Devil May Cry 2

"DMC = Master of Puppets, DMC 2 = Re-Load"

Capcom's Devil May Cry was released in late 2001, during a kind of Silver Age of Playstation 2 releases when many great games were coming out. The hype started for it many months earlier when screenshots and movies were released, showing a half-demon vampire-killer-esque dude sword-uppercutting enemies into the air and then suspending them with twin pistols. A demo was cleverly placed as part of the billionth iteration of Resident Evil, and many players bought the game just for that (yes, I was one). Salivating over its slick, fast-paced gameplay and overall sense of style, players couldn't wait for the final game to be released. In October 2001 it was released to mostly-universal critical acclaim by editorials and players alike, with only the cries of wimpy casual gamers who can't get past the first spider boss, and RPG freaks who need every game to be at least 50 hours or actually thought the game might have a story on the level of FF7 or Xenogears naysaying.

Being that this is Capcom, the professors of Franchise Milking 101, the inevitable sequel was soon announced and on its way. Players figured the formula would be the same with the usual minor sequel tweaks like more levels, more moves, and a new character, and since DMC was a faster and more fun Onimusha, which was a faster and more fun Resident Evil, the sequel should be just as great, right? Right?

Wrong. Somehow everything about Devil May Cry has become inept, forced, or just flat-out boring. How is this possible?

Well, one main factor is the new, inexperienced development team. Instead of building upon the groundwork laid for them by the previous team, they decided to tweak and alter and change things around (maybe to make a name for themselves?) enough so now the DMC we knew in 2001 is a far different animal than the DMC2 that we now see. The balance has been thrown off, the game has been made far easier, even the campy story and dialogue from the first game has been replaced by flat, emotionless, cutouts and seemingly random story events which make little sense and have no cohesion or explanation.

But wait, who cares about the story in an action game? Well, normally, I'd agree. The point of the game is the action, right? If I wanted a story, I'd play an RPG. (Actually, I'd read a book, but I'm staying in context) However, most developers these days feel the need to flesh out their action games with some intermittent story scenes to at least explain why the Evil Bad Guy is who he is. Kind of like how even the most generic action movies take some time out to have a few plot points. And so, the least Capcom could have done was to create a token story that while maybe predictable, wrapped itself up at the end (and maybe teased for yet another sequel). But no, they decided to approach vague levels of abstraction. The beginning nor the end is nowhere to be found. Events happen without rhyme or reason, characters are introduced with little or no backstory, and there's little satisfaction to be gleaned from the ending. Again, I'm not saying this has to be MGS2 length here, but I would have preferred no interfering story scenes at all or very obvious ones instead of the confusion and resulting resentment. Ask someone if they know what the story to DMC2 is and see if they can tell you anything beyond ''well some evil guy is trying to take over the world with artifacts, i think??'' It's a sad state when the story is inferior to even DMC's B-movie quality.

Fortunately, the story is the least important point here. The gameplay in an action game is of course the main crux of whether a game succeeds or fails. Much of the original Devil May Cry's success came from its white-knuckle action as you shot and slashed enemies in cramped quarters, using moves and combos that you bought yourself earlier in the game. The boss battles were explosive as you used all of your skills (both in the game and as a video game player) to barely evade death's door. Many players were crushed and gave up in frustration (if temporarily) at the very first boss, but the exhilaration you felt at success inspired you to continue onward and find out what new challenges await in the next mission.

DMC2 evokes none of these same feelings.

What's gone wrong? Well, the design team in all of their tweaking and changing of things, apparently thought the first game was too difficult. So, now they've swung the pendulum in the other direction and made the game too easy instead. The twin pistols Ebony and Ivory return with newly ramped-up power and force. Many minor enemies will now enter a kind of ''stun pose'' after being shot repeatedly, rendering them near-helpless until they expire. At the same time, the enemy A.I. is just chilling out, with only the occasional lunge, shot, or swing at Dante's form. What does this mean? It means you can pretty much stand back and hold down the fire button and watch the auto-aiming take out most of the enemies for you. And you can't do much manual aiming, as the lock-on system is haphazard at best with the game wanting to target the nearest enemy for you most of the time. The famed uppercut-gun juggle move has been pretty much castrated now due to the overriding auto-aiming. Even if multiple enemies happen to rush you, the stun effect from being shot allows the auto-aiming to target them all by the time they reach you. Nothing like having to work hard for results, right?

