Devil May Cry 5 is an action-adventure hack and slash video game developed and published by Capcom. It is the fifth installment of the mainline Devil May Cry series, and was released on 8 March 2019.
Several years after the Order of the Sword incident...An unusual phenomenon suddenly appears in Red Grave City. A gigantic tree pierces through the surface in the middle of town, attacking with roots that drain the poor citizens of their blood.
Young Devil Hunter Nero races into Red Grave aboard the mobile Devil May Cry vehicle with his partner Nico, a self-styled "artisan of arms" who provides Nero with his new weapons.
Nero seeks to recover many things in Red Grave: Lost pride...stolen power...and a man left behind.
The Plot:
The story takes place five years after the events of Devil May Cry 4, Nero having set up his own demon hunting agency based out of a van adorned with a neon "Devil May Cry" sign Dante gave him with support from Kyrie and his engineer, Nico. But on April 30, Nero encounters a dying demon who rips off his Devil Bringer arm and uses the Devil Arm Yamato to open a portal to escape in. A few days later, a man known as "V" comes to the Devil May Cry office to hire Dante, Lady, and Trish to kill a certain returning demon. The group arrive in Red Grave City on May 16, crossing paths with Nero as they share the same target: A demon named Urizen who has planted a demonic tree called Qliphoth in the city, which is killing people for their blood. The assembled group attempt to attack Urizen together, but the demon overpowers them all with Dante having V take Nero to safety. With his sword Rebellion broken by Urizen, Dante is forced to use the Devil Sword Sparda but is ultimately defeated and ejected from the Qliphoth. Urizen then captures Lady and Trish, turning them into cores for the demons Artemis and Cavaliere Angelo.
A month later on June 15, Nero returns to Red Grave after being outfitted with the "Devil Breaker" prosthetic arm Nico made for him. Nero meets up with V after besting the demon Goliath, who is seeking Qliphoth for its fruit - born of condensed human blood - which makes whomever consumes it the king of the Underworld. As the pair destroy the Qliphoth's roots while searching for Dante, Nero defeats Artemis to rescue Lady while V slays the demon-parasite Nidhogg, accidentally releasing the root construct Gilgamesh which then goes after Nero. V rejoins Nero after learning another demon named Malphas is also after the Qliphoth's fruit while seeking the Sparda in fear of its namesake's descendants acquiring it. V splits off to find the Sparda first and discovers it along with a hibernating Dante, whose presence was being hidden by the sword. However, V nearly stabs Dante and says that if he never existed, but he misses and told Dante that it was the only way to wake him.
After Dante learns what occurred during his month-long nap, he fights his way to Urizen and frees Trish from Cavaliere Angelo along the way. V then reveals to Trish that Urizen is actually the demon-side of Dante's brother Vergil, who used Yamato's power to separate his demon and human halves - the latter of which manifested as V himself with his body now at its limit. Dante, having heard the full story when first meeting V, deduces Rebellion's power is the opposite with the ability to unite halves, as he travels the remnant of his childhood home. Realizing why his father gave him Rebellion, Dante stabs himself with the broken sword's hilt to absorb the Sparda into himself, acquiring his Sin Devil Trigger form along with his own Devil Sword Dante. Nero attempts to confront Urizen again but is overpowered once more, with Dante arriving just in time to save him. Dante gains the upper hand with his new powers until Urizen takes his leave once the Qliphoth begins to bear fruit. While Dante is conflicted on having Nero join them, an ailing V insists on it and the three split up to find their own way to Urizen. Dante arrives first and defeats King Cerberus before facing Urizen, having now eaten Qliphoth's fruit. Meanwhile, after saving V from Malphas, Nero learns of Dante's history with Vergil. He and V reach Dante just as he defeats Urizen, but a dying V intervenes and merges with Urizen before Dante can finish him, reviving Vergil once more.
Dante attacks the newly-revived Vergil, who overpowers him quickly before opening a portal to the top of the Qliphoth tree, telling Dante to recover to his full strength before they spar again. Nero insists on going after Vergil himself to seek answers for losing his arm. But Dante, having known that he was the young demon hunter's uncle since they first met on Fortuna, finally reveals to Nero that he is Vergil's son and sends him away to keep his hands clean from killing his own father. Nero, Nico, Lady, and Trish escape the slowly-expanding Qliphoth but, despite the group urging him not to confront his father, an angry and confused Nero goes back to chase after Vergil.
Dante fights his way through V's now-independent familiars before reaching Vergil and the sons of Sparda engage in yet another duel with each other, during which Dante tells Vergil that Nero is his son. Following a call with Kyrie, Nero expresses his conflicted emotions at having found his family and not having the strength to save Kyrie's brother Credo years ago. Kyrie convinces Nero to stick to his instincts, and the young demon hunter resolves to save both his father and uncle from killing each other.
