Its my opinion, feel free to have your own opinion about the game but this is what I think.

My overall standing to this game is well.

It was the BEST DMC GAMEPLAY I have ever experienced, but the

Gameplay

Nero

I always found Nero to be the most fun DMC character to play as. You don't really have so much of an issue closing the gap into enemies with your devil arm and this game brought the grapple ability back. It was always satisfying to grapple enemies in, and the arms ability allowed us to have more versatility in gameplay. I was overwhelmed by the number of different arms you would get, but it turns out because of how disposable and how you don't change from arm to arm works, you are forced to use different arms and not stick to the same arm because they break when you use the super move or when they hit you while using the arm. That was really good, and I had the chance to use almost all the arms and to each added a unique way of playing. There wasn't a single arm I disliked, except for the sweet surrender which is basically just a heal. It kinda ruins momentum but at least it allows you to heal without the use of items. I just use it for the superheal. Me personally I always refuse to use items in DMC, even gold orbs. It affects ranking and it feels like I have to grind to get yellow orb. What I usually do is just do the boss fight over and over and over and over. I feel like that was the real way of experiencing DMC considering it actually detriments your ranking. I think his gameplay has been the most satisfying yet.

V

V was really hard to use at first, but once you master him it becomes so explosive its funny. Its just destruction everywhere when you max the "chicken" and the cat who is exactly the same as one of the difficult mobs in DMC 1. It gave me a sense of nostalgia and it felt so satisfying to use a mob that was a pretty difficult mob you have fight before. Anyways the fact that you use 2 characters, technically 3 with Devil Trigger, leaves room to so much chaos. Like you cause literal chaos and its so satisfying to finish them off and get those easy S styles. I accidentally got an SSS once. His gameplay was actually extremely satisfying, and when you learn how your guys work, except a ton of explosions and havoc. Even then I feel I didn't use him to his full potential, but it doesn't make him any less fun.

Dante

Dante is Dante and is always Dante. I think Dante was the best handled character here. In fact think of this Dante as a mix with his DMC1, DMC2, DMC 3 and DMC 4. Technically DMC 4 completely improved from DMC 3 in its own way by making him feel more versatile at the cost of being more complex. Anyway, this was THE BEST Dante of all Dantes. I mean like it took everything good from DMC1 all the way to DMC4, and made it into this guy. IT WAS BADASS AWESOME STYLISH HOLY SHIZZZ.

• get the satisfaction of getting a better weapon that you previously had and now you feel so powerful like in DMC 1
• Got the super badass Devil Trigger from DMC 2 and this time with a much better rewarding mechanic
• Get the styles from DMC 3 and 4, but more into 4 that you can use all of them with the directional buttons.
• We got back ceberus :D ( DMC 3 )

This Dante IS THE MOST POWERFUL DANTE YET and they did it the best way possible. They took EVERYTHING that was awesome from Dante and made stronger than ever before. As in it felt like we are finally playing Dante at his full potential again and it was so nostalgic and satisfying. Now you came all the way and you are fighting an even stronger version of Vergil, this Vergil that took in so much demonic power, he became a giant of mess and POWER!!!!!!!!!! I was doubtful that even after Dante's new DT he could beat Vergil considering he was actually bigger and looked more powerful, surprisingly he actually does beat Vergil, then it hit us that its not over yet and that he has to fight him again. I was like "WHAT THIS IS INSANE". Then you go through story and end up fighting King Ceberus ( who even claimed to be more powerful than Berial and is stronger than every other Ceberus ), mere words can't describe how awesome that felt. He has the aspects Ceberus had, and the aspects Berial had, and one up'ed them both. You beat him and it was an insane boss fight. There on afterwards you see Giant Demon King Vergil again, and he is about to eat an apple which gives him "more power". My God, never thought we'd have to fight an overpowered version of an overpowered version of an overpowered Vergil. Vergil literally speaks "overpowered" and yet he still speaks more power. The Boss fight stood up to overpowered cuz I had, a lot of trouble with the boss and considering I constantly refuse yellow orbs and played it in the hardest starting difficulty, this boss stood up to its name of "POWER!!!!!!".

What it comes down is how I've had these adventures with Dante ( Even DMC 2 ), and how it comes together to form this one ultimate Dante, and you are fighting an ultimate version of tough bosses you fought before. It was just epic and badass. You feel Dante's struggle and at the same time you feel his growth, that he could actually fodderize Sparda and Mundus now.

