Nero's mother and who she might be

[Taramafor]

First thing's first. Virgil, even in his younger years, simply isn't the kind of person to "just have sex with anyone". This does not mean it might not have been someone he "only had minimal contact with". But there's no way in hell it was a hooker. I have a talent for reading people so I know what "personality types" are like (considering my observations are always accurate I say I have the experience). Virgil, in any DMC game, simply won't spend his time with you if you're "unworthy". He's made that VERY clear over and over. So many times. It's his whole life. It's his "creed" so to speak. What he REALLY needs is to see you being capable. He doesn't prioritise "sex". And he's very in control of himself. He controls his own urges. Get this. If anyone needed affirmation and affection more then anyone, it's Virgil. But you don't get that with "hooker". Sex and affection are not mutual. If any "stranger interaction" happened it was probably someone that knew control, managed to wrap him around her finger (if you can imagine that. Basically, Virgil will respect you outplay him. But you MUST outplay him somehow) and then things happened. But that doesn't quite add up either. Unless that person also happens to fulfil the following criteria.

Let's examine this for a moment. We know NOTHING about Nero's mother. I repeat. N-o-t-h-i-n-g. Ignore any and all rumors or "made up stories". Anything outside of the devs mouths is not to be trusted. Anything outside of the games themselves is not to be trusted. We have a BLACK person as Dante's landlord instead of a white one. Which is fine. I point this out because in the animie he was white. So ANY and ALL rumors are NOT to be trusted. Assume nothing. But consider everything.

Touching back on Virgil. I know what that kind of insanity, loss and pain is like. Especially in regards to "emotionless robot" (what Urizen represents). Let's consider how Nero treated Virgil. It's about YOU. It's about YOUR safety. It's about what YOU want (beyond mere instant gratification). Nero didn't "ask" or "get offered". He just... gave. With an ass kicking, yes, but VIRGIL'S safety. Suddenly Vergil has a reason to care. To really really care. Even Dante didn't do this. Nero never speaks of his mother. But there might be a very good reason for this.

If one person was that kind to you, simply "gave" that much to you, did everything with you, actually cared about you and was the ONLY person in your whole life... The ONLY one... Once they're gone and you have NOTHING left... You go through what Virgil did. With no one else left, with nowhere else to direct yourself, with NOTHING left, you go downhill like that. Dante bounced back over and over. But what if... What if Virgil only did that ONCE and didn't again until Nero arrived? That's going to cause much more psychological trauma between the two events. Event 1 being "The loss of Nero's mother" and event 2 being Nero himself.

Remember what Virgil said in DMC3. "Might controls everything. And without strength you can not protect anything. Let alone yourself." It means Virgil LOST something he HIGHLY values. He never got to know his mother. But a lover? A lover is a different story. Someone you chose to be with. Someone that you failed to protect when you're supposed to be more able and capable. Especially after already losing your parents. Once that happens you start seeing yourself as a failure. Blaming yourself. PUSHING yourself. IMPROVING yourself. Or trying too at least. "Power. Give me more power."

That will fuel your desire to protect. Fuel your desire to be in control. To gain more power. But without anything left to protect... You end up losing a reason too.

If just one person was that giving, that kind. Like Nero. And you lost them. You'd do everything in your power to protect what's worth having too. At ANY cost. So it really gives some food for thought into just who Nero's mother is/was. Could even be a hermit living in a swamp for all we know. To be visited by Virgil to have a long talk with at some point (after killing demons on the way of course).

I can brainstrom a bagillion ideas. But it's all speculation. And hey, the main enemy could even BE Nero's mother. For some complicated reason. Picture along the lines of when Wolverine in X-men had to stop Jean (if you don't know, he killed her himself and loves her). Imagine Virgil having to kill his girl. Or Nero even. In the most heartbreaking way imaginable. Unleashing demons from hell beyond her control and having to be stopped after begging to die. We saw Arkham being unable to control Sparda's power. But he was just a corny bad guy. But someone closer? That you don't want to kill? Now there's an idea...

 

[Hungry Alien]

The problem with Nero's mom is that we basically have almost nothing on her. We only know she meet Vergil in Fortuna when he was visiting the city (and we don't know how much time he spended there), that Vergil lost her (but nothing on how he lost her), and that she abandonned Nero when he was a baby.

Then we got the suppositions. Sanctus guessed that she was a whore because no one in Fortuna knew her. So we know she was an outsider in Fortuna, no one knew her. She most likely look human since no one in Fortuna paid attention to her. But we aren't sure if she is human or something else (half demon, pure demon in hiding, or just something else). Since she got the attention of Vergil, I would bet she isn't fully human given Vergil was already on his way to power (looking on how he act in the DMC 4 cutscenes). She could also be a witch like Arkham was a sorcerer.

Another thing to consider is how Vergil didn't even remembered having a son or cared to raise him (judging on his reaction durng his fight with Dante). To me, it negate the theory that Vergil lost this woman because of his lack of power. If it was the case, why leave the child behind ? I know it's Vergil and he is kinda edgy at time, but I don't think he would just leave the last remnant of the woman he cared for enough to get her pregnant behind. Or maybe they got separated and Vergil though she died with his son, leading to him telling Dante his famous line. But even then, he doesn't really care about Nero until this one prove his strenght, only using him as a tool to set his different with Dante.

Another speculation would be that Nero was some kind of test. If his mother wasn't fully human, maybe she got along with Vergil because of that, and later she and Vergil tried to breed a new kind of person. It sound really cold, but it would still fit Vergil state of mind. Also it would explain why Nero's DT is so special and strong. Then maybe Vergil lost her when others of his kind came to stop this, forcing the mother to hide Nero in Fortuna before getting caught and preventing Vergil from raising him.

Many theories, but with so little to go on, we can only speculate here

 

[Ronin]

I would find Nero's mom to have left Fortuna and became a scientist in a city like Naomi Hunter. Even someone might've turned her into a demon.

Who knows.

 

[Morgan]

Ooh, a topic for me to be facetious about! Don't mind if I do!!

