Devil May Cry 1-5 & DmC

[KSubzero1000]

LEAKED:


Trailer isn't as well produced as the others and rehashes a lot of previous scenes, but first official V footage! Now that's just... completely different. Environments look drab, but that gameplay looks sick. Also, Bloody Palace. WANT

[KSubzero1000]

Donguri is just too sick not to share. (Heightened syntax anxiety on that sentence, btw.)

[Scrustle]

Anyone else play the DMC5 demo? I really liked it, but I've still got a few hangups about the game. Combat feels really good and feels pretty familiar, but with a new fluidity to it that is pretty nice. In a sense it feels a little looser than 4, but not in a way that feels like it hurts the experience. You still feel completely in control of everything. It's kind of like the different between Yakuza 6 and the previous games, but without all the issues 6 had because of how it changed things. The general pace feels a little bit quicker, but I think that's down to the improved mobility options you get, since the speed of combos feels pretty much the same. Lock-on walking speed is a bit quicker too. I ended up liking the Devil Breaker mechanics more than I thought I would. Before I was worried that they would be annoying as a limited resource, and that it meant you would only be able to have the same mechanics from 4 with certain Breakers. Turns out you can still grapple no matter what you have, and the Breakers themselves are pretty easy to hang on to if that's what you want. Still not entirely sure on the whole idea though. They could be more fragile in the final game, and being forced to destroy your current one to change to another might end up being a pain.

Still not crazy about the aesthetic of this game, but actually seeing it in action on my own TV, it did look a bit better than I was expecting it to. The colours are a bit more vivid than what the drab trailers had presented. Might be because I have the colour turned up a bit on my TV though, but that does help. Lighting effects during combat were pretty nice too. Helps fights have an extra bit of visual flair, with light and particles coming of your sword when you pull off an Exceed attack, and the flashes from the various Breaker abilities. But there was also one thing about the combat that I wasn't so keen on as well. There seems to be some issues with sound design, with your sword attacks feeling like they don't have as much impact. Sound effects for swinging your sword and hitting things are really pushed back in to the mix compared to 4. It's something I already picked out in trailers seeing Dante's gameplay, since his Rebellion is lacking its very distinctive sound that it previously had. Seems like this is an issue for Nero as well. It isn't disastrously bad, and can be mitigated somewhat by changing the audio range and just turning up the volume. Still, it's a shame this is an issue. Could conceivably be fixed by final release, but I kind of doubt it will be.

[KSubzero1000]

I don't have an Xbox One, so I couldn't play the demo. I'm curious, though. Would you mind elaborating on the

improved mobility options

you mentioned? It's difficult to know how everything works from just watching the trailer.

Also, sorry to hear about the audio design issue. It sounds (ahuhu) like the kind of thing that would fly under most people's radar, but would certainly be noticeable to dedicated players once they're in the zone. And now that you mention it, the trailers did indeed lack a certain je ne sais quoi in the audio feedback department...

[Scrustle]

I don't have an Xbox One, so I couldn't play the demo. I'm curious, though. Would you mind elaborating on the improved mobility options you mentioned? It's difficult to know how everything works from just watching the trailer.

One of the Breakers, Gerbera, gives you the ability to launch yourself in pretty much any direction. Hitting B/circle and a direction while not locked on will boost you in whatever direction you're pointing. You can do it in the air or on the ground, but on ground it will also launch you upwards. It also damages and launches nearby enemies too. So that gives you a really powerful option to get out of a lot of bad situations. And combining it with Calibur and Snatch gives you loads of mobility in the air.

[KSubzero1000]

Ah, cool. So it's like a powerful but limited version of Trickster for Nero, then?

[KSubzero1000]

Final DMCV trailer just came out. It shows... a lot. Mostly stuff that could have been inferred already. But I kinda regret having watched it, so be careful if you're sensitive about spoilers and still wanna have some story surprises left when the game arrives next week.

[Scrustle]

Yeah, I've been mostly avoiding trailers for the same reason. There's a few things I've accidentally seen that I wish I hadn't, but I'm still relatively clean I think. Not that I expect the game will have some amazing story I don't want to spoil, but things like bosses and environments I would rather come across naturally in the game and be a nice surprise. But not long to go now!

[Magical_Isopod]

Yes hello I just wanted to say that DmC is my favourite in the series and I probably won't buy DMC5 because Mikami Dante is just kind of lame.

[KSubzero1000]

Mikami Dante is just kind of lame.

...What does Mikami have to do with a character created by Kamiya and who has remained under Itsuno's exclusive supervision since 2003??

[Magical_Isopod]

Mikami Dante is just kind of lame.

...What does Mikami have to do with a character created by Kamiya and who has remained under Itsuno's exclusive supervision since 2003??

I get Mikami and Kamiya confused all the time. Kamiya is the one obsessed with Super Seinen and unfunny "comedy" scenes, right?

[KSubzero1000]

Kamiya is the one obsessed with Super Seinen and unfunny "comedy" scenes, right?

Yep, that's the one.

[KSubzero1000]

Watching some more gameplay footage, I'm getting slowly but surely really hyped for this.

...It's gonna be a long week.

[KSubzero1000]

HE'S BACK

[Scrustle]

Pretty cool. I should make some stuff like that. I've got a bunch of clips saved of some good fights, but they're usually pretty chaotic and can be hard to see what's going on. Focusing on building something in the training room sounds like a good idea though.

Also this is sort of related to a thing I was thinking about from playing recently. For some reason I find it extremely hard to get to the highest style ranks with Nero, despite feeling like I have a better handle on him than any of the characters. It was always the same in 4 as well. I can get to S, but really struggle to get higher than that. Yet with V and Dante I've got quite a few SSS ranks without really trying overly hard. I definitely don't use everything Dante has available to him, yet his style rank just seems to climb much more quickly than Nero's. I kind of suspect that's maybe on purpose, since Dante is canonically meant to be better, but I don't know. I've heard people say they have a tough time with Dante instead too.

[KSubzero1000]

Are you using MAX-Act or at the very least EX-Act often enough? I find that my style meter with Nero usually depends on how often I land those during the fight.

[Scrustle]

Yup I'm definitely using Exceed as much as I can. Far from perfect with it but I think I do okay.

Maybe I could be using Breakers more, but I am still trying to make a point of using them too. But that wouldn't make sense with having the same problem in 4, not having that variety available.

[KSubzero1000]

Yup I'm definitely using Exceed as much as I can. Far from perfect with it but I think I do okay.

Great! Yeah, I'm not exactly consistent with it either.

One other thing I've noticed is that the taunt is rather temperamental. It will only give a style bonus at the very end of the animation, but simply pressing the taunt button is enough to prevent future taunts from counting. So don't taunt unless you're sure you have enough time for the whole thing. Air taunts are usually the safest bet thanks to their mobility.

[KSubzero1000]

So apparently the latest DMC5 patch tweaked the final boss' moveset as well as adding the

Spoiler: show

concentration mechanic from DMC4 to his debug version

!!

E3 suddenly became a lot more interesting.