Devil May Cry 4

Title
Developer
Publisher
Genre
ESRB Rating
Demo Release Date
Full Release Date
Platforms
Official Website
Demo Download Size
Review Date

Devil May Cry 4
Valve Corporation
Capcom
Action
Mature
5th June 2008
8th July 2008 Buy Now
PC (Reviewed), PS3*, Xbox 360*
http://www.devilmaycry.com
804MB
6th June 2008

What did I think before playing?
The Devil May Cry series is now in its forth iteration and has established a loyal fanbase. I know there are people out there that really like these titles, but I've never played one. I thought this may be a survival horror game, but turns out it is another hack-n-slash, third person, beat-em-up.

What is included?
Two modes: 1) a time limited mode which gives you 10 minutes to get as far as you can and 2) a boss battle mode in which, with only one health bar, you fight two large monsters at once.

What did I think afterwards?
Nvidia have got their ads all over this one. The first screen of the installer is all about how DMC4 uses the latest graphics technology, sat next to Nvidia logos. When starting the demo after the install, logos for Nvidia, Intel and others flash by. (Not important really, but just wanted to point out that some games are selling out. I can't say if this game in particular is specially engineered for Nvidia cards, but that would be a bad thing if games start heading that way.)
Anyway, before starting the demo a config screen popped up allowing me to setup the controls... but only for a gamepad. It implies that you should really be playing with a gamepad, (an Xbox 360 one at that,) however it seems to just be a mapping of gamepad buttons to keyboard keys. I decided to bite and play with a 360 controller.
After starting the demo the first thing I do is check out the options. I noticed this one had all the graphics settings all defaulted to HIGH, including an HD resolution of 1280x720, running in a letter-box mode. I didn't change anything to see how well this would really run, since the desktop I am using isn't a graphical beast. For whatever reason I am then held to ransom by a progress bar which takes minutes to finish with absolutely no explanation for what is going on, (optimizing shaders?) After all that, the "Performance Test" option caught my eye. I thought this would tweak the settings to something more sensible, but was actually just a typical game scene running with an FPS counter so that you could judge how well the game would run with the current settings. I was getting an average of around 25FPS, which was good enough for me, so I started the game.
I began with the 10 minute mode which let me know what was going on by throwing up a tip each time a new attach became available, or I picked up a new item. The main thing that jumped out at me was that you had to go through doors to progress which broke the world up into very discrete units; something somewhat dated in today's sandbox-game filled world. It also wasn't obvious what you had to do to actually get through those doors. Where most games now throw up a tool tip for any "actions" that can be performed, this title suddenly changed the jump button into the "go through door" without any prompting. Aside from that, this was a fairly standard beat-em-up I think, (there isn't a huge difference between this and Kung-Fu Panada, beyond graphical style!)
After getting through a few scenes my time ran out, a "Coming Soon" splash screen went by and I'm sent back to the main menu. I tried my hand at the second mode in which I had to fight two boss monsters. Not much difference between this and the first mode really, so I gave up after two attempts.

Would I buy the full game?
No because I don't see what is special about DMC4 compared to other titles in the genre. Perhaps there is a strong, ongoing storyline throughout the series, but that doesn't come across in the demo.

Demo Pros
Good performance with a high quality output. The ten minute limit gives you a good taste of the gameplay and provides an extra element of excitement due to the added urgency of progression.

Demo Cons
I'm not keen on the advertising, but that helps Capcom pay for the game. Not much wrong with the demo, but I found the gameplay samey and nothing stands out as unique to me.

Demo Rating 7 / 10

Thoughts after playing the full game?
If I play the full game I will put comments here about whether I feel the demo was representative of the final product and if I am happy with the purchase.

Sales Figures
If I can find sales information about a game after it has been released I'll add that here. It may be useful to track demos to sales performance.