Devil May Cry 2

"Petiton: This game is now "Bob's Day Out""

Devil May Cry II is a 3D action and adventure game. This is the direct sequel of the VERY popular Devil May Cry (I). This is a major disappointment as a sequel of one of the best action game ever made and a little bit as a video game it self.

Through out this review I will first describe DMC2 as game itself (stand alone; as if DMC1 did not even exist) then I will compare it to DMC1. I am doing this to give both sides and to be as fair as I possibly can. Also this some people may of actually hated the original DMC because of things and might actually like this one much better. Let me break it down for you.

Game Play:
The game play, as you all know, makes the game and is the best and the most important quality in a game. For the majority, this game displays sub par gameplay bars and it seems the creators of this game were just a little too lazy to make this game the best it could have been.

The concept: The concept of this game is very simple, even more so than the original. You are Dante or Lucia. You run around in a 3D environment and try your best to kill things. There are small little puzzles to be solved but they are not hard to solve. In this game, you can run, jump, shoot, attack, shoot and attack, and do a bunch of other various moves. If you ever played a general action and adventure game, you know what kind of game this is, I will now go deeper.

Movement: This game at first site may look like it is going to be another one of those Resident Evil type clones where you have to hold up to move forward. Sure this is more efficient and accurate than most 3D games, but this idea made the game run slow. DMC2 takes after the first one, in the way it brilliantly did its movement aspect. Whatever direction you press on the direction pad is where you go on the screen relative to your point of view rather which way your character is looking. This is by far the best 3D system for movement. There is one slight problem in this area of movement. That is if the camera changes around you have to hold down the same direct to move the way you were going. This ok until you have to turn and you end up double backing any ways. Jumping in this game is way easy which is a good thing. Lucia, the female character, gets to swim. The swimming in this game is really bad and could have been done better. When you swim, you are in a third person view like always and you move like a snail stuck in quicksand. Not only that, but there is an under water level where you have to activate about six switches in a short amount of time. Not only is it hard to get aimed up right and find these triggers in the first place, but you also have your two mile a hour swing slowing you down. Then top this all of with a poorly made under water boss, and you got your self a crappy concept of swimming. Ground movement actually looks like it improved over the original DMC, I am sure why, but I think it is because of the pulled back camera and it seems like it changes the viewpoint less often. The jumping got better and worst. It got worst because Dante jumps WAY too high for how far he goes. It got better because now you start with a double jump right from the get go this makes things. The swimming has gotten god awful in this installment as I explained before. The swimming from DMC1 was quick and in first person and there was no puzzles or hard enemies, the swimming in DMC2 just ruined the game farther.

Combat: The general combat system has gotten worse and easier (Noobie friendly). First off, let me start on what it is like. You can attack with either your guns or your sword, and even both. You see, you can do combos with your. The game also features several moves, like a the Stinger, in which you trust you sword forward and the High Time, which is a uppercut with your sword. You upgrade your swords and all that happens is I believe damage increase. Your guns can be used to lift enemies off the ground and as a long range form of damage. These can also be up graded and perform kind of lame special moves. There is also a combo rating system on “Style,” this system is used to calculate how many red orbs you will receive (Red orbs are still DMC's form of currency) on the defeat of an enemy. To avoid attacks enemies dish out, you can dodge in many ways. You need to either roll, back flip, or do a hand-less cartwheel since you can not block at all in this game. Also, a very important part of the game, is the Devil Trigger. This is the way you change into a devil. This will allow you to attack stronger and in special ways and do other things like fly and regain health. What you can do is determined buy the type of “heart” you have equipped. The combat did not get better for the most part. First off, they raped the Devil Arm system from the first game (Which let you have three VERY different swords each with there own Devil Trigger.). The devil trigger system in this game is also bad. You only get to choose really three things. To attack faster (lightning) To slow enemies (Frost) or to be a little bit stronger (Fire). The only thing this really changes, is the flashy color of when you attack. The upgrade systems sucks for the most part and is worse than the original’s concept of buying moves instead of make this game more RPG’ish. Any ways, now you have three swords with each character. Each sword has the same moves and is just like the one before. They vary a little bit in damage, speed, and range but they only really differ in appearance. This makes the game lame. The projectile weapons in this game are WAY too powerful. You can stand back for a whole Boss fight just shooting, this obviously makes the game too unbalanced to be worth using. The guns do, however, have useless moves, such as the “Rain Storm” Which at the apex of your jump, if you shoot, you will turn completely upside down and shoot strait into the ground. This move never hits any thing besides the tank enemies. Although the dodging is WAY better in this game than in DMC I the wall running is all just lame matrix hype as double jumping is so much more efficient than running up the wall like an idiot. The combo system also took a large fall. Remember how easy it was to be “Stylish” in the first game? Well now it is near impossible to get a good rank in style and reach a SHOWTIME!! With out fighting weak enemies or being in a closed spaced. Why the closed space? Well because now a stinger will launch an enemy flying off the screen. Not only that, but it takes forever to get to even the first rank because you will usually kill all the enemy off before hand. The devil trigger is now more of a puzzle solving requirement rather than a way of fighting, it is weaker than before and you hardly have anything special in it.

