Bayonetta PS3

[j_garcia]

Picked it up last week with a X-mas gift card. It is pretty fun so far, but it is very much in the Devil May Cry vein as expected. The moves and weapons are very familiar if you've played recent DMC games. Only one sequence was dumb so far, her on the motorcycle, but other than that it is entertaining and the bosses are relatively challenging on normal. Good variety in the levels and bosses, and the bosses are WAY more over the top than even DMC, and the finishing moves are always entertaining. Sound is very good, though the graphics could have been better I think.

The one complaint is that it was clearly created for the 360 and as such, it relies on reading from the disc too much (no install option). Because of this, load times are pretty long and on the busiest sequences I did notice some slow down. I read the reviews and it said the 360 version does not have this issue. Some sequences are semi-static images on "filmstrips", meaning the images have elements moving but they are not fully animated and it just feels lazy.

Fun game. 8 out of 10.

 

[Serj22]

I love it, I bought it for my wife when I showed her the demo and she loved it. I'm a big fan of the Devil may cry series and have played through every game. The witty remarks by Bayonetta along with the over the top sexy-ness make it a truly great game. It does fall in the same sort of DMC Good Vs. Evil thing, but I'd say that the people who fight on hell's side aren't seeming like bad guys in this game. The storyline is weird and cool, and makes sense for all the fighting going on where people live, as now the heroin transports to an alternate dimension to fight bad guys, but you can still see the "ghosts" of people running around in horror as their cars are blowing up for no reason and glass is exploding all over the place.

I'd say it has to be one of my favorite games right now, and I even put down modern warfare 2 for a while to play it. Now we're just waiting for Army of 2 40th day to come out...

Oh btw, those filmstrip pieces are a nice touch because they are supposed to be backed up in time to during the action you had witnessed previously but did not show the characters talking after it as it would make a long scene even longer, so the character's mouth's don't move but it gives it a nice book feel to include you in a storyline, and since the game is made by Sega, they put a lot of little retro aspects in the game, like in 2 of the levels, you can have ancient Sega BGM play in 5.1 during the levels instead of the normal Japanese pop happy music. Yes, a lot of the game is accompanied by happy music while you kick a$$. Also note that the game is immediately launched in Stereo, and you have to go to options to change it to 5.1 if that is your desire. I think the graphics are great, and very smooth. This seemed to me like an actual showcase of graphics and a good idea, backed by a simple story, with an excellent main character.

Fans of DMC will note that you are not stuck with the same guns throughout the whole game. Or just guns in general. She carries 2 guns attached to the heels of her stilettos, and two in hand, all guns fire from that location, so to fire from the heel, she lifts a leg up and fires it right off the heel (somehow). You can swap weapons into each of the 4 locations, for instance, in her right hand, I now have a Samurai sword, in the left she has a double-barreled magnum, and 2 shotguns attached to both heels, so there is variety.

Overall, I'd give it a 9/10

 

[j_garcia]

You can only swap primary weapons to the hand positions, but you can swap different guns to her feet (so far). I have the sword with the shotguns on her feet and the whip with the .45s. I also picked up an extra set of shotguns and you can have them at all 4 locations!

I understand that the past sequences are shown in the filmreels, but it doesn't always work. When only certain things are bouncing around in the frame, it looks funny.

The similarities to DMC would be the "white haired" nemesis, a lot of the moves are the same as DMC3 (not a bad thing), though I do love the addition of "torture attacks".

Mine didn't launch in stereo, it came up in 5.1. I haven't played anything else since getting this either. I put Uncharted2 on hold for this one.

 

[Serj22]

I'll play uncharted 2 when it comes down in price. I got the first one for about $25, and it was great, but really short.

I sort of like the little film reel things. It's just little things that move like their hair will blow in the wind, or people move past, etc. It's wierd but it's different from the casual walking talking cutscene. I give them props for trying it. They could make you look at a page in a book and narrate, which is all it is, and that would be terrible and cliche.

I haven't gotten the whip yet, but i enjoy the rock'n'roll atmosphere they kept from the dmc series. I.E> in order to get new weapons, you play terrible LP's that drive hell crazy, then the bartender goes down to craft up some weapons. It's interesting. They even threw in the nemesis/friend that has a motorcycle like Lady in DMC3.

 

[j_garcia]

The filmreel thing has been done in a number of games before, which I guess is why it doesn't do anything for me. The last game like that for me was Okami, another really good game on the PS2. The cutscenes were done in the same way.

One new thing I like is the "perfume". You can equip a pefume that will change your costume for a particular weapon and I presume make that weapon more powerful. I have the one for the whip and I unlocked the one for the greaves but haven't bought it yet. I purchased all the techniques already, though I don't like a few of them.

