Devil May Cry HD Collection

My first honest impression of the Devil May Cry HD Collection is that Capcom wrapped three games of wildly uneven quality in a wrapper that feels almost apologetically thin. This is a port of a port: the 2012 HD Collection, itself a light upscale of PS2 originals, was bumped to 1080p and pushed to PC in 2018 with minimal additional effort. If you walked in expecting a modern remaster treatment, the reality is a rude awakening. The good news is that the core games doing the heavy lifting are genuinely excellent. The original Devil May Cry, born from a scrapped Resident Evil project, brings gothic castle atmosphere, locked-camera tension, and the debut of Dante, Ebony and Ivory, and the iconic style-ranking system that grades your combo chains from D all the way up to SSS. Chaining swordplay into gunfire to keep airborne enemies bouncing while the style meter climbs is still a satisfying loop. The fixed cameras and Resident Evil-style key puzzles show the age of the design, but the combat holds up. DMC3: Special Edition is the package's jewel: a prequel that pits a young Dante against his brother Vergil, with multiple combat styles to choose from (Swordmaster, Gunslinger, Trickster, Royal Guard among them), a bigger weapon arsenal, and boss fights that critics consistently praise as the best in the trilogy. Running at a solid 60fps, DMC3 is where most players will spend the bulk of their time and come away satisfied. DMC2 is the mandatory footnote that nearly every review treats as the fine print on an otherwise decent contract. The combat is sluggish, the environments are sprawling and dull, Dante loses most of his personality, and the difficulty is so easy it robs the experience of the tension that makes the other two games worth playing. It belongs in the collection for historical completeness, and that is the kindest thing you can say about it. On the technical side, this PC release is not the definitive version anyone hoped for. Menus flip awkwardly between 4:3 and widescreen, pre-rendered cutscenes are still blurry legacy video from the PS2 era, and some ambient audio loops incorrectly. There is also a known bug where running the games above 60Hz causes them to speed up, so capping your framerate before launching is genuinely necessary housekeeping. Keyboard controls are bare-bones; a controller is strongly recommended. The community has filled some gaps with mods that restore textures and fix various issues, which says a lot about what Capcom left on the table. Who should buy this? Anyone who skipped these games entirely during the PS2 era and wants to understand where character-action games came from. DMC1 and DMC3 remain foundational entries in the genre, and even the lazy port cannot fully obscure why. Returning players chasing nostalgia will find the games unchanged and the packaging underwhelming, but the muscle memory for style-ranked combat comes back fast. Veterans who already own DMC5 and want context for Dante and Vergil's rivalry will find DMC3 worth the price of admission on its own. Just lock that framerate, plug in a controller, and quietly skip DMC2 after your first mission.

Alex · Scout Team

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