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| One of the most badass moments of the entire game right here. |
Nero arrives just in time to stop Dante and Vergil as their fight reaches its climax, fully awakening his Devil Trigger while regenerating his right arm. Vergil mocks his son's resolve of a peaceful solution as he decides to fight him instead, but finds himself pushed back until he begrudgingly concedes. Giving Nero V's book to remember him by, Vergil joins Dante in a one-way trip to the Underworld to cut the Qliphoth down and seal the portal before it rips the Earth apart.
As the Qliphoth falls, Nero leaves Red Grave City alongside Nico while taking out any straggling demons along the way. Weeks later, Trish and Lady are hired for a new job by Morrison, who Dante left in charge of his office before the events at Red Grave City. In the Underworld, Dante and Vergil duel each-other endlessly - due to being equally matched and the constant interference from demons out to kill them - though their rivalry appears to be on more friendly terms.
The Verdict:
*** WARNING: SPOILERS DISCUSSION AHEAD ***Overall Gameplay
Right off the bat, let's address the micro-transaction controversy with the game that was a major concern with players prior to the game's release. Throughout my entire time with the game, there were times where I was running low on funds from spending them immediately on all of the cool special moves and upgrades that I wanted, but I never felt like the game was being stingy with how much you garnered from completing missions and defeating enemies. To be honest, I thought the game was more than generous in that aspect. If you don't have enough Red Orbs for a purchase though, a disclaimer does pop up to ask you if you would like to purchase more from the PlayStation (or Xbox if you're on that console or Steam if you're on PC) Store if you so desired to do so. In that aspect, I never felt like I was being forced to resort to that method to unlock everything. That made me happy as Devil May Cry 4 and it's Special Edition (despite the wealth of Orbs you get for purchasing the add-ons to that game), made acquiring all of the skills such a chore in that aspect to say that the game itself was already not that good to play repeatedly. That turned me off more than anything to DMC4. This game I felt the complete opposite. I wanted to keep playing to keep unlocking more moves and open the floodgates even further to what the three playable characters could do.The gameplay is still what veterans of the series have come to know as the norm for this genre of "over the top" action games, with each playable character having both long range and close melee attacks, coupled with a third option/modifier that opens the door to separate each character in terms individuality with their unique gameplay. Nero has his specialized Devil Breakers that enhance his combat with various effects. V can't attack on his own; instead, he relies on his demonic "pets" to deal damage for him until he can land a finishing blow to execute his enemies. Dante is the jack of all trades of the three, who has four distinct fighting styles to draw from (Gunslinger to enhance his firearms, Trickster for more evasive dodging and stylish movement for positioning, Royal Guard for blocking and countering opponents' but requires an excessive amount of enemy attack knowledge to properly master, and Swordmaster that unlocks even more melee attacks for Dante's various swords and Devil Arms that he obtains over the course of the game). Each character has the ability to enter a Devil Trigger state that powers up their attacks even more while recovering a bit of health over time.
The Void serves as a training room akin to fighting games to practice each of the playable characters' moves before you purchase them in Nico's shop or to merely test out and/or practice your combo execution. Veteran DMC players have been asking for something like this for years now and it's cool to see something like this finally implemented into the series. I vaguely remember DmC: Devil May Cry having something similar, but it's even more welcome in this return to the classic Devil May Cry (main canonical) series.
This entry has the best amount of enemy variety that this series has seen to date. Enemies from the original Devil May Cry return here, including but not limited to: variations of Nelo Angelo as mini-bosses, Nobodies, Sin Scissors (going by a new name), a variant of the Blades/Assaults (Devil May Cry 4 version of Blades), some variations on the classic Beelzebub enemies. On top of that, there's LOTS of new enemy archetypes to truly test your skills and mastery over all three protagonists.
My biggest gripe with the original release of DMC4 was that the majority of the game with Nero felt bland as hell (at least until you unlocked Max-Act for the Exceed ability), but when you got Dante for the short portion of the game that he was playable that his gameplay blew everything out of the water that by the time you got back to playing Nero for the remainder of the game, you were left feeling underwhelmed that all of that freedom and extra combat options were taken away. Here, that problem is non-existent. For majority of the game, Capcom gives you the choice of which of the playable protagonists that you want to play as for majority of the story - save for the mandatory missions from a certain character(s)'s perspective on those events. I'm sure that Capcom's going to either provide the option to play as a single character throughout the entire game down the road (more likely with a Special/Definitive Edition release) as a feature via an update when they add the Blood Palace as free add-on downloadable content in April or possibly charge for it as purchasable addition to the game.
Maybe it's just me, but if I could complain about anything in this game - trust me, I have VERY few complaints about this game as a whole - it's that the targeting in terms of cycling through enemies isn't perfect. It's nowhere as bad as the lack of that option in the original release of DmC: Devil May Cry, but it's noticeable enough to irk me during gameplay and screw up combos since I couldn't focus my attention onto the incoming threat in time. It's not as a problem for V as it is for Dante and Nero as you're always re-positioning anyway in terms of his gameplay, but if Capcom were to tweak this one minor issue, I think the gameplay would be just as good - if not better than Devil May Cry 3's (both versions) gameplay as whole.
