MadCap's Game Reviews - "Devil May Cry"

I’ll go ahead and say it, I have never played the Devil May Cry games before doing these reviews.  I know, I know, a travesty (to varying degrees, as I have been told).  However, my youthful experiences with the Playstation systems were tenuous at best, mostly because I stuck on the gaming company I had come to know and love from childhood – Nintendo…at least until they started naming consoles after bodily fluids. But now that they are one of the only two names in gaming anymore – considering how Microsoft keeps shooting itself in the foot – that…wait, sorry, getting off topic here.  Devil May Cry, that was it.

 Thanks to an early Christmas gift from a friend (and thank you, good sir!), I was gifted with Devil May Cry HD Collection for the Xbox 360.  And, as of the time that I’m typing this, I have just completed the first game in the trilogy.  And, yes, I know there are four, but this collection only contains the three.  So I guess you all know what you have to look forward to for the next two weeks, right?

Regardless, to begin at the begin, we have Devil May Cry, an offering by Capcom.  Started as the original Resident Evil 4 (and boy does it show!), we are introduced to Dante.  He’s cocky, snarky and for all intents and purposes the very definition of awesome.  Running around in a red overcoat as he puts to use his two pistols – “Ebony” and “Ivory” – and his sword Force Edge.  Dante is the kind of guy who shrugs off being run through with a sword and being swallowed whole by a giant demonic pile of waste like it’s absolutely nothing and, likely due to his demonic heritage, it doesn’t even seem to do more than moderately inconvenience him.

The story begins with a brief text screen and narration, telling of a demon called Mundus who once tried to overtake the entire world.  However, a demon named Sparda “woke up to justice” and single-handedly defeated Mundus and his armies, sealing them away in the underworld.  And then, at some point years later, Sparda met a woman named Eva and they got married and had two children – Dante and Vergil.  However, this is Dante’s story, not Vergil’s…though that’s not to say that Vergil is completely out of the story…sort of.

Not many scares, but for moments like these, pack some extra undies...

But we actually pick up in the present at Dante’s shop “Devil May Cry”, where he is visited by a woman named Trish who plows her way through his front door on a motorcycle and proceeds to attack him.  But Dante, shrugging this all off, apparently finds that this was just a test by Trish who tells him of the return of Mundus from the underworld.  Dante, holding Mundus responsible for the deaths of his family, agrees to go out with her to Mallet Island to stop him.

Here we get to see the use of Dante’s guns and his sword against enemies like demon marionettes that begin to rise within the confines of the castle – oh, yes, the game takes place in and around the castle on Mallet Island.  Sound familiar? – and we get to see Dante’s skill in combat.  He’s an expert with a sword and apparently never needs to reload his pistols.  And not just his pistols, but any of the firearms he finds in the place from the shotgun all the way to the Nightmare-beta (which is the best Alien reference I have ever seen in a game).  Most enemies can easily be dispatched with just the pistols, though I found myself using the sword often enough for it to be relevant, particularly in some of the puzzles and in a certain boss fight that was one of the few to get repeated and yet not feel repetitive.

However, while the combat is just enough that I don’t feel that it gets repetitive, there is a major problem with the game that I have that damages it somewhat for me – the camera controls…or, really, the lack of camera controls.  It’s a problem I also have with the Resident Evil series as well.  While it’s also inexcusable there, Devil May Cry is admittedly a hack and slash, shoot ‘em up action game and when you can’t see enemies coming at you, you have no real way of launching a counter attack.  Which means you’re going to get hit, a lot, by things you can’t see and thus can’t react to.  This was also a problem in one of the later boss fights when I had to hit a sigil on the wall to access the enemy’s weak spot and that required hitting it with the sword.  However, no matter how much I pressed the left analog stick towards it and pressed attack, Dante would attempt to ram his sword through the boss and be completely ineffective whilst opening himself up to a demonic ass kicking.

