Definitely a classic, one of the best!
Devil May Cry starts with a little history-class about the legendary dark knight Sparda, who stood up against the evil lord of the underground. After this you’re getting acquainted with Dante and Trish. Dante is the son of Sparda and is a demonhunter. Trish comes to Dante to warn him about the lord of the underground who has risen again. Dante answers her call and our little big adventure begins...
You begin on a cliff with a one-way-road. At the end is a big mansion where the first part of the game (about a third) takes place. The scenery looks sinister, the music sounds eerie and the empty hall you’ve just entered feels cold and abandoned. For a short period you can’t do anything but wander around and look for a way through it. When you have finally found that rusty key for the locked door in the main hall you get attacked for the first time and you’re (finally) being introduced to the battle system.
Dante carries around two types of weapons: devil arms (a sword) and fire arms (his two handmade pistols: Ebony and Ivory). The sword of course is for close-range hacking and slashing and the pistols are for both long and close-range actually. The best way of fighting is to use them both. There are various options to fight and they all feel great. I, for one, used a combination a lot where you throw en enemy in the air with your sword and then keep them hanging in the air by giving them a whole lot of led with the pistols. I simply loved that, but as the game advances the enemies became tougher and they won’t be tossed so easily. When things become really hard you can enter the Devil Trigger mode. This will transform Dante in some kind of demon and he will be much stronger and possesses various new abilities. This will only work when you have three or more symbols glowing below your life-bar. Devil Trigger will become availably when you obtain the Alastor-sword in one of the first missions.
When you kill an enemy, they often leave orbs. Red orbs can be used to buy various stuff like recovery items, but also more symbols for the Devil Trigger-mode and new skills for the Alastor-sword. Green orbs will replenish your life. Other orbs, yellow orbs (revive when dead) and blue orb-fragments (increase life-gauge) can’t be won by killing an enemy, but have to be found throughout the levels or bought with red orbs.
Considering this is one of first games for the PS2, I’d have to say that the graphics really look awesome. I know that games like God of War look so much better, but for a game this old they are really solid. The same goes for the sound. As I mentioned before, the music sounds really eerie and puts down a really sinister atmosphere. At some points you really must be on your guard, cause you never know what happens next. It is at these points in the game where you can really feel that it’s made by the same creator as Resident Evil, which is a good thing of course! :)
Devil May Cry is one of those games that really draws you into its gameplay and won’t let you go until you have finally beaten it. It’s still one of my favorite action-adventure games!