Y'know, this actually reminds me of
a topic I covered regarding Final Fantasy.
It's damn-near true that if this game had come out under another name, it would be consistently referred to as a Devil May Cry knock-off, in the same way the likes of Dante's Inferno is to God of War, or Mighty No.9 is to Mega Man. Why is that such a thing? The gameplay. Regardless of nebulous statements of "quality" the core of the gameplay is what determines what something is or isn't. DmC plays like a DMC game, through-and-through, there is absolutely no way to deny that without goin' full ostrich (even though they don't really do that), and it's really not up to us as fans to determine what gets to carry that name (and your shirt would have to be mighty stuffed to think it is), because in the end, what the hell does a name matter...? It unifies elements sure, but...in the end a product is simply a collection of themes and ideas, and people gravitate to those more than they do names; case in point, people gravitated to Bayonetta after feelin' the itch DMC gave them, and that certainly wasn't "Devil May Cry".