And then, of course, there are the sections later in the game in the “Mirror World” where the view gets all wavy and distorted in certain areas.  Because what I really need when I already have trouble with the camera is to be able to see even less of what I need to in order to operate.  And on that note, why can’t I see anything? There are sections of this game that are just too dark and it’s damn near impossible to see anything, even in areas that are supposed to be very brightly lit.  The best part of this is that the game doesn’t even have a brightness control, just a screen that you can follow as a guide to set the settings on your TV.  And I did…

And no, it didn’t help.

But I will say, when this game is good, it absolutely glows.  As I said before, camera issues aside, the combat is pretty good if a little overpowered on your end (at least at the beginning).  Dante never runs out of ammo regardless of what gun you’re using, so it’s pretty much a case of “Press ‘X’ to Kick Ass”, and kick ass you do in a variety of ways from Dante’s trademark pistols to a grenade launcher to an experimental weapon created in the underworld (though, sadly, you don’t get to use that one that much before the end).  The sword combat is pretty good too, if that’s your bread and butter, and manages to be rather fun with various combos and special moves that can be purchased and put to use.

And the mentions of combat brings me to the Devil Trigger.  A handy little mode that makes Dante faster and stronger, as well as giving both sword and gun attacks a much welcomed boost in combat.  Of course, like most power up modes, it doesn’t last forever.  However, bringing it back is pretty much as simple as running around avoiding damage and repeatedly striking back against your enemies.  There are also Devil Stars that can be picked up and used to refill your Devil Trigger, which are definitely handy in a tight spot.

There are certain places where Dante can make a sacrifice of Red Orbs (received from defeating enemies) to the God of Time in order to receive power ups that take various forms, such a Yellow Orbs that allow the player to continue if they die (which, with save points, are pretty much worthless), Blue Orbs that increase your health meter, and Purple Orbs that can increase the number of sigils on your Devil Trigger mode.  There are also green stars that refill your health meter, holy water that can severely damage all enemies onscreen, and yellow stars that turn Dante invincible and make him faster and stronger for a brief time…

Yeah, I think you’re beginning to see where this game is awesome by this point, right?

"Jackpot."

Devil May Cry is actually a fantastic game if you can look past its few flaws.  The castle itself has a very creepy edge to it, and is very reminiscent – to me, at least – of the Castlevania series.  In fact, I can see quite a few places where DMC drew inspiration from that series, up to an including the final boss fight against Mundus, who attacks you in three forms much like Dracula did in Castlevania III (not to mention the inverted parts of the castle later on, very Symphony of the Night, though in a lesser capacity).  And there are, of course, little references to other game series in the story (like the aforementioned invincibility stars) and they’re all done well.  They’re references done right, just little nods and nothing more, and they all sync very well in the world we have them presented to us in.  The puzzles are sometimes complex, but not to the point of me wanting to pull my hair out by the roots, and it has probably one of the most awesome endings in video game history – escaping the crumbling castle on a World War I-style fighter plane.  How did it get there? How is it that the caverns you fly through are just big enough to maneuver through in order to escape?

Rule of Awesome, people. Rule of Awesome.

Seriously, if you can get the HD Collection, or even a copy of the original game on Playstation, I strongly recommend that you buy it and play it at least once.  It is more than worth it.

Devil May Cry is now available from Capcom.  The Devil May Cry HD Collection is available on Playstation 3 and Xbox 360.

This review is based on the Xbox 360 HD Collection. 

For the latest from the MadCapMunchkin, follow him on Twitter @MadCapMunchkin 

MadCap's Mad Rantings - "Alien: Isolation"

Oh, goodie! Another game based on the Alien franchise is coming out. Please excuse me as I sob uncontrollably and clutch the gaping wound that Randy Pitchford left in my heart...by nuking it from orbit (it was the only way to be sure). "But wait", cries David Houghton of Gamesradar, bringing up to me the truth of it that neither Randy Pitchford or his den of conniving charlatans has anything to do with the production of this new game, Alien:  Isolation.

I can hear the angels singing!

I'm not kidding either, that is honestly the best news I've heard about anything ever at this point.  Developed by UK studio Creative Assembly, apparently most known for the Total War series (which I've not played), the fact that this game does not have the festering stink of Gearbox Studios on it means that I will very likely and quite happily be playing it, if only to see how this one fails too.

