Legit though, DMC4 sucked.
- Thread starter Bazilican
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So basically, Nero is so poorly written because they tried to insert his character without thinking of how to integrate him into the story/lore and then defaulted to telling us literal nothing in the games campaign about him. Not even giving us a sliver of a backstory about how he grew up, how he ended up in the city or how he he came to know the people he affiliated with.
Actually all that stuff is explained in the DMC4 novel which is basically the original version of DMC4 Bingo wrote but was scrapped from the full game due to budget and time constraits.
They(well Bingo) thought his full backstory out it just didn't make it into the game. Plus its not like the full details of Dante's life were fully implemented in the games either but left to be explored in books and anime as well. There is far more to Dante's story as well that aren't covered in the games.
1)I shouldn't have to read a book to figure out the backstory and info of a character in video game that I'm evidently supposed to care about.
2)Well at least with Dante they gave us something and a reason to care.
1) Its not really the writers fault if the stuff he wrote wasn't fully capable of making it into the game due to issues from the finance dept and developers side so its not "poor storytelling" but rather limitations and budget cuts. Its poor storytelling if the story was actually written like that by Bingo. In the game design or game development implementing a story isn't as easy as it sounds...elements of gameplay or just issues with actual implementation of the game and the dev process by the developers can matter too. With set time and budget developers must implement each aspect of a game (gameplay/mechanics, cinematics, level design, modelling, animation, etc) all together and part of the same budget. Story content from games have been cut before because there wasn't enough time or a change of plans.
2) A reason to care for a character can differ from people to people or situation to situation. One reason I found to care for Nero in the context of DMC4's story was the fact the people and organization he worked his entire life for and dedicated to all turn on him and revealed to be the bad guys. We know he worked for the Order and to be betrayed by them is the equivalent of a soldier doing his time in an army only to be f*cked over and tried to be killed off by the same group he is apart of. We know he strongly cares for Kyrie even not giving an actual in story cutscene (although bits of Nero's and Kyrie's backstory are in the in-game journal so you have some info of them in game such as the orphan bits and being raised by Kyrie's family) reason why. So the fact he is being betrayed by the same group he worked for and dedicated himself to and the fact the person he cares for the most is being used as part of their plans. We also learn from various story interactions and hints that Nero preferred to work alone in the Order, Credo's subordinate, and despite working for the Order didn't belief or follow their religion (him listening to music during the sermon and even saying "pppffft Savior" when Gloria said "Let the Savior be with you") although the book mentions he was an atheist which is why it was meant to be....well meant to be a big deal when he starts thanking God for his arm.
1)It may not be their fault but I can't excuse it. And it still a fault of the game.
2)True, however I don't see how having to read a manual to get a character's back story is different from having to read a book or manga.
TWOxACROSS
Hot-blooded God of Guns
Having played the demo, there was no way of knowing that all the things I didn't like about the game, from story to other mechanics, existed. Not to mention that trailers do little to show the actual game, trailers hide flaws and will sell you on a version of a product that doesn't exist. With DMC4 and its story, the sad part was that what little they showed to make us intrigued by who Nero was were actually all that the game had to show - the trailer hints at more, and nothing became of it. Specifically, I remember in the trailers "That k-k-k-kid possesses d-d-d-demonic power!" that made me go "Oh sh!t, gonna be interesting to hear how that came about," and then there was nothing more to it. The manual says his arm was injured earlier by a demon, which left me with a vague assumption that his arm was infected, and now that I think about it, not much has come to light to change that assumption >.>
1) It actually still is his fault, because when you have to cut things, you find any way to still leave that information for the audience. They could have added way more into any files included in the game. The series actually loves those files to explain more about the world and lore, while also explaining game mechanics and such. We could have found items, or even documents in-game that explained certain things.
All in all, what really should have happened is if they couldn't get in the things Bingo had thought up about Nero, they should have left the f#cking character out. I don't understand how they could try to make DMC4 Nero's story, cut out most of what actually would make it his story, and then leave the character in to become a giant question mark who looks and acts like Dante, but isn't Dante.
Hate to bring up DMC2, but hell, Lucia was more her own person than Nero was >.>
2) This is actually a pretty crummy reasoning, because Nero is shown to consistently shrug off the command of the Order. He does it because he likes to fight, and he wants to protect Credo and Kyrie, but he's never seemed at all invested in the organization itself, nor their religion (which you mentioned). Fighting Credo was the most worked up he got about his relationship with the Order of the Sword. Nero's emotional arcs begin and end with Credo and Kyrie. The Order of the Sword is nothing more than a vehicle to manufacture drama for him.
However, Nero's strong desire to protect Kyrie above all else isn't motivation enough for a lot of people to care, because Kyrie, bless her heart, is a Princess Peach cardboard cut-out. Sadly, in this day and age, you can't bank on an audience to just care enough about a "get the girl back" plot. The audience really needs to understand why she's worth getting back, and "We're childhood friends/lovers" does not cut it - of course you love her, but why is this relationship special?
