Bayonetta Review

Greetings dear readers, and welcome to my first review on MPR Syndrome. As a warm-up to writing reviews and as test for this idea, I have chosen to review a fairly old game that I have been replaying non-stop since I decided to replay it; Bayonetta. Bayonetta is a Character Action Game (akin to games such as Devil May Cry and Metal Gear Rising Revengance) created by Platinum Games and published by SEGA for the PS3 and X-Box 360 in 2010. It released to a slew of praise from various gaming review sites yet failed miserably in sales. Which means that it is quite possible that 4 years have past and still many people have probably not even tried this amazing game yet and I believe that is a shame-

Is it really?

Oh crap...

Its poor sales could be attributed to the fact that it simply didn't have mass appeal. No matter how good the game, if the player didn't fancy its direction or look then no amount of good gameplay would convince them otherwise. Since 4 years ago was the start of the Call of Duty craze, the majority were looking for more FPSs than Character Action Games such as Bayonetta. Furthermore, there were bound to have been several people who didn't buy it simply because it featured a female protagonist who the majority of the male audience simply couldn't relate to.

Now, well, you see-

HEY SHUT UP, GREEN!!!!

Siiiiigh.... 

Bayonetta has the BEST action and controls EVER! I have yet to see an action game with controls THIS responsive and action THIS insane! Its super simple on the outside but hard to master! Dodging feels AMAZING and the bosses, THE BOSSES! They are the HYPEST BOSS BATTLES EVER!!!

Good God Red, use you inner voice! Shouting won't get your point across to the readers when all you're shouting is hyperbole with nary an explanation!

HEY YOU STARTE-

GREEN! RED! Please, I'm trying to do something here so please keep it down! *Ahem* So anyway, lets slow down and explain the premise of Bayonetta. Bayonetta is the name of the protagonist who happens to be a hot, saucy Witch who uses four guns on her hands and feet-

THATS SO AWESOME!!

-right....along with many other weapons and channels magic through her hair which can summon giant fists and legs and even giant demonic dragons to eat her enemies which happen to be Angels out to get her. She also happens to use her magic to wrap her hair around herself like clothes. the controls are simple; a punch and kick button as well as a shoot button for offensive manoeuvres while there is a jump button and a very important dodge button for defensive actions.

What Bayonetta does different than other action games is that when the player dodges an attack at the last moment, time will slow down for a few seconds, giving the player ample time to counter-attack in the most stylish way possible. Every battle is has a ranking at the end that takes into account three things; combo score, time, and damage. Players who like to improve will find themselves driven by this ranking system to do better in battle, which the game handles very naturally.

Yet players who don't care about improving can safely ignore the ranking system without penalty as the rankings are merely shiny medals to brag about.

While that may be true to some, anyone who chooses to start paying attention to the rankings will be amazed at how everything the game allows you to do can be used to improve upon your ranking. Now one of the highlights of the game are definitely the bosses-

OMG THE BOSSES!! LET ME TALK ABOUT THEM PLEAAAAAASE!

Alright, alright, fine.

The bosses are BIG, they are BAD and they are EPIC! Each boss fight is big and memorable and left my jaw on the floor EVERY time!

They are memorable, I admit.

Indeed, now on to the story-

Oh don't even get me started on the "story" if you can even call it that. Nothing made sense in it! There was nothing intellectual or thought provoking about it and merely served as tool to connect the action together. It certainly isn't memorable nor is it going to earn any praise.

Now, now, the story of Bayonetta is certainly not one for everybody. Those looking for a serious tale will be disappointed but those looking for a fun, tongue in cheek romp while punching and kicking Angels in the face will feel right at home with the story and its hyper, over the top cutscenes.

In the end, Bayonetta is a wonderfully hyper and over the top action game with almost perfect controls with a ridiculously satisfying difficulty curve that is under appreciated by many. 

So under appreciated that the sequel is going to come out on a completely different console than the original; the Wii U.

YEAH THATS BULL! HOW COULD THEY BETRAY US LIKE THAT! HOW BOUT THE FANS WHO PLAYED IT ON THE PS3 AND 360!!!

Calm down, Red. Due to Bayonetta 1's abysmal sales on the PS3 and 360, no other publisher (not even SEGA) wanted to risk funding the sequel for fear of it not selling as well. We are lucky to even get a sequel thanks to Nintendo's decision to publish it for the Wii U.

So I hope this review has reignited your spark to give Bayonetta a replay before the sequel's release, or perhaps I helped you decide to find this 4 year old game and play it before the sequel releases. Thank you for reading this review. This is Black

Green

And RED!

Signing off