Devil May Cry 5 Full Control Over

Theres a boss fight early on against a huge demon with a gaping mouth for a belly.

Its a genre where your moveset is so broad that it only reveals its true depth over multiple playthroughs.

Rather than having just one character to master, here we have three.

Newcomer V is weak and attacks with spectral animals called familiars.

The twist is that V has to personally finish each enemy off, meaning he must get in and out of range constantly hes only effective when an enemy is staggered.

Those familiars which are partly controlled by AI can be knocked out of action temporarily, too, causing the grotesque hordes to focus on you.

You have to constantly keep V out of danger: a horizontal dodge causes you to skate along the ground with your panther familiar, Shadow; while dodging backwards summons your bird, Griffon, to fly you to safety.

Not only does the timing of these affect V, but they cause your familiars to disengage.

Conjuring this massive creature instantly revives Griffon and Shadow, so timing is paramount.

Though hes the most complicated on paper (youre essentially controlling three things at once), V feels built for newcomers.

Theres some nuance in how you can charge up one familiar while moving out of danger and hammering attack with another, but hes the easiest character to parse.

Racking up those SSS ranks is a doddle especially when you learn to chain together finishers, teleporting between enemies and driving your magical cane into their hides.

The moody newcomer is fun to play for a while, but his lack of depth makes him the weakest of the roster.

Devil May Cry 5 Full Control Over

His familiars can also be a little frustrating, since you never have full control over their range and they dont always do what you intend.

The cocky youngsters moveset seems simple on the surface one button swings your sword, another fires your gun, and another uses your Devil Breaker: prosthetic arms with varied abilities but hes more complex than it appears.

You can hold buttons to charge up gunshots, launch enemies into the air, pause between hits to twist into a different combo, rev your sword to Exceed and unlock a fiery new moveset, and pull enemies towards you with a locked-on grab.

But its in those Devil Breakers where Nero comes into his own.

Theres a Breaker that grabs and pummels enemies, one blasts out an electric charge, another burrows into demon flesh, one has a rocket-powered punch (which you can also ride), one fires out kinetic blasts, launching you through the air, and theres another that fires out multiple whips, lashing enemies all around you.

They also all have a charged technique that overclocks and breaks them once triggered.

If youre hit while a Breaker is active, it breaks, forcing you to equip the next.

You can also manually break them to send out a powerful blast, damaging enemies around you this also works to escape from otherwise unblockable attacks.

The only way to get to the next arm in your inventory is to purposely (or accidentally) break the one youre using.

The idea is that Neros moveset constantly evolves as you play.

I can see high level players having a lot of fun with locking down the perfect Devil Breaker setups for each level, knowing exactly when to switch during each encounter.