Ok lets take for example DMC 1 you barely knew who dante was, you don't know what happens to Vergil all you know is that he was Nelo Angelo, and other tidbits here and there. They took out a Prequel to explain most of the stuff, but again no one went bat sh@t about the flaws the game had concerning story....
TWOxACROSS
Hot-blooded God of Guns
Yeeeees, because it was the complete introduction to the series. They told us about Dante a bit beforehand, there was a wealth of information in the manual, and the story specifically dealt with things regarding origins - it hit a lot of the common themes that are necessary in an introductory piece. The emergence of Mundus and his threats helped us to learn more about Sparda's legacy. Some of it was new to Dante, but it was all new to us.
And y'know what? Nelo Angelo being Vergil was also pretty dumb, to be quite frank. You got one mention of "a brother" at the beginning of the game, and then when Nelo Angelo is finally defeated, we are treated to a scene where Nelo Angelo had an amulet of his own and a half-sentence audio of "Dante, Vergil, happy birthday~" And then another scene with Mundus saying "Trish, Vergil has been defeated." Dante cries out over Vergil's death, but there is almost no emotion a player can feel, because the connection of Nelo Angelo being Vergil was made after he was killed, and it was done in one of the worst ways possible.
As far as I remember, people harped on DMC1 for having a silly and cliched story, especially the lack of emotion regarding the story in terms of Vergil. People didn't talk about DMC1's story because there was nothing noteworthy about it, and most mention of it is just making fun of how hammy it was. In the end, though, no one really cared, because it was a really cool action game and in the end the gameplay was what mattered. The general consensus on Devil May Cry has always been "great gameplay, sh!t story", and the reason why DMC3 is so beloved is because it did so much right, even with its story, which then also attempted to make DMC1's story better.
Devil May Cry is okay at getting information across, but not good at telling a story. Then, in DMC4, they weren't even good in getting some information across that would have been really nice to have.
The criticism of DMC4 is worse than DMC1 by virtue of DMC3 being such an unbelievable gem, and then it was like they learned nothing from it, because DMC4 had so much unrealized potential.
Also - them creating DMC3 to tell us how Vergil became Nelo Angelo did just that - that one thing. It was one answer to a multitude of questions, the main one being "how the hell did Vergil survive when everything we know has told us that Vergil was killed along with Eva?" Even DMC3 tossed us a character who by all rights shouldn't have been alive, and didn't tell us anything about why he was, and why he was being such a cock about things
Even DMC3 had some lost potential, but it's still the best in the series.
Even though I love DMC4 to bits, I'm with TwoxAcross on this one; there really was some lost potential-not to the point of it "sucking" (let's face it, whether it sucks or not is entirely subjective) but there was a lot that could have been done with it, and wasn't. In the words of the Gaming Brit (if you don't know of him, he's a youtube game reviewer). "Earth to Capcom: people didn't find it (DMC4) a little subpar because we didn't enjoy the universe; people found it subpar because you didn't finish it!"
Again, love the game, and honestly, not a horrible storyline, either-but, they left so much out, neglected to give us crucial info, that it does seem...unbalanced.
It's true; the general consensus when it comes to the Devil May Cry games usually does involve "great gameplay, lousy story" from the vast majority of players. But, as TwoxAcross also said, DMC3 succeeded in creating a balance between both aspects that none of the other Devil May Cry games had-it still came up short in some ways, I suppose, but overall, it did the best job of it.
General statement here, just so no one gets their knickers in a twist:
All that said? no two people are going to agree entirely on every aspect; if you love the game, don't let anyone ruin that for you. If you hate the game, don't be an a$$, and go out of your way to ruin it for everyone else. The game is what it is, folks, and what it is and our interpretations of it are going to differ dramatically. My "kernel of wisdom"? Avoid the games you don't like, and play the sh*t out of the ones you do. Simple as that.
Again, love the game, and honestly, not a horrible storyline, either-but, they left so much out, neglected to give us crucial info, that it does seem...unbalanced.
It's true; the general consensus when it comes to the Devil May Cry games usually does involve "great gameplay, lousy story" from the vast majority of players. But, as TwoxAcross also said, DMC3 succeeded in creating a balance between both aspects that none of the other Devil May Cry games had-it still came up short in some ways, I suppose, but overall, it did the best job of it.
General statement here, just so no one gets their knickers in a twist:
All that said? no two people are going to agree entirely on every aspect; if you love the game, don't let anyone ruin that for you. If you hate the game, don't be an a$$, and go out of your way to ruin it for everyone else. The game is what it is, folks, and what it is and our interpretations of it are going to differ dramatically. My "kernel of wisdom"? Avoid the games you don't like, and play the sh*t out of the ones you do.
