Topic: DMC: Devil May Cry (2013 Reboot) from Ninja Theory

[MysterD]

NEWEST -> 1-14-2013:
DMC Reviews from Metacritic -> PC; X360; PS3

OLDER
Destructoid -> DMC to use Unreal Engine.
Joystiq -> DMC (Devil May Cry - Reboot) to be developed by Ninja Theory.
Joystiq -> DMC - Trailer.

[Xessive]

Odd choice for a franchise to reboot. Didn't think anyone cared enough either.

Speaking of Ninja Theory, I liked Heavenly Sword and I am kinda looking forward to Enslaved.

[TheOtherBelmont]

The reboot thing I don't mind too much, but I'm not digging the new Dante's look.  I wish they would just make a storyline sequel to DMC 3.  Maybe a new developer can breathe some new life into the series though since DMC 4 was so-so and not nearly as good as DMC 3(which in my opinion is the best one).

[Quemaqua]

I had completely forgotten about this. I used a little of my aid refund to grab it... holy fuck! It's so good. So so so much better than, IMO, all prior DMC games, or at least a more complete package. The production values are fantastic, the art is at times jaw-dropping and always beautiful, and there's even a story with some great performances. I loved the other games for what they were, but this is much less ridiculous (though still plenty ridiculous) and considerably more interesting. The gameplay is great too so far, and thank God they made grabbing/grabdashing an element of the core gameplay. I loved Nero from DMC4 but when you had to go back to Dante it was agonizingly slow by comparison.

Anyway, if you haven't given this a look, do so. I've only done the first two missions and I'm floored. Apparently the PC port is the best version because it runs at 60 fps. My rig can't hack it, so I got PS3, which I guess is the worst, but it's not really something you'll even notice unless you hold different versions up side by side. Other than the usual UE3 texture pop-in on load, it looks and plays just dandy. Tons of modes, too. Three difficulties to start, and you can unlock like 4 or 5 progressively harder remixes of the game, all the way until you've got enemies with standard health but Dante dies in one hit. It's fucking great.

[gpw11]

I loved the other games for what they were, but this is much less ridiculous (though still plenty ridiculous) and considerably more interesting.

SOLD. I remember really liking the third game (including how ridiculous it was) until you got that guitar weapon and did some stupid surfing move (or something, I really don't remember at all) and then I just dropped the controller and never played again...because fuck Japan.  DMC4 never had that moment for some reason.

[Quemaqua]

Yeah, this actually has a much more serious story, and it's quite well acted thus far. Dante is still a cocky goofball to a degree, and there's some hilarious stuff in there, but it seems like it's not going to get as utterly nonsensical as the others did. I liked most of that because it was funny, but yeah, that part of 3 threw me too. It was just kind of a little too much. Bayonetta suffered a bit that way too, with a story that maybe deserved a bit less of the goofy stuff that surrounded it. This one seems a lot more consistent.

I wish I could stay up and play some more, but I have to go to school. Ugh. The combat is a lot of fun. You get your guns, your sword, an axe, and a scythe, all of which you can use at any time: square for guns, triangle and circle for light and strong sword, then holding the triggers and use triangle/circle for light/strong axe or scythe. I think there might be a fist weapon later too. When you unlock more of the moves, combos are just so fun and satisfying because you can fill them with so many different moves. And both the axe and scythe can reach out with chains so you can grab enemies to you with the axe from a distance, or use the scythe to pull yourself through the air toward enemies, making you hyper-mobile as well. Ugh. It's so good.

[Xessive]

Been playing it on PC over the past few days. It is awesome!

The characters, the animations, the gameplay, the level design; there are some really trippy, mesmerising environments! Ninja Theory have really made their mark on the franchise.

I've tried the PS3 and it's still awesome at 30fps yet this is a game that really benefits from 60fps, like God of War and Dante's Inferno.

As Que said, give it a go. It is awesome!

[gpw11]

I put in ten min or so on PC and it seems awesome.  Surprisingly, it also seems to run like butter (at least in the first area).

[Xessive]

I put in ten min or so on PC and it seems awesome.  Surprisingly, it also seems to run like butter (at least in the first area).

Unreal Engine smoothness!

I really hope this is a sign that Ninja Theory's future games will make it to PC as well (though I think this case was due to Capcom).

[Quemaqua]

Definitely seeing some serious beef to this game. It's got some legs, lots of stuff to do and always seems like there's something else to strive for popping up. Combos are utterly ridiculous, but the fluidity seems greater here than before. Story continues to be interesting and well-told. I stayed up until 2 in the morning on a school night playing, and I haven't hardly touched a game in months, let alone actually done something irresponsible to keep playing.

