DmC: Devil May Cry – General Guide

Overview

A general guide to the rebooted version of the Devil May Cry series. The main essence to my guides is that they are written after grasping all the essential aspects of the game, explaining what one might find obscure, sharing experience gained after countless hours of gameplay and providing in-depth tips and advices.

Introduction

DmC: Devil May Cry, the reboot that divided the fans of this ageless serie. Those who have been part of this serie since the very beginning are likely to detest this reboot, very few would be open-minded about it.

Maybe you’re completely new to the series and if you are looking for a fast-paced, stylish and really high-action based game, DmC is plenty good for that. Fear not, if you are about story as well, you do not need to have played the previous titles to recognize what’s going on as this game attempts to summarize all of what’s happened before into one storyline so you would still be getting the main story.

It is worth noting, however, that having played the previous games, you will be having some nice moments recognizing the subtle (sometimes not so subtle) references and you will see the classic story of Dante and Vergil from a different perspective, as if from an alternative reality.

With that being said, allow me to begin the guide.

Characters & Story

Altough there are not as many characters for this story, it is enough for the game to bear an interesting plot. All the parts I would consider important are blackened as you would learn them later on, while others are presented to you at the very start, however some after a bit of playing.

Dante the demon-killer, the nephilim who possesses the powers of both demons and angels, living alone and laying low, his life is about to change as soon as he is encountered by a mysterious girl while being attacked by a Hunter.
Dante’s personality is very care-free initially, somewhat childish and rude with an ironical sense of humor, his puns are often so bad he realizes it himself. His character takes a strong turn in terms of his development and becomes more mature and responsible towards the end of the game.

Unlike Dante, Vergil gives out the vibe of a more reliable and strategic person, in multiple situations he’d attempt to take the cold and more calculative way, more logical but crude. In comparison to Dante, Vergil is the mind, while Dante the muscles.
Vergil, being Dante’s brother, is in many aspects the perfect counterpart. My personally favorite character.

The firstly introduced character, she guides Dante through their first encounter and proceeds to aid him and Vergil on many occasions. She’s their sidekick, one they can rely on with useful information.
Vergil saved her when he found her in the limbo, helped her escape her demonic father and ever since she’s been helping his cause.

The main antagonist, controlling the human population, deceitful and manipulative. He seems to be the figure behind all events in the “real world”.
He was the one to kill the Nephilims’ mother and imprison their father, Sparda, for an eternal tornment.

There are two main “planes” where the story takes place, that is the “real world” where humans live, often tricked by the demonic influence and their propaganda and the “limbo”, the domain where the demons reside. Dante, as he is pursued by Mundus, is often trapped in limbo and that’s where the fight takes place.

The limbo is the real deal, there you get to see the world’s true face. It’s where the news anchorman Bob nests, or his demonic version that is, same goes for Lilith the night club owner and other characters that are of demonic origin.

Difficulty modes

There are a lots of difficulty options in DmC: Devil May Cry as is a custom, or perhaps a homage, to the previous DMC games. Each mode differs slightly, but enough to have a seperate mode for it. Let’s break them down in a straight forward and more simpler way.

Human – Easy, enemies have less health and deal less damage.
Devil Hunter – Normal, the basic difficulty.
Nephilim – Normal-Hard, slightly tougher than Devil Hunter. Completing game on this difficulty with SSS ranking on all missions unlocks and achievement.

Son of Sparda – Hard, tough enemies spawn very early on, Dante deals less damage, enemy deals more damage and have more health. Unlocks a costume and more modes.
Dante Must Die – In addition to Son of Sparda, enemies perform special attacks that they have not shown before and/or use unbreakable moves where even if hit, their attacks will still go through.
Heaven or Hell – Everyone, including Dante, dies in one hit. You are given 3 gold orbs to use to revive yourself whenever you die. I find this mode fairly easily as utilizing your firearms makes up for an easy playthrough.
Hell or Hell – As the name suggests, it’s tougher than the aforementioned difficulty. You die in one attack but enemies don’t and are as tough as if played on Son of Sparda.

