When you’re looking for stylish, challenging, over-the-top third-person action, you know the name: Devil May Cry. Sorry, I really wanted to do that. While Devil May Cry had its own fair share of inspirations, it’s the series we typically credit for crystallizing a particular sub-genre of action. For the longest time, Devil May Cry and Nintendo platforms seemed to have trouble connecting. That changed with the Nintendo Switch, which not only saw decent ports of the HD versions of the first two games, but even got a fancy Special Edition of Devil May Cry 3 HD that added new gameplay mechanics. For the Nintendo Switch 2, it seems that Capcom has opted to skip ahead to Devil May Cry 5 Devil Hunter Edition.
There’s a time and a place for me to moan about not being able to play Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition on my Switch 2 yet, and it’s not here. It’s on the record now, at least. No, today we’re here to talk about Devil May Cry 5 and what exactly the Devil Hunter Edition entails. Neither vanilla Devil May Cry 5 nor Devil May Cry 5: Special Edition, the Switch 2 version of the game attempts to bring as much as it can from the latter while acknowledging that performance-wise it has to settle for many of the limitations of the former. While some might lament that certain parts of the Special Edition haven’t made the cut here, we’re still left with an incredible package. If you’re new to Devil May Cry 5 or simply want a good portable option to play it, you’re unlikely to be disappointed with this Devil Hunter Edition.
Upfront, here’s what you should expect. Performance-wise, you’re looking at something more akin to the PlayStation 4/Xbox One version of the game. That goes for the visual presentation as well as the targeted (and generally achieved) 60 frames per second gameplay. Curiously, there are slightly more performance hiccups in docked mode. VRR doing its job yet again, I suppose. Vergil is here as a playable character with no additional purchase required, along with several pieces of DLC that were sold separately in other versions. Missing from the Special Edition are two of the extra modes: Turbo and Legendary Dark Knight. These are not insignificant cuts, but I imagine there are performance-related reasons for their omission. The former made the game play 20% faster, while the latter added a lot more enemies on-screen to increase the difficulty.
Still, you’ve got a great version of Devil May Cry 5 here in general, and I’d argue that Vergil is by far the most important element from the Special Edition. It feels really good to play, and even without those additional two modes, you get a ton of things to do with what is included. Capcom’s really been doing great work on the Switch 2 so far, and this is another example of that. Now, if you’ve already played this game elsewhere to your satisfaction, there isn’t anything new here to bring you back beyond the ease of playing on the go. Similarly, if you own a PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series and don’t care about handheld play, you’re going to get a slightly better experience with the Special Edition.
Just make sure you play it somewhere, at least. It was a really long wait for Devil May Cry 5, but it ended up being worth it. This series has always been on a roller coaster ride, with the first game famously being born from a discarded attempt at making a Resident Evil 4. When the game was a hit, Capcom rushed to get a sequel out as soon as possible by handing it over to a new team. After an extremely troubled production, Devil May Cry 2 was released to a relatively mixed reception. That didn’t stop it from selling fairly well, securing the opportunity for some of the people behind it to take a second swing of the sword via Devil May Cry 3. That game fared quite a bit better, and the team immediately moved on to Devil May Cry 4. This would be the first entry in the series to release on consoles other than PlayStation 2, with a multiplatform release on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, which was the style at the time.
Devil May Cry 4 hit the mark in some ways when it first released in 2008, but not everything about it was well-received at the time. It introduced a new playable main character named Nero, and while Dante was playable in the game, his portion mainly consisted of travelling through the same levels Nero had already been through. While most agreed the actual nuts and bolts of the mechanics were excellent, many felt that the game spread its levels and bosses a little too thin. The game still sold quite well, but Capcom felt the franchise had more potential and decided to go for a Western-focused reboot rather than a sequel. The Cambridge-based Ninja Theory was selected for the job, and that gave us the highly controversial 2013 release DmC: Devil May Cry. Suffice it to say, it didn’t quite meet its sales targets, putting the series in a sort of limbo.
With the initial 2019 release of Devil May Cry 5, the series basically picked up where Devil May Cry 4 left off over a decade earlier. Nero and Dante are back, albeit a little older and somewhat wiser, and a new playable character, mysteriously known as V, has joined their ranks. The trio are up against the Demon King Urizen, who may well be the most formidable foe Dante has squared off with yet. Each of the three has their own distinctive playstyle, with V in particular breaking away from the other two. The combat feels like a refinement of what was seen in Devil May Cry 3 and Devil May Cry 4, with Dante especially feeling like a comfy old pair of slippers. He has some new weapons and abilities to play with, but for the most part, his style of fighting is the most familiar.
For his part, Nero has a new mechanic called the Devil Breaker. Lacking his Devil Bringer arm for story-related reasons, Nero now relies on fragile but powerful artificial arms to take its place. They can be used and abused, but they will shatter if you’re too hard on them. You can even deliberately break them for a powerful effect. You can collect or buy a variety of different Devil Breakers, and they add some fun variety to Nero’s combat repertoire. Don’t worry, you can still grab enemies from afar. Wouldn’t be Nero without that, after all. He’s still a blast to use, and if anything, the new Devil Breakers only increase his combo possibilities.
V is the most different of the three. He doesn’t do as much direct attacking as the other two, instead relying on demon familiars to attack the enemy. Once they’re sufficiently softened up, V uses his cane to finish them off. I found V a little hard to wrap my head around sometimes, but if nothing else, he adds even more variety to Devil May Cry 5’s gameplay. Then we have Vergil, who should be considered more as a bonus than anything. He’s not part of the main story’s playable cast, but he’s a fully-featured character all on his own with a very fun playstyle. Although his stages are assembled from bits and bobs of the main campaign rather than being custom-built for him, Vergil’s still a blast to play with.
The bottom line is that all of the characters here feel great to use, offering tons of options for dealing with your foes in a variety of stylish ways. You’ll be rewarded for maximizing your style, giving you greater rewards you can use to upgrade the characters with. All four, once their full movesets are fully unlocked, are strong enough in terms of mechanics to support an entire game on their own. Experts will find a lot to play around with here, and the traditional Bloody Palace mode is here to give you a place to push that to the maximum. At the same time, the game offers options for newcomers who want a less taxing trip through the story.
As for that story, Devil May Cry 5 is very typical of the franchise. It’s serious at times and silly at others. It’s not afraid to be stupid to try to make you smile, and it has at least a few strong emotional moments as well. Series fans will appreciate all the references and character interactions here, unless they’re Devil May Cry 2 fans. We apparently do not speak of that one. Lucia died on her way back to her home planet. Everyone else should be satisfied with the events that play out as the story twists and turns towards its conclusion. I’m sure we haven’t seen the last of this crew, but if this ends up being their last outing, it at least wraps up in a satisfying way.
Devil May Cry 5 Devil Hunter Edition may not be the ultimate version of the game, but it’s another strong port from Capcom that especially excels when played in handheld mode. The core game has plenty to offer, and it’s fantastic to have Vergil included without any additional cost. It’s unfortunate that not everything from the Special Edition could be included, but despite that, Devil May Cry 5 is still easily one of the best games of this kind that you can play on the Nintendo Switch 2.
Version Tested: Nintendo Switch 2
Review Copy Provided by Capcom
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