Other Aspects

When they added the slow motion shots after he beat all enemies, the sound effects, the graphics. The music can get somewhat repetitive but it wasn't really a problem to me too much. If you want a DMC game for the gameplay, then 5 has the best of it.

The Story or More Importantly, Was I Satisfied?

I was pretty excited about how Nero is. He changed and became more fun, in his own way he is becoming more like Dante but still Nero, so at least he is still technically in-character and I liked that. He was willing to become strong because of how Dante called him "dead weight" just like in the trailers and he is an adolescent still. I was excited because he still had so much room to learn and so much room to grow.

SUPER MEGA HEAVY SPOILERS

So the game starts out with them being inside the demon tree or like the demon king's lair. Just a heads up the demon king was obviously Vergil, and I guessed that already from the trailers and the start of the game. The dude was screaming "power" and that was Vergil's meme. The start of the game had Nero hate him because he took his arm and in the trailer that was obviously also Vergil since he wielded Yamato. The Demon King is very very very overpowered. So why he is overpowered is because,

• he broke rebellion
• forcefields stopped Sparda and called Sparda "of no use anymore"
• This guy can seemingly fingerflick Mundus.

This Demon King stomped Dante, Trish, and Lady. Yeah they were all there, and Dante had to be the real deal who still got stomped. So Nero comes in and we fight the boss, a fight we are supposed to lose. Since this game has Nero obviously the main character I'll talk about his drives and motivations. They were really good.

• He wants revenge for taking his arm, and anyone who played DMC 4 would know his arm was something he hated but learned to appreciate later on.
• He was is consistently dead weight to Dante. Dante literally says that to him and he refuses to believe that.

Nero is a teenager still (although the game sorta implied he was married to Kyrie who we never got to see throughout the game), he still acted like a teenager, out of impulse and rash decision making. That is what made him so interesting is because he had room to grow. The best part was that Dante can't always be there for him, because he can't even deal with the Demon King, who is a tier above Dante and multiple times magnitudes soo much more powerful than Nero. And we soon learn Dante HAS to beat Urizen/Vergil, because he is his brother and he knows that.

So yeah after we lose, Dante has to save his ass of course by going Devil Trigger, and going at his STRONGEST DT FORM with Sparda and straight up thrusting at Vergil but alas to no avail. He tells Nero and V to run, which Vergil refuses but V still pulls him away from the debris that the clash was causing. Dante gets bitch slapped and loses his DT form and is sent flying away. This is was probably THE BEST way to introduce DMC 5. We are sooo weak and this is who we are up against.

Now I liked playing as Nero because I felt like the underdog, trying to play a more significant role, so he obviously needs to get stronger, and I mean unrealistically so much stronger in that one game. Like going from kid Naruto to Naruto Shippuden in one game, that is how strong he needs to get and the game makes that clear. After the events I told you about where they all got stomped and only Nero and V escaped, playing as Nero we had to do our own thing like stop the roots which were basically giant building sized weird plant things that if you kill a boss, the plant dies too. That is what we were doing playing as Nero, so over this course of time dealing with bosses and stopping the spread, and literally without Dante's help, I felt significant playing Nero. You are playing a role in the game, instead of having Dante do everything. We know at this point he is more competent. He is saving the world without Dante around. Nero ends up saving Lady who was inside a boss and does more things. What we got so far, he is obviously capable. What we don't have is him being strong enough to beat Urizen.

Then the game has go faarrr into the deep of the biggest plant which was the same place Dante, Trish and Lady fought Urizen.We do know that Nero is becoming rash again and that he is here so that he can fight Urizen again. I liked that because it was giving us a chance to explore more of his flaws, which is him being irrational as hell, and trying too hard to already be as strong as Dante when he obviously isn't. That made me like to see Nero develop so much. It was soooo interesting. I was really happy, it didn't feel as bland as DMC4 where its literally just "KYRIE KYRIE KYRIE KYRIE KYRIEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!".

So Nero did passed through some blood evelators, blah blah blah, platforms etc. And then we reached it again. We are closing in to the throne going to fight a battle we will obviously lose. Back in the exact same place as the prologue part of the game where we got stomped. During the boss fight you can't even take away his health bar, what you do have to get past his shield. HOLY HELL, I lost sooo many lives trying to get past the shield. IT WAS A STRUGGLE. That level was soooo hard. You can literally feel Nero's struggle. Hey you are only getting past the shield. You aren't doing jacksht. We managed to break the shield, only to progress as much as "just a drop of blood" which eventually just regenerates. Demon King Vergil had enough of that, called him "human" and was crushing him with tentacles. AND THEN DANTE SHOWS UP.