There's a ton of replay value here as players will be grinding to earn over 12 million Red Orbs to buy out all of the special moves and upgrades for all three protagonists. There are 12 Secret Missions to find and complete for Blue Orb fragments. They are available for replay on the main menu after clearing, which is a welcome new addition. Then don't forget the Purple and Blue Orb fragments scattered throughout the 20 Missions for increasing the characters' max health and Devil Trigger gauges.
I've heard a lot of other veteran players of the series say this too, but I thought Devil Hunter mode (Normal difficulty in this one) was tad easier and much more forgiving than previous outings of Devil May Cry
Three Playable Characters
Nero
It's no secret that I flat out thought he was piss poor addition to the cast of characters in the Devil May Cry franchise in DMC4 and even worse as a "replacement" for Dante in majority of that game's narrative.Players can unlock the ability to both use the original Devil Bringer and Devil Trigger after clearing the game once. This grants Nero the ability to use his classic "Buster" grapple technique, along with all of his disposable Devil Breakers made by Nico in combat to add even more depth to his style of combat.
The new Devil Breakers add a lot of variety to Nero's gameplay. They made me think about enemy encounters in a manner I haven't thought of them prior to this game. You actually have to plan your loadouts for what you expect to run into and how to counter what you plan to go up against.
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Devil Breakers |
Like the description says, it's a jack of all trades Breaker. This Breaker is excellent crowd control, deal massive damage to just about anything unfortunate enough to get hit by it, and you can pretty much add it as a combo ender if you don't know what else to do during juggle combos/aerial raves or standing ground combos. This is that Breaker I make sure to have at least two of on every mission and especially for boss fights.
During my time playing the demo, I absolutely HATED this Breaker. Now with the retail release, I actually come to respect this Breaker for it's mobility options and ability to cancel combos/special attacks that you couldn't do otherwise. It opens up a wealth of combo options that Nero normally doesn't have access to like Dante in terms of jump/standing cancels. Not to mention, it's really good at crowd control and re-positioning.
My personal favorite Breaker just from the sheer amount of utility for this thing in combos. You fire it off and it focuses on a single enemy, dealing continuous damage until it returns after a few seconds. As an added bonus, Nero can ride on it during the recall and perform stunts using button combinations on the controller and use this as an added method of mobility in combat. The arm can be detonated in this state for even more insane damage. Only downside is that if you're hit during ANY point of the animation, it breaks and has little effect on crowd control.
This is essentially a revamp of Nero's Devil Bringer from Devil May Cry 4. Sadly, if you're hit during the Buster animation(s), the arm breaks so use sparingly. I like to keep this one in my load outs (prior to beating the game) for boss and mini-boss encounters just to experiment on what Buster grapples I can get off during one-on-one encounters to deal massive damage with minimal effort.
To make a long story short, this Breaker is essentially the Quicksilver style from Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening, which was inspired by similar powers given to Dante in the original Devil May Cry from the Bangle of Time special item. For Nero, it freezes a foe in place for a few seconds, allowing for repositioning and more unique opportunities to retaliate. This can prove to be very helpful towards the end of the game where the game throws multiple troublesome foes along with their underlings at you all at once. This Breaker proves to be helpful in those encounters to isolate the hordes and deal with foes as you see fit.
I slept on this Breaker for the early portion of the game, but was blown away by it when I picked up one off on a whim during one of Nero's missions. It powers up both the Red Queen and Blue Rose to what seems like an equivalent of the Exceed and Charge Shot boosts/power-ups. The Blue Rose can deal massive damage while stationary in this mode (You just need REALLY good aim) while this Breaker is active. That may sound suicidal on higher difficulties, but there's definitely some use to be made out of this weapon.
I only experimented with this weapon briefly when the Hell Scissors enemy was introduced and not much after that. It's decent for breaking the defenses of enemies holding shields or love to block/guard, but Nero has much better options for breaking through defenses than relying on this Breaker. It's not horrible, but I personally wouldn't waste a load out slot on this on a regular basis.
The only Breaker that I didn't spend any time using. The idea of merely extending the range of the Wire Snatch (I had the max upgrade for that anyway) and ability to pick up heavier foes with it didn't appeal to me much if I'm perfectly honest.
I didn't think Nero doesn't shine the most in this game on his own until his Devil Trigger state is awakened during the game's climax in Mission 20. Don't get me wrong. I loved what the Devil Breakers brought to the table in terms of catering to each players' individual playstyle and preferences in terms of approaching the game's combat, but he finally feels like his own entity instead of a carbon copy of trying so hard to be like Dante and Vergil that he finally stood out on his own here. The combination of having the Breakers and his signature Devil Bringer back - complete with the Buster ability to grab enemies or even bosses in truly amazing counters was icing on the cake in what Capcom started to do with him back in Devil May Cry 4.
I kid you not... There's nothing more satisfying against the final boss where you CATCH him out of his ultimate special move with a well-timed Buster and slam him into oblivion.
