Two women at a time, actually.
The point still stands, but thanks for the correction and pardon my recall.
Macabre, I respect your ideas and opinions, but I disagree.
That's very good of you to say chief, thanks.
In God of War, Kratos never changes. It's just three games of "RAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! MURDER FRENZY! RAAAAAGE! GRAAAAAA!"
At least DmC Dante goes through the same journey as DMC3 Dante, going from a hedonistic assshole to a mature protector.
GOD OF WAR SPOILERS
Kratos is a very emotive character. He screams constantly in battle, his body language conveys power and fury in every step, and no, that isn't all there is to him. Taking 1 as the example, Kratos's primary motive throughout the game isn't mere revenge or the quest to kill the mightiest adversary in the world, but instead to have emotional solace. Several times throughout the game he is taken aback by his memories and becomes intensely aggrieved ("By the Gods...what have I become?"). His ultimate battle with Aries has him forced to relive the murder of his family
in gameplay, where as Kratos the player is forced to murder hundreds of images of himself as they attempt to slaughter his wife and child. If you fail, Kratos is so overcome with despair that the replicas descend upon him and tear him limb from limb. The man's grief is so powerful that it physically destroys him. Hell, the entire game's framing device is Kratos standing on the edge of a mountain prepared to
kill himself because the horror of what he is done is too terrible to live with.
The game goes out of it's way to demonstrate this without having it intrude on the gameplay, so that casual players can just hammer through and think it's a well put together mindless Harryhausen murderathon, but if you scratch the surface it's actually a brutally effective modern take on the Greek tragedy, albeit with less incest. Hell, you could even look at Krato's downfall as reminiscent of Othello with Aries being his Iago if you are so inclined.
Dante in DMC3 on the other hand emotes in a completely different way: he loves his job. Itsuno and his boys took the core gameplay mechanic of the series, the combo system, and made it illustrative of Dante's character. He's the kind of man who does things for his own amusement, motivated by being as CRAZY and flamboyant as possible. There's no one watching or anybody to prove anything to, it's fun for fun's sake. He whoops with glee as he surfs monsters down the street, spraying gunshot in every direction, he giggles with amusement as he dodges Lady's bullets, he'll even admire himself in his sword's reflection as he prepares to throw down with a living GOD.
It's all because that's the character we play in gameplay and seek to emulate. We play Devil May Cry to kill monsters and look as bad ass as possible, so our avatar in the game world illustrates this. We aren't playing to get things done as quickly as possible or to see the next cutscene; we're trying our best to be Dante, while he does his best to be
us. Everything in the game world is secondary compared to us
having fun.
View attachment 477
New Dante is...well, his defining trait is probably how emotionally passive he is. While he might scowl while calling Succubus a sack of doody or groan orgasmically as he charges up a punch with Eryx, on the whole his presence as a character is incredibly neutral, even when the plot would benefit from him actually caring. One of NT's boasts is that New Dante is more relatable than Classic Dante, but he acts in such a way which is...really quite inhuman.
This is a character who barely has three words and a frown to contribute when his brother risks the life of the woman he loves so he can shoot a defenceless hostage and her unborn infant. This is a character who doesn't get upset when his home and almost everything he owns is destroyed.This is a character who doesn't shed a tear when he remembers his mother getting her heart ripped out in front of him.
You can see why NT made him this way. After the 2010 trailer was revealed, one of the primary critiques people had for the way the character appeared was "Emo".
The second that assertion was levelled at the game, it had to be changed. New Dante had to become as bland and emotionally passive as possible in order to avoid that stigma. He can only demonstrate anger in his acting, or otherwise people might say he's a pussy. We couldn't have players think New Dante was weak in any way, right?
It's creative cowardice at it's most blatant.