First thing's first. Virgil, even in his younger years, simply isn't the kind of person to "just have sex with anyone". This does not mean it might not have been someone he "only had minimal contact with". But there's no way in hell it was a hooker. I have a talent for reading people so I know what "personality types" are like (considering my observations are always accurate I say I have the experience). Virgil, in any DMC game, simply won't spend his time with you if you're "unworthy". He's made that VERY clear over and over. So many times. It's his whole life. It's his "creed" so to speak. What he REALLY needs is to see you being capable. He doesn't prioritise "sex". And he's very in control of himself. He controls his own urges. Get this. If anyone needed affirmation and affection more then anyone, it's Virgil. But you don't get that with "hooker".

Agreed, but try telling that to Bingo and whoever keeps writing the plot and dialogue for these games and their associated novels.

Sex and affection are not mutual. If any "stranger interaction" happened it was probably someone that knew control, managed to wrap him around her finger (if you can imagine that. Basically, Virgil will respect you outplay him. But you MUST outplay him somehow) and then things happened. But that doesn't quite add up either. Unless that person also happens to fulfil the following criteria.

Counterpoint: Arkham. Outplayed Vergil and still got merc'd. But you did mention criteria, so let's go on.

Let's examine this for a moment. We know NOTHING about Nero's mother. I repeat. N-o-t-h-i-n-g. Ignore any and all rumors or "made up stories". Anything outside of the devs mouths is not to be trusted. Anything outside of the games themselves is not to be trusted.

You kiddin'? Anything in the devs mouths is not to be trusted, and the games are even less trustworthy in light of that. We didn't get

• Dante's demeanor from 1 ("witty like a British guy" + "traditional fighting man") changing to Dante's personality post-3 (unintelligent, largely disaffected slob)
• the Fallen of DMC3 presented as having fallen from grace, the Wing Talisman containing a crystallized angel wing, and Mundus's entire pre-revelation appearance, plus the existences of Nelo / Bianco / Alto / Cavaliere / Scudo / Proto Angelo, and the Seven Sins in the manga having the appearance of and being referred to as angels, only for Itsuno to say "there are no angels in DMC" even though it'd be patently stupid for Mundus to name his creations after a non-existent concept,
• Vergil wielding Doppelganger and cutting portals with Yamato and having a massive Dante-centric inferiority complex in 5, when none of these things appeared in DMC prior to the reboot,
• Vergil's motivation for power formerly attributed to his desire/failure to protect Eva per the Material Archives: Note of Naught artbook, only for DMC5 to come out and show us he wants power because he dislikes how Dante took Eva's attention and wanted to defeat Dante to prove himself the worthy [of saving] son,
• the DMC1 novel being put back into continuity about a decade and a half after DMC3 kicked it out, via a granddaughter to Nell that we'd never heard of because the only mention of Nell's son was her hallucinating him in her own dying moments, suggesting he was already dead prior to Dante appearing in her life (eyyyyyyy turns out she just suffered a divorce and the ex took the kid), which in itself is useless because Nico is Nell's granddaughter by adoption, she's the daughter of Nell's son's half-sister from that ex-husband's relationship with another woman, and that half-sister hooked up with Agnus of all people,
• Kobayashi stating "Lady is about ten years older than she was in DMC3" but oops, 4 needs Nero to be Vergil's son and Nero is around 16-17 according to the novel or at least "the same age Dante was in DMC3", so it should be that many years after 3 and not ten years,
• DMC1 establishing that Dante lived in modern America and Kobayashi stating their setting is ours (modern day) but without cellphones, but then Itsuno saying "all of the previous games [before 4] take place in the 80s because I didn't want to explain the lack of cellphones and laptops" but haha oops, DMC5 which should take place in modern times still has our protagonists using payphones instead of smartphones in order to communicate but they've clearly got flatscreen TVs and wireless headphones,
• 3142 being changed to 31245 over a decade after the fandom accepted "DMC2 takes place in the far future" for the sake of one game, even though the 3142 artbook hadn't come out that long ago and Itsuno straight up said that while the motorcycles in 2 and 5 weren't the same ones, he was looking forward to how people would receive the connections between 2 and 5 (turns out he meant the novel, that isn't accessible to most of the game fandom, where Dante acts like an a-hole to Lucia, meanwhile the game has nary a worthwhile connection to 2)

out of respect to continuity. In fact, all this is disrespect to previous continuity, showing us full well that if needed, they will absolutely backhand the statements of a previous developer, director, producer, even themselves from a few years-months-weeks-minutes ago if it means they get to say something new to support whatever new game they want to make. They could make Nero's Mother a classy woman who won Vergil's respect and then lower her to the status of hooker or the other way around, they could even make Kyrie and Eva into whores! Literal whores!

But I agree we know nothing about Nero's Mother, and it shouldn't take them that long to come up with details on the poor woman. Anyone getting the impression that mothers just aren't important in DMC? They straight up don't matter outside of Motivation By Death, or simply producing the actual protagonists of the plot. Not even Kyrie is safe; she adopted a bunch of kids and we never see a single pixel of her in this latest game.

We'll probably never know what Nero's Mother was about if they keep up with their track record. Still, speculating doesn't hurt. Not getting it from me yet, though.

 

[Hungry Alien]

Ooh, a topic for me to be facetious about! Don't mind if I do!!


Agreed, but try telling that to Bingo and whoever keeps writing the plot and dialogue for these games and their associated novels.


Counterpoint: Arkham. Outplayed Vergil and still got merc'd. But you did mention criteria, so let's go on.