[idolminds]

I can't vouch for the site since I haven't used it, but looks like SimplyGames is selling DmC for dirt cheap already. Steam keys.

[Cobra951]

Has anyone been following the drama around this game?  I haven't seen a shitstorm like that since Diablo 3 went online only.  Some longtime fans are all butthurt about the changes to the DMC series, or maybe just Dante.  I find it ridiculous, but I haven't played any of the games.  I've made a few related comments on VG247, but I think those were aimed at a bitch of a staff writer who gnashed her teeth against the entire gaming community.  You can also find evidence on Metacritic, where the "player" review section is getting bombed.  It's all quite entertaining.  Bring popcorn.

[Xessive]

Damn man, the game is too good to get that kind of flack. I've played and loved the original DMC games and this game is exactly what the franchise needed to thrive.

[sirean_syan]

I think the issue is that seems to be the level headed view of the game. Using myself as myself as my only data point, I like to think the vast majority of people who actually remember the series out there thought the first was cool and then the series became either: a) terrible (DMC2) or b) lost to a pretty hardcore audience (DMC3). I had honestly forgotten the Xbox 360 game came out. I really liked the first one and I do think there was something special there, but it was obvious the series needed a shot in the arm to be more than a memory of a fun game from a previous generation if it wanted the same kind of broad appeal it original had.

Of course, I had no idea that were people this dedicated to the series or at least there were this many of them.

[Quemaqua]

I doubt it's really an accurate representation of anything. Most of these people probably played one or maybe two of the games at best, but don't like the character design of this one just looking at it on the box so prefer to bitch because that's 99% of what gamers do these days. But yeah, I can't tell you how many nerds don't like the new Dante. The problem is that old Dante wasn't even a character, he was a cartoon collection of stupid cliches that were amusing in principle, but this game actually has a story and actually tries to build something. Old Dante could not exist here. This really is a reboot in the best possible sense, in that the reason for being reset was to build something special out of something that still had good qualities (great action, cool art direction) but was mostly lost to tired development and a lack of original ideas.

But gamers as a group are pretty much the lowest common denominator of anything as far as I'm concerned. I fucking hate them now that I'm not one of them anymore. Talking to the idiots at a game store most of the time is like having someone slam me in the balls with a shovel.

I get that changes to a series may not always be popular. Sometimes it feels like a betrayal of what fans wanted, and I've been on that end a few times too. But I don't think these fans really even wanted all that much, they're just convinced of something they think is nostalgia but is really just rosy memories of a throwaway franchise. Don't get me wrong, I loved DMC, DMC3, and enjoyed the whole of DMC4 (just not the fact that they wanted me to play it over again as a less-fun character to beat it), but this is absolutely a better place for the series to have gone. The other was a dead end and was proving itself to be, because there was little to it beyond raw combo-focused gameplay. This has that in spades plus so much more. There's no conceivable reason for anyone to be upset.

[gpw11]

Has anyone been following the drama around this game?  I haven't seen a shitstorm like that since Diablo 3 went online only.  Some longtime fans are all butthurt about the changes to the DMC series, or maybe just Dante.  I find it ridiculous, but I haven't played any of the games.  I've made a few related comments on VG247, but I think those were aimed at a bitch of a staff writer who gnashed her teeth against the entire gaming community.  You can also find evidence on Metacritic, where the "player" review section is getting bombed.  It's all quite entertaining.  Bring popcorn.

I read this post earlier today and just now got a few min to look into it.  Obviously, in cases like this, the place to go to see idiots bitch would be Gamefaqs.  I did that and yup, a lot of people complaining.  I also quickly browsed SomethingAwful and Reddit and saw mostly the same opinions echoed here: Game is awesome and a step up.  A few people would chime in with reasons they liked one or more of the previous games better, but really there was very little vitriol.

There are probably legitimate reasons to like the old series more if you're a fan.  Maybe the different combat styles or something, but from what I've played of this reboot, it is leaps and bounds ahead in a lot of ways and you'd think any legitimate fan of the series would have to recognize that. Keep in mind that I had no problem with DMC4 and enjoyed it quite a bit, but literally found DMC3 unplayable. So, when I see someone say something like "the writing of the new game sucks" it blows my mind.  Obviously, what they mean is that the writing sucks compared to the older games...which is (from what I can tell so far, and taking into account my limited experience with the original series) bullshit.  They either mean story, dialogue, or both:

1.) The storyline of DMC was never something that I found at all impressive or remarkable.  Fuck, I don't think I even thought about it except when playing the 4th one I actually paid attention to it somewhat. Shit wasn't Citizen Kane or even Watership Down.

