Devil May Cry 2 (2003)

I don't think I've ever written a review for a game I've given 1 star before. Hell, I rarely even give out 1 star ratings. I typically only use them when a game is wholly unplayable for some reason or has virtually nothing about it I can praise. Yet this feels like it deserves special attention. I went into this game with the full knowledge that the game has a very bad reputation and was still taken aback at how terrible it really is.

There are two points of praise I can give to this game when I push myself to find something good to say.

1. The final boss is kind of cool. The first phase is neat conceptually, even if it plays like garbage. The second phase is maybe the only decent boss fight in the game. It's almost fun.
2. The game is over fairly quickly, so you don't need to suffer long if you're playing through it. It took me 3 hours and 23 minutes according to the in game timer and I didn't feel like I was rushing or anything. Though I should mention I only played Dante's campaign. I did check out the first two missions of Lucia's campaign after but it seemed like more of the same.

That's it. Other than those two points, I can't really think of anything that struck me as positive about my experience with Devil May Cry 2.

The gameplay feels like a massive step down from the previous game. Dante doesn't really have a "moveset" here so much as a string of attacks that you can choose to end early. Enemy AI feels slow and broken, making every encounter way too easy even for someone who sucks at the genre like me. Many enemies also feel like they were designed for something more ranged combat-focused like Resident Evil, as they refuse to come down into melee range, forcing you to spam your guns on them till they die. The game also has several spots where it infinitely spawns enemies without warning and also respawns enemy hordes you've already defeated. It's obnoxious to deal with when you're just trying to find the door to the next room and get ganked by enemies you've killed already.

The visuals (both the game world and UI design) are drab and ugly. I guess Dante looks alright? But still not great. The soundtrack is pounding and irritating to listen to a lot of the time. The voice acting is worse than the infamous first game's without being nearly as funny and there is just about no coherency to the story being told here whatsoever. Dante's signature playful attitude feels entirely missing and instead he comes off as cold and unattached.

There's really no reason to play this game outside of if you have an interest in playing through the series in release order like me. It's not even a "so bad it's good" kind of game. It's just bad.

Hm. Except maybe the helicopter boss. That was kind of funny.

I remember this game being decently fun albeit much easier than the original. Little did I remember that the gameplay was a monumental downgrade from the original. Gone are the Resident Evil style pre-rendered backgrounds to be replaced with massive ugly backdrops that zoom out to make you the size of an ant. The gameplay actually IS difficult, but for the wrong reasons. Enemies are bullet sponges and one fight in particular (Helicopter boss) was such a slog I nearly gave up on this game. Even the storytelling is bad (which is not an especially high mark to hit for Devil May Cry). Best not revisit this if you had semi-fond memories for it.

My playthrough highlights:

because anything that shoots is mightier than the 3 samey swords (unless if you use your c===B as both, then you could have the most powerful weapon in DMC).

Like everyone else has said, Devil May Cry 2 is fucking awful. It is one of the most tedious, incompetent games that I have played. I could only give an ounce of credit to Devil May Cry 2, and it's that you can switch guns on the fly and the addition of the bloody palace, which carries over to later DMC games.

Devil May Cry 2 is worse than its predecessor in every way. The auto lock on is even worse. There are levels that want you to hit something to progress the level, but when you're trying to rush through this abomination, like DMC1, Dante locks onto the enemy. I say that it's worse because DMC1 didn't implement these kinds of switches all that much compared to DMC2. Mission 14 is the worst level that I have ever played in my life. What I said before applies here. There are 4 scattered orbs around the level that you have to hit a bunch of times to progress. If you return to the same portion of the map, the same setup of enemies respawns. 1 orb was hard to find because you don't know what is an invisible barrier and what isn't. Also Phantom from DMC1 shows up in this game because reasons and he is just worse in this game.

The combat is a downgrade from the first. There are 3 swords, all of them have the same movesets. The delayed input has been removed from the game so the "3 movesets" are lacking compared to DMC1. DMC2 doesn't tell the player what buttons or combinations do. I know that there is this flip attack thing that you do in the air. I don't know what the hell it is, but DMC2 doesn't tell you how to use that combo. Enemies don't make you switch to different ways of play so as said in the start, anything is better than a sword. Ebony and Ivory are starters to "launch enemies", and then you switch to the akimbo SMG's to launch them into fucking space. The shotgun can stagger enemies to the point where they can't attack you. Even before they get up, you can still stagger them again, leaving them in this loop. The rocket launcher is a damage dealer so you might as well stand from afar and shoot. From what I have heard, if you beat DMC2 on "hard difficulty", you unlock Trish from DMC1 and she plays just like DMC1 Dante with delayed inputs and all. Why Dante doesn't have her moveset boggles my mind.

DMC2's story is extremely minimal, but I don't think that it is a good decision. DMC2 feels like something that is all in a day's work for Dante. Speaking of Dante, he is extremely quiet in this game. There is barely any dialogue between Dante and the bosses. They're just there, you kill them, they die. That's it. Dante just goes to places. No reason, he just goes there. Bosses in this game just exist because they exist. There is no reason why Phantom is alive or Griffin is a part of the final boss. The environments are nowhere near as cohesive as Mallet Island. Visually, it is the blandest looking game that I have played since Modern Warfare 3. While the levels tried to look barren just to make the player feel oppressed like in DMC1, they're just boring.

It's hilarious to me that when Devil May Cry 5's recap brought up DMC2, it went straight into DMC4 1 SENTENCE LATER, and I think that says something about Devil May Cry 2. It is an almost worthless game that adds only 2 good things to the series and nothing else. Don't play it because it's bad. This is not the funny kind of bad. This is just bad. Fuck this game. Don't play it.

FINAL RATING: 1.5/10

This game is both a hidden gem, and deserving of all the hate it gets. It's an average-to-above average action game for 2003, but does away with the style (and difficulty) of the rest of the series.

The gameplay is still stylish, but Dante (hell, I'll call him Daniel) is practically mute and is way too tryhard; flipping coins like a Cool Kid™ to make all his decisions. The story is absolutely nonsense. Characters teleport around when convenient, layouts of maps seemingly change in cutscenes. You'll find yourself saying "What?" so many times it's (almost) not even funny. I still couldn't tell you if Daniel even knows who Lucia (the other main character) is. Or more importantly, what the hell he's doing on Dumary Island, and by extension, the campaign itself.

Anyway, going in with a 2003 hack n' slash mindset, it's not that bad and genuinely offers some enjoyment to be had.