Devil May Cry 4 Review

"You got a jacked up notion of fair play, pal, and it's beginning to piss me off."

Some gamers may bemoan Devil May Cry's gameplay style and its initially awkward combat system, but if you're looking for a fast action, no bars, stylish hack and slash that'll unapologetically kick your ass (you masochist), look no further than Devil May Cry 4. DMC4 is the latest in a long-standing line of action games from Capcom that focuses on the cocky, swordswinging half-demon Dante and newcomer Nero as the prior crashes rather violently into the latter's life.

One fateful churchgoing day, Nero and his love interest Kyrie bear witness to a silver-haired assassin in a red coat crashing through the ceiling and planting a bullet between their pastor's eyes. Unapologetically proceeding to slaughter the religious warriors who try to take the man down, this "mysterious" man is only fought off when Nero joins the fray. Shortly afterwards, demons begin to engulf the town and Nero is ordered to hunt down Dante so that he can be brought to justice and, presumably, so that the random slaughtering of innocents can be stopped.

The core of DMC gameplay under Nero's guise is very similar to DMC 1 and 3 in that all of the moves are very character-centric: depending on whether the enemy is locked on to, which direction the enemy is in relative to Nero, which direction the control stick is pressed, and the timing of the weapon strikes, different attacks may be pulled off in succession with varying effects, power, and ensuing vulnerability. Unlike past titles though, Nero has a certain flair that gives him an edge over his demonic foes: a demonic arm which allows him to draw enemies towards him, crush them into the pavement, toss them around like cheap toys, or make their faces implode (Ouch). It's no mystery who the father is, but Nero's radically different powers and his inexperience in the demon-hunting arena make him a relatively easy transition into the game for newcomers who may not have had too much experience with DMC gameplay.

A slight SPOILER will follow this sentence! Dante! Dante, Dante, DANTE! You can play as the guy you're supposed to! Who'd have thunk. Anywho, Dante's been given a massive upgrade from his DMC3 days. Instead of selecting which weapons and style you're going to go through the mission with (Trickster, amirite?), Dante can use ALL of them throughout the level. Though he can't dual-equip styles, he is able to instantaneously switch between any of his four styles on the fly in any situation and he can do the same for the weapons he will gain throughout the game. This makes for some very awesome gameplay. Though I haven't exactly ever gotten decent with using Dante, the possibility of swapping to the right style and weapon for each step of a combo that'll blast away entire mobs of enemies while stylishly weaving between torrents of attacks is exactly how a stylistic hack and slash should operate. You could even potentially pull off fight scenes that are like in the cinematics if you're good enough, though it's freaking hard.

Alas, I took a short break to look up videos of gameplay to see if I could use a screenshot for a picture, and my soul is crushed seeing how bad I am at this series compared to some insanely stylish guy (wow, I suck at DMC3)...But anyways! It is difficult to put into words what exactly the entertainment value of games like DMC4 is without selling it short. After watching that video, I feel an intense urge to get good at DMC4, so I'll wrap up with saying that the gameplay is stellar, the narration's pretty good for a game where you wouldn't expect a story, the music is good though not on the level of DMC3, the atmosphere isn't too great due to the fact that each area is unique though lacking in personality, and the graphics are great. The ratings are a corresponding 5, 4, 4, 3, and 4, resulting in an overall rating of 4.0. Screw ratings though, you can't judge a lot of games by its sheer components, so I'm going to say that this game kicks ass and I love it and think it should get more than a 4.0. Adios, and have a happy new year!