You kiddin'? Anything in the devs mouths is not to be trusted, and the games are even less trustworthy in light of that. We didn't get

• Dante's demeanor from 1 ("witty like a British guy" + "traditional fighting man") changing to Dante's personality post-3 (unintelligent, largely disaffected slob)
• the Fallen of DMC3 presented as having fallen from grace, the Wing Talisman containing a crystallized angel wing, and Mundus's entire pre-revelation appearance, plus the existences of Nelo / Bianco / Alto / Cavaliere / Scudo / Proto Angelo, and the Seven Sins in the manga having the appearance of and being referred to as angels, only for Itsuno to say "there are no angels in DMC" even though it'd be patently stupid for Mundus to name his creations after a non-existent concept,
• Vergil wielding Doppelganger and cutting portals with Yamato and having a massive Dante-centric inferiority complex in 5, when none of these things appeared in DMC prior to the reboot,
• Vergil's motivation for power formerly attributed to his desire/failure to protect Eva per the Material Archives: Note of Naught artbook, only for DMC5 to come out and show us he wants power because he dislikes how Dante took Eva's attention and wanted to defeat Dante to prove himself the worthy [of saving] son,
• the DMC1 novel being put back into continuity about a decade and a half after DMC3 kicked it out, via a granddaughter to Nell that we'd never heard of because the only mention of Nell's son was her hallucinating him in her own dying moments, suggesting he was already dead prior to Dante appearing in her life (eyyyyyyy turns out she just suffered a divorce and the ex took the kid), which in itself is useless because Nico is Nell's granddaughter by adoption, she's the daughter of Nell's son's half-sister from that ex-husband's relationship with another woman, and that half-sister hooked up with Agnus of all people,
• Kobayashi stating "Lady is about ten years older than she was in DMC3" but oops, 4 needs Nero to be Vergil's son and Nero is around 16-17 according to the novel or at least "the same age Dante was in DMC3", so it should be that many years after 3 and not ten years,
• DMC1 establishing that Dante lived in modern America and Kobayashi stating their setting is ours (modern day) but without cellphones, but then Itsuno saying "all of the previous games [before 4] take place in the 80s because I didn't want to explain the lack of cellphones and laptops" but haha oops, DMC5 which should take place in modern times still has our protagonists using payphones instead of smartphones in order to communicate but they've clearly got flatscreen TVs and wireless headphones,
• 3142 being changed to 31245 over a decade after the fandom accepted "DMC2 takes place in the far future" for the sake of one game, even though the 3142 artbook hadn't come out that long ago and Itsuno straight up said that while the motorcycles in 2 and 5 weren't the same ones, he was looking forward to how people would receive the connections between 2 and 5 (turns out he meant the novel, that isn't accessible to most of the game fandom, where Dante acts like an a-hole to Lucia, meanwhile the game has nary a worthwhile connection to 2)

out of respect to continuity. In fact, all this is disrespect to previous continuity, showing us full well that if needed, they will absolutely backhand the statements of a previous developer, director, producer, even themselves from a few years-months-weeks-minutes ago if it means they get to say something new to support whatever new game they want to make. They could make Nero's Mother a classy woman who won Vergil's respect and then lower her to the status of hooker or the other way around, they could even make Kyrie and Eva into whores! Literal whores!

But I agree we know nothing about Nero's Mother, and it shouldn't take them that long to come up with details on the poor woman. Anyone getting the impression that mothers just aren't important in DMC? They straight up don't matter outside of Motivation By Death, or simply producing the actual protagonists of the plot. Not even Kyrie is safe; she adopted a bunch of kids and we never see a single pixel of her in this latest game.

We'll probably never know what Nero's Mother was about if they keep up with their track record. Still, speculating doesn't hurt. Not getting it from me yet, though.

Can't wait to see Kyrie as a whore in DMC 6 because it's too long to make models for the kids she is supposed to take care of. Also wtf is up witht the no cell phone ? I feel like it has been decided only to avoid the subject of 2 major demonic invasions before DMC 5, but people still have no clues about demons. And then regular phones exists in DMC 3, so why specifically cut off the cell phone ? This make literally no sense.

I firmly believe no one in the dev team has a plan for the serie and just blindly follow what Bingo imagine, and he just doesn't care about the serie. The last time we got an actual well written story, it was DMC 3 and Bingo wasn't the sole scenarist. That would explain the weird stuff we get from Itsuno during interview, he just has no clue about what is going on and try to avoid the subject by briefly answering confusing stuff. DMC 6 would be a great turning point to get ride of Bingo, he did so little for the serie while creating a confusing mess.

 

[V's patron]

Probably dead but I like the idea of her being alive and untrustworthy.

 

[Morgan]

Can't wait to see Kyrie as a whore in DMC 6 because it's too long to make models for the kids she is supposed to take care of. Also wtf is up with the no cell phone ? I feel like it has been decided only to avoid the subject of 2 major demonic invasions before DMC 5, but people still have no clues about demons. And then regular phones exists in DMC 3, so why specifically cut off the cell phone ? This make literally no sense.

I firmly believe no one in the dev team has a plan for the serie and just blindly follow what Bingo imagine, and he just doesn't care about the serie. The last time we got an actual well written story, it was DMC 3 and Bingo wasn't the sole scenarist. That would explain the weird stuff we get from Itsuno during interview, he just has no clue about what is going on and try to avoid the subject by briefly answering confusing stuff. DMC 6 would be a great turning point to get rid of Bingo, he did so little for the series while creating a confusing mess.

I'm friggin' cackling. Kyrie has to make money somehow to take care of all those kids, and Bingo did create her as a sensual woman with a huge rack because that's his type, so...

Yup! No cell phones, but Nero's wireless headset works in a medieval-styled island town, and there are flat screen HDTVs in Redgrave City. It doesn't even make sense at face value: even if they eliminated the cellphone, other forms of long distance communications exist and definitely existed prior to the 80s! The telegraph was established in the 1800s and it's only innovated from there, so people should absolutely know demons exist from someone having the presence of mind to broadcast it or remember the event to publicize it later, or even record the footage on something on a storable format like tape and it'd be sent to a news network later, like in the 1998 Godzilla movie. How does Itsuno think we heard about world or cross-country news, having everyone stand in single file and hand it down like an assembly line?

I guess we're expected to believe that in this setting, for the past 4 games, an anime and some novels, entire towns are magically cleared of all people except our protags and antags, but then the Redgrave incident is broadcast over radio stations without any explanation for what'd end up being a massive infrastructure/culture shift that made radio suddenly feasible when it wasn't happening between five and twenty years prior (DMC4 all the way back to 3, which apparently is now the 70s), but also they've gone straight to payphones being so reliable they survive a giant tree infestation and Nero can talk to Kyrie from a phone in bumf#ck nowhere as well as summon Nico to break the laws of reality with her van to get to him no matter where either of them are in that particular point in time. This is like a Monkey's Paw version of the idea I suggested in the "DMC5: What should it have?" thread. (Exc: "[Co-op missions] summon a menu from which the player can choose the Player 2 to accompany Dante, and there's a quick transition scene where the other character shows up -- Dante calls them from a nearby phone booth, or by cell...").