Simple as that.
TWOxACROSS
Hot-blooded God of Guns
My "kernel of wisdom"? Avoid the games you don't like, and play the sh*t out of the ones you do.
Always been my philosophy, and it bugs the ever-loving sh!t outta me to see people who actively go out of their way to express their dislike of something. It's like people who dig something just aren't allowed to chat it up with other like-minded people, there has to be someone to come in and p!ss in their corn flakes.
And before someone says this post is the pot calling the kettle a racial slur, I'd remind all that this was a thread regarding someone's distaste for the game
^ like Chancey did, for example.
Dmc4 wasn't perfect, and Nero was incomplete. The whole game (for those who do not know this tidbit) had once encompassed the plotline that Nero actually is Vergil's kid. Then just before release, some idiot must have said Nero needs to be mysterious, or that they might receive backlash that Vergil isn't actually in the game, or that the story is too predictable when it's all laid bare to the fans, so take out most referneces to Vergil, etc. Bet you there had been more back story as to how Nero got his arm stuffed up too. I mean I dunno, maybe if I could blackmail Dan into fessing up about that, I could make a more informed guess, but he's fairly hard ass.
To the point, I loved dmc4 best because it wasn't as buggy as DmC, and it had better graphics than dmc3. Of course it has its faults which I have stated repeatedly in the past, but if I had to list all the faults in DmC and make a thread about how it legitimately stinks as a modern game and a reboot in general, you guys would feel the need to nitpick dmc4 even more.
If we had to scrap every 'bad 'game in the dmc franchise, we would be left with dmc3 and dmc1 and nothing else. You know maybe capcom really just sucks at games in general. Maybe they don't know any better than making really, really bad calls. History tells me as much.
So in short: you don't like dmc4.
BOOHOO.Cry me a friggin river:'(
Dmc4 wasn't perfect, and Nero was incomplete. The whole game (for those who do not know this tidbit) had once encompassed the plotline that Nero actually is Vergil's kid. Then just before release, some idiot must have said Nero needs to be mysterious, or that they might receive backlash that Vergil isn't actually in the game, or that the story is too predictable when it's all laid bare to the fans, so take out most referneces to Vergil, etc. Bet you there had been more back story as to how Nero got his arm stuffed up too. I mean I dunno, maybe if I could blackmail Dan into fessing up about that, I could make a more informed guess, but he's fairly hard ass.
To the point, I loved dmc4 best because it wasn't as buggy as DmC, and it had better graphics than dmc3. Of course it has its faults which I have stated repeatedly in the past, but if I had to list all the faults in DmC and make a thread about how it legitimately stinks as a modern game and a reboot in general, you guys would feel the need to nitpick dmc4 even more.
If we had to scrap every 'bad 'game in the dmc franchise, we would be left with dmc3 and dmc1 and nothing else. You know maybe capcom really just sucks at games in general. Maybe they don't know any better than making really, really bad calls. History tells me as much.
So in short: you don't like dmc4.
BOOHOO.Cry me a friggin river:'(
That's fair, DMC4 has it's flaws, but I personally felt the good outweighed the flaws. Least that's my opinion
^ This, on so many scales; not to mention that if such a thread was created, countless people would jump all over the OP about how they're "wrong", and how, "they should stop whining about a game that came out a little more than a year ago".
Ha! (No seriously, so much laughter, here). And yet...they complain about a game from six years ago?
I agree with you, DS; whoever scrapped the idea of giving us (the fans) a more definitive answer on who and what Nero is, deserves a cuff upside the head, at the very least. I'll take an overly cliché, played-out trope over having no answer at all.
But, C'est la vie: "We take what we can get, right?" :wink:
And agreed, Agent Redgrave; I feel the same way.
TWOxACROSS
Hot-blooded God of Guns
The only thing i disagree is this. It's hinted in many ways that Nelo has a relation with Dante: Nelo's reaction to Dante's amulet is the most crucial of them, i think, but we also got identical fighting styles (and it's stated on the bestiary to reinforce this, in case the player doesn't notice) and even identical animations, although we assume his brother is dead because of the lines in the beginning of the game; it's pretty much told that Nelo had a strong connection with Dante, just not exactly that he was Vergil.
DragonMaster2010
Don't Let the Fall of America be Your Fall
Please, I knew Nelo was related to Dante the second he showed up. The mirror thing was an obvious giveaway.
TWOxACROSS
Hot-blooded God of Guns
It's not that I had a problem with Nelo Angelo being Vergil, it's that there was virtually no drama to the discovery because we had absolutely no connection to Vergil in order to care >.< DMC3 retroactively makes it a bit more dramatic, though.
Actually i think there was enough drama, alone from audio that played during Nelo Angelo's demise, where Dante remembered their past. I think it has much stronger impact that explanation like "it's sad, because---"
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