Combat Tips, Scoring System & Blood Palace

Look away! If there are two or more higher tier enemy types on the fighting scene, say a Tyrant, Butcher, Rages or Knights and you’re having some trouble as you are forced to dodge very often, just turn your camera away from them. I can tell that even a mid-charge Tyrant will stop charging as soon as you turn camera away, has to be turned early enough though, not just before the impact. Same for Butcher, the saw boy, he would just walk around, shamefully waiting for you to look at him so that he would attack you. A mere oversight? A bug? Likely so, but it’s there so use it if you need it.

Parry signature attacks every time! Now, you will probably not be intentionally wanting to parry low tier minions such as the Stygians but you sure should be looking for an opportunity to parry Dreamrunners, Drekavac or the Butcher, they are very easy to read and thus to parry. It’s significantly tougher to parry with a mere Rebellion swing but it’s doable. Easier way is with your Osiris’ shredder, use that to parry the Butcher’s thrown saws. Use fully charged Eryx as soon as dreamrunners escape into into the portal and prepare to jump at you, listen to the sound and when they jump, release it, same for Drekavac. It is the more efficient way to parry them with Eryx rather than to attempt to melee them. Witch’s heavy shield is a big trouble so if she charges her swords that come flying at you, spin your Osiris or hit 3 perfectly timed swings with Rebellion and turn her swords back at her.

Use demon trigger! If you find yourself overwhelmed, not just by numbers but also by the tough enemies and think healing up would not help as much and your demon trigger bar is not filled up enough, make sure to always carry a devil trigger star, preferably large and only on higher difficulties (Son of Sparda and higher). Use one and initiate Demon Trigger instantly, not only you will heal up well enough, thus eliminating the need for a vital star, but also style a lot faster due to your score counter being boosted up during the DT and at the same time, killing all the enemies. Use it, don’t save it.

Seen it too many times? Once you’ve been through the game 4 or 5 times, you are probably not going play the game for the cutscenes, you will want to skip them, the button for that is Backspace. I swear the only reason I’m putting this here is that I thought there is no button for skipping scenes so I rolled with that long enough untill I accidentally found out. It’s BACKSPACE PEOPLE!

Item penalization. Using items and dying throughout one mission hits you with some penalties at the end of the mission, however, unless you intend on scoring SSS on all Nephilim missions, it need not bother you.

A must get abilities. There are a couple essential abilities you should get as soon as possible. Those are the Angel Evade, Demon Evade, Angel Boost, Death Coil, Trillion Stabs and Overdrive. Once you get the Arbiter, your main and only concern should be the Trinity Smash which along with Demon Evade does unreasonable amount of damage.
Now, Angel Evade is an excellent gap closer as well as a tool of escaping and making some room. Demon Evade, if timed well, gives you a boost damage for your next attacks so combined with Trinity Smash, you will be striking enemies with a proper amount of damage. Deathcoil is necessary for the continuity of your combos as well as is Trillion Stabs, which can be also used as ending to a fight, as you can rack up a lot of points from it if channelled long enough. Your index finger will take a beating over time.

The following video is a favorite combo if mine, it feels clean and not too flashy, for scoring purposes however, it would’ve been beneficial to use Double Up with the Osiris instead of Rake when bringing opponents up. Altough, that would complicate the situation, putting the enemies slightly above Dante’s head, having to angel pull to them and hope to continue combo with enough enemies left to use the Raining Storm on, which is the idea here – have as many enemies survive as possible on the way up, if they don’t die from the firearms, they sure will from Eryx drop.

Now, the way to score as much as possible is to mix up your weapons and combos as often as possible, simple as that. Your attacks carry over with one weapon into another, meaning you could swing twice with Rebellion for ‘Hacker’ ability, but midway swap to Osiris by holding Q and pressing LMB for the third time for ‘Cleaver’.
Combination is the key and so is not getting hit, which drastically reduces your combo metter which is the following:

D – Dirty!
C – Cruel!
B – Brutal!
A – Anarchic!
S – Savage!
SS – SSadistic!
SSS – SSSensational!