Not only that, but we're supposed to believe that Redgrave City is mostly emptied out over the course of a month given that even the armed forces got washed in the initial infestation and some people got skewered by a murderous tree, but in the final cutscene of the game it looks like some random diligent employee(s) of the state managed to set up police tape in the area and construction scaffolding, only hours between Nero going up the tree to save Dante and Vergil and then him coming back down to kill straggling demons with his magically disappearing arm.

Which also doesn't cover the fact that for 3, 4, and 5, people still lived in the invaded areas that don't because either they were killed, they escaped in the wake of the invasions, or they moved out permanently to avoid a repeat incident, but the casualties can number in the hundreds of thousands for 3 and 5 at least, so unless absolutely everyone involved agreed to a Nibelheim-tier conspiracy to cover up the invasions they went through and not mention a single word about demons, someone is going to move into a newly empty apartment with a lot of backstory, or cross state or national lines to do a wellness check on a family member or friend that hasn't called back in weeks, and in 5's case, families of dead soldiers are going to get the bad news on their doorstep or something, and at best if that soldier that saw Nero use his Devil Breaker survived, he's probably gonna spread the word about a dude with a cyborg arm and Certain Interested Parties will wanna contact Nico one way or another about her skills and putting them for the Greater Good to Prevent Future Tragedies. There's gonna be a big fat Never Again slogan attached to Redgrave City. There can't not be. But this involves actually thinking of the world as a world with people in it where the events of each game actually affect the setting of the next and not only in the lives of a small cast, and no one seems interested in that. They should just stick to glorified Bloody Palace.

I'd say the fact that DMC5 resorted to the characters using payphones when they've already established wireless headphones working perfectly fine is emblematic of how emotionally stunted the entire plot is since it relies on the characters not taking sensible actions (to the point of not even sharing crucial plot info when they're face-to-face) merely because "I just didn't want to think about it" and "because the plot needed to happen like this", but contradictory details will be peppered in solely for the aesthetic.

And this is how we have people speculating that Nero's Mother is the Random Fortunan Woman who noticed Vergil walking down an alley even though other people should have noticed Vergil because he isn't dressed in any way like any regular of Fortuna and thus sticks out like a sore thumb, but we're supposed to assume that this town that has children in it capable of bullying Nero simply because Everyone Knows Everyone and they couldn't identify his mother, is also populated by jaded adults who don't notice the obviously atypically dressed outsider.

 

[Demi-fiend]

No cell phones, but Nero's wireless headset works in a medieval-styled island town, and there are flat screen HDTVs in Redgrave City. It doesn't even make sense at face value: even if they eliminated the cellphone, other forms of long distance communications exist and definitely existed prior to the 80s!

Off-topic:

How come there were no cellphones in the original Blade Runner?

• the Fallen of DMC3 presented as having fallen from grace, the Wing Talisman containing a crystallized angel wing, and Mundus's entire pre-revelation appearance, plus the existences of Nelo / Bianco / Alto / Cavaliere / Scudo / Proto Angelo, and the Seven Sins in the manga having the appearance of and being referred to as angels, only for Itsuno to say "there are no angels in DMC" even though it'd be patently stupid for Mundus to name his creations after a non-existent concept

I've always had an issue with this.

It's like me creating dystopian spaghetti raptors, only to say later on that there were no such creatures to begin with because only utopian ravioli dilophosauruses exist now.

Spoiler: dilophosaurus

Credo Angelo mentioned angels as well. How can they not exist if they're mentioned by name?

These demons were angels once, so it's not like they can just start off as demons right away unless explicitly stated by the creators, which would only make things even more complicated than they were before.

 

[V's patron]

It would be funny if she was named after Kat. She's one of the few things people liked about DmC so it would be cool to bring her over.

 

[Taramafor]

Kat

This DID happen "a long time ago". In 5 Virgil is a grown adult. In the reboot he's practically a kid himself.

Virgil at least met Kat. Didn't pay much attention to her on screen of course but what happened afterwards? In the reboot it's obvious (to me at least) that Virgil is much more "simple minded". He's a teenager, young and naive. Of course he is. Very "black and white". This is proven when he shoots Mundus's spouse. Who, I should stress is pregnant with a baby. This is done to make Mundus angry. And it works. Virgil was attempting to throw Mundus off his games and stop, in his mind, a "greater evil" at the time. Effective tactic. Clever logic. But for black and white reasons. "Moral high grounds". Thing is Virgil just murdered a wife and baby in the back of the head. And even Mundus is overcome with grief and anger at the loss because he cares. You don't see him pretending to be a better person then contradicting himself. Now we see Mundus being defeated in the reboot of course, but eh, he kind of "fell" in the physical/human world. And he's a demon and comes back after being beaten. If Virgil can do it "I should be able to do it too". And in the ending of 3 we do see Mundus as what is basically "Floating orbs" in hell itself, which can represent his spirit is in hell after his body had been defeated and he's still forming power and still has yet to take physical form (he can even feed of Virgil's power here, which leads to events in 1). It can take a while. This works around Mundus while still keeping Kat and Virgil intact.

So what if Virgil and Kat got closer after those events and had Nero?

Virgil finds himself as a farther. Would he raise the kid? He knows he outright slaughtered a mother and child at once himself. Would YOU raise a kid knowing that? Think about it. "I know I'm a bad person. That makes me a bad farther." A very plausible reason not to raise Nero. Or even remain with Kat, even if they did get closer.

Suddenly Nero's desire to run an orphanage makes more sense. Nero is now alone (found by the order. Maybe Credo). Nero gets raised by an orphanage. Nero knows that pain. Nero helps run orphanage. This makes sense. At least in regards to the orphanage.