V plays like he was pulled straight out of Chaos Legion with his pets - three familiar adversaries for anyone who has played the original Devil May Cry. Each one of the face buttons perform their attacks and special moves while they each all have an use of the Devil Trigger gauge to power up their attacks.
Personal Impressions: Nero
I didn't think Nero doesn't shine the most in this game on his own until his Devil Trigger state is awakened during the game's climax in Mission 20. Don't get me wrong. I loved what the Devil Breakers brought to the table in terms of catering to each players' individual playstyle and preferences in terms of approaching the game's combat, but he finally feels like his own entity instead of a carbon copy of trying so hard to be like Dante and Vergil that he finally stood out on his own here. The combination of having the Breakers and his signature Devil Bringer back - complete with the Buster ability to grab enemies or even bosses in truly amazing counters was icing on the cake in what Capcom started to do with him back in Devil May Cry 4.
I kid you not... There's nothing more satisfying against the final boss where you CATCH him out of his ultimate special move with a well-timed Buster and slam him into oblivion.
V
V plays like he was pulled straight out of Chaos Legion with his pets - three familiar adversaries for anyone who has played the original Devil May Cry. Each one of the face buttons perform their attacks and special moves while they each all have an use of the Devil Trigger gauge to power up their attacks.
V's pets can be "downed" for a short duration after sustaining too much damage, but this process can be sped up from V being in close vicinity to them.
Unlike Seig in Chaos Legion, V himself is a sitting duck while his pets do his bidding as he can't attack himself outside of the finishing moves that he performs to finish off his enemies, so combat comes down to methodical positioning and meter management as reading from his book builds Devil Trigger gauge that will be a precious resource while playing this character.
He moves so much slower than Nero and Dante, but his pets that are at play definitely fit in this game's crazy gameplay to leave his own unique flair on the combat in DMC5.
Too bad he looks just like Adam Driver from the current batch of Star Wars films... I doubt anyone's going to be surprised at his "true identity" either.
Too bad he looks just like Adam Driver from the current batch of Star Wars films... I doubt anyone's going to be surprised at his "true identity" either.
Much like DMC4, the game recycles the same boss fights from both Dante and Nero for a "boss rush" of sorts for V to face against towards the end of the game. Fortunately, these bosses are slightly weaker than their initial appearances against the Devil Hunters.
Personal Impressions: V
Much like I mentioned above, V reminds me completely of the gameplay from Chaos Legion, a lesser known PlayStation 2 title from Capcom. I'm surprised that they haven't attempted to tie that game canon to Devil May Cry's lore in some fashion. At least V's stages and gameplay wasn't as frustratingly hard as that game was.
A minor issue I ran into where I had to HOLD the button down to make V read from his book to build Devil Trigger meter instead of pressing it once. Could have been an oversight on my behalf, but I could have sworn the tutorial said just tap it. Just thought I should mention that as well.
Dante
New Weapons:
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| Devil Sword Dante |
After Rebellion is broken as part of the game's story, Dante stabs it's remaining hilt through his chest and absorbs his father's Sparda weapon into his body, thus creating this new weapon with his own namesake. This weapon has the range of Sparda (and same moveset as Rebellion) while allowing Dante to conjure up spectral swords to assist him in attacks. These swords can be powered up to help Dante offensively and defensively, much like Vergil's Spirit Swords in previous games. As an additional treat, Dante gains the ability to charge up his Devil Trigger even further with the Sin Devil Trigger meter above his normal DT gauge. Unleashing this form allows Dante to deal massive amounts of damage and completely invulnerable in this state, but at the cost of his health not recovering at all.
This is a spin on the Cerberus weapon from Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening of the same demon archetype. The added twist is that this weapon has multiple different modes that invoke lightning and fire damage as the weapon morphs into three different forms.
A motorcycle that can be split down the middle into two chainsaw-like blades. This weapon is VERY slow, but the trade-off is that the weapon is excellent at staggering opponents. After the initial charm wore off, I honestly didn't use this weapon much, but when I did, Swordmaster style makes it a lot of fun to use.
An unique new firearm that is powered by the amount of Red Orbs you use to power up it's attacks. It can also garner a lot of Red Orbs as a result as well.
Admittedly, I didn't use this weapon much with my time with the game, but I couldn't help but laugh at Dante's antics while using it. The late Michael Jackson would be proud.
There's already an exploit to farm the max amount of Red Orbs to obtain everything in the game - roughly 14 million Orbs, using this weapon.
Merely a return for Lady's classic weapon that she loaned out to Dante in Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening, with the same bag of tricks that are amplified in Dante's Gunslinger style. It still does a considerable amount of damage to bosses too. I honestly stopped using Ebony & Ivory and Coyote-A altogether after getting this. I was the same way in DMC3.
There's actually a hidden means to allow Dante to dual-wield TWO of these in the game. That's something I wasn't aware of until I read about it online after taking back my Redbox rental.
