Devil may cry 4 Preview

About the preview:

I've decided to make this one as a preview because the game is still in Demo Stage and its features arent Complete yet, since the main Character of the Franchise "Dante" is still absent from the game since he only shows up as a playable character after Crossing the first quarter of the game, This is my first Preview/Review on NBR so suggestions would be very helpful.



Whats the Game all about?

Devil May Cry (Also known as DMC) is a hack and slash action game Developed by Capcom, the Game has 4 parts : DMC1,2,3 and that last developed was 4, This game takes part after the events of Devil may cry and before Devil may cry 2, This game allows the player to kill the enemies with Stylish Combos and various arsenal of weapons.

System requirements:

I was surprised by the system requirements since they weren't anything near demanding, allowing a larger Slice of gamers to enjoy this Fantastic Port by Capcom, and these requirements are:

Minimum System Requirements
OS: Windows XP/Vista
Processor: Pentium 4 @ 3 GHz
Memory: 512 MB (1 GB for Vista)
Hard Drive: 8 GB Free
Video Memory: 256 MB (nVidia GeForce 6600 SM3 Required)
Sound Card: DirectX Compatible
DirectX: 9.0c
Keyboard & Mouse


Recommended System Requirements
OS: Windows XP/Vista
Processor: Intel Core 2 DUO
Memory: 1 GB (2 GB for Vista)
Hard Drive: 8 GB Free
Video Memory: 512 MB (nVidia GeForce 8600)
Sound Card: DirectX Compatible
Keyboard & Mouse

but i also recommend a Controller to Fully Enjoy Stylish killing.

My setup was the following:
Notebook:Alienware m9750
GPU: Nvidia Geforce go 7950GTX SLI
Ram: 2 GB PC 5300 DDR2-667
Hard Drive: 100 GB Seagate Momentus 7200 RPM
OS: Windows XP professional SP3
Mouse: Microsoft Optical Mouse 4000
Processor: Intel t7200 @ 2ghz OCed to 2.2ghz (minor OC )

The game's Performance was quite remarkable , i was using the XG mobile 175.63 driver (which is a killer btw and i recommend it for this game)

i Ran the game @ 1440x900 resolution with 2xMSAA and everything on Super high, with FPS set to Variable and no Vertical Sync and ofcourse, the Game was running on DX9 mode, Also i have to note that there was pretty much no difference visually between dx9 and dx10 but a little improved motion blur and a 5-10 FPS decrease based on some people's opinions Including HaloGod2007 with his Desktop 8800GTX.

I did the benchmarking test that came with the demo and it was like the following:



Gameplay:

The Game is all about killing with Style, all you need to do is to swing your sword and pull your gun's trigger and unleash your rage on the enemies, the Combat system Consists on a combo ranking system of 7 levels : SSS,SS,S,A,B,C,D depending on the Player's skill the ranking will be displayed, the Same thing goes when the player completes an Episode, he will get a rank aswell.

The Character we played the Demo with is Nero, who is armed with a Sword Called the Red Queen, and a Gun named The Blue Rose, and most importantly The Devil Bringer on his arm, Unlike Dante , Nero wont be getting any new weapons, but he will be getting upgrades for his Devil Bringer, Also Nero has the power to Rev up his sword in an ability called Exceed, Charging his sword when squeezing the MotorCycle Bike Handle of his sword, Giving him more damage to deal to his foes,look at the pic below:
Nero's revved up sword

Nero with the DB




The Demo consists on 2 modes, the first one will allow the player to go through a full episode within 10 minuites to complete it, Going through some week enemies, then reaching the powerful frosts and at the end, the Mighty Berial!
The other Mode will start with encountering the Frosts and then Leading the way to Berial Fight, Both modes are very interesting.

Unlike the Console versions, the PC version is supposed to have a turbo mode which will increase the game speed by 20% giving it more action, and make the player in need to of better reactions and more accurate moves.

Also there is another Extra for the PC game which is the Legendary dark Knight mode, which makes the player face Hordes of Enemies that will fill the screen, taking advantage of Multicore Processors, we can see a view of that mode in the 4th scene of the benchmark test.


The Graphics:

The game is just Graphically stunning! with a Great playable FPS (im my case Never Below 70FPS) with high levels of Details and in some Cases the Textures are Double the Textures used in the Xbox360 when using SuperHigh settings .the game takes advantage of many Graphical Features including HDR and Motion Blur, with highly detailed Enemies and Bosses,See the Screens Below:





Pros
+Amazing stunning Graphics
+Awesome Story and Plot
+Kill the Enemy with Style
+Huge arsenal of weapons in the Case of Dante, The DB in Case of Nero
+The Game is nothing Near demanding, it runs perfect on most systems out there

Cons
-The game has to do a somewhat big loading time each time you change the Graphics options
-The Keyboard wont give the best experience of the game


Score: 9.1

 

Great review of the demo! +rep

 

Thanks Tianxia

 

Hehe, nice review, I don't think anyone reviewed a demo before
Nice.

 

hehe, i'll be doing the full game aswell cant wait to play with dante!

 

awesome preview, i've decided to go buy this game once it comes out. +rep

 

Maybe I'll give this game another shot. The first time I played it on 360 I didn't like it. I'll try it on my laptop this time.
P.S. Comes out exactly one month from today.

 

yes thats true, whats good in this game is that it runs Damn well on 8600gs and above cards with reasonable settings!

 

how difficult is it to play this game with a keyboard and mouse? i have it and beat it for 360, so i know how it feels playing with a controller. what would you do to perform a combo, etc with a keyboard?

 

don't make comments on the differences between dx9 and dx10 visuals or performance when you are testing dx9 hardware. if you make such comments, then its just what you heard through the grape vine and it is not your comment. it makes for poor reviewing at best... plagiarism at worst.

also, having to reload the engine after changing graphics settings is common and shouldn't be a "con"... if consoles had graphics options they would also have to reload the engine when changed

your alternative to having to wait through a loading process is having no access to graphics options. trust me, its not a con.

make the pictures either clickable thumbnails or at least lower the resolution on them to something like 500-600 pixels wide instead of 1440. it makes for a better readers experience.

(you asked for opinions)

not all bad though- including lots of pictures is good! more editorial content would also be good!

 

With more difficulty than a gamepad. More practice required to pull off the flashy combos.

 

Stick to playing with a controller. One of the biggest problems playing with the keyboard is that you can't do everything at once. For instance you can't be locked on, charging gun, and do a directional input sword attack (i.e. streak or high roller). Secondly, doing any kind of diagonal input is a pain and makes it VERY difficult to pull off directionally-based moves against diagonally positioned enemies.

 

The 1st problem is probably doable but requires flexible fingers and possibly key remappings, the 2nd problem is probably the biggest reason why a gamepad would make the game much easier for PC users.

 

Thanks for your suggestions, but about the Dx9 VS Dx10 thing, i'm basing my Phrases on my Friend's Experience with both Mods, AKA Halogod2007, he tried both modes on his Desktop 8800GTX and only a bit improved Motionblur was Spoted with a loss of 6-10 FPS.

 

i totally believe you- and you should still site your source (say that in your article)

it just sounds like you are making it up or that you heard it somewhere else when you say you are running dx9 hardware and make comments on dx10 performance. it sort of makes your writing lose credibility when you do that. thats just a general writing thing, im not really ragging on your for this short preview.

 

Alright, Article Edited

 

Nice review. I also have this Demo on my lappy. And it runs great.

 

yup, cant wait for the full version, gonna review it , this demo is a very solid benchmark you know, it even can stress high end desktop cards at high resolutions, specially scene 2