Vergil is calculated. Seeking answers. More so then Dante. More so then any normal person. He wants to know why. "WHY ISN'T THIS WORKING! Is there something missing? Must more blood be shed?" He asks question after question. Seeking answer after answer. He's frustrated at his own inability. He's driven by the desire to protect, or at least have the ability to do so (due to the "Without strength you can not protect anything" quote, as referenced in 3). This indicates a GREAT deal of loss and pain. SEVERE past trauma. To the point you know true suffering. The kind of pain and suffering that is beyond all endurance. The kind of pain and suffering where you break down altogether. When you break like that you damn well seek out those answers. "What's wrong? Am I... being defeated?" Even when he falls he's STILL asking himself. No matter how bad a situation is. No matter what is tossed at him. Trying to be a better person. More capable. But he also doubts himself. Doubt after doubt. "Suffering defeat after defeat". And that's quoting V himself. Virgil seeks out power because he feels like he can't trust his own abilities. This is why Virgil sees himself as weak. With every defeat he loses the will to keep going. Until Nero comes along and gives him something to fight FOR. Giving direction and drive to Virgil's power. A reason. A purpose behind it.

If I hurt a girl, caused her to suffer, got manipulated by a jester who was also a serious liar and deceiver, got captured and corrupted by a demon king, got my ass kicked over and over... Yea... You're just so done at that point. It's no wonder Virgil grabbed yamato and stuck it in his chest. You just don't want to FEEL after that. Damn guy needs a break. Hey, son, I love ya, but all these memories in my head are fuzzy right now and I only just came back from insanity land and I'm struggling to keep it in my own head, let alone explain anything to you. But I'm never going to actually say that because it shows how weak I am. He's doing something very very similar in the new vid where Dante and Virgil actually have a proper conversation and talk things out without fighting (that is so weird. Those two not fighting each other for once). Therefor, any missing information regarding Virgil can be interrupted as "He just doesn't want to admit he was weak". Which, ironically, is why Virgil is weak. Step 1; Admit weakness. Step 2: Do something about it to turn it into strength. Suddenly we're left with a very believable reason about why he never mentions who he was with. Even if he knew her very well. I mean, let's face it. He just pulled himself back together and is still adjusting. He's not really in a condition to go "Past history".

If there ever is another DMC game (which I doubt) it will be interesting to see if this is ever touched upon with Virgil and Nero. could also do a DLC maybe. Tie up a number of lose ends. Maybe work Nico and her "asshole daddy" into the picture a bit. Past memories in some parts, current day in other parts. Gives Virgil room to explore his own mind (for real this time. Not that illusion we got in the reboot) and it gives Nico a reason to touch on her daddy issues (while fighting demons of course). Work in Dante a bit with the objective to get back from hell and you're set.

 

[Morgan]

Off-topic:

How come there were no cellphones in the original Blade Runner?

In 1982? The cellphones back in those days were boxy things that came with their own suitcases at a time where payphones were still ubiquitous and cost maybe a quarter to operate, and the movie was based off a novel in the 1960s. I give Blade Runner the benefit of the doubt from the genre; it's easier to make things up the less familiar people are with it, harder to do with things that have hard basis in real life. (Unless you're Stephenie Meyer and you think Brazil has a west coast in your story of sparkly vampires). At best the "cellphones" they'd have in BR82 would just be derivative tech and still come up short, see: "hover cars that still require drivers (scifi)" versus "driverless cars that self-park (reality)".

And anyway, Deckard's just generally a not-affluent-enough-to-get-a-real-cellphone guy, even if they did exist.

Spoiler: No Phones, 2049 Edition:

To stay on this thread, none of our tech was added into the setting of Blade Runner 2049 because “There’s nothing more boring than a detective behind the keyboard looking at Google,” which.... yeah. Villeneuve's got a point. They're not called "gumshoes" because they clack away at keys, after all. Detective stories live off of the associated tropes of the protag really getting their hands dirty, seeing things with their own eyes, and all that. Using a computer or a phone feels like cheating, same as a story about a detective who's rich enough to hire someone else, so he kicks back and watches Netflix and occasionally checks the push notes on his phone to take the credit by the end of the story.

Related: anyone miss Dante being a private eye? Because Capcom forgot that's a thing he would do. They've more or less taken the DMC1 intro (mysterious dame shows up to the PI's office to offer a job connected to his turbulent past), corrupted it in DMC3 (some shady dude doesn't even offer the PI a job, he just insinuates about his family life, and he treats it like a party) and then did who knows what with it in 4 and 5 to where Dante now waits for news to come to him and somehow still refuses unless his hand is forced, with the additional cheap trick in 4 of having Nero remark "Never took this guy for a bookworm" while idly flipping a page, suggesting Dante read a book without actually showing us him reading a book. And Dante straight up cracks about not having to use his brain very much in this recent game.

It also just hit me, screw the timeline switch. DMC4 taking place after 2 is not supported by Nero's line of "Guy just came from Hell. He's gotta hit up a couple tourist sites" to say Nero is aware that Dante went to Hell in DMC2 and came back, primarily because Nero didn't even know Dante by name.

"Dante...? You mean the man that killed His Holiness?" "And who the hell is Dante?"

So, nope. Can't slip that one by me. Screw that retcon. Nero can't not know who Dante is, but still know exactly what he did. That assumes people would leave Dante's name and basic description out of the retelling for no reason. Plus, who would Nero have even heard that from?

I've always had an issue with this.

It's like me creating dystopian spaghetti raptors, only to say later on that there were no such creatures to begin with because only utopian ravioli dilophosauruses exist now.

Credo Angelo mentioned angels as well. How can they not exist if they're mentioned by name?

These demons were angels once, so it's not like they can just start off as demons right away unless explicitly stated by the creators, which would only make things even more complicated than they were before.

"Demons were angels once" is exactly what Arkham said in the manga, even. "Semantics. Were they not one and the same?"

If Itsuno said that angels don't exist currently because they were all corrupted or defeated behind the scenes, that'd be one thing.

But to say that angels don't and have never existed, and they were just misidentified demons? Nope. Not happening.

When creatures appear in that world that retain the appearance of angels, when people and texts in and out of the game's storyline associate "angelic" appearance with "distinctly non-demonic", and items with "Holy" in their name are stated to be "divinely blessed" and can "purify evil", there's a term for that and it means the concept exists. It looks and quacks like a duck and even Satan himself is calling it a duck, it's not gonna be a dog.

It's even stupider to say that when the backstory to DMC hinges on "Sparda is treated like a myth in modern times, but he's not. Sparda existed, his sons and grandson can trace their lineage to him, everyone else that knows him treats him like he existed, and there's also a portrait of him in his own mansion".