The number and combination of combos on this game are staggering. Even more than DMC3. I kind of like the Angel attack min-game also and the ability to "concoct" your own "lolipop" items for use. I also really like the ability to transform into other forms and how they worked those different skills into the game. The weapons get progressively harder to unlock, but I still find the sword to be the most useful.

 

[Nemo128]

Ummm... 360 > PS3.

 

[j_garcia]

Ummm... 360 > PS3.

Actually, it is that the game is handicapped because it was designed for the 360's inferior hardware

 

[Serj22]

Neither is better than the other, but the power behind the Ps3 is better and the loading times could get better if they let us install things on the hard drive. I'm sure an update will fix it. 360 has more games, ps3 has less, but higher quality picture, etc. You can't really say one is better than the other, but we're talking about Bayonetta here.

I've been noticing an issue with my game though. During the parts where you win a level, there is a yellow fog loading screen, and I can see a screen chop about an inch down from the top on my 6ft screen. I'm sure on a smaller TV, you may not even see it but it's blatantly obvious at this size. It's like the top inch of the screen is a second behind the rest of the video. The loading hasn't bothered me yet, except for the loading time to get up to your inventory menu or switching weapons.

BTW, I did finally get the whip, and it was really useful for fighting the stupid double dragon thing.

 

[j_garcia]

Finished it for the first time last night on Normal difficulty. There were a number of things I did not find or unlock, so I will definitely need to play through again. The story wraps up more or less how I thought, but the final battle was maybe a little different that expected, even though you know to expect something big since they start telling you about Jubelius early on. There are some fun twists at the end that keep things moving along nicely. The battle is just about right, with it not being so tough you can't beat it, but not being formulaic and simple once you figure out a pattern. I felt they wrapped everything up nicely and it was a satisfying ending with that Devil May Cry style. A lot of cool stuff is unlocked in the Extras section once you beat it, as well as Hard difficulty. As with the beginning and also like DMC, keep the controller handy during the credits Very fun game.

 

[Serj22]

I want to unlock the cheerleader outfit and the bikini... haven't beaten it yet. Been doing a lot of remodeling at home.

 

[j_garcia]

I want to unlock the cheerleader outfit and the bikini... haven't beaten it yet. Been doing a lot of remodeling at home.

There's also a Kimono, and both her and Jeanne will be in these outfits.

 

[ratso]

hoping some heads will roll over at sega for this one. no excuse whatsoever to rush out some crippled port for the ps3 of this game. reminds me of when the ps3 first came out and all the games were crappy versions of xbox games. thought we had put that behind us already.

 

[Ares]

I know what you mean I'm glad a friend of mine bought it and I got to test it out, I'm a patient guy but come on, what the hell! why is the load time take so long.
Here is a review from IGN. http://ps3.ign.com/articles/105/1057012p1.html

 

[j_garcia]

Load times are the one thing that really suck on this game. They take a long time because it has to read from the disc A LOT. It is able to load up most of a section, but when going from section to section it can take quite a long time. They did at least give you the ability to practice the massive number of moves during most of the load screens, ala Assassin's Creed, but it gets old. Like the review said (I read it before I bought it), though it does get annoying, it doesn't keep it from being a fun game.

On a lighter note, I unlocked almost all of the costumes last night. Something I achieved opens them up for purchase at the store so I bought 3 or 4. Kimono is given to you when you purchase the "mirror" that allows you to change costumes. I got the bikinis, the (Japanese) PE uniforms, the Queen (WOW) outfit, and the D'Arc one. Only have like 2 left. Costume changes in this game are a LOT more interesting than DMC

 

[darien87]

I'll have to check this one out. I didn't like the demo that much though. I bought Darksiders instead and so far I'm not impressed. Graphics aren't that great and it's pretty repetitive.

 

[j_garcia]

Alternate costumes:

http://gamevideos.1up.com/video/id/27622 (a little NSFW).

 

[Ares]

I read some of the comments there some guy said the main character looks like a tranny. Instead of costumes they should have added extra weapons or unlock some extra storyline.

 

[j_garcia]

There are a number of unlockable weapons, but they are initially going to take a long time to get as the requirements are in the MILLIONS of halos collected. One allows you to earn more halos, so I would presume that one would make it easier to get the others.

 

[Nemo128]

Actually, it is that the game is handicapped because it was designed for the 360's inferior hardware

Yeeeaaahhh... you keep telling yourself that.

 

[Serj22]

I just opened up a 360 to fix a red ring... I almost couldn't stop laughing when I took it apart, the crap in there is garbage. The xbox might as well be an inch thick because there's nothing in there... and they used freaking band-aids as heat sinks, so there's no way the 360 is even a competent system at all.