2.) The dialogue and actual character/set/environment interactions outside of game-play sucked ass in the original series and I can't see this taking a turn for the worse.

Yeah, that's going to be hard to fucking top.

And I get it, maybe you're more into the over the top humours aspect of the game...but it's not like it was really consistently there or well done. "I killed a witch demon, turned her into a guitar and rocked out!"  Yeah, that's fucking hilarious.

And even if you WERE into that, you could still argue that you liked that more and complain about the DIRECTION of the new game. Just as you could complain about the DIRECTION of the Nolan batman titles if you like cheesy ass camp and neon lit sets. You can't, however, complain that the Burton or later movies were more "well written".

I think the consensus among more grounded people seems to be that a lot of people were upset that the series was getting a reboot rather than a sequel and were going to complain regardless of how the game turned out. They want 90's anime Dante and they can't have him, so fuck Dante.

Personally, I totally agree with Que and think that hardcore videogame fans are just shit. "WiiU is awesome.  Have fun with your CoD and Battlefield clones, losers!  I'm going to be balls deep in great gameplay every 18 months". "I want to fuck Tali because she's different...just like me".  "Lets make cake jokes for 6 years because we all played the same thing!"  And I think this kind of group complaining really does go back to something I've touched on before - young, hardcore gamers want what they do to be legitimized and to feel like their hobby is important and have bearing so they create scandals. They also care waaay too much about stupid shit and tend to get caught up in group-think situations. And realistically, a lot of people prone to this are probably drawn to certain franchises and genres so it's more heightened with things like DmC...because lets not kid around - The original series was Anime as fuck and we all know who that's going to primarily attract.


But really, who the fuck cares? Gamers like that are going to complain when something changes, but bombing the reviews is only really hurting themelves. They're little anime niche market wasn't enough for Capcom to make a DMC5 so they tried to gain more appeal by rebooting the franchise. These guys bomb the reviews and all they're going to get is no more DmC at all. By all means, criticize, but lets not make things a bigger deal then they need to be just because the chicks have smaller breasts and Dante looks less like a gay cartoon character.

Sorry, I kind of went long there.  I also hate "gamers".  Which is hilarious because I love video games (sometimes).

 

[Xessive]

Considering the origins of the franchise, it's hard to fault Capcom's "Team Little Devil" for focusing on gameplay over story; it was originally being developed as a Resident Evil game but as it was such a departure from the RE series instead of scrapping the project completely they re-rolled it into what became the original Devil May Cry. Interesting sets of gameplay mechanics with a shallow story slapped on to give it some sort of reasoning.

I was originally concerned about the new Dante; his new look and scrawny build seemed a bit of a stretch at the time. Yet he gradually grew on me, by the time the game had released I was ok with it, however, when I actually played the game and got properly introduced to the new Dante I see what Ninja Theory had done with the character: they gave him substance!

(click to show/hide)

I also like how Dante starts off with dark hair but gets gradually white as you unlock more Devil Trigger upgrades until it's all white. Or when you finish the game you get the white hair Dante as a skin.

EDIT:
I consider myself a gamer but I do not associate myself with these whiners. These are the same sorts of people I've heard complain about Street Fighter IV going "3D" and bitching how the game is not the same anymore.. Asshole, play the F-ing game and then make a call, you moron. There were these hordes of ignorant idiots who assumed the game had become Street Fighter EX or a Dead or Alive clone without even playing it!!

Gamers enjoy the game at its core; sure there are things to complain about at times but they are faults in the build of the game. As long as a game has a solid build a true gamer enjoys it nonetheless. I fancy myself the guy at the gameshop enlightening young gamers about the origins of gaming and the true meaning of being a gamer. *cue gospel back-vocals*

[gpw11]

Don't get me wrong, I don't fault the old games for being all cheesy....well, I kinda do, but that's just taste.   They're still good action games that did a ton for the genre.  I just think it's retarded to say that the "writing" is "bad" in the reboot and that's why it is inferior.

[gpw11]

I'm now bored of this. It's a really good game but it almost throws too many moves at you at once and I'm really developing a case of gaming ADD.  The art direction is amazing though, and I'll probably give it another go.