"But wait again", cries Mr. Houghton, who has apparently gotten an inside look at the game while still in development (and due to release later this year). "It's based on Alien, not Aliens!" I must admit, I am more than a little intrigued by this.  While Alien was undoubtedly a major hit on the film scene back in 1979, it was really Aliens that unarguably brought the series a wider mass appeal.  Really, the differences in the two films very easily spotted; Alien being more like a thriller with the main cast trapped in a confined area while a malignant force picked them off one by one. Aliens was more straight up action, in true James Cameron-style taking the fight to the alien menace by riddling it with bullets and blowing it up with every explosive device known to man.

I still hold Aliens over Alien, but I don't debate that Alien is a good movie.  That all being said, it's interesting to see a shooter based on the franchise that isn't based on the second movie.  "But wait again again, Madcap", Mr. Houghton is more than happy to stop me once more, "it's not a shooter. It's a survival horror game." I have to admit, my heart dropped a bit when I read that part.  Colonial Marines was supposed to be partially survival horror as well, and it failed miserably. But from the looks of it, particularly the mention of a motion tracker being the only real "weapon" in the game, got me interested.  No weapons? In survival horror? What a refreshing concept!

I joke, but for the Alien franchise, it really is.  Every other game we're allowed to play a Marine (if we don't play one by default) with enough firepower to level a small moon, so it's rather interesting to see a protagonist who is stuck trying to survive by wits and tools alone. And just who is this protagonist, you may ask?  Mr. Houghton provided that answer as well:  the daughter of Ellen Ripley, Amanda.  If you've ever seen the Director's Cut version of Aliens, Amanda is mentioned as having perished in the fifty seven years since Ripley went missing, but no real detail is given to her beyond that fact that she had died in the time.

At first, of course, I thought this was going to be beyond terrible.  After all, when does a new sibling or child by adaptation ever go well? I, like Mr. Houghton does in his write up, feared that adding such a character would become a Star Wars prequel trilogy-esque trip in making the universe small and everything being coincidentally connected. Apparently, however, this isn't the case as Amanda is every bit the badass that her mother was (well, is, technically) and isn't remotely a...Prequel Sue? I suppose we could call it a Prequel Sue. It's a new term, roll with it.

Keeping in with the homages to the source material, the design of the game (if the one screencap provided is to be believed) is very much a modernized 70s Sci-Fi look much the same as the original move had. As Houghton puts it, "“CRT, not LCD” is the mantra." And it definitely looks like it, and it's really rather refreshing to see a design that isn't something generic.

Oh, and as for the Aliens themselves?  Well, it's really only a small amount and, again, the game is a survival horror so now using a shotgun to gleefully blast them away or grenades to turn them into little bits of acid-burned flesh on the walls. According to Houghton, the AI is set up so that the Alien has no preset pattern and it's vastly unpredictable.  And, of course, if it finds you, you are going to die.  Lovely.  Of course, we were promised an AI that could tie its shoe laces for Colonial Marines, so I'll just take your words with a grain of salt and see how it goes.

So, a new story, pure survival horror, characters that we can care about, and an AI that is not only immensely varied, but unpredictable.  This sounds like everything that Colonial Marines should have been...and failed.  So forgive me, Mr. Houghton, if I'm not as convinced as you are by it.  Given how one of the best movies ever was shat upon so thoroughly around this time last year, I'm pretty sure you can.  Aliens:  Colonial Marines was supposed to be the game we deserved and the game we needed.  It failed, falling far, far beyond everyone's expectations.

Will Alien:  Isolation come in to fill the gaping hole left in us? Only time will tell...

For the latest from the MadCapMunchkin, follow him on Twitter @MadCapMunchkin 

MadCap's Reel Thoughts - "WarGames Vs. Hackers"

In WarGames, young computer gamer David Lightman (Matthew Broderick) hacks into a secret government computer that has just been put in charge of NORAD’s missile defense system, beginning a race against time to prevent World War III. In Hackers, young computer genius Dade Murphy (Jonny Lee Miller) is, at the age of eleven, tried and convicted for causing one thousand, five hundred and seven computer systems to fail, which also led to a seven point drop in the New York Stock Exchange.  Seven years later, he is once more pulled into the world of hackers, and right into the middle of a battle between a sinister corporate hacker (Fisher Stevens).  With a cursory examination, one would dismiss any notion that these two films might share a connection.  But with a closer look, one might find that these two films have far more in common than at first believed, as well as the differences that make the latter film fall far short of the former.