When having the opportunity to kill an enemy using the environment, don’t do it. You’d rid yourself off the chance of draining that enemy of off more points, make sure to take your time if you’re aiming for the score. Play it safe, don’t get hit and mix attacks.

Blood palace is a classic addition to the game’s repertoire of mods and secret missions to give you the instant gratification of DmC’s combat. It’s composed of 101 levels and can be unlocked after completing the game once. Enemies get tougher and more numerous as you progress through levels and kill bosses you’ve encountered.

Personally, I find the Blood Palace to be a good way to let off some steam quickly but soon find myself be somewhat bored and wanting it to be over already. If memory servers well, the following was my longest (and thus best) run, hitting the 97th level out of 101.

Collectibles

There are a couple of things one might collect on his way through the game. Those are keys, lost souls and openable doors.

Personally, I suggest you don’t bother yourself with those on your first playthrough as if you are about to go for full achievement completion, you are likely to play the game more than once anyway and on your way, you will find them all eventually. Also, it is impossible to collect every single collectible in one run as only later on you will obtain means to unlock passages previously unaccessible. You also get to start with those “means”, your new game to unlock these said areas.

There are more types of keys and each type is used to open a certain type of doors. These doors hide secret missions. And then there are lost souls that generate a low amount of red orbs, you can hear their desperate moans from afar so they’re fairly easy to spot. Same goes for keys that are human-sized so it’s easy to find.

Weapons

In total, there are 4 types of weapons – demonic, angelic, fireams and Dante’s signature Rebellion sword.

Angelic weapons are generally made to affect more enemies at once, their area of effect radius is large enough for you to handle hordes of enemies while the demonic ones are heavy and slow punishers of singular enemies. While his sword doesn’t possess the capability of handling all of your surroundings like the angelic weapons, or the brute strenght of the demonic ones, it’s a great combo starter as well as a tool to continue combos from afar and adding versatility to your combo counter.

When it comes to firearms, you start with Ebony & Ivory, two semi-auto pistols that aren’t much use other than shooting them 2 or 3 times to add some mixture to the combos which is the essence of getting high scores. Later on you acquire a shotgun and a Kablooey that detonates fires shot upon impact. You’ll find that the only one you might be using more often is Kablooey as it’s an absolute boss whacker.

Dante’s Devil Trigger is what you obtain later on in the game, it increases your damage output, swings all enemies into the air, enabling them for easy aerial combos. I heavily suggest using Aquila’s Aerial Buy In during DT. Dante also regenerates health during this. The DT meter needs to be filled at least to roughly 15% of the bar to make it usable for a few seconds. Personally, I prefer saving DT for boss fights to make sure my damage is at its peak when the boss is open to attacks, i.e. stunned.

source: image has been taken from [link], by Evymonster9406.

Demons (non-boss)

The most basic opponents, cannon fodder almost. Apart from the higher difficulties where they can block attacks (use demonic weapons to break their blocks), they are no trouble.

First, break their shields using demonic weapons. If the knight is hellish looking, use demonic weapons only, angelic won’t harm them at all. If they’re the angelic version, use Osiris to break their shields first, this will take some time as angelic weapons are weaker in damage. You can, however, deflect their frostline attack using Osiri’s Shredder.

Harpies usually pose no trouble, they are the flying Stygian. You cannot hook them to you, but you can easily hook yourself to them using the angel pull, give them 2-3 Rebellion slashes, then one Eryx punch and repeat. I find useful using Ebony & Ivory’s Ricochet as well as Aquila.

Ravagers easily dealt with airborne. While they are on the ground, they channel up powerful attacks that you can only dodge, those attacks make you immovable for a bit as well. Get them up and slash them to bits, they should be your priority in combat.

Usually your first priority as well, they carry a shield that needs to be taken care of using the demon pull, they die in 2-3 hits so they aren’t durable but must be taken care of as soon as possible for their attacks are ranged.

Same strategy from Pathos applies to Bathos, they differ in their attacks as one throw bombs, the other shoots crossbow projectiles.

The sluggish Tyrants often open up with either a charge attack, or if the player is too close, they leap onto Dante. Use demon evade to get that damage boost, get behind them, deliver a few slashes and just as they are about to turn around, get them on their backs using the demon pull and continue slashing and make sure to ulilize Trinity Smash at least once.