Enemies: This game is mostly action so it is heavily focused on you killing demons and monsters. First off, there are exactly 45 different enemies in this game for you to slaughter. These enemies range from freaky ass caged skeletons to giant goats. Most of these enemies use about two attacks and are generic. They are, for the most part well designed but there are a few cliches. In this one city level you fight tanks! This concept is lame as all hell and looks like it was ripped right from Shinobi. Most enemies are too dumb to know how to attack and actually will wait right in front of just standing there like blind idiots. Enemies in this game can just be killed in ONE way, by dodging back and shooting. This makes them all the same. Also, there are WAY too many enemies that take to the air. Combine this with the that fact that Dante has almost no air offensive out of his Devil Trigger, these turn into LONG boring tests of you holding down the shoot button. One more thing I noticed is very wrong with the basic enemies you fight... They all like to spawn off screen and attack you while the camera is not even on them. This also forces you, again, to use your projectile weapons. Every enemy in this game in this game, save for the goats, are a disgrace to the original DMC. Enemies in that game had well over five attacks each, even the basic puppets. Most enemies in DMC2 have one move! For instants, there is the basic monkey type enemy, the first ones you find only can claw, that’s it! Unless you are off screen or sleeping, these attacks should never hit you. Also, there original only had one palette swapped enemy, in DMC2, there are four types of these monkey creatures, talk about RPG’ism. Remember how good the files were for enemies in DMC1? They had an average of about seven big paragraphs for each enemy. The DMC2 file has about a long sentence. Not only that, in the original, you had to see the enemy’s attack to add it to the file, with them getting maxed out the first time you see them, this takes away all reasons to try and see new things about them. The only thing better in this game with regular enemies, is that try all have life bars. This can help newer people, but is mostly not needed. They are also hard to see.


Bosses: The bosses in this game are just like the enemies, lame. First off, there are way too many bosses in this game. DMC1 had re-occurring bosses for a reason. Most bosses in this game are so freaking easy and some have no attacks at all! There is a moth boss that does not attack you at all. It does however release annoying tremors that like to eat you, but that is all it does! Speaking of which, most bosses now have something interfering with you. Whether is be those little Msiras or Caged Skeletons. I guess they try and make up for the crappy boss, so they have to try and make it seem like it is better. In the original, all the bosses kicked my ass the first time through. The bosses in this game can just be beaten all the same way, give or take two. Just run away and shoot. Most bosses are either impossible to kill up close with out getting hit twenty times or they fly. Oh... Let me tell you about the Helicopter boss. But when you first find it, you kill it. Then it goes away. Then you are in a building it comes back... You kill it again... This goes on three more times. Want to know how to kill it? Shoot, hold down square. You can skip the first four fights, but nobody knows that on their first play through. The bosses in this game have no personality at all! They do not talk, and all except one, is fought for no reason at all. What makes this game sad, is that in DMC1, a frost and a shadow have more detail, moves, and work put into them than more than 90% of the bosses in this game.

Puzzles: The puzzles in this game are easy and more of a chore than actual puzzles. They mainly consist as hitting globe switches. This is lame and is not that great of an idea. Some “puzzles” span way too long and start to get annoying. The thing that makes this even worse is the fact that you have to hit a striking globe about twenty times before it actually activates. In DMC1, the wall switches can be turned on with a single combo, in this one, it takes four. Combine that fact, and the fact that it is god near impossible to hit one of these with enemies around, this will really get under your skin. There is also no point in these puzzles, except the fact to make the game seem longer, which is bad since puzzles suck in the first place. The puzzles in the original game have a point with in the story. In DMC2, they did not need to be there.

Layout: This game is broken up into missions. Dante has a total of 18 missions while Lucia has a total of 13 missions. After each mission, you can save and get an opportunity to buy stuff. After each level you get to see how you ranked and the rubric that you are graded on. That is about it. Generally, the layout is the same. Only there are few things I have to mention. First off, in the first one, the mission system did not restrict you to any part of the game. In this game once you beat a level, you can not get back to it at all! This makes it annoying when you are trying to get red orbs, because you are restricted to only a very select few places to fight and gain anything. The end ranking system is better, because now you know why you get what you get, but it is pointless because you will find out it is near impossible to S rank anything with out trying your heart out. Another thing that is good, after you beat the game, you have a level select option to go to any stage you have beaten. This does make it immensely easier when trying to S rank the game, but again, S ranking is pointless because it is too hard and it doesn’t even reward you with anything special. Oh yeah, just to let you know, Most of Dante’s levels are shared with Lucia’s levels. Save two water levels, because those are about Lucia’s only unique levels. Only sometimes she will have to travel backwards through the level.