What about the sword, Dante's other weapon? It's now become just a mere backup to the overwhelming power of guns. If any scary enemy happens to scarily come within 10 feet of you, you can just perform some simple sword button-mash combos and knock them flying backwards. Some enemies are strong enough to resist one or two sword strikes without being stunned, but these enemies tend to be slow and lumbering which means, yes, you can circle around them endlessly with your guns. Not even multiple enemies can give you much trouble. A particular scene near the end has a small elevator on the outside of a building where Dante becomes surrounded by several enemies. No problem. Just hack away and the auto-aiming and wide range of the sword will take care of everything without a scratch.

This kind of simplistic design further shows through with the sub-weapons. The shotgun from the first game returns, as well as a pair of submachine guns and a missile launcher. Gee, didn't we see these in Doom 10 years ago? I'm sure there's something even earlier than that. The shotgun is slow to fire and slower to reload, the submachine guns have no power at all, and the missile launcher only works against enemies that move at a snail's pace (of which there are a few). So you'll be relying on your twin pistols most of the time, leading to seemingly endless long-range shooting against enemies that weakly fight back.

And long-range shooting is what you'll be doing most of the time, as the environments in DMC2 have been made bigger and more expansive. There is now much more room to move around and dodge, if need be, and the camera has been pulled back much farther. Unfortunately, this doesn't alleviate any of the camera problems that plague these kinds of third-person shooters. There will be many, many occasions when your enemies will be off-screen, never to approach as your guns pin them in place, leaving you to watch an enemy life meter gradually decrease on-screen, to be eventually replaced by several more belonging to unseen enemies. This leads to boredom of these filler action scenes with no challenge or excitement. An action game where you have little risk of dying also provides little chance of fun. Even more irritating are the token scenes of platform jumping where the inept camera angles give you little depth perception to Dante and the surrounding environment.

But, some games manage to redeem themselves with epic boss battles at the culmination of a level. DMC had those battles, starting from the very first boss, the lava spider. Each boss battle was challenging and worthwhile and the persistence of certain bosses throughout the game created a persistence within yourself that drove you to kill them one more time.

Here is where DMC2 perhaps has its biggest failures. The boss battles in the game are even easier and weaker than the action scenes leading up to them. The bosses themselves are bigger and look great, but it's all flash and no substance. With just one or two types of easily-countered attacks to worry about, the bosses are just well-armored pattern-based wastes of time. You'll feel cheated as you come in expecting some kind of grandiose battle to occur and leave with little damage a few minutes later. Even the return of a previous boss from DMC can't save this failure as he falls into the same kind of yawn-inducing battle as any of the others.

The upgrade and combo systems have been similarly simplified. No longer do you need to purchase sword or devil-trigger moves and then use them to perform a ''Stylish!'' combo to get more red orbs. Now, you just upgrade the guns and swords' power themselves to make them stronger. Being that the twin pistols are so powerful, and that one sword is not much different or better than any other, you'll find the upgrading to be just replacing the odd Vital Star as you wait for the next five-digit-cost basic weapon enhancement.

As you're left to sludge through the 18 or so missions (with an even shortened version of the game as the secondary character, Lucia), you'll wonder where it all went wrong. Capcom certainly knows how to milk a successful formula, and in fact it's almost ironic that by changing it around they're encountered failure. DMC2 is merely average and completely devoid of any great moments that gamers identify with a classic game. It's actually fortunate that the game is mercifully short (less than five hours) when the combat is this bland. However, I still think the game is worth one play-through on a rental basis, just so you can say you've played it and formed your own opinion. But only one. The first DMC, like Master of Puppets, was exciting, intense, and ground-breaking, while DMC2 like Re-Load, is sterile, unchallenging, and hopefully succeeded by something better.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 03/16/03, Updated 03/16/03