[Quemaqua]

I find this one actually a bit more comprehensible than the others. I sort of wonder if that might not upset some of the fans, as I remember the other games being arcane things that I loved but knew I'd never be particularly good at. This one I feel the opposite. I have a decent sense of the flow of things, and now that I've finished it on Demon Hunter and am going back on Nephilim, it's a cakewalk. I'm getting SSS combos on a pretty regular basis, have learned to some degree how to use perfect evades (especially the Demon Evade, which ups your damage output and scores considerably), juggles, and to stay airborne almost indefinitely. In fact, my only complaint is that sometimes the fights don't live up to my bloodlust. After I hit S combos a lot of times I'm starting to run out of dudes, and I wish the game would throw more of them at me. Probably one of the remixed difficulties would be better since the enemies have new attacks and more health, and there are different sets compared to the original 3 difficulties, and longer waves.

The ending was a bit overblown, but the story is really pretty good for what this thing is, and at the very least is compellingly told throughout. There are a few overdone moments toward the end that they drag out a little, and it is of course all a bit too grandiose, but the fights are fun, and there are some great little moments where you get to do awesome stuff and crazy things happen. I thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing, so now I'm going back and trying to find all the stuff I missed on the first go around (keys, souls, secret doors) plus seeing how quickly I can do the levels. Once I've found everything on this go, I'll probably go again on Son of Sparda. I don't know if I'll be maxed out by then or not. I've got all the core abilities, everything to Rebellion, everything for Arbiter, and I think everything for Osiris, and most of Ebony and Ivory, but only a scattered handful of upgrades for everything else. I need to get the rest of each weapon's combos and specials for score-combo purposes.

I normally never feel compelled to do this sort of thing with games, but finishing this the first time felt like just the beginning.

[gpw11]

So, I lost my save in the most ridiculous way you could possibly imagine (randomly pushing buttons while on the phone and not looking at the screen - which pretty much led to the perfect combination to select my save, delete it, and confirm the deletion).
 

Que's posts always bring me back into playing this but I'm thinking I don't feel like running through the first few levels again so soon. I may go back and play DMC 4 before returning to this. Because I'm kind of interested to see if there is any truth to the claims that the combat is different.

[Quemaqua]

Going through the levels again could potentially at least net you some more of the collectible goodies. But yeah, probably a little dull having just done them. I'm enjoying them a lot going through a second time, but that's mostly because now I've got 2/3 of the upgrades and can fly through the levels super fast. I'm enjoying watching the story stuff again too, though if I do another run I'll probably just skip the cutscenes. I'm just doing Nephilim now to practice combos and finish getting the stuff I missed in each level, then if I go again will do Son of Sparda fully upgraded and see how it goes. I think the one after that is the one where enemies and you die in a single hit, and they say that one goes by in a flash because the fights are so short.

[gpw11]

True, the downside is that I think deleting the actual save file deleted all my progress, so I don't have any upgrades/keys/abilities to transverse where I couldn't before.  I'll probably just take a week or so and then get back into it...if I'm not playing Tomb Raider.  In either case, I'm convinced I will return to it.

And I just took a swing at DMC4 again:

1.) It looks good, but it's amazing how far games have come in the last few years. Specifically in art direction and "cinematography".  It's like a saturation point has been hit where the marginal returns on the increased resources put into models and textures had diminished to a point where it just made more sense to allocate those resources to art direction and shader effects. The result is that things look GOOD. Just an observation I made while playing and remembering how we all thought that the last generation jump occured too quickly because, apart from higher resolutions, games didn't look all that much better.  I guess the industry just had to evolve.

2.)It's really tough to say which combat system is better. They both can be confusing when stepping in and lead to button mashing, but both are pretty awesome. The new one certainly has a much better flow though.

[Quemaqua]

Still digging on this. Almost through for the 2nd time on Nephilim, getting all the keys and souls, doing all the secret doors. Going to take a run through Son of Sparda I think before I actually fully upgrade, though I'm close now. I have all the base upgrades so I can perform every attack, just have another 5-10 upgrades for damage to go.

Really looking forward to trying the game on SOS. Nephilim has been fun, learning more of the ins and outs of the combat, the different weapons, the enemy weaknesses and patterns, how to reliably do stuff, what doesn't work, demon evade timing, and getting SSS combos more consistently. Once all the collectibles are done I can focus on doing the levels quickly. I've gotten a few SSS rankings on timing already, but I haven't really been worried about it too much either way. I'm also watching the story again, just for fun. Next time I'll be skipping all that.

This game is great.

EDIT - Crapping hell, SOS is way, way, way harder. Enemies get new combos, do more damage, have some different timings, have attacks that can't be interrupted, and they throw new mixes of them at you in addition to more waves. It's like playing an entirely different game. I'm almost 100% upgraded and you can't make dumb mistakes. Demon evade is your friend constantly, and learning how to control really bad mixes of enemies is a must.

