This is probably still my favorite game in the franchise. Might sound strange to some since the game's combat is a lot more limited when compared to later entries but that's part of why I love it. Every move in Dante's arsenal is worth using at some point or another and I do mean EVERY move. Charging Ebony and Ivory with DT to increase your style against Griffon. Locking Nobodies in place with Round Trip. Shotgun cancelling Bloody Maries. Vortexing Phantom to death during the chase scenes. Every move I ever doubted on my first playthrough back in 2012 have proven me wrong and become staples in my moveset in the years since. While it's an absolute blast experimenting with Dante's expanded kits in later titles, it's just as rewarding finding new uses for moves you once thought had been depleted of all their worth.
A big contributing factor to all this is the stellar boss lineup. I don't know how Hideki Kamiya and his team did it, but Team Little Devils created one of the best rogues galleries in an action game all the way back in 2001. This game's roster of baddies will test you, and I mean fucking TEST you on all of your defensive options as well as your offensive ones. Even enemy attacks that you once thought you mastered your way around will turn out to have an even more efficient way of dealing with them as your skill and understanding of the mechanics increase. You're always learning new things against these foes and that goes doubly so for the bosses. Phantom, Griffon, Nero Angelo, even the dreaded Nightmare (ESPECIALLY Nightmare) all offer many lessons you'll take to heart. Some of these are exclusive for their respective fights, like learning how Nightmare's cores work. Others are multi-purpose, like figuring out double jumping before striking down on Phantom from above deals more damage. The game even uses its Secret Missions to teach some of these techniques and it does so with more elegance than the missions in later DMC games.
To top my love for this game off, I want to give a special mention to this game's wonderfully eerie atmosphere. Something later DMC games lost. Mundus' castle feels like a place lost to time. The world feels alive, not in a "Oh wow, there's so many moving objects and blah blah blah" sort of way but more in a "The castle is a liminal space that's trying to swallow you whole" kind of way. The early levels have music that sounds like the dead are having a ballroom dance in an adjacent room while later stages have music that feels utterly oppressive, like you pissed off the castle itself and now it's trapped you within its walls. I really wish the franchise would return to this kind of horror instead of the dull, lifeless environments found in later installments.
Then again, it's not so surprising DMC1 would have these horror elements, along with more focused gameplay. The title was going to be Resident Evil 4 at one point in development and it seems a bit of that classic RE game flavor found its way into the final product. When taking that factoid into account, it's a miracle DMC1 is not only a game so fantastic that it kickstarted a brand new franchise, but one to make such a strong impact on the future of high quality action games.
Devil May Cry's a rocking don't come a knocking baby, yeah!
A big contributing factor to all this is the stellar boss lineup. I don't know how Hideki Kamiya and his team did it, but Team Little Devils created one of the best rogues galleries in an action game all the way back in 2001. This game's roster of baddies will test you, and I mean fucking TEST you on all of your defensive options as well as your offensive ones. Even enemy attacks that you once thought you mastered your way around will turn out to have an even more efficient way of dealing with them as your skill and understanding of the mechanics increase. You're always learning new things against these foes and that goes doubly so for the bosses. Phantom, Griffon, Nero Angelo, even the dreaded Nightmare (ESPECIALLY Nightmare) all offer many lessons you'll take to heart. Some of these are exclusive for their respective fights, like learning how Nightmare's cores work. Others are multi-purpose, like figuring out double jumping before striking down on Phantom from above deals more damage. The game even uses its Secret Missions to teach some of these techniques and it does so with more elegance than the missions in later DMC games.
To top my love for this game off, I want to give a special mention to this game's wonderfully eerie atmosphere. Something later DMC games lost. Mundus' castle feels like a place lost to time. The world feels alive, not in a "Oh wow, there's so many moving objects and blah blah blah" sort of way but more in a "The castle is a liminal space that's trying to swallow you whole" kind of way. The early levels have music that sounds like the dead are having a ballroom dance in an adjacent room while later stages have music that feels utterly oppressive, like you pissed off the castle itself and now it's trapped you within its walls. I really wish the franchise would return to this kind of horror instead of the dull, lifeless environments found in later installments.
Then again, it's not so surprising DMC1 would have these horror elements, along with more focused gameplay. The title was going to be Resident Evil 4 at one point in development and it seems a bit of that classic RE game flavor found its way into the final product. When taking that factoid into account, it's a miracle DMC1 is not only a game so fantastic that it kickstarted a brand new franchise, but one to make such a strong impact on the future of high quality action games.
Devil May Cry's a rocking don't come a knocking baby, yeah!