I wasn’t all that excited about this game when it came out, but yesterday my friend said that it was really good and “harder than Ninja Gaiden”, and now he’s piqued my interest.
Has anyone played this? Is it worth getting? Is it actually harder than Ninja Gaiden?
I don’t wanna sound like a gaming sissy… but that’s a good thing?
I didn’t like Ninja Gaiden anyways, but it was the difficulty that ultimately got it shelved. But difficulty curves have even landed games I loved (ie Viewtiful Joe) back on the shelf of eternal dust collection.
That’s not to say I don’t appreciate a good challenge, but there’s fun hard and there’s punitive hard.
Everything I’ve read implies that it may very well be harder than NG. That almost strikes me as going to far - to this day I think DMC1 was better at providing a great challenge while not making me frustrated, than any other arcade game I’ve played. NG was off-the-charts tough, at least until you figured out how to block all the various attacks/combos and knew when to retaliate, and while I liked it, I also found it frustrating.
But at least DMC3 isn’t pathetically easy like its predecessor! That alone gets my hopes up.
One of the Caltrops dudes posted a first-impressions review of it that has me once again being unable to decide between DMC3 and God Of War. For a while it looked like GoW would be the slamdunk winner here.
I don’t wanna sound like a gaming sissy… but that’s a good thing?
I didn’t like Ninja Gaiden anyways, but it was the difficulty that ultimately got it shelved. But difficulty curves have even landed games I loved (ie Viewtiful Joe) back on the shelf of eternal dust collection.
That’s not to say I don’t appreciate a good challenge, but there’s fun hard and there’s punitive hard.[/quote]
I’m not necessairly saying it’s a good thing, and I didn’t mean to create that misconception - some people enjoy near impossible, frustrating challenges, and some (probably most) despise them.
That said, I put myself somewhere in the middle there, so when someone says “It’s harder than [the hardest game you’ve played]” it piques my intrest, not in a kind of “Oh god, this game sounds awesome! I’m gonna go get it RIGHT NOW” way but more in “What’s the deal with this?” way.
If that made any sense.
It’s on par with Ninja Gaiden, from what I can tell so far. It simply isn’t that concerned with not frustrating the player, which was one of the distinguishing features of NG.
If you’re having a tough time with a boss, for instance, you have to replay through substantial chunks of the game to get to the boss every time. On one hand, this raises the stakes. But on the other hand, people like me who aren’t quite so adept at doing all those “R1+left analogue back+triangle(pause)triangle triangle” kind of patterns get kind of pissed off at having to replay the game because we have the fingers of thirty-plus-year-old men. I suspect you eventually get used to the control scheme, like with Ninja Gaiden.
But it’s still not forgiving. Make sure to play on Easy, which is unlocked after you’ve died three time. Or, better yet, wait for God of War later in the month.
-Tom
For a while it looked like GoW would be the slamdunk winner here.
Indubitably.*
-Tom
Okay, thanks guys. Sounds like I should wait for GoW to pick between them. :)
I was really looking forward to DMC3 until I read about the difficulty. The first game was plenty difficult, thanks.
Ninja Gaiden was frustratingly difficult (for me) because it was hard to avoid attacks, and guys like the first boss punished the hell out of you for screwing up, or doing anything that deviated from exactly what Tomonobu “Rockstar” Itagaki wanted you to do. It also required you, much like DOA3, to memorize obscure button combinations in order to do moves, something that DMC3 avoids (moves are simply directional + button presses so far).
Devil May Cry can be quite difficult, but any time I’ve died, I know exactly what I did wrong, and know to avoid it the next time. The first boss in DMC killed me the first time I fought him, but he didn’t absolutely demolish me the way the first boss in Ninja Gaiden did.
Both games have irritating “die and you must replay the last area” gameplay, as well as pretty shitty save systems.
I’m pretty annoyed that DMC3’s “normal” mode is the Japanese “hard” mode. One of the things I loved about DMC2 (over DMC1) was that I could actually finish it without chucking the controller through the window.
