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| Source // PlayStation |
"Can you make a Devil May Cry game with a female lead?"
"Yeah, sure, why not?"
"Can she be an 8-foot tall witch who strikes all the poses, speaks in an almost impossibly English accent, and wears a catsuit made of her own magical hair with guns for shoes?"
"..."
And that's how I'm going to introduce you to Bayonetta, an action title that is all about the action, with an awful lot of it. If you think Devil May Cry got a little silly and over the top, wait until you dive into this one.
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| Source // PlayStation |
Fun Times
I know of Bayonetta, and what kind of game it is, but have never taken an interest in it, largely because I knew I didn't get very far through Devil May Cry games. The star of the show, Bayonetta herself, is as iconic as Dante was, and her journey for me started off similarly: Insane.
Well, actually, first of all, my PlayStation 3 copy didn't play any sound, but after that easy fix was an introduction to the game which saw two witches defying physics, standing on the side of a clock tower that is falling down a never-ending cliff, while the narrator sets us up and we get to bash a load of buttons and desperately try to see what they do.
It was a bit of a hopeless endeavour, really. Even with subtitles, I couldn't follow the story, and with all the action that was happening, I could barely find myself against the night sky. Whoever decided to crank the opening scene up to 11 must have slipped, cranked it up a lil more, then broke the knob.
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| Source // Steam |
But our story isn't to begin there. In a graveyard is an incredibly tall, skinny nun, chanting over a coffin. Beside her is a chatty fella by the name of Enzo who I hoped would shut up long before he eventually did. He zipped it because Hell - or maybe Heaven - had broken loose, the nun leaping into action and revealing herself as Bayonetta, the coffin opening to reveal another character whose name I forget, and both of them going to town destroying some weird-looking angels.
It was a cutscene that seemed to go on forever, and I was left wondering when I was going to get the chance of doing all this flippy, spinny, shooty stuff myself, but that time was coming and took the form of a simple little tutorial on what it is you'll be able to do.
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| Source // PlayStation |
These screenshots will jump around through the game a little but imagine them taking place in a graveyard at night and you'll do fine.
Bayonetta has an encyclopedias-worth of attacks she can pull off, from the simple mashing of triangle to punch or use a melee weapon, to some leggy kicks on the circle button, to infinite ammo pistols on the square button, and of course she can jump and get ridiculous hang-time on the X button.
Mix those all up though, and you can end up pulling off some utterly devastating combos, launch enemies into the air and then into the ground, and even stop the combat to shoot everyone around you, either using the guns in your hands or the guns strapped to your feet.
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| Source // PlayStation |
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| Source // PlayStation |
Pull off longer combos and Bayonetta's witch powers come out in full force. Her suit is made up of her hair, and these massive-looking attacks are formed with her hair, and so the bigger the attack you serve up, the more skin you reveal.
There's not a lot of skin on show to be fair to Bayonetta, but she does strike some poses that basically have her sitting on the camera, and various animations are designed to make her look like a supermodel, albeit one striking extreme versions of their poses.
Forgetting about those looks and concentrating on the actual look and feel of the combat, and Bayonetta is mighty impressive, though maybe with some problems here and there.
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| Source // Nintendo |
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| Source // MobyGames |
She's a responsive character. If you point her in one direction, she'll go and attack in that direction. Inputs need to be precise for combos, and whatever you do feels satisfying, whether it looks basic or not.
There's an option to lock onto a target using the R1 button, which I didn't find myself using, and there's a really nice dodge mechanic on the R2 button. Time a dodge to perfection and you enter Witch time, where everything but you slows down for a while, so you can batter the hell out of whoever was silly enough to swing a weapon your way.
When you time it right, it feels as great as the rest of the combat does, but seeing an attack coming for you in the thick of the action is tricky, and I found that if I'm wailing on someone with the face buttons, my grip just doesn't give me good purchase on the R2 button. It's almost like I'd prefer a dodge mechanic on the right analogue stick, which would be more useful than the camera controls, but then would likely make activating Witch time harder.
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| Source // Xbox |
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| Source // MobyGames |
Frustrations
After some graveyard combat lessons, the cutscenes decided that animation was too much for them, and it was more of a slideshow - not performance-related, they just didn't get animated. Then it was back to an actual cutscene again as we drove through a city and learned that Bayonetta knows she's a Witch, but little else.
She's been having brief flashbacks of her and another woman in red, who we recognise from the intro fight, and she then appears, our car crashes, some ridiculous stuff happens and we have a face-off, but we're not fighting each other, rather we're fighting a bunch of enemies who were stupid enough to come too close to us.
This time, however, we've got to pull off some special attacks within a time limit. To be able to pull off these attacks at all, you need a chain of successful attacks without being hit yourself. I just couldn't do it - not enough for the requirement at least. I did see some elaborate special attacks, including magical guillotines. It's a weird game, you know.
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| Source // Steam |
Unfortunately, I couldn't try again from where I failed, so I had to go through the graveyard stuff again, but then I got to this fancy challenge and did it in what felt like 30 seconds. It's a timed challenge, remember, so these easier difficulty levels are very, very easy.
Sadly, the story I wanted to see was just not doing anything for me. It's all about Heaven and Hell and roaming around Purgatory. It's not explicitly Christian or anything - Bayonetta is far wackier than that - but it's not particularly engaging all the same.
I don't like the comic relief found in Enzo, and this guy whose name I still forget is one of those hard talking know-it-all's who thinks he oozes cool. It's rather Japanese, this game, let's say it that way.
The best character so far has to be Bayonetta, which is good, the main character and all, but I don't really like her too much either. The accent is far too uptight, the sexualization is almost worse than just being nude, and I've no idea what's going on with her backstory enough to want to see where it goes.
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| Source // MobyGames |
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| Source // PlayStation |
Because I'm playing with assists turned on, though, I'm able to blitz through combat without pausing for thought or to worry about my health. Boss fights, which contain the weirdest looking things you've seen in a long time, and take place in all manner of moving environments, are over before you know it, all because I don't feel comfortable enough to play Bayonetta as intended.
But at 11 or so hours, with combat as good as this, I might well at least give it another go. Yeah, I don't care about any item I'm picking up, and don't understand what's going on, and really hope these Witches ingredients don't have to be mixed to form an item at any point, because I never have an interest in that sort of stuff, but the combat looks and feels so damn good that I might have to think twice.
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| Source // Steam |
Final Word
I've played just over an hour of Bayonetta, most of it on super duper easy mode. I'm very glad it exists and allows us to enjoy these games, but the best part about Bayonetta is the combat, and I'm seeing it, rather than actually pulling any of it off myself.
These easier modes allow me to focus on the story then, but I don't find myself gravitating towards it, or any of the characters in it, and if I'm not latching onto anything, what am I doing going through it all, other than passing time?
It generally looks great to pass that time, though, with weapons as bizarre as celestial tubas getting used to knock out grotesque-looking angelic forces, and set-piece moments that you won't see in many other places, mostly because only physics-defying witches could pull them off. I just don't know if there's any point in seeing it for myself.
It's a little weird to say that because I can clearly see how this elaborately deep combat system can easily rival the likes of Devil May Cry, and I'd like to say I was skilled enough to at least have some degree of control over a bunch of these moves, but these days I don't.
With better characters and story, Bayonetta could be a game I play for a while longer, but it's mighty good nonetheless.
Fun Facts
Dante has Ebony and Ivory, Bayonetta makes use of Parsely, Sage, Rosemary, and Thyme.
Bayonetta, developed by PlatinumGames, first released in 2009.
Version played: PlayStation 3, 2010.