Now lets talk about Dante, and they made him pretty awesome in this game because I liked how he had to be more powerful than before, like ever since DMC 1 and 3, this is the time we see him struggling again, to a point he got stomped. So remember when Demon King beat up Dante and his crew, well he got into a 1 month coma somewhere in the giant tree. Got woken up by V who separated paths from Nero to find the sword Sparda, found the sword Sparda, and woke Dante up with it. Dante awoken wondered whats going on and asked how long he slept, which is one month, and gets back to work immediately. Like he takes Sparda, kicks demon ass, and proceeds to find Urizen. He ends up finding a familiar place and because the tree that grew in the area, right in the bottom and the middle of it, was Dante's house. So then we get his backstory, see his memory of when he last saw his mother, and remembered that back when they were very young, Vergil stabbed Dante with rebellion to awaken his demon powers.

Before we get to that lets talk about V, it turns out that V was Vergil's human side. The reason Vergil became Urizen was because after he took Nero's arm, he used Yamato to stab himself to seperate his demon and human self, with V being his human self.

Dante remembered that Vergil stabbed him with rebellion, so he tries that again with the broken Rebellion, to seperate his human to demon. Then he becomes super ultra mega demon Dante, and that is one HELLA Demon. Like it looked more powerful than any Devil Trigger we have ever seen and of course it is. Dante didn't exactly seperate his human still, but he just unlocked a new super Devil Trigger. He also got a new sword named "Dante" so like instead of Sparda whose sword is named after himself, its Dante and we know Dante is more powerful than Sparda now. So yeah Dante became super powerful. He actually is strong enough to beat Demon King Vergil/Urizen, except Vergil says its too late now and teleports away which Dante couldn't reach him in time. Enough of that now

About Nero who is pretty much the main thing about DMC V, he is still rash even at the brink of death. I really liked that, Nero's personality is strong and hard to break and seeing the game now, he might forced to be more patient or something along the lines, and then everyone starts getting conflicted and Dante is like "stay out of this" all the time and Nero is just so insistent. So then I was really excited, how is Nero going to get stronger. Even by this time, we still haven't unlocked Nero's devil trigger. Then it goes on and Dante goes his own way.

Oh right Dante is consistently getting stronger, and I mean he is MUCH MUCH stronger than his DMC 1 self. This was already obvious when he had to beat "King Ceberus" who claimed he could stomp Ceberus and Berial. Dante beat that, reached Vergil, has they're own talk. Vergil gets the apple of power and the reason for the trees was to transport human blood to make the apple. Eats it and gains ULTIMATE DEMONIC POWER. Like Vergil went from being Demon King overpowered, to Demon King overpowered overpowered. I was like HOLY SHT, THIS IS INSANE CAN YOU IMAGINE BATTLE FORUMS RIGHT NOW. Dante beats Overpowered Overpowered Demon King Vergil because yeah, Dante is still one hell of a winner. So right remember when they went their separate ways. Basically Dante, V, and Nero went separate. Nero and V are underdogs, and Dante beat Vergil before they can even get there. V being the mysterious guy, says he wants to go to Vergil and Dante lets him. Turns out, bad move because V merged with Vergil, to well..... become Vergil again. Vergil looks older, and I sort of didn't like it.

Hard to explain why I don't like it, but it doesn't quite feel Vergil. His face looked a lot less scary compared to before. So Vergil as Vergil, is still as strong as Dante so he beat Dante who was tired, and told him to recover first before they "settle things".

So, it was getting good when Nero still complained to Dante that he can still do something. Dante tells him the truth now as to why he told him to stay out of this, is because he doesn't want Nero to kill his father. He tells Nero, that Vergil is his father and hell..... he became shocked. I REALLY REALLY LIKED THAT. NERO BECAME SHOCKED. Nero is going to grow. We have a reason to see Nero grow. I LOVED IT. And now we have a more powerful foe to deal with and we are already at like mission 16 or 17. That made me think, "is DMC V gonna have 30 missions".

This is where it gets horrible ( salt alert )

Its only 20 missions. So I was wondering, Vergil seems like a good guy now and seems to regain control of himself and hoping for redemption. He wasn't himself that time.