I haven't had this much fun with the gauntlet-style weapons in a DMC game since DMC3's Beowolf. This weapon is what I jokingly called "the Street Fighter mode" after the Street Fighter series character of the same name. You can bob and weave to evade attacks stylishly (Sway Mode I think it's called that looks like Dudley's evades from Street Fighter IV) and retaliate with punches and kicks that flare up like Ken's V-Trigger state in Street Fighter V. That's ironic since Dante's voice actor voices Ken in Street Fighter V as well. I swear the Flip Kick/Flash Kick-style special interrupts and/or counters just about anything coming in from air at point blank range. I got so many counters that resulted in instant Stylish ranking in combos for that alone. That move is so damn good. I would personally invest an entire additional playthrough of the game exploring the combo options for this weapon to be quite honest, just from how much I enjoyed it over all of the other new weapons.
Personal Impressions: Dante
The new "Shin Devil Trigger" you obtain about halfway into the game's narrative is pretty damn sick and a welcome upgrade to the tried and true Devil Trigger mechanic. Another playthrough of the game would definitely make me invest in buying out the rest of the upgrades for that and the new weapons that Dante picks up during his missions.
The last half of the game in terms of his missions and adversaries faced are a ton of welcome throwbacks and references to the series' humble beginnings, notably from the original Devil May Cry and Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening.
Dante faces King Cerberus, which he comments about facing a "pup similar to him back when he was younger" as a direct reference to the boss fight against Cerberus in DMC3.
Dante faces all of V's pets as a last line of defense prior to facing the revived Vergil. All of V's pets are former bosses/enemies from the original Devil May Cry, causing Dante to comment that he feels like he's back on Mallet Island all over again. I thought it was a nice touch that they even had their old music for that boss fight. The story explains V's pets as remnants of Vergil's fractured mind from back when he was Nelo Angelo back in the original Devil May Cry so it makes sense they would take the forms of stuff from when he was under Mundus' control.
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| The Sons of Sparda stand off against each other once again... |
Last but not least, we get the rematch between the Sons of Sparda as the revived Vergil is back as the final boss of sorts for both Dante (Mission 19) and Nero (Mission 20). It was pretty sick that even some of the combo methods still work on him from 3. Bravo, Capcom, on that small detail there. I was just sad that Vergil didn't say "Now I'm motivated..." or "You're going DOWN!!" when he went into his Devil Trigger state. So much nostalgia and history in that fight it's not even funny. I enjoyed
the hell out of the last half of the game. If you don't feel like going through that headache, I have the secret ending linked below
The bonuses aren't anything game changing to the gameplay in terms of the Devil Breakers available by default. They are more cosmetic than anything else.
There's a special gallery that unlocks after clearing the game that has Nico add screenshots of Nero finishing off that particular enemy type in that enemy's file in her database, along with her own snarky captions attached to them. This is worth a look for all of her comments on every enemy type in the game alone.
There's a special ending that is unlocked by defeating Urizen during the Prologue mission with Nero. After he goes down, the events of the game don't happen and the game immediately goes into a text based ending without a cutscene. The game just merely applauds your efforts and unlocks Dante Must Die difficulty right off the bat and unlocking an achievement/trophy for this monumental task. Unfortunately, this is no easy task, even on Human difficulty as Urizen's attacks deal massive damage and he has such a huge pool of health to diminish before he's defeated. I gave it a few tries after clearing the game once, but I still don't have all of Nero's abilities and upgrades bought out. An alternative is merely not attempting this task until you unlock Heaven or Hell difficulty (where both players and enemies die in one hit). Your choice on that one as unlocking that difficulty requires a full clear of the game on Dante Must Die difficulty and that definitely won't be easy.
I've raved enough about the main theme of the game, "Devil Trigger", back during my first impressions of the game after playing the demo and my thoughts remain the same here. There's a great variety of tunes to jam out to throughout the game and especially throughout it's crazy, hectic, and yet stylish combat. There's some great choices in terms of nostalgia too as the game brings back a few noteworthy themes from the series' past to highlight these reflections to past events in the franchise.
If I have any issue with the micro-transactions in this game, it's with the damn Jukebox. A lot of "legacy" fighting games are dirty for this too, but 90% of the music library is locked due to purchases on PlayStation Network or Xbox Live. I think this is an absolute ripoff, especially when there's not even the full soundtracks for the series here, just scattered miscellaneous tracks that they pulled from the series up to this point.
For newcomers of the series, there's a welcome "History of DMC" video in the main menu for those who want a Cliff Notes version of the series' events thus far. I was surprised to see that Devil May Cry 2 was referenced in this as Capcom - along with fans - considered that game a stain on the franchise's history and didn't bring it up again. Devil May Cry 4 went out of it's way to establish that those events don't take place in the current timeline as DMC2 is far off into the future. The producers of this game at Capcom have officially changed the timeline so that DMC2 is prior to DMC4 in terms of the events of the series' timeline thus far.
