So far this year I’ve completed both Wolfenstein: The New Order and Wolfenstein: The New Colossus. Now I can add hack n slash Devil May Cry 2 to my list. Just like the others though I’ll have to go back and play it again as Lucia. I may also have to play again anyway just to stream it, I feel like it would make good commentary fodder just because of how bad it is. :v:
I have to say out of all of the Devil May Cry games I found DMC2 to be the easiest one to play, and also the most off-putting as I referenced in an early impression of the game. On its surface it seems like a promising game, but between the even weirder camera, the lackluster combat, broken-ish boss fights as well as lame enemy designs (what were they even smoking when they were making possessed infected tanks and helicopters?), boring level design and the super serious Dante I just wasn’t impressed. Perhaps if I play it on hard it might make the gameplay more of a challenge, but from what I’ve been reading I’m not entirely sure.
Some of the bossfights are just outright broken. For example this pile of shit right here! This is a collection of every single boss you’ve fought already in other chapters all forever trapped in a pile of dung. If you kill any one of the monsters they’ll melt back into the pile, and from there you can stand slightly out of reach and finish them off with a rocket launcher. I did it single handed, I’m guessing this was intentional so the developers could wank off during play tests. :zorak: In other DMC games the bosses seem really difficult, to the point that I have to look up a tutorial for how to defeat them once in awhile, but in this game I haven’t had that kind of trouble. If anything I had to look up tutorials for how to solve a couple puzzles or where to go. For example in mission 9 you need to get out of a building in a certain amount of time before you die, and some of the doors were a little too well hidden to the point of frustration. Fortunately there was a video I found by IGN that helped me get out of there. I’m the kind of person who hates breaking down and using tutorials or walkthroughs to get anything in a game accomplished, but I don’t think I would have ever figured this one out without one.
There were also inconsistencies when it came to going to other rooms. Some of the doors you walk up to automatically transport you to the next sections, some others require you to press a button like in the other games. When I entered the demon world I tried to go through the elevator and it wouldn’t let me walk through. After exploring a bit more I went back up to it and pressed a button on my controller and sure enough I was riding the Hellevator!
If it’s any small saving grace I did like the character designs. Dante still looks really cool, it’s just unfortunate that his personality was replaced with a wooden plank. Even with the bad voice acting in DMC3 he at least had more of a personality. But here he’s just super serious all the time, and on the off chance he makes a smartassed remark it just doesn’t feel like what I’ve played of the other games.
The ending could have been done better too. After defeating the final boss, Dante rides his motorcycle (that I’m guessing he pulled out of his ass just like in other random cutscenes) deeper into hell with no further explanation, then the game tells me what I’ve unlocked and to play the Lucia Disc (I guess the PS2 version had Dante and Lucia separated on two different discs and they never bothered changing it out for re-release on other platforms).
Overall I am glad I finally got to play this, but at the same time it’s nice to know I never missed out on anything. I always heard DMC2 was terrible, now I have a full understanding as to why.