Devil May Cry 4 (XBOX 360)

- Finished this last night. 13 hrs 17 min. I could have probably done it a lot faster but I spent some time exploring finding hidden items and secret missions. I also farmed a bunch of red orbs at the start of mission 7 to max out my blue and purple orbs.
- Having never really played a previous DMC game for more than a few hours I thought I would try Human level. It's a bit too easy if you ask me. I never died once and used health items like twice. If you can handle Ninja Gaiden then you probably should stick with Devil Hunter Mode.
- Major game padding, cheap lengthening issues. You fight all the bosses 3 times!!!! Granted they are some great boss characters but 3 times is a bit ridiculous. You backtrack the ENTIRE GAME, not a level or part of a level but the entire game. Sure you get a few new enemies and all the puzzles are already solved but it's basically the same thing all over again. Talk about major asset reuse.
- Graphics, art direction, and sound are all great. It's a really pretty game with a very fast and smooth frame rate. Voice acting isn't even that bad especially for Capcom.
- There are some really poor design decisions and almost requires you to have some previous knowledge of the earlier games. There are secret missions you can't complete your first time finding it or as a certain character. None of this is explained. That brings me to another point. There are a few poorly designed battles where it's just down right confusing on what you are suppose to do.
- Changing characters is quite jarring especially from a gameplay/control perspective.
- The story is quite confusing. I really don't understand the motivation for why some of the characters do what they do.
- Secret missions are really tough. I tried them all but only finished a few of them.
- The combat/gun play/combo/sytle system all works fine.
- Didn't really need to use Exceed all that much. Maybe it's more important on harder difficulty levels.
- No gamma slider adjuster!!!!! The game can be pretty dark at times.
- Finishing it unlocks some items like a history on DMC, art gallery, and a movie mode to watch all the cutscenes.

Overall I enjoyed it but it does have it's flaws. Recommended to 3rd person action fans. So far though I think Ninja Gaiden is better. I really looking forward to Ninja Gaiden 2 later this year.