Butchers are easily dealt with from afar, wait for them to throw their sawblades at you, then parry ideally with Osiris’ Shredder or Rebellion. Once they are stunned, get close and throw in one Hacker/Death coil followed by Trinity Smash. Repeat. When they are about to die, they explode so keep your distance.

Rages come in variants just as Knights do. I find the Ghost (blue) Rage slightly more annoying to deal with and especially so if they spawn in a pair of one being Ghost Rage, the other Blood Rage. If that happens, throw Aquila (Round Trip) on the Ghost Rage, turn your camera away and focus on Blood Rage, repeat.

Witch isn’t hard to deal with by her own, but is generally annoying to leave her on the battlefield for too long. Use Shredder or Round Trip to remove her shield or parry her swords. After that she’s vulnerable and can only teleport. If there is the opportunity for an environmental kill, this is the only time I would support it as she teleports around quickly enough to break your chain without trouble, make you busy enough to not be aware of other enemies. First priority as well as Harpies and Bathos & Pathos

One of the most formid enemies in the game. He can block almost all of Dante’s attacks, is resistable to firearms and can counterattack in a hardly predictable way for a newer player.
I find Eryx be the best solution for him if you want to play it safe. Make a big distance between you and him, charge up Eryx, hold the charge button, when you hear him come out of the veil and re-appear, release it to perform a parry and open him up for a few attacks, repeat. You might as well try to melee him but only using charged Eryx attacks, first charge is enough.

Drekavac uses the Dreamrunner type of combat, only bears a slight visual changes and makes some storyline appearances, making it look like he’s an important character. In the meantime, he’s “just” Mundus’ bodyguard, the first time he fights you, he fleets, at the end, when he defends Mundus, he stands his ground.

source: all images have been taken from [link]

Demons (boss types)

The following section includes some minor spoilers as well as heavy spoilers, which, as per usual, will be hidden in the spoiler tab.

You’ll encounter this boss very early on when you are not expected to know a lot of combos nor have them learned so he is no big trouble. His repertoire consists of winding attacks which are easily dodgable into any side or by jumping up, after that, he is open to your attacks. Focus his head, after taking some amount of damage, he will be stunned and thus enabling you to inflict more damage. From time to time, he jumps up so watch out his shadow and dodge accordingly to its location. If he jumps out of the combat zone and attempts to snipe you with his claw gun, shoot him down with your firearms.
At one point, he will breathe out darkness, a mist if you will, hiding himself and throwing his weapon at you at either horizontal or vertical angle, therefore dodge either by jumping up, or sideways. Then the fight repeats.
TIP: When the boss is stunned, use Trinity Smash (ARBITER) for maximum damage punishment, if this is not your first run. Otherwise, do whatever attacks you have available at hand.

Second boss fight, which heavily relies on you dodging a fair amount of attacks before you can dish out your own. Focus her head’s red glow whenever you dodge her attack. The fight takes place on 3 platforms, you will need to go to 2 of them to rip out the tubes she’s feeding herself into the Virility drink.
After dealing a fair amount of damage, a cutscene plays and you are to jump on either the left or right platform, do so, pull the tube and get back down. Repeat.
TIP: When the boss is stunned, use Trinity Smash (ARBITER) for maximum damage punishment or Trillion Stabs is also a viable option which you can have unlocked by this stage.

In my opinion, one of the easiest fights, somewhat easier than The Hunter as well, but truthfully very well executed fight scene. What is key to this fight is stomping the red circles connected to Barbas using Stomp. Firstly, you merely need to destroy one, then Barbas opens up for a series of attacks. As you try to reach other red circles, you will be met with attacks from Barbas that you will need to dodge, but they are easily doable and so proceed by smashing more red portals. Every time Barbas returns to strenght after you beating him up, you get to enter his eyes into a live feed camera, where you are to fight Stygians from upper perspective, twice.
TIP: When the boss is stunned, use Trinity Smash (ARBITER) for maximum damage punishment, Trillion Stabs as before but this time, you’ll have plenty of time for charged Revenant shot to increase the damage output even further. Preferably, however, you should use Kablooey shots – 3 – 4 while jumping to increase the timing and detonate them before Barbas regains strenght again.

