Verse I

First of all, I had to say that when I heard the premise of this game I was really turned off. A witch that has guns on the heels of her shoes, who casts spells with her hair. I stopped reading after that. Immediately I dismissed this game as a pure pile of crap based on that concept alone. Imagine my surprise when my roommate showed up with the game a few days ago. I couldn’t not talk shit to him, I mean, what kind of idiot picks up this crap… then he started playing.

Verse II

I watched and was instantly captivated by how awesome this game is. I continued my snide comments until he was finished with it, then it was my turn to wreck shop. I played it for 7 hours straight the first night, 8 the second. I beat it, and then came back for the newly unlocked hard mode. There was just too much to do, too many combos to learn, too many new weapons to unlock, too many accessories to buy, and too many cutsceens with women in scantily clad attire to rewatch. The soundtrack leaves something to be desired. I like the jazz and all, but something about a woman singing Sinatra’s Fly Me to the Moon during EVERY FUCKING BATTLE rubbed me the wrong way. There is a very slight learning curve, but after the first level you’re kickin’ ass and lickin’ lollipops.

Verse III

The game is beautiful. First and foremost, the fluid attack animations combine seamlessly with each other. The magic and special attack effects are dazzling. There are a multitude of different enemies you encounter throughout the game, each is unique and have really badass introductions. I almost cried when “Grace and Glory” ripped my face off continually during our first encounter. Oh yeah, they all have crazy names and are Angelic in most ways, but I’ll touch on that later. What needs to be talked about now is that this crazy witch uses her hair for magic. Apparently one of her magic spells is to transform her hair into a leather pantsuit which she walks around in. When a spell is cast, that same hair is used to form something like a giant fist, or a giant spider, or a variety of other giant things. Needless to say, this can (and does) lead to some very racy (yet tasteful!) attack animations. In other words, “Dis broad gets nekked when she be killin’.”

Verse IV

Alright, enough horndoggin’. Lets talk about some game play. This game can be enjoyed by technical players and the more common button mashers. Virtually every single button combination is a different technique and they all transition into each other quite nicely. This allows you to plan your attacks in a super sick combo or just hit buttons and wreck shop. Thats not to say the game is easy, oh no, quite the contrary. Although you have this multitude of combos at your disposal, your greatest ally is the dodge button. Press it and Bayonetta launches herself into a flip or handspring of some sort to keep her out of harms way. Not pressing it will have you dead in less than 3 seconds. Dodging at the right moment during an enemy attack will not only avoid the attack, but also initiate “Witch Time” or bullet time for those of you who saw that one movie. The catch is that Bayonetta still moves at full speed while all enemies are seemingly stopped in their tracks, leaving them completely vulnerable to whatever you can dish out. In addition the game tests your reflexes by throwing in buttons to press to counter otherwise devastating attacks. During one fight, some bitch threw a missile at me, I caught it and threw it back feeling pretty smug I almost missed it when she recountered (counter countered?) and it was coming back again. The need for good timing constantly keeps you on edge as its not restricted to combat, but also it used during various cutscenes where its less than expected.

Verse V

The enemies in this game are crazy awesome. Angels, Beloved Giants, Harmony, even a Two-headed Dragon with another head for a belly. I think that makes it a Three-headed Dragon, either way he has three faces, and that makes him awesome. Battles can range anywhere from a couple of small Angels all the way up to massive enemies that you have to climb on to kill. In addition to the standard button mashing, you can perform “Torture Attacks” which are mostly unique to each type of enemy. These attacks deal massive damage to individual targets by kicking them into the iron maiden, a guillotine, or a variety of other devices.

Verse VI

As stated in the beginning of this article, I had no idea of the premise of the game beyond the concept for the main character. It also seems that nobody can truly grasp the story and review it properly, so I’m going to do my best here. A long time ago in Europe god gave two rival clans ‘eyes to watch over the world’  keeping them separate balances the world, but bringing them together will cause chaos. For some reason your character doesn’t remember any of this but possesses the left eye. She doesn’t remember any of this because she has been ‘asleep’ at the bottom of a lake for 500 years, the game makes this hard to decipher as you start 10 years after your reawakening but there is never a scene for your actual reawakening. So anyway, now that you’re alive, you kill angels because demons pay you money to do it. You do this all while traveling between hell, heaven, and either earth of purgatory I really have no fucking clue. Maybe they’re supposed to be the same place, go figure.  Somewhere in the middle you find a little girl who is actually you and you have to protect her. OK, listen,  I really have no idea how the time travel shit comes into play for this game. It’s just kinda sprung on you, like I just did there. BAM, great article. Eventually you come to find that you actually are the left eye and that you’ve been strung along the whole time as a pawn to kill angels as sacrifices in order to resurrect “The Creator” and then you have to kill him. Yes, you kill god, again after he’s died once before, then a third time on hard mode. One thing that needs to be mentioned here, is the weird cut-scene at the end where a Priest (who is your father?) merges with your 8-year-old-girl body. The end result of this incestularpedotastic church scandal is a man with a baby sticking out of his chest trying to resurrect his holiness. In effect it seems to be an entire game based around the concept of “Maybe whats good is bad and whats bad is good”.

I thought about putting a spoilers tag in there, but the fact of the matter is the story in this game is so shallow that anyone that complains really needs to go outside for a while.