Devil May Cry 2

Genre: Spectacle Fighter

Players: 1

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Review:

Devil May Cry 2 is a Spectacle Fighter that was considered a disappointing sequel when it was first released in 2003, and is still to this day generally seen as the worst in the series. Created by a different development team from the first game, Devil May Cry 2 retains more or less the same basic framework as the first game, but loses a lot of what made that game so beloved.

When it was remastered as a part of a trilogy re-release on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in 2012, many considered it to be more of a nice extra rather than a selling point – both the first and third games are much better-regarded. This remaster was later ported to other platforms, and finally in 2019 it made its way to the Nintendo Switch… at the same $20 price tag the entire trilogy sold for on the PlayStation 3 over half a decade ago. Much as with the first Devil May Cry, the Nintendo Switch version of Devil May Cry 2 adds nothing to the game beyond the Nintendo Switch’s portability, but unlike the first game, Devil May Cry cannot claim to be a beloved classic, and this time it isn’t being packed in with the other two games, which leads to the obvious question… is there any reason to buy this game?

At the very least, this game doesn’t have the same puzzling lack of polish in its remaster that the first game did – video sequences and menus in this game look fine, unlike the first game, although of course the character models here are still notably low-poly and the textures are still pretty blurry by today’s standards. And like the first game, this game features a better overall resolution and framerate.

However, unlike the first game, the sense of style that the first game had in spades feels largely lacking here, with enemies that often feel a bit more generic, and environments awash in muddy shades of brown. Plus, the story seems to have been an afterthought here, with new playable character Lucia barely getting any sort of introduction, and the motivations for both characters to confront the game’s demonic antagonist murky (beyond the “he’s a demon” bit).

As for the gameplay, this game has the basic idea of what the original game did right, but fails in the details. This time around, the combat doesn’t feel like it flows as smoothly as the first game, but it hardly matters since enemies this time are a pushover. Frustratingly, attacks either seem to toss them around like they weigh next to nothing, making it harder to get in a combo… or else they don’t seem to react at all until they’ve taken enough hits to be stunned or killed. Either way, this saps a lot of the fun out of combat.

When I finally did encounter enemies that were a challenge, it wasn’t due to the gameplay demanding more of the player, but because the game’s targeting system insisted on having me attacking enemies other than the one I was facing, or because the game’s camera obscured them from view. As much as the camera was a pain in the first game, here it’s outright excruciating, with fixed angles not working well at all with the game’s wider-open areas, constantly shifting perspective and making it hard to keep track of where you are among the game’s repetitive environments.

The game doesn’t do everything wrong though. Moving the dodge button to a separate command was a smart idea, even if the command itself isn’t implemented smoothly here. And the way your character can briefly run on walls using the dodge button is a nice touch too. Also, giving players a second playable protagonist whose journey mirrors Dante isn’t a bad idea either, even if she doesn’t ultimately feel too terribly different (she has faster attacks, but not as much range as Dante).

However, it’s pretty safe to say that Devil May Cry 2 is a game with major problems that make it a repetitive slog, and those problems are not improved in this release. Yet, despite that, Nintendo Switch owners are being asked to pay a premium price that’s pretty much an insult when compared to releases on other platforms. Where the first game’s price amounted to some atrocious price-gouging, this is the same level of horrible price-gouging without an actual product worth buying at the center of it. Do yourself a favor and skip this game, even if you want Devil May Cry in handheld form – it’s a pale shadow of what the first and third games have to offer anyway.

tl;dr – Devil May Cry 2 is a Spectacle Fighter that is generally considered to be the worst game in the series, and this remaster doesn’t change that fact. Yet despite this, Capcom is still trying to price gouge customers looking to get the game on the Nintendo Switch, charging the same price for this game as the cost of the full trilogy on other platforms. This isn’t just greed or disregard for customers, it’s pure stupidity, since the easiest way to respond to an overpriced bad game is to not buy it.

Grade: D+

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