Not overly difficult fight but accompanied by an excellent soundtrack. The key to this boss is to get strike him hard enough for him to open his third eye on the forehead. Do that by either focusing the crystal ball he’s holding onto in his abdominal arm, which is more effective, or just slash at his limbs. When he opens his eye, attack it in order to stun the boss. Then, pull Lilith out and if possible, use devil trigger to increase your damage if possible as well. Use charged Revenant before initiating your combos on Lilith too. As with the bosses before, from this point onward, repeat. Mundus’ Spawn palette of attacks slightly grows and he becomes able to throw crystal discoballs, either dodge them but preferably parry them. Also, his regular attack of smashing the ground once is now empowered and he smacks the ground several times, with the last hit being a bit off so time it precisely, Jumping up in the air will do the trick nonetheless.
TIP: When the boss is stunned, use Trinity Smash (ARBITER) for maximum damage punishment, Trillion Stabs as usual, Kablooey on boss’ eye or onto Lilith, but charged Revenant shot is preferable IMO. Don’t forget to use DT to increase your damage on Lilith.

source: all images have been taken from [link]

Final Battle (spoilers)

The fight takes places on two rooftops, you only need to switch between them when Mundus starts covering the place with lava. Throughout the fight you will need to dodge his arm attacks, the safest way is the double angelic dash to lose the tracking. Make sure to jump as well, if his fist landed too close for comfort and avoid the shockwave it emitted. Keep charging your Revenant all the time and when you are about to injure his hand, shoot Revenant and apply the traditional Trinity Smash/Trillion Stabs or Hacker combo. Repeat. Often he may attempt to hit you with the crystal balls, just like his child. I strongly advise to parry those as it’s a free damage to one of his arms. You’ll need to take both of his arms away and after you do, you will have to deal with his crystal orbs a bit more so either dodge them all, or, preferably, parry them. If you dodge them, you will be met with his demonic abyss, angelic dash to it and deal some damage.
Not overly difficult fight but accompanied by an excellent soundtrack. The key to this boss is to get strike him hard enough for him to open his third eye on the forehead. Do that by either focusing the crystal ball he’s holding onto in his abdominal arm, which is more effective, or just slash at his limbs. When he opens his eye, attack it in order to stun the boss. Then, pull Lilith out and if possible, use devil trigger to increase your damage if possible as well. Use charged Revenant before initiating your combos on Lilith too. As with the bosses before, from this point onward, repeat. Mundus’ Spawn palette of attacks slightly grows and he becomes able to throw crystal discoballs, either dodge them but preferably parry them. Also, his regular attack of smashing the ground once is now empowered and he smacks the ground several times, with the last hit being a bit off so time it precisely, Jumping up in the air will do the trick nonetheless.
TIP: It’s imperative that you attempt to parry every crystal ball possible as well dodge arms that can be quite devastating.

What a surprise, but not unforeseeable. After the fight breaks down, focus on Vergil’s blue swords and parry them. The timing is easily recognizable; whenever the sword lights up blue, parry. It’ll open Vergil up for attacks. If he summons more than one sword, you may use Shredder to take care of them all. Vergil starts off with a basic set of abilities – aerial ranged attack and a damaging dash. Both are adviced to be dodged; his aerial Flush attack can be dodged right into demon pull onto him, deal some damage as Vergil is open for a little while, then back off, same for his dash attack. He is completely immune to firearms and any melee attacks unless he’s just missed a hit or been parried. A few cutscenes play during the fight the lower you get Vergil’s health. He’ll be gaining more and more abilities but the fight doesn’t change that much; dodge to attack. A fact worth noting is that once Vergil gets low on health enough, he’ll summon his doppelgänger, this is Vergil’s Devil Trigger. Try to survive untill his close goes away, then again, get Vergil low. When you do, he will attempt to replenish his health while his clone will be protecting him. You can muster up some DT points by hitting his doppelgänger. Once Vergil is on his knees, trying to get health back up, trigger your own DT and strike him down.

source: Vergil & Mundus images have been taken from [link]

Vergil’s Downfall

Following section may include spoilers, if you have not played through the entire DLC yet.