At the start of the game, I was dreading that this entry was repeating the same pattern as Devil May Cry 4 with someone stealing Devil Arm(s) - figuratively and literally in this game's case - and using them to open the gates to the Demon World and unleash Hell on Earth once again with this Urizen character. Nero got his arm stolen by a man in a hood that I instantly recognized as Vergil's initial appearance at the start of his content in Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition. Even without seeing the retail release trailer beforehand, I would have recognized Vergil's swordsmanship with Yamato without question. The whole first half of the game I was dreading the confrontation with Urizen since I was thinking that he was going to be revealed to be yet another corrupted/delusional human that thinks they can wield demonic power to disastrous results. By the time the credits rolled around, I completely satisfied with this plot was merely a clever device to bring Vergil properly back into the series after his defeat as Nelo Angelo while being manipulated as one of Mundus' pawns in the original Devil May Cry, even though the plot seems to take a few nods from Inuyasha in terms of what both Vergil and Dante's swords are capable of and their links to their father's lineage and legacy.
With Nero's ties and origins revealed to be linked to the Sons of Sparda, DMC5 confirms what many regarded as a fan-fiction writers' deepest fantasy with Nero being a descendant of their family. I can't speak for anyone else but I always chucked Nero's ability to be able to use the Devil Bringer and use Yamato in his own means as merely a fluke just because he came into position of that demonic limb. I saw him being able to use Yamato as the Devil Arm respecting it's wielder with it's power - much like how Dante are able to obtain and use Devil Arms. It wasn't confirmed until Capcom released the official artbook for Devil May Cry 4 was when and where they painted the picture clearly that Nero and Vergil were related. In that regard, I felt that this game did a better job of explaining that flat out to Nero. My only question is who was his mother if Vergil is Nero's father since Dante and Vergil can't do anything remotely close to what the Devil Bringer brings to the table.
I loved Dante's jab at Vergil about it too though, "Hey, we were all young once!"
In terms of jabs and jokes though, Nico really took the cake in that aspect. She's a newcomer to the series but she has ties to the series' lore as her gunsmith mother made the trademark Ebony and Ivory handguns that Dante uses to this day, along with the bulk of his non-demonic weaponry. If you didn't get it from the hints in-game or on her biography, she's related to Agnus from Devil May Cry 4. She resents him for the part he played in the events of that game and disgracing her family.
I didn't notice this until I was watching a Gaming Sins video on Devil May Cry 4 (which I agree with about 90% of the points brought up to the table) but there's a major plot hole that's not really explained very well in the narrative in relation to this game's plot. Dante mentions that he's never been stabbed with Rebellion prior to his acquisitions of his Sin Devil Trigger state and Devil Sword Dante weapon, but that's completely false. Vergil stabs him in the chest after defeating him in DMC3 during their first encounter in that game to "unlock" his Devil Trigger for the first time. Canonically, following the series' timeline, Dante's been stabbed through the heart by something in every game of the series to date, including Nero stabbing him with Rebellion again after their second battle during the halfway point of Devil May Cry 4, so what was so special about returning to their childhood home and stabbing himself there like Vergil? There's a lot of people debating this topic on GameFAQs to interesting results, but my understanding of that scene was that maybe it didn't trigger this transformation until now in his adolescence because Dante didn't possess both Sparda back then and hasn't grown this much in demonic power yet to obtain that form. If Capcom are going the Inuyasha route with explaining Sparda's sons' signature weapons/family heirlooms, each of the fathers' respective offspring in those stories had to gain a considerable amount of power on their own before their mastery of those weapons that their fathers left behind. In Inuyasha, the Great Dog Demon left his sons, Inuyasha and Sesshomaru, both the Tetsaiga and Tenseiga respectively with the purpose of both protecting and aiding his sons in surpassing him in demonic power. In the Devil May Cry series, the Legendary Dark Knight Sparda left his twin sons, Dante and Vergil, both Rebellion and Yamato respectively, but this is the first game in the series where they actually explain what the swords are meant to do.
If I had any gripes with the game's narrative, it's that Trish and Lady got the shaft big time in terms of involvement here. I thought it was cool that Urizen had corrupted them and made them into bosses (sadly they weren't themselves) but damn, I thought we would have gotten to see something of whatever they were up to while hanging out with Nico the whole time. I guess whatever "new job" Morrison has in mind will be DLC for those two to keep things interesting until Dante and Vergil find the means to escape the Demon World.
Speaking of Morrison, holy fuck at all of the references and call backs to older stuff in this franchise - from both the anime and previous video games, outside of DmC: Devil May Cry. I haven't heard that name since the game manual for the original DMC. Bravo for Capcom actually paying attention to and knowing their own lore for once. Too bad the Street Fighter series couldn't get that much attention to detail on their narrative as of late.