The entire narrative falls apart when nothing in it can be taken at face value and the existence of something can be revoked by some director that CBA to think about it, despite the characters and even the game telling you those things were there. If angels don't exist, demons can't either. The fact that one faith-based existence has more preference over another is totally arbitrary and it could turn out in the next game that there's no such thing as demons and devils or Hell either even if demons and devils identify that way and direct mentions of Hell are in the script.

Did Dante say he had demonic powers as a child? Wrong. He didn't get any powers until he was 16 because they simply don't kick in until puberty and he was a late bloomer.

Did Mundus call Dante a Son of Sparda? Wrong. Dante is the great-great-great-great-grandson of Sparda and his dad just took their ancestor's name to look cool. And Eva isn't Dante's mother, that's his step-mom. His real mom died in childbirth. In fact, there's no such thing as "women getting pregnant" in DMC, Arkham had that wrong. Sparda went full Piccolo and spat the eggs containing Dante and Vergil straight out of his mouth.

Did Dante call himself Vergil's little brother? Wrong. They're not even brothers, they're cousins who happen to look a lot alike. There's no such thing as brothers in DMC. Twin brothers, even less.

Did you see Dante awaken his Devil Trigger in DMC3? Wrong. That wasn't an awakening, so the game's title is wrong. That's not even a Devil Trigger, that's just a basic shapeshifting technique because Dante is a mutant like in the X-Men series, his transformation is just really focused on looking demonic for some reason, but it's not demonic in nature, because demons don't exist in DMC.

Did you hear Dante and Vergil banter about "counting" and "numbers" in DMC5's epilogue scene, and characters (primarily Dante or V) said "one," "two," and "three" on different occasions in the script? Wrong. There's no such thing as numbers. People simply cannot math in the DMC universe. That banter was fake as f#ck. They can't count. No one can count.

@Taramafor Not to harsh your buzz here but the reboot and the classic series are not in the same continuity and 100% do not share a timeline even with the retcons to Classic Vergil's powerset and motivations. Also, Reboot Vergil was a duplicitous muckstain, not a "simple-minded" idealistic teenager. Guy got rich off of the "security encryption" business and wears a literal black hat as part of his outfit. He's a hacker with control freak tendencies and the best thing he had to say about Kat was "she was useful", it's safe to say Classic Vergil wouldn't be able to hack or manipulate his way out of a paper bag (V only managed because Dante Is Dumb).

I do respect that you typed a long post, though.

 

[Foxtrot94]

Dante's demeanor from 1 ("witty like a British guy" + "traditional fighting man") changing to Dante's personality post-3 (unintelligent, largely disaffected slob)

A correction is in order. Those are traits that have been with him from the very first game. Not something the newer ones came up with or changed him into.

When it comes to the latter, the absolute first scene we see him in has him lay on his chair turning down a job call, with bottles, food and trash all over his desk and floor.

As for the former, he meets a woman who very suspiciously looks almost exactly like his mother, smashes into his establishament and beats him up, impales him and electrocutes him, knows about his past and his family, has details about Mundus and his comeback plan, yet he still ends up trusting her to the point of being genuinely surprised at her betrayal, and getting duped.

Nothing "changed" as far as all that is concerned.

 

[Ronin]

Doesn't anyone agree with me she'd be from Fortuna citizen to city scientist like Naomi Hunter?

 

[Morgan]

A correction is in order. Those are traits that have been with him from the very first game. Not something the newer ones came up with or changed him into.

When it comes to the latter, the absolute first scene we see him in has him lay on his chair turning down a job call, with bottles, food and trash all over his desk and floor.

As for the former, he meets a woman who very suspiciously looks almost exactly like his mother, smashes into his establishament and beats him up, impales him and electrocutes him, knows about his past and his family, has details about Mundus and his comeback plan, yet he still ends up trusting her to the point of being genuinely surprised at her betrayal, and getting duped.

Nothing "changed" as far as all that is concerned.

Aww, how cute, you probably rewatched the intro video on YouTube and thought you had something to say, huh?

Latter: DMC1's display of Dante's office isn't even half-worth calling him a bum over. It's unfinished pizza and bottles right next to the pizza, but nothing atypical of a common bachelor who lives by himself and gets most of his jobs through calls, and he could always... y'know... finish eating the food and drinking his alcohol. The novel at the time supported that he's still getting enough work to pay the bills and stay fed but needed calls involving demons for his personal quest/the entertainment factor. DMC2 has the same space cleaned up and orderly, and he still is the only person in that office that we knew of, so he is perfectly capable of cleaning after himself considering the scenery is right there, no trash in sight.

Post-DMC3 games and supplementary material amplified it to him living like a pig full-time-- papers strewn everywhere, cheap trash cans, crates for some reason, and a bar right next to his desk-- to where the women around him complain about it, and in Patty's case she becomes his housemaid because he generates some ungodly level of filth day in and day out. It's now a character trait that he refuses to clean up after himself (except for DMC2, the DMC commonly noted as Dante Being Depressed, and somehow his office is the most clean it's ever been-- maybe he Stress Cleans). But then Lady or Trish lay across his desk in his still-filthy office in 4 and 5, eating his pizza and licking their fingers like they didn't just complain about how filthy and lazy he is. And he's also now so incompetent that he can't pay any of his bills and he lives in perpetual debt, emphasizing just how lazy he is. The DMC van in 5 is a sh#tshow too, because Itsuno thinks being disgustingly sloppy and being unable to manage ones finances is part of being cool, I guess.

Former: He meets a woman who he immediately clocks as a demon on sight, who then makes a weak show of force that he shrugs off because he's survived impalements before and she apparently didn't realize he had guns. He follows her because she's the only lead on Mundus's whereabouts, she willingly offered more information about Mundus than Dante really needed to hear, and killing her would be overkill as he already over powered her. She ain't sh#t. She leads him straight to Mundus's front porch and let's him rock around the island unsupervised where he defeats a bunch of Mundus's generals including his just-about only equal on the island (Nero Angelo) and she does nothing else except provide commentary and remarks on his "incredible power..." then betrays him again at a point where she's still outclassed and achieved the square root of absolute nothing because she acted too little, too late, and Dante got some free Devil Arms out of the deal and awakened the Sparda sword capable of defeating Mundus by that point. All things being sensible, Trish could teleport around the island at will with her lightning and thus could've and should've accessed the non-Sparda weapons first and deprived Dante of additional power, but she didn't do it. Probably because she still ain't sh#t and wouldn't have survived acquiring Alastor or Ifrit. Anyway, Dante then defeats Mundus and gained Trish's sacrifice and loyalty because he wasn't heartless to her. If anything, Mundus's entire plan would have fared better if he hadn't sent Trish to begin with or at least not relied on her as a Plan B for friggin' Vergil being defeated, but here we are.