Vergil’s Downfall takes place after Vergil’s lost fight to Dante. Vergil is living through his own personal hell. Throughout the story, you can see how his personality changes, he is tying up loose ends, obtaining more power.
All of this DLC’s cutscenes are made as a black & white slideshow which may add some uniqueness to it, but I’d have preferred the classic animations. There are 6 missions, as opposed to 20 in the DmC, as well as all the difficulties from the full game.
You are presented a completely new set of skills and abilities. Two major factors are that now, you get to charge a lot of your attacks by holding the combination down (just like charged firearms or Overdrive) and if you time it perfectly, and release at the right time, the results are such that even the mightiest opponents will be affected by its crowd control (knock ups etc).
This DLC is here to close Vergil’s story and to draw a parallel between the original DMC series’ Vergil, and this reboot’s Vergil of how he came to be the way he is in the originals.

Two new enemies have made their way into into the DLC, that is the Wisp and the Imprisoner.

The Wisp is relatable to our Harpies, altough personally, I find Wisp’s attacks hard to read, unless you’ve played through the game half a dozen of times. Their grey cloak prevents you from being fully able to read them, but you can anticipate some of the major sweep attacks. I myself like taking them down with Spiral Swords and a combination of aerial attacks composed of Orbit Embed (Angelic Yamato) and Aerial Rave Embed.

You will only fight this opponent twice (do not recall his present in VMD mode). He has easily dodgable ranged attacks where he throws chunks of rocks at you. Best way of dealing with Imprisoners is charging up the perfect Solar Flare, it will knock them up and you can unleash your Orbit & Aerial Rave Embed combo. Make sure to use Spiral Swords as well as Blistering Swords for maximum damage output.

source: Wisp & Imprisoner images have been taken from [link]

I can imagine that this boss fight is a complete hell for many players but there is a very easy and somewhat cheeky way to accomplish it. The following video shows it all.

You may open up with Solar Flare as your very first move, worst case scenario; you will parry Vergil so no real issue, just as has happened in the video. Once you get him up, keep mixing up between Orbit Embed and Aerial Rave Embed. You will need to mix up at least 1 Aerial Rave after every Orbit to make sure you can keep the combo going. Ideally, you will one-combo him so that he immediately goes to his heart and intiate the swords attack, which are all about timing. Unfortunately, in my video, I wasn’t around one health bar away from forcing him into his first retreat. But generally, you can do it if you mix in some Killer Bees.

Personal View

When it comes to my own opinion on DmC: Devil May Cry, the reboot itself, I stand by saying that the game would’ve been very well accepted by a much larger portion of the gaming community, were it not labeled as a DMC game.

The original DMC series has a long, long history and therefore every sequel is largely anticipated, thus, a lot of people were not happy with getting a redux version. In my view, the game got too much underserved hate from overly loyal, almost zealot-like fans. DmC is good as its own game, naturally, not AS good as a proper DMC sequel would be, but as a standalone game, it’s great.

I’ve played DMC4 years ago and have the general lore knowledge regarding the previous DMC games (1, 2 and 3) so I feel I’m in the safe spot. Greatly enjoyable game nonetheless, great level design which is, to me, an important note if the game is built on seperate levels or missions. Awesome combat and very well executed boss fight scenes. I think that the only letdown are the characters, mainly Dante and Kat. I liked the new Vergil’s reasoning and “ruthless” calculations which seemed familiar to his “original DMC” counterpart, logic before emotions.

Closure

It was a well-spent gametime and with that I’m glad to present another one of my general guides with a game being fully completed. As of now, DMC5 has been announced, so we may finally let the reboot rest in peace.

I hope this guide provided you with all or any info you might’ve needed as I do not go in-depth in a specific aspect of the game, but instead, trying to provide the general information first, followed by personal experience and advices that I’ve accumulated after fully completing the game.
Experience may be invaluable.