. The theatrical dialogue, impossibly athletic
animations, and swooping camera work make for quite the spectacle, but
somehow, it's a spectacle that manages to stay on just the right side of
cheesy. Devil May Cry 4 takes itself seriously, but not too
seriously, so for every shocking, bloody cutaway, there's an equally
funny quip that helps keep the narrative in check. There are a couple of
cringeworthy exceptions, such as one scene where Dante decides he's a
tango dancer (don't quit your day job!), but overall, you're apt to find
the scenes to be gorgeous, thought-provoking, and emotionally stirring.
Nero's claim to fame is his demonic arm,
better known as the devil bringer. With it, you can grab onto distant
enemies and pull them in, pick them up, and slam them around for some
excellent combos, plus deliver a few other surprises. These mechanics
are easy to pull off, and they represent a general shift from the
defensive gameplay of Devil May Cry 3 to a more aggressive approach. As
you play, you can pull off some incredibly satisfying moves, both in the
air and on the ground--the most violent of which are accompanied by
slick, bloody animations and appropriately gory-sounding thwacks and
slashes. Timing these various moves can be tricky, but like in the
previous games, eventually the subtleties of your combos click, and in
time you'll be pulling enemies toward you, slashing them into bite-size
pieces, and smashing them into one another with glee.
The devil-bringer moves go a long way, which is probably a good thing,
since Nero has neither as varied an arsenal as Dante nor access to
multiple fighting styles. However, he does have his standard sword, red
queen, and a revolver known as blue rose, and later on he earns another
weapon that franchise fans will enjoy seeing in action. As you progress,
you will earn proud souls based on your performance in any given
mission, and with them, you can purchase new combos and upgrade existing
ones. And you'll need them, too, since you'll need to handle droves of
demons that get progressively tougher--and they're awesome to look at,
to boot. You can choose these new moves individually, or you can let the
game auto-select them for you based on how varied you want your array
of attacks to be. It's worth noting that you can't really make a mistake
here; if you don't like the move, or if there is a more powerful
upgrade available to you, you can unlearn what you have purchased for a
full refund and use the souls for something else.
The action is stylish, beautiful…and bloody.
You'll also encounter a number of secret missions scattered about, and
you'll no doubt find them the most challenging aspect of the game. In
some cases, you have to execute a certain move a set number of times in a
row, or dispatch every demon within the allotted time. While those
missions are challenging, others require you to have purchased a
particular move before you can manage it. If at first it seems that some
of these missions are simply unbeatable, have faith and return to it
later. There's a good chance you were simply just missing a piece of the
puzzle. You aren't required to do these missions, but the orb fragment
you earn is a perfectly fine reward, and accomplishing these difficult
tasks is incredibly gratifying.
About halfway through
the game, you'll take control of Dante, and you'll likely go through a
period of adjustment while you get used to the change in gameplay
techniques. Frankly, the devil bringer is a great mechanic, and losing
it is a bit of a disappointment, since it's likely to be the center of
your fighting style. Instead, you'll have a new set of actions and
combos to get used to, new weapons, and four (eventually five) fighting
styles. Yet once your arsenal of melee weapons and guns expands
(Pandora's Box is a favorite), you'll enjoy the cheerful boldness of
them. There's just a lot more variety here than with Nero, and it's a
lot of fun to switch styles and weapons on the fly, just to find more
interesting and flashy ways of crushing demons to a pulp.
In addition to the dazzling action, you'll work your way through
some light puzzles and platforming sequences. The puzzles aren't tough,
but they do require you to roam about a bit from time to time, bashing
on some switches, using a special device to slow down time, and
accomplishing some other odds and ends. They help break up the pace, but
all too often these breaks result in lulls that last a bit too long,
making you long for another crazy demon attack. Some of the platform
sequences are fine, requiring you to use the devil bringer as a
grappling hook to fling yourself around, while some of the more standard
sequences suffer from bad camera angles and an annoying tendency for
the camera to change positions midjump.
The boss fights are rather fun. Good thing, too, since you'll see most of these guys three times.
Don't let the variety of weaponry and special moves lull you into
believing that the rest of Devil May Cry 4's design is similarly
diverse. In fact, the many different ways of killing enemies is quite a
stark contrast to the repetition at the heart of the experience. While
backtracking and repeated environments have been a problem in past games
in the series, the newest entry takes these issues to an even higher
level of monotony. Many successive levels take place in the same castle
hallways and forest meadows, and when you switch to Dante, you visit
them all over again. Granted, most of these areas are easy on the eyes,
packed with gorgeous architecture and grand outdoor vistas. Yet when you
see them over and over again, and when some of the light puzzles have
you traipsing back and forth, you will wish for more to see. It has the
effect of making a seemingly grand adventure feel oddly limited.
That repetition even makes its way into the admittedly spectacular
boss fights. These battles are easily the shining star of Devil May Cry
4, and each boss is wildly different from the last, requiring some
split-second timing and good control over your reflexes. From a giant
toad to a hulking stone behemoth, these bosses are cleverly designed and
a good deal of fun. Yet in the second half of the game, you'll face all
of the same bosses as Dante that you fought as Nero. While the game
could have benefitted from some new blood during these missions, the
differences in styles between the two at least lend some diversity to
the repeated bosses and test the newest additions to your arsenal. Yet
amazingly (and irritatingly), Capcom brings most of them out for a third
time in the game's padded and plodding penultimate mission. Yes, these
fights are fun, but forcing most of them on the player three times is
overkill.
Regardless of which platform you play
Devil May Cry 4 on, this game is a looker. Both Nero and Dante are fluid
in motion, showcasing a good deal of flair and subtlety in their
movements. The more damage a move does, the more astonishing it looks
onscreen, and few games can approach the pure razzle-dazzle of Nero
jumping into the air, his cape flying and the glowing devil bringer
tossing lumbering demons around with matchless grace. From a design
standpoint, the visuals can be gorgeous to behold, and moments like your
first glimpse of Gran Album bridge are bound to take your breath away.
What's more, all of this visual prowess is smoothly rendered on both
platforms, and broken up only by the occasional loading time. This can
be noticeably reduced if you are playing on the PlayStation 3, since
some files will be installed to the hard drive, though the loading times
aren't excessive by any stretch. The downside for PS3 owners is that
the installation takes around 20 minutes to finish.
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