Now here is the thing. I am pretty sure Vergil and Dante are no longer enemies by the end of DMC 3. They just had they own reasons to "protect each other" or "protect their legacy". Vergil doesn't want Dante dead. He lost on purpose at the end of DMC 3 which was implied because the portal was closing, and Vergil didn't want Dante trapped here and he accepted his lost. So I was kinda confused, does Vergil want to be redeemed? Did he actually accept his loss? Didn't he care about Dante at the end? That was what I felt playing DMC 3. I mean why did Vergil want power? TO PROTECT AND NOT LET THAT HAPPEN AGAIN. He cares about Dante but their fighting led here. I liked that in DMC 3.

So why are they fighting now? Well I was sugarcoating and thinking, Vergil must still not be Vergil. Turns out he was confirmed sane now. And I was like.... why do you still want to kill each other and that was what we were supposed to think. Dante didn't want Nero to kill his father Vergil so he takes the responsibility instead. The game also made it clear he doesn't need human blood anymore or demons to take over the entire city. What is Vergil scheming now? Nothing.... absolutely nothing. I was really thinking what does he want now. Turns out he only wants to get back at Dante. LIKE WHAT!? Whats all this buildup to stopping Vergil now. We stopped the super demon at like in the middle of the game, so why fight Vergil now? Why kill him? He just wants a rematch against Dante? Why make it all dramatic? I know this because in the end, Vergil also agreed to stop the portal from the demon world to the human world, which he might have created as Urizen. I wanted a better redemption but this was just so sudden an unnatural. Like why? Settle what exactly? A sibling rivalry that has no substance anymore ever since DMC 3 ended?

Vergil isn't even the worst of it. It turns out, the worst end was from Nero. HOLY SHT, his comeback was literally ughhhhh. So remember about Nero needing getting stronger and more involved? He got that it the worst way possible. Remember when Vergil stalemated Dante who beat OP Urizen and beat OP OP Urizen. So Vergil is obviously stronger than his Urizen self and OP Urizen self. Well Vergil for the FIRST TIME, unlocks his Devil Trigger, and it looks, not so great.

I didn't like it because its literally his first legit Devil Trigger where he actually changed form. And when you talk of Ultimate Devil Trigger, you look at Dante's majin form or Vergil's new DT. This looked like it came out of a cringey anime shonen targeting highschool edgelords. I would have been fine if..... this didn't happen.

Where SUDDENLY, Nero unlocks his Devil Trigger, and stops BOTH DANTE AND VERGIL. Like WHY!? He had to rely on Dante before, he had Dante save his ass. It wasn't like DMC 3 Dante where he was an independent cool badass who deserved strength. He was still a cringey emo kid. He had nothing to deserve strength.

You know what it took? All it took was a phonecall to Kyrie and Kyrie telling Nero "You always know the right thing Nero". Like really??? The buildup was sooo good. I really didn't need Nero to get on their level so soon, but I liked he was feeling struggle and is now developing, but it doesn't quite amount to what Dante had to go through.

The worst part, then WORST PART OF IT ALL, IS THAT HE TURNED INTO DmC DONTE!!

I was really excited to see how Nero develops but like........ it went back to "cringe". Not only that, they pulled off THE WORST

LITERALLY and another LITERALLY. When I say that I mean. Nero LITERALLY turned into Donte. Like the literal BJORK YOU. He became soo bad. Watch the video, it brings so much bad memories.

Anyway my real complaint wasn't the power levels. Its how he got there. We never got to see any real progression in getting stronger, he didn't get any real progression in powers, and worst of all, it didn't feel like he progressed much as a character in a good way. It didn't feel good. He felt incomplete. If he had some training or if he showed he got stronger, I would have been happy to see it happen or change from the person he was once before. Like maybe by the time he lost his arm, he still had his long hair, and then a month later when DMC 5 starts he gets his short hair. This could at least show some change that he is proving to be more competent. Its just not fair, in DMC 3, Dante had to go through more loss, had to go through extreme struggle without any help, had to become more mature, and had to bear an extremely large responsibility all on his own because its his own brother and this didn't happen because he got a new Devil Trigger, but because he had a better standing of his responsibility as the son of Sparda.

I really think the issue for DMC V was that they either rushed, or didn't put enough content to it or couldn't. It was a big game for sure, and the story. No it wasn't bad, they were really going in the right direction, but because they had to rush Nero's development, it all came crashing down. The ending can literally be a DMC meme.

Overall

I think the game was really good, and its got some nice replay ability in it. The story isn't exactly so bad, but its just how it ended leaves you feeling dissatisfied. It didn't feel like a complete game but it was at least good.

Armstrong Academy

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The red one requested by zets

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gosh darn.

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