To sum up: DMC3 on “Easy” is harder than DMC2, but easier than DMC1. And waaaay easier than Ninja Gaiden
For a while it looked like GoW would be the slamdunk winner here.
I’ll second that…I’ve had the God of War demo for a week, played it through 8 times or so and I l(still) love it. Everything in the game just feels, well, right - the camera doesn’t frustrate, the visuals and animation are pretty damn nice for the PS2 and the combat control is nigh on perfect - the button placement is very logical and moves flow together naturally, meaning that within a few minutes of play you’ll find yourself in the zone, stringing together insane, satisfying combos without the “wait, is it X, X, Left, O” disconnect I usually get when trying to pull of crazy combos in this sort of game.
As for difficulty, from what I’ve played so far, the game is challenging but nowhere near as tough as Ninja Gaiden or DMC3. The fact that it has, IMHO, the best camera/control setup of the three really helps. You always feel like you’re in complete control, and so far I haven’t been attacked from offscreen once.
Overall, the whole thing just feels polished to high heaven and I can’t wait to play the final game.
(yeah, I liked it, lots)
That’s what I loved about Viewtiful Joe. Some parts of that game were really hard, but beating up even peons was so much fun that I didn’t care. If it had been mundane I’d have quit early on, but I played through all the way.
DMC’s success baffles me. They just don’t seem like they’re that well made. I think it may have something to do with Dante’s cool factor, which also explains why “featuring Devil May Cry’s Dante” is actually used as a selling point for another game when he’s just in there as an unlockable character.
That’s not to say I don’t appreciate a good challenge, but there’s fun hard and there’s punitive hard.
Actually, that’s what I thought about Ninja Gaiden. Sure it was tough, but it wasn’t unfair. Same with Viewtiful Joe. Devil May Cry was hit and miss in that regard - you often spend as much time trying to SEE the bastard you’re trying to take out as you do, well, trying to take 'em out - the camera is better in DMC3, but still far from perfect.
Well Devil May Cry defined the modern 3rd-person action genre… everything else has had to imitate it. Some coughNinja Gaidencough more shamelessly than others
Reading about the save system in DMC 3 has been enough to turn me off from it. Replaying entire levels just to repeatedly die in boss fights is not what a consider a good challenge.
Still very much looking forward to God of War.
[quote=““Thrrrpptt!””]
Err, no. At least not for me.
DMC’s appeal is actually rather easy to understand. Before it came along, all games that approached third person 3D action were slow-paced, mostly lethargic affairs heavily loaded down with adventure, stealth or survival horror elements. The ones that tried to be faster mostly failed miserably and spectacularly at it. A lot of them tried to tie in complex control systems like you would see in a fighter and it just was an abysmal state of affairs. About the best pure action game during the PlayStation era was probably 2000’s Silent Bomber and while that’s a nice game, that’s certainly not saying much. There was talk that it just couldn’t be done as well in 3D.
Then DMC came out. While it translated several of the ideas in Onimusha ot more full effect, the control for Dante so superlative that it easily outclassed any prior efforts by an order of magnitude. What’s more the sword and gun combo was so easy to mix and match that it gave birth to an even wider variety than before of personal play styles. On top of that, the game’s rewarding of the player for understanding and making good use of its various combos, moves and control mechanisms to produce “stylish action” and use that further to strengthen, improve and in a way, customize Dante proved an addicting new angle on things. This linking together of moves gave the game a much more tactical slant and it was just insanely fun to try out in zillions of ways it could go. When you add to that to the fact that even the same enemies would begin to evolve and get more and more tricky, yet at the same time you would be getting more weapons and techniques, gradually expanding your repertoire, and this was all taking places with the lightning speed, fluidity and tightness of control of the fastest 2D action games, as well as in environments as beautiful and impression-lasting as excellent 2D backgrounds, it was more than most imagined was possible at the time.
I think a lot of people got lost in the game at three points:
If it was too hard in the beginning of the game and they resorted to the easier difficulty level and control schemes, they never got back up to the point where they could play the game without that crutch, so it never “evolved” for them.