Vergil being still obsessed about surpassing/defeating his twin brother and obtaining more power was a great play though into how damaged his psyche was after the events of the original Devil May Cry from his time as Nelo Angelo. He was trailing back to his obsession back in Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening. I bet that even though Mundus was defeated, it took him quite some time to recover enough to seek out Yamato as I'm sure he was still trapped in the Demon World until the events of Devil May Cry 4. He sought Nero out and got his weapon back before pulling something that I haven't seen since Danny Phantom: The Ultimate Enemy where a character forces out their human nature to become a more corrupt being than ever possible otherwise. By the time Dante defeats Urizen and V reaches towards the end of his tether of existence, I honestly felt like Vergil's journey as a character finally came full circle. He rebounded from being Mundus' pawn and found his own means to acquire the power that he desperately craved since his youth.
I know there's going to be a lot of critics that may say that Capcom relied on too much nostalgia or callbacks to the past over doing anything new here in terms of both the narrative and gameplay, but this is one of the rare times I'm completely fine with that. Capcom tried a lot of new for DMC4. Let's be honest here - it wasn't very good, despite a few cool moments sprinkled here and there. Ultimately, Capcom had to give up the ghost and go back to what people loved the most about these games - the over the top gameplay and accompanying characters to boot.
Look at it this way. There's two ways to do games like this - you can either go really over the top in terms of gameplay and overall presentation and not take yourself and more importantly your narrative serious at all, much to the detriment of said game. In that vein, both Bayonetta and Clover Studios' Godhand immediately come to mind, where the story is so out there that it makes fun of itself so much that by the time the credits roll around, the player(s) aren't going to feel any weight to it either. Alternatively, you can go with how Devil May Cry 5 presented things here. You can do a lot of over the top stuff in terms of gameplay and presentation, but know how to reel it in for players can feel something when the narrative demands for it.
For Devil May Cry fans old and new, definitely give this entry a shot, even if you weren't too thrilled with Devil May Cry 4. Even though I breezed throughout the game in weekend from a mere 3-day Redbox rental, I plan on buying the game down the road and replaying it on higher difficulties and seeking out to unlocking everything. The only reason I didn't purchase the game at launch is that I knew I would finish it in a weekend sitting. Plus, I can't ignore the fact that Capcom habitually re-releases their games, especially this series, with Definitive/Special Editions with all of the post-launch DLC and fixes, so that's why I didn't bother.
If you're looking for something with a ton of great gameplay - by far a return to the greatness that was DMC3's gameplay - along with pretty cool story to boot, you can't go wrong here.
Extras
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| Bonuses for purchasing the Deluxe Edition of the game. |
There's a special gallery that unlocks after clearing the game that has Nico add screenshots of Nero finishing off that particular enemy type in that enemy's file in her database, along with her own snarky captions attached to them. This is worth a look for all of her comments on every enemy type in the game alone.
There's a special ending that is unlocked by defeating Urizen during the Prologue mission with Nero. After he goes down, the events of the game don't happen and the game immediately goes into a text based ending without a cutscene. The game just merely applauds your efforts and unlocks Dante Must Die difficulty right off the bat and unlocking an achievement/trophy for this monumental task. Unfortunately, this is no easy task, even on Human difficulty as Urizen's attacks deal massive damage and he has such a huge pool of health to diminish before he's defeated. I gave it a few tries after clearing the game once, but I still don't have all of Nero's abilities and upgrades bought out. An alternative is merely not attempting this task until you unlock Heaven or Hell difficulty (where both players and enemies die in one hit). Your choice on that one as unlocking that difficulty requires a full clear of the game on Dante Must Die difficulty and that definitely won't be easy.
Sound
I've raved enough about the main theme of the game, "Devil Trigger", back during my first impressions of the game after playing the demo and my thoughts remain the same here. There's a great variety of tunes to jam out to throughout the game and especially throughout it's crazy, hectic, and yet stylish combat. There's some great choices in terms of nostalgia too as the game brings back a few noteworthy themes from the series' past to highlight these reflections to past events in the franchise.
If I have any issue with the micro-transactions in this game, it's with the damn Jukebox. A lot of "legacy" fighting games are dirty for this too, but 90% of the music library is locked due to purchases on PlayStation Network or Xbox Live. I think this is an absolute ripoff, especially when there's not even the full soundtracks for the series here, just scattered miscellaneous tracks that they pulled from the series up to this point.
Narrative/Story
For newcomers of the series, there's a welcome "History of DMC" video in the main menu for those who want a Cliff Notes version of the series' events thus far. I was surprised to see that Devil May Cry 2 was referenced in this as Capcom - along with fans - considered that game a stain on the franchise's history and didn't bring it up again. Devil May Cry 4 went out of it's way to establish that those events don't take place in the current timeline as DMC2 is far off into the future. The producers of this game at Capcom have officially changed the timeline so that DMC2 is prior to DMC4 in terms of the events of the series' timeline thus far.
