Over the last several months, Capcom has been bringing the older titles of the acclaimed Devil May Cry series to the Nintendo Switch eShop, complete with enhancements. Last week, Devil May Cry Cry 3 Special Edition (DMC3SE) was released. Though it has been years since I played through it on the PS2, it’s probably my favorite of the entire franchise, and I think that’s a common thought amongst many gamers. Anyway, whether you’re a hardcore fan of the franchise or a newcomer, DMC3SE on the Switch is a unique and awesome treat that is well worth the price of admission. This release is for sure the ultimate, definitive version of this all-time action classic.
DMC3SE features the brash yet enjoyable Dante as the protagonist. The story takes place ten years before the events of the original Devil May Cry, and begins with Dante and his brother Vergil fighting one another. Humanity is in danger as Arkham is intent on opening a portal for demons to come through and destroy everything. Dante, chilling at his yet-to-be-named shop one night gets visited by hordes of demons, which he takes out in an incredibly stylish way. Granted, at this point you’re not going to be very impressed with the PS2-era (2005) quality of the cutscenes in terms of its visual fidelity, but the content is excellent. Expect to be much more impressed with how great the gameplay holds up with DMC3SE, though, as players blend gunplay with melee action. The gameplay has aged very well!
The biggest feature of this DMC3SE release on the Switch is the inclusion of Freestyle mode. As you may know, in previous releases of DMC3SE, you had to choose Dante’s style (Swordmaster, Gunslinger, Royalguard, or Trickster) before the mission started (or at fairly-rare checkpoints). You also had to choose your gun at the time. Sure, this still gave players a lot of quality options for dishing out punishment to the demons (or outstanding defensive tactics with Trickster’s dodge and Royalguard’s blocking ability). Now, though, you can actually change between these modes at will, right from the start of the game (rather than having to wait to unlock these throughout the story)! This gives the game a vastly different feel and makes achieving SSS ranks in Style much easier, and makes playing on harder difficulties more intriguing. It’s a ton of fun to be able to cycle through these abilities and weapons at will, much more like a modern game would behave like, than to have to wait at certain points to be able to stop and change them out. The idea and implementation of this by Capcom was excellent.
The second upgrade with the Switch version is the ability to do local co-op on the Bloody Palace, which pits you against wave after wave of increasingly challenging enemies. There are 9,999 floors to this mode — but you can skip up to 100 floors at a time, but it’s still wildly challenging as you go further and further into it. Player 2 will be using Vergil, but it’s still best to complete the story mode before using Vergil so that you can level up more before taking on the Palace. I love that co-op was used for this, including a splitscreen view during boss fights.
These two features alone are well worth the price of admission at $20. The dated graphics (especially some of the cutscenes) and sometimes irritating camera don’t hold back the otherwise excellent game that DMC3SE is. What’s more, the Switch version’s inclusion of Freestyle Mode (which can be disabled if you so prefer) and co-op Bloody Palace make it a must-have as far as I’m concerned, for franchise fans and newcomers alike. Additionally, built-in achievements, small storage size (around 5GB), and super fast load times make this much more than just a port — it’s an impressive “ultimate” edition, if you will. Bravo, Capcom.
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