So many people suffer under the impression that action games as a genre don’t have the intrinsic play mechanics to be deep. Those of us though who saw that tendency in games like Super Ghouls & Ghosts and Metal Slug were more than happy to welcome it back in to 3D with DMC. Those who thought these games were supposed to be shallow button mashers got frustrated without finding out how to bring out the mad skillz and finesse that every bad dude has hidden inside his crumpled, black heart. :P A game like Viewtiful Joe makes the beating up parts relatively unique from other games and thus, more obvious and apparent how to do the “tricks.” (The brilliance of making two of the moves a zoom in and a slow down can’t be denied, as it also served to make it easier and more clear what instants, what moves, what controls to try out.) Despite its innovation, combos and special moves are not that removed from what you expect in an action game.
3)The camera annoyed people. ;) I’m convinced that this has become one of those preference things like random battles vs. encountered battles, linear vs. non-linear, fast-paced vs. slow-paced, briefs vs. boxers, Bush vs. Donkey Kong, herpes vs. syphilis, Honey Nut Cheerios vs. Lucky Charms and asses vs. tit/dicks. Except for that ghost ship battle with the bird in the original, I had no problem focusing my energies around the arena. Some people believe the camera should always show you every threat. I believe if you have auditory or player-ingrained cues, that its alright to make the gamer be on edge and make them pay attention to their surroundings more.
It the same type of thing as how replaying levels, hunger/thirst systems, weapon breaking systems and limited inventories are claimed to either be valid or invalid gameplay conceits depending on the person. shrugs I had no problem avoiding and attacking the lava spider in that chamber where the angles would change to where you couldn’t see him when you went to certain places. Again, the cues were well-placed enough that such a thing wasn’t needed.
As for Dante’s personality, the fact that he’s got a certain charisma to go with the title of the games, despite his goofy lines, I don’t really pay much attention to. He could be a hachiko hero for all I care.
-Kitsune
Yeah, I think Kitsune pretty much nailed it here. As many will recall, I was not all that thrilled with Ninja Gaiden at first, until that elusive “something” finally clicked in my head and I suddenly understood exactly how to play the game better than the enemies did. I’m actually playing through it again (fourth time) currently, and the “difficult but fair” challenge method is incredibly satisfying. So I’m really looking forward to trying out DMC3 when I get a chance, considering what I’ve heard about the challenge level and the improvements to the combat. With the lesson of NG behind me, I’ll try to stick with DMC3 long enough to really grasp the combat system before I judge the challenge level one way or the other.
Isn’t the trick to NG just to hold down block at each and every moment of every fight except when you’re attacking? worked for me. Don’t do that, and you’re ninja bites.
That’ll keep you alive, but to really flip out and kill people, you have to keep moving at all times and thoroughly abuse the Swallow Dive.
That’ll keep you alive, but to really flip out and kill people, you have to keep moving at all times and thoroughly abuse the Swallow Dive.[/quote]
Another good way to flip out: stand next to a wall and do the move where you flip off the wall and do a downward slice repeatedly. Repeatedly as in I didn’t even wait for the next monster to come up to me, I would just constantly rebound off the wall and slice. You’re invulnerable most of the time, and the enemies keep charging into your whirli-blade. Good for clearing the challenges where you kill 60 monsters for more health, and the horseman at the end of chapter 2.
That’ll keep you alive, but to really flip out and kill people, you have to keep moving at all times and thoroughly abuse the Swallow Dive.[/quote]
And if you totally want to get pumped then if there’s essence nearby try jumping towards your enemy and the instant Ryu starts to hit the ground press and hold Y for a bare second and he’ll launch straight into an ultimate technique. You can use this instant charge technique any time you dont attack while jumping (ie, off walls or after the wind path) or you can even cancel out of Blade of Niirti or Izuana Drop straight into an ultimate technique.
If you get this stuff down then you’ll totally be popping the biggest boner ever and the enemies will just like explode into a million pieces straight away.
edit: sp