Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening

"My favorite action/adventure game for the PS2, hands down."

Devil May Cry 3 is what you would hope for in a action/adventure game and probably more. The gameplay is what makes this game superior to the others in the series. Some fans of the series might be skeptical about buying this one after the letdown Devil May Cry 2 brought upon us. This game put the series back on the map. It is a prequel to the other games and it far superior. It is extremely fun and it was definitely worth my time. Read the rest of my review to see if you think it will be worth yours.

Graphics 9/10

Graphically this game is very impressive. The charachter models are simply stunning. Dante's hair is detailed right down to the last strand and for the PS2 thats pretty impressive. The lighting effects could be a little better but Dante does have a shadow which is good. The environments are excellent. They are big and very detailed. This is the best in the series graphic wise, no suprise because it's the latest in the series but they still did a nice job on todays standards.

Sound 9/10

First off, the soundtrack for DMC3 is metal. Me, being a fan of rock music personally I enjoy this quite a bit. If your dont like the heavy guitars and screaming music you might want to turn the sound down. The sound effects are simply amazing hearing the sword whoosh! through the air every time you swing it. Or, the crisp boom! after every shot of Ebony and Ivory (your handguns) no matter how quick you fire. The voiceovers are the only thing that really needs improving. They aren't all bad its just they can be cheesy at times and it seems some of the actors tried a little to hard, it wasn't very natural sounding. For the most part the sounds was very appealing to my ears except for a few minor problems.

Story 8/10

In an action/adventure game I'm not really looking for the story, but the gameplay and fun factor. Though Devil May Cry 3 does come with a nice story. You start off playing as a young man named Dante. He is part demon part human. Dante is just sitting in his newly built shop minding his own when a man walks through the front door. He goes by the name of Arkham and tells Dante his twin brother Virgil wishes to meet him. He then summons a horde of demons and then the first mission begins. As the story progressess you learn Vergil's plots and why he wanted to meet Dante after them not seeing each other for years. There are cut scenes before and after every mission. Some of them can get a little long-winded and somewhat unentertaining but most involve Dante doing some crazy fighting and tearing up demons which will surely keep your eyes on the screen. The overall plot is above decent for this genre of game. The charachters, for the most part, are well developed and you will have different ideas about each one from when the story started to when it ends.

Gameplay and Controles 10/10

The gameplay for DMC3 is much more like the original than Devil May Cry 2. Which, in my opinion, is a good thing. The control schem works very well and is very fluid. I will tell you right now this game is no button mashing hack and slash. It takes time to get good. Knowing the conroles and being good with them is one of the few keys to your survival. Like in previous games square is shoot and triangle is slash with your sword. You can change your weapons in battle like in previous Devil May Cry's but you can only have 2 weapons equiped at a time. You cannot scroll through your entire inventory mid-battle. You can rotate the camera with the right analog stick which at times is very helpful but other times does nothing. For some reason the camera can get stuck in mid-battle and you cannot rotate the camera and you can't see Dante.
The biggest new item they added to the gameplay was Dante's different fighting styles. They include trickster, gunslinger, sword master, royal guard and a couple others. Depending on which style you use for boss fights can be very important and vital to winning the fight without using many items. They each have their own special abilities and those abilities can be performed by pressing the circle button. Also these styles can be leveled up to learn new abilities. As always in Devil May Cry style is important for getting a good rank and in this game good style is achieved by using different weapons and performing many different combos. There is a meter which appears on the screen and if you get it full by attacking once it goes full it goes up a level. For instance it goes from Dope to Crazy to Blast to Awesome to Style to SStylish and finally to SSStylish. The meter goes down if you do not attack or repeat the same combo. This adds to the fun factor of the game trying to get the best style possible. Though the story is good as mentioned before it will definitely be the gameplay that keeps your fingers wrapped around the controler.

Difficulty 9/10

Yes, this game is very tough and probably harder than what most expect. I actually ended up with the game because a friend of mine couldn't beat the third mission. But, it can be beaten with a little hard work and some patience. You will most likely die rather often and loose the motivation to play at times but every mission can eventually be beaten, trust me. You can just abuse the use of vital stars or just play until you have enough practice either will work. Most boss fights take quite a long time to beat and you will often find yourself dying on normal enemies. The game seems like it gets easier as it goes. Not that it actually does but like I said above you become more used to the controles and you will become better without even realizing it. Even though this may be the hardest game I have played in a very long time I am not giving the difficulty a 10/10 because once you beat the game once it's pretty much no problem playing it through again. Every time you get a level higher in difficulty it seems like your just playing it on normal when you first played. After beating hard mode normal mode seems like a joke. Still the first time you play it through will probably be one of the toughest gaming expieriences you've had. Maybe even the toughest, that is if you don't play it on Dante Must Die mode which is extremely aggravating.

Replay Value: high

The reason this games replay value is high mainly because of the great gameplay and all the different modes you can play it on. There are 5 different difficulty modes and many things to unlock. You can unlock different costumes for Dante, there is 6 all together i believe. Also after you beat it the first time on easy or normal you get the gallery which has a whole bunch of cool stuff to look at and watch. There are videos concept arts etc. You get more stuff in your gallery for every difficuly you beat. I have been playing a combined time of 30 hours and there is still stuff i have to do. You will most likely find yourself playing and enjoying this game for quite some time.

Buy/Rent/Pass

Hands down definitely a must own. If you have played all the others and even after my review is skeptical about playing this one because of DMC2 you will like it. Trust me this one is much better. Even if you are new to the series this one is a good one to start with because it is a prequel and you don't have to know the story of the previous ones to get this one. it should only be 20 bucks now. That is a great price for a great game. I highly reccomend that you buy this game

Overall Score 9/10
-ABUSIVExGAMER

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 04/24/06