At the start of the game, I was dreading that this entry was repeating the same pattern as Devil May Cry 4 with someone stealing Devil Arm(s) - figuratively and literally in this game's case - and using them to open the gates to the Demon World and unleash Hell on Earth once again with this Urizen character. Nero got his arm stolen by a man in a hood that I instantly recognized as Vergil's initial appearance at the start of his content in Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition. Even without seeing the retail release trailer beforehand, I would have recognized Vergil's swordsmanship with Yamato without question. The whole first half of the game I was dreading the confrontation with Urizen since I was thinking that he was going to be revealed to be yet another corrupted/delusional human that thinks they can wield demonic power to disastrous results. By the time the credits rolled around, I completely satisfied with this plot was merely a clever device to bring Vergil properly back into the series after his defeat as Nelo Angelo while being manipulated as one of Mundus' pawns in the original Devil May Cry, even though the plot seems to take a few nods from Inuyasha in terms of what both Vergil and Dante's swords are capable of and their links to their father's lineage and legacy.
With Nero's ties and origins revealed to be linked to the Sons of Sparda, DMC5 confirms what many regarded as a fan-fiction writers' deepest fantasy with Nero being a descendant of their family. I can't speak for anyone else but I always chucked Nero's ability to be able to use the Devil Bringer and use Yamato in his own means as merely a fluke just because he came into position of that demonic limb. I saw him being able to use Yamato as the Devil Arm respecting it's wielder with it's power - much like how Dante are able to obtain and use Devil Arms. It wasn't confirmed until Capcom released the official artbook for Devil May Cry 4 was when and where they painted the picture clearly that Nero and Vergil were related. In that regard, I felt that this game did a better job of explaining that flat out to Nero. My only question is who was his mother if Vergil is Nero's father since Dante and Vergil can't do anything remotely close to what the Devil Bringer brings to the table.
I loved Dante's jab at Vergil about it too though, "Hey, we were all young once!"
In terms of jabs and jokes though, Nico really took the cake in that aspect. She's a newcomer to the series but she has ties to the series' lore as her gunsmith mother made the trademark Ebony and Ivory handguns that Dante uses to this day, along with the bulk of his non-demonic weaponry. If you didn't get it from the hints in-game or on her biography, she's related to Agnus from Devil May Cry 4. She resents him for the part he played in the events of that game and disgracing her family.
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| Every time in the DMC series where Dante gets stabbed in the chest. Y'know I think it's his thing... |
If I had any gripes with the game's narrative, it's that Trish and Lady got the shaft big time in terms of involvement here. I thought it was cool that Urizen had corrupted them and made them into bosses (sadly they weren't themselves) but damn, I thought we would have gotten to see something of whatever they were up to while hanging out with Nico the whole time. I guess whatever "new job" Morrison has in mind will be DLC for those two to keep things interesting until Dante and Vergil find the means to escape the Demon World.
Speaking of Morrison, holy fuck at all of the references and call backs to older stuff in this franchise - from both the anime and previous video games, outside of DmC: Devil May Cry. I haven't heard that name since the game manual for the original DMC. Bravo for Capcom actually paying attention to and knowing their own lore for once. Too bad the Street Fighter series couldn't get that much attention to detail on their narrative as of late.
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| Vergil's been my favorite Devil May Cry character since his "proper" introduction in DMC3, so of course, I marked out for seeing his return in this sequel. |
Vergil being still obsessed about surpassing/defeating his twin brother and obtaining more power was a great play though into how damaged his psyche was after the events of the original Devil May Cry from his time as Nelo Angelo. He was trailing back to his obsession back in Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening. I bet that even though Mundus was defeated, it took him quite some time to recover enough to seek out Yamato as I'm sure he was still trapped in the Demon World until the events of Devil May Cry 4. He sought Nero out and got his weapon back before pulling something that I haven't seen since Danny Phantom: The Ultimate Enemy where a character forces out their human nature to become a more corrupt being than ever possible otherwise. By the time Dante defeats Urizen and V reaches towards the end of his tether of existence, I honestly felt like Vergil's journey as a character finally came full circle. He rebounded from being Mundus' pawn and found his own means to acquire the power that he desperately craved since his youth.
I know there's going to be a lot of critics that may say that Capcom relied on too much nostalgia or callbacks to the past over doing anything new here in terms of both the narrative and gameplay, but this is one of the rare times I'm completely fine with that. Capcom tried a lot of new for DMC4. Let's be honest here - it wasn't very good, despite a few cool moments sprinkled here and there. Ultimately, Capcom had to give up the ghost and go back to what people loved the most about these games - the over the top gameplay and accompanying characters to boot.
Look at it this way. There's two ways to do games like this - you can either go really over the top in terms of gameplay and overall presentation and not take yourself and more importantly your narrative serious at all, much to the detriment of said game. In that vein, both Bayonetta and Clover Studios' Godhand immediately come to mind, where the story is so out there that it makes fun of itself so much that by the time the credits roll around, the player(s) aren't going to feel any weight to it either. Alternatively, you can go with how Devil May Cry 5 presented things here. You can do a lot of over the top stuff in terms of gameplay and presentation, but know how to reel it in for players can feel something when the narrative demands for it.
Buy It or Don't Bother?
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| JACKPOT... This game is an instant classic. |
If you're looking for something with a ton of great gameplay - by far a return to the greatness that was DMC3's gameplay - along with pretty cool story to boot, you can't go wrong here.
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