That pretty much sums up the game play for this game. There is not any real improvement. True I did say the dodging was a lot better, but I will explain why that ultimately makes the game worse. If I didn’t stress it enough by now, the main theme of this game is to kill things and most of the fights in this game are boring. Just so you know, they took out the taunting and gun charged DT shots...
Below Average

Challenge:
This game’s difficulty is a major disappointment. This game is easy, now let me explain why. First off there is three difficulties levels you can choose from, each is unlocked after you beat both character’s one before it. You start off Normal. The normal difficulty is just like Easy auto of the first game. Easy enemies that have low health and are weak as balls. They do not even attack that often and not once was I like “Oh My God, it is going to kill me! Your guns you use are too strong also, and you can beat most enemies by just standing way back and holding down square. This is not only boring, but doing this gives you no sense of accomplishment. Any ways, when you go into your devil trigger, you gain way too much life back, this makes most damage races with you and bosses your victory so easily. Bosses are just as lame as the enemies and take very little skill. Hell, some bosses will attack you and miss, and still combo in the WRONG direction! This lets you see how well they worked on creating an effective AI.

When you are done in normal, you can now go to hard (That is after you waste your time with Lucia’s normal difficulty). So, is hard actually hard? Hell no. Want to know the only difference from normal to hard? The enemies just have 50% more health! That is it! This game has to be one of the cheapest games made for it budget mostly because of this. Instead of making the enemies smarter or putting more of the harder ones in place of the easier ones, they just made them long to kill. They try to make it seem harder. If you played Normal, it was probably too easy for you, hard just is a waste of time. The hard mode in this game is still easier than the first ones normal mode.

So now you must think Dante (Lucia) Must Die! will be hard right? Nah, it is about half the difficulty of DMC’s Hard mode. The only difference really now, is that enemies can use a devil trigger like you, just like in DMC1. There is just another thing wrong with this. It seems the testers did not even try this game out. In the original DMC, enemies used their devil triggers if you took too long to kill them, in the sequel they use that ability way too soon. Since they are harder to stun and thus attack in melee, you must resort to long range once again.

This games dodging system is way too easy to pull off. You do not have to try hard and even know what the hell they are throwing at you. This also makes you look dumb, because you are doing roll dodge after roll dodge... In DMC1, it takes skill to dodge, as you can not just mash a button. The next two things are how they try and artificially inseminate fake challenge into this game. This game’s enemies lack telegraphed attacking sequences. What does this mean? Remember back in DMC1 when you would hear a puppet twirl its shotgun around. Or how the Phantom would charge up a nice juicy fireball? Well, there is about none of that in DMC2. This makes bosses attack you in cheap ways that you can’t prepare against. In other words, some times this game does take luck. Another way is that most enemies have attacks that are nearly impossible to dodge. They try and have as much possible things hit you at once at lower damage. This is a lame attempt to make this game balanced in difficulty. This game also lets you hold forty healing items, which is way too much, so if you did have trouble, you can just cheese your way through.

I would like to point out the only difficult part of this game. There is a boss name Trismagia. Only he gets harder since the high up you go, he gets more projectiles at This means he is exceptionally harder than he was before. I just urge that if you have the nerve to put up with this game, at least try him out. In my opinion, he is harder than nightmare’s third form from DMC on DMD!
Lacking

Control:
The control itself is perfect in this game. There are absolutely no button combos are anything fast to be entered. One button jumps, another shoots, and so on. To do most moves you must hold down a shoulder button and press an attack button and either towards or away from the enemy you are facing. Like the stinger is used if you hold in the shoulder button and walk toward the enemy and use your sword attack button.

The only flaws I can find are in the one execution. That would be the circle button. The circle button has two functions. One is to roll, this will be used a lot for dodging and it is used as your “action” key to get inside of doors. Well think about in this game when you are searching for all the hidden rooms... Guess what happens if you don’t hit the door the right way. You will run up that wall like an idiot.