EDIT x2 - This game is so worth playing this way. You learn a whole new level of gameplay and it gets ridiculously satisfying.

[gpw11]

And you probably just sold me again.  I'll try to hammer through the part I played through already.  I think with games like this I need to just take the stance where I plow through it the first time and then decide if I want to go back and collect a bunch of shit.  And also not be a dumbass and delete my saves in the stupidest way possible.

[Quemaqua]

For this game I think you really have to be sold on the balance of combat to want to keep going past a couple runs, though if you start to understand it, it's hard not to love. It's rewarding if you take the time to learn. I always got frustrated with the other games because I could never reliably extend my combos as long as I wanted to. This does away with that in the sense that your style points basically just keep going up as long as you don't get hit, so you mostly just have to worry about playing smart, using a variety of moves to get the most points per hit, and dishing out raw damage (which is why demon evade is so tremendously awesome... the damage bonus is big, but the point boost even more so). And obviously you want to move reasonably quick to get the highest multiplier for time at the end.

But yeah, SOS is really almost a different game. Fights I felt horribly unequipped to handle right at the start on SOS are now things I can deal with reliably. You really learn as you go, though it did take a good couple of deaths in a few maps to figure out how to deal with a certain combination of guys. Boss fights are tougher, too... new moves and stuff to deal with.

I've got almost everything now. Only things left are the single ivory door to open and I think 3 more upgrades? Something like that. I'm surprised I'm still so motivated. My only complaint at this point is that I wish there was an option to turn off all the story elements so you could just do the gameplay. Not because the story isn't good, I watched it all twice and for the most part it's great, but a lot of cutscenes in the levels mask loads and stuff, so you have to wait while whatever loads when you skip them. Would be nice if you could jump directly to controlled portions, and skip a couple of the spots where you have to do some walking or in-game conversation before things start properly.

Still, A+. This game has a ton of value for something of its type.

[sirean_syan]

Just wanted to chime in and say, yeah, the game is pretty awesome. I played it over the past couple of weekends on Nephelim and came away pretty happy. What really sold me was the sense of identity throughout the game (I'm a closet sucker for punk stuff, even though this really wasn't punk). I was probably sold the instant I saw how much thought was put into how Dante really throws himself into the last swings of combos. That sort of set the tone for me and it kept me happy throughout. It's also strangely refreshing the way the bosses and Dante traded insults throughout the fights even though they were really juvenile. Somehow they kept from getting stupid silly while still being vulgar and silly(?). The enemy and level design were also pretty top notched. I sort of dug the look of the standard enemies more than bosses, but the bosses were still good fights (one is especially awesome).

Oh yeah, and the club. That was pretty fucking rad.

[Quemaqua]

I'll second most of that. And yeah, the club was awesome. Probably my favorite level.

[gpw11]

And sold once again....just played through he first level for the second time and had a lot of fun with it.

[gpw11]

Okay, I'm enjoying this so much more now.  It's almost like the game throws too much at you (weapon/moves wise) after a certain point the first time and going through again is just so much more natural.

But still, I think they should have stuck with one grapple.  Like, it works, but it's kind of silly.

[Quemaqua]

It becomes an essential component later in the game and especially on subsequent playthroughs. There are points where you won't touch the ground for an entire fight, or will need to use both in order to navigate certain spaces during combat.

[gpw11]

I kinda saw that in the last boss battle before I lost my save, but yeah, I think it's just I still fuck up sometimes when I mean to pull a shield away and end up pulling myself into a badass demon.

[Xessive]

I kinda saw that in the last boss battle before I lost my save, but yeah, I think it's just I still fuck up sometimes when I mean to pull a shield away and end up pulling myself into a badass demon.

It took me a while to get a hang of switching between Angel mode and Demon mode, with a lot of unintended moves.

[Quemaqua]

Yeah, it's easy to fuck up at first, but it becomes second nature before too long. And you get good enough that even if you fuck up, you can immediately recover by just pulling yourself away from the tough enemy, or you know how to evade, or you can just use the close proximity to get a demon evade in to up your damage, etc. This game is super fluid. Unless you've walked directly into a big hit or combo, you can usually just jump straight back into the mix.

[gpw11]

Just finished it.  Pretty sure it's the best DmC game out there.

[Xessive]

Just finished it.  Pretty sure it's the best DmC game out there.

Oh yeah!

[Quemaqua]

For sure. Now play SOS! Even if just the first level, just to see the differences. Some wicked enemy combinations right off the bat.

[Xessive]

Vergil's Downfall is out now!