Somehow this moment of him following his gut and being correct, endangering no one except himself, is expected to sensibly progress to characterization where: in 4, he shoots Sanctus in front of the congregation and slaughters the knights with him, which scares civilians out of a church and puts them in prime position to get wasted by some newly-summoned demons (rather than him waiting until Sanctus was alone, endangering no one as collateral). He also suspects Nero is related to Vergil but still allows the inexperienced devil hunter to run half-cocked to fight Sanctus who's transparently using Kyrie as bait, and more or less handed Sanctus the restored Yamato on a silver platter. This allowed Sanctus to kill Credo and then awaken the Savior and kill even more civilians, and only then does Dante embark on his quest to retrieve some Devil Arms that he apparently already owned, even though he knew he was the strongest person in the room and was several steps ahead of Nero through all of the campaign and should have already obtained the Sparda and the Yamato (if not just the Yamato) plus the other Devil Arms and dismantled the Savior before Nero fell into Agnus's labs.

For 5, he lets Lady and Trish go first as cannon fodder to fight a giant tentacle monster sitting in a tree and only from their defeat he gets that Urizen is Vergil, even though V straight up told him Urizen was Vergil-- also he suspected V was being shady all along but still allowed him to be within striking distance of Urizen which resulted in Vergil being recompleted, when he could have followed his gut and merc'd V after beating Urizen so they could both die instead of letting the bumhat monologue and merge, and instead of Dante prioritizing cutting the Qliphoth or whatever because it's running out of control and enough people have died, he prioritizes his b#tchfest of a sibling rivalry with Vergil and then they pivot to the Qliphoth, and by then hundreds of thousands of people have died as direct result of their actions or lack thereof.

In 3, some shady bald dude goes in and insinuates he knows Vergil. Dante, even after he knew Vergil was after his amulet from events in the manga and that he went on a wild goose chase thanks to some shady character that was also searching for the amulet, and after noting through environmental cues that the entire city was wiped because of whatever Vergil was up to for nearly a year, still goes over to the tower to practically give Vergil the damn thing and then it leads to Arkham opening Hell and turning the place even more into a ruin. Add to that Dante's total inability to grasp that three characters with the exact same style of heterochromia are related to each other and that he actually saw Lady in a photo in the mansion he broke into in the manga, the same manga where he's hired to rescue a kidnapped 8-year-old and first shoots a disembodied head resembling her before he susses out whether that head is really her or a fake, which sure would've cost him the mission if it was real, huh?

In the anime, Sid more or less broadcasts that he's up to no good and openly endangers Patty as well as hogs artifacts from recently deceased demons right after Dante kills them, but Dante allows him to live long enough to resurrect and take on the powers of Abigail, which overpowers him for long enough to be impaled and KOed and then puts civilians in danger. But before that, there's the Poker episode where he plays cards to lure out King at the request of a worried wife wanting him to save her husband, but the Death Poker game kills everyone in the game except Dante but including the husband he was hired to save, and then it turned out King was the woman who walked into his office in the first place, which he neither identified as a demon or handled appropriately on sight, for no other reason than to waste the viewer's time.

All of these situations are from Dante's idiocy growing to the point of casual disregard for human life that he didn't have before, but you're saying Dante was equivalently idiotic (or that the roots were properly laid) in 1 because he didn't shoot from the hip over some bucket-faced bimbo Clark Kenting him. Man, that's a good one.

@Ronin Well... what about Nero's mom being a scientist like Naomi Hunter? What's there to agree with?

 

[Foxtrot94]

Aww, how cute, you probably rewatched the intro video on YouTube and thought you had something to say, huh?

LMAO, Jesus Christ you get so dense so fast. Struck a nerve, I see. Don't like your double standards called out and your idealistic vision of DMC1 and its Dante touched, mmm?

DMC1's display of Dante's office isn't even half-worth calling him a bum over. It's unfinished pizza and bottles right next to the pizza, but nothing atypical of a common bachelor

Bruh, there are bottles on the floor as well, and pool balls as well. He didn't give two ****s about being clean or orderly back then too. I walk into what's supposed to be a professional place of business held like that, I ain't gonna think the guy's just "a regular bachelor".

But hey, if you wanna mince words, make it a matter of degrees (as if his stupidity in 1 didn't have the potential to end the whole human world as well... talk about regarding human life) and think that genuinely trusting a power-bearing, Eva-looking woman who suspiciously knows details about his family that she really shouldn't, smelling like trap from a mile away regardless of how much weaker she is compared to him, is so much smarter than anything else he's done in the other games, go ahead bro. Suit yourself. XD
I, on the other hand, ain't gonna pretend these characteristics spawned out of the blue in the later games and had no basis prior. Because they didn't.

You're probably gonna mince words again in another long winded rant as per usual, but remains double standards. Damn right I'm claiming the roots for his messy attitude and naivety were laid out in the first game. Take off your rose tinted glasses. And while you're at it, grow up a little will you? Getting from 0 to that dense constantly whenever someone disagrees with you like you always do ain't good for your health.

 

[V's patron]

@Ronin
You didn't write enough for us to really consider it. You just dropped a pop-culture reference and didn't elaborate.

@Taramafor I just meant it should be a reference to DmC, not that they should try and merge the two takes. @Morgan's right, it's harder to go from one take to the other and we got enough mess in DMC's canon as it is. Granted that something they could've been more careful with when coming up with DmC in the first place. It would've saved us a few years of fighting over it.

 

[Angel]

Can we try and keep it a bit more chill please? I'm seeing things getting a tad personal and there's really no need.