That only other things that might be bad in some cases, is that they changed the original lay out from the first one. But I actually like this game’s layout better since hitting X to jump is so much better for me. They did add a way to switch guns without going to the option screen but there is no way to switch swords or devil heart. But that does not matter since the only time I change hearts is when in the bloody palace (Healing heart) and when you need to fly.
Great

Story:
OK, lets face it, the DMC series never had a great story. This game not only keeps that tradition, but it enhances on its cheesy-ness. First off there are only four characters that matter.
Dante: Dante is nothing like he was in the first one. He as a pale face and a even worse looking trench coat. He rarely talks at all and most refer to him as “Bob.” He doesn’t trash talk bosses and sometimes even looks scared. Basically his story takes a back seat to...
Lucia: Lucia is a dumb woman. She requests Dante to come to an island (of course Dante follows). That is all she really does in this game! She gets caught and you must save her (with Dante). She sports a fake as hell accent. When ever she says the would “Arius” it is in a totally different voice.
Arius: He is the villain of this game. He is weak, lame, and dumb. He is the head of a corporation (cool, we go from Hell to a freaking business) and is trying to get artifacts to summon a giant piece of crap (I’m being serious, the thing he wants to summon looks worse than nightmare). Any ways, when he talks, It sounds like he just hit puberty. He also looks like Hiehachi went on a Safari.
Matier: Matier is Lucia’s mother. All she does is give you useless insight.

Other noticeable parts: Only two out of the about 16 bosses actually talk, and only Aruis has more than one line. Dante also uses a Coin to make decisions. This makes it look like he has no free will and has Batman’s Two Face written all over it.
Poor

Visuals:
The graphics in this game are actually great. The game mentions that it is double the resolution as the previous game. Well it doesn’t look twice as good, but it is up there. Its main flaw is actually twofold; The way the camera is set up (really pulled back) and the way the levels are set up.

First off, in DMC1, the back grounds are packed with tons of things, armor, table, a giant freaking Rider statue, etc. Any ways, this game is wide and empty. Hell this is half the reason you cannot effectively get good ranks in style, since enemies fly about twenty feet away. In the original, you had walls to stop them. There is very little detail in background patterns too. Hell the first level has houses that almost all look the same. I think every single level in the game has only 1 color and its monochromatic counter parts. Also these levels do not look real at all.

The bosses look good in design and all, it is just that they aren’t unique. Like for instants, the first boss is a giant monkey. The only things that makes this monkey different from a regular monkey, is that it has like four eyes! Wow, this is so hardcore!

I do think the fire looks great in this game and made a jump from the spites they used in the original game.
Average

Audio:
The music in this game is actually pretty good. The battle music is newly done and has better rhythm than some tunes in the first DMC. The boss music in this game is disappointing for one reason. Not every boss has its own theme music. This is minor, but I hate hearing the same music for 3 different bosses. There rarely is music without fight while you are just plain walking around, but there wasn’t really any of that in DMC1 either. The credit music is freaking awesome too. Some say that the Credit’s music and presentation is better than the whole game itself. The god of time music is also great. Nothing still is as great as the Frost’s theme or a pimped out music box version of Seeds of Love.

The effects in this game are pretty good. Again, nothing is bad in this area. Gun fire doesn’t sound too real or fake, you get the point.

The voices in this game are horrible. Dante sounds all depressed, Lucia talks with a speech impediment, Aruis sounds like a boy that in half way there to manhood.
Average

Re playability:
Ok, I am going to list the things you can do in this game.

First off, there are 3 difficulties in this game. Now there are two characters to go through it the game with. That is effectively 6 slightly different play throughs. But there is two bad parts to this, the difficulties are almost the same, so it will get boring. Second, you only get unlocked costumes when you beat the game. This is not worth the time and thus no real incentive is there to make you actually play through the whole game.

Then there are secret rooms for each player. 60 for Dante and Lucia has 30. They are nothing like the one from the original game at all. All you do is have to fight two waves of enemies in a small square room. This is lame and boring. Not only that, but after the first 33% of these rooms, you get ass for reward and not worth it at all. Hell, you get nothing for doing all of these missions except for getting a start with the number sixty next to it. In DMC1, the secret rooms were not only fun for the most part and well through out, but also taught you valuable things In this game, it teaches you how to hold down the square button for a long ass time.

Then there is the bloody palace. This is the mini game. All it is a room, just like all the secret rooms. Into them you fight enemies and bosses. You go up levels. Once you beat a level you can choose to go up one, ten, or a hundred floors. Any floor that ends with a zero is a boss fight. You only get a few orbs for your troubles and there is no reward for getting to the top.

There is no really reason to play after you beat the game every time either. S ranks no longer give you any thing. All you can do it buy up grades to your weapons and waste money on items you are never going to use.
Below Average

Unless you are one of those girls who is just in love with Dante, rent this game. Chances are, if you like good action games or the original DMC, you will see how flawed and under developed this game really is. I myself wasted 54$ or so because I bought into hype. Yes, I was a fool to Capcom, do not make the same mistake has me, since I only got about 12$ store credit for this POS game.

As a sequel, I give this game a 1. But has a stand alone game I give this game a 5. So I will go halfway and give this game a 3. There is much better games out there for less cost. In fact, DMC1 is about 15$ as of now, you should play that game instead.

Reviewer's Score: 3/10, Originally Posted: 10/14/03