You're all smart and lovely people - let's keep it that way

 

[Ronin]

About my idea for Nero's mom to be like Naomi Hunter

After Nero's mom leaves Nero behind, she probably have moved from Fortuna to the big cities. And perhaps since the Qliphoth incident, she might take part in some science division to investigate demonic power. And since her time in Fortuna, she might give some interesting information to some corporation on how to combat them.

What if Nero ends up finding/meeting her in order to investigate why she left him behind and how she & Vergil met. Investigate how his powers differ from his dad & uncle. What the mystery behind his mother's lineage could be.

Like how Naomi Hunter is investigating her genes on what life & path she should take on.

 

[Taramafor]

and the best thing he had to say about Kat was "she was useful

This is Virgil we're talking about. Coming from him that's the equivalent of sleeping with you. Any praise from him is like gold dust.

And reboot or not it's obvious the devs kept SOME elements from the reboot intact. We literary get the exact same scene in 5 about the home. With one or two LITTLE details touched on. I don't see the harm in taking Kat and Virgil and basically doing an "after event" with something involving them and then explaining Kat's absence somehow. As long as it makes sense in a very believable way. Otherwise we're basically erasing an entire character with zero explanation for their disappearance (Kat). The thing with the reboot is that people just don't want THAT kind of Dante and Virgil. But that shouldn't be a concern at this point. 4 and 5 have proven that.

Whatever the case the rest I said about Virgil still applies. Kat or not. I wouldn't underestimate what he's capable of either. Maybe he knows how to hack but finds it too much like a gun. "Too easy". It tends to send more of a message when you destroy those deadly robots instead of deactivating them. He never uses guns because, basically, "anyone can pull the trigger". Unless it's VERY personal and he's done giving a **** (Arkham). Even then he really wants to look his opponent in the eye. Otherwise "Defeating you like this has no meaning". Hacking would definitely prevent that. In the past it was more about firewalls and the like. In this day and age? Getting robots and drones to do the fighting FOR you, and that isn't Virgil's way of doing things. That also means even if we're keeping Virgil's personality from the reboot intact we can still have a very plausible reason for why he doesn't go using computers. Not that we know of at least.

It also just hit me, screw the timeline switch. DMC4 taking place after 2 is not supported by Nero's line of "Guy just came from Hell. He's gotta hit up a couple tourist sites"

I'm fuzzy on the details. When does Nero say this? If it's in 5 I don't see why Dante and Nero can't just talk about past events. If it's in 4 then I can't remember. But being with the order wouldn't it make sense to have information regarding the most efficient demon hunter? Surely they would have found out somehow that he went to hell. Especially after the events of a giant tower showing up out of nowhere. That kind of thing is going to attract attention. Dante also sells devil arms (that reminds me. Who even gets these things anyway?) and with those being used it's going to put a radar on the map.

Dante isn't exactly... subtle. he so much as sneezes and there goes the entire building. And that's not even a metaphor. XD

she probably have moved from Fortuna to the big cities

Isn't Fortuna a big city itself? Either way it makes sense Nero's mother would be anywhere else. But it's been, what, how old is he now? There needs to be a reason for his mother to seek him out. Maybe because Virgil couldn't be trusted at the time? Now that they made up perhaps she'll have a reason to come back. Someone more... direct though. If she's anything like Kyrie I'm going to barf at all the sunshine and rainbows. If Virgil and Kat ever did get together I imagine Kat would have been forced to go through a major personalty shift due to events being as hostile as they were. Not to mention the whole "You did some really bad **** and even though you got me to care about you you're in really thin ice". Anyone like that would be like that with Virgil really. But He'll just respect you for it. I really don't see that with Naomi. Who got so weak and incapable she actually killed herself. Hey man, calling it as it is. While I understand that pain, in the end she couldn't handle the responsibility. Snake lives. She doesn't. Naomi works better with someone like Issac from Dead Space. Anyone even getting close to Virgil not only has to show control and ability, but also managing to get him to change direction and getting him to want to do it. Without manipulating him with lies and secrets. Which is what Nero did. Buuuut Nero is A: a male and B: His son. Man, really makes me wonder what mom was like now. If she was even MORE capable then Virgil at his peak (Minus fighting ability) can you imagine what that would be like? And if she was the enemy of the next game for complicated reasons? However that ends it would be neat. if done right.

Like how Naomi Hunter is investigating her genes on what life & path she should take on.

Genes don't decide for you. You do. That's the whole point of Snake overcoming the "better" clone. It's also what Sanctus failed to understand. And why he lost. "Strength is a choice. To fight like hell to protect what's important". The most genes can give you is give you a physical tactical edge. And even that won't save you if the other person simply refuses to be defeated and finds a way to counter your every move. Their determination means their brain chemicals are flowing better. Liquid lost because he fixates on the negatives. Chemicals constantly change depending on how we think btw. It's not the body that will be defeated first. It's not the DNA or how physically capable you are that determines the outcome of a fight. And Virgil knows this. We have never once seen Virgil complain needlessly or fixate on what he can't do. Every advantage will crumble and fall if the most important thing of all is eroded.

Your will. Doesn't matter what DNA you have. You either choose to keep going and have a reason for it or you don't. Either that or have a big ass mech and stomp on the other guy. But then they'll just hop up and drag you out of the cockpit.

 

[Morgan]

I'm fuzzy on the details. When does Nero say this? If it's in 5 I don't see why Dante and Nero can't just talk about past events. If it's in 4 then I can't remember. But being with the order wouldn't it make sense to have information regarding the most efficient demon hunter? Surely they would have found out somehow that he went to hell.

I dunno man, I think I made it super obvious that all of those lines came from 4, and I was talking about DMC4 in relation to DMC2, and DMC5 would never have factored into that "screw the timeline switch" portion of my text because not only did I not mention or quote it in that bit, the next thing I said was "Nero doesn't know Dante by name", which he obviously does in 5 but.... y'know, he didn't in 4 (until he fought him a second time). And then I supplemented that with lines straight from DMC4's script including the mention of "His Holiness", which, do you recall a His Holiness in DMC5?

And you missed the question of how would Nero know Dante went to Hell in DMC2 yet not know who Dante is on-sight. Again, who would give him the detail of "Dante went to Hell" and not describe Dante at all?