An important thing to keep in mind with both of these films is the time they were released:  WarGames in the 1980s, and Hackers just a decade later.  Both of them were released at a time when technology was developing more and more into the style that we know now. Both of them were released as well during a time of turmoil that was caused, at least in part, but the advancement of that technology.  In WarGames, several scenes occur in Lightman’s bedroom, where he uses his computer.  For modern viewers, this may not seem like a big deal, but it was a brand new thing in the 1980s.  The same goes with Hackers, which came out not long after the birth of the Internet and all that it has led to.  Again, this likely doesn’t seem like any more important than the use of the home computer in WarGames, but it is a very large part of what both movies are.

That being said, both films have a strange way of explaining or showing things that no computer (at either time) could actually do in order to forward the plot.  Whereas Hackers has rather stilted or strange dialogue that sounds more like something read from a textbook than something that anyone would actually ever say, WarGames just uses the time honored writer’s easy button of “Computers are magic!”  While it is nice to see the application of technology in both cases to solve the problems presented by the plot, both films rely far too much on the audience being clueless as to how it actually works.  This could technically be forgiven by the notion that a detailed explanation of the processes and everything involved would take up too much of the screen time and thus bring the pacing to a screeching halt.  Even so, the writers should have been informed that if they weren’t going to put forward the effort, then the attempt should not have been made to begin with.

Both films also showcase a facet of fear that was brought on by the use of technology in both cases. In the case of WarGames, it was the fear of nuclear annihilation, something that was constantly feared in the ongoing Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union almost immediately from the end of World War II up until the early 1990s. The fact that WOPR forcing the United States down the path to global thermonuclear war serves as the tension for a great deal of the film, and very much played on fears of 1980s society at the time, many of whom lived their lives knowing very well that where they lived could be the direct target of a Soviet missile strike. For them, the United States military was the only defense against such an incursion. But what if they were unable to prevent a terrible catastrophe, even from within their own walls? A chilling thought that had many audiences frightened at the prospect that such a thing could happen.  It makes the film all the more gripping, with the audience on the edge of their seat, waiting with baited breath for the resolution to the crisis.

Hackers, being set in the time of the beginnings of the internet, brings a still quite relevant fear to the table in the form of cyberterrorism. Even today, this remains an issue in the cultural consciousness - best showcased with groups like Anonymous, LulzSec, and even government groups such as the NSA who spy on individuals, retrieve information, and put it to use as they see fit for their own purposes.  Most of the activity in Hackers isn’t as harmful as that, save for the villain’s main plan, but at the time it was a major issue with the public at large in reality. The thought that absolutely nothing was safe, that someone could simply break their way into our home computers, or into the computers of businesses that hold important information and just take it, is even now a very crippling fear.

Beyond the theming of the technology and fear, however, the two films begin to diverge drastically.  This is no better illustrated than in the two main characters, the aforementioned David Lightman and Dade Murphy.  In WarGames, Lightman is an underachiever.  Brilliant, lazy, and willing to hack into the school’s computer systems to change his grades to ones he thinks he deserves.  By the same token, however, he’s largely innocent.  He isn’t even intending to hack into the WOPR system, he does it completely by accident thinking that he might be able to play games from a new computer system, and in the end he is the one who encourages WOPR’s creator, Professor Falken to assist in stopping WOPR from causing World War III. Sure, he’s lazy and has some questionable morality in some cases, but he is unquestionably a decent human being.

Dade Murphy is likewise an underachiever in the latter half of his teens, like Lightman. The similarities begin to wane , and rapidly so, when it becomes clear that Dade cares nothing about his future and seems to only want to use his genius-level computer skills for completely frivolous reasons. To drive the point home on this almost from the beginning, the spends his first night back on a computer hacking into a local TV station to put on an episode of “The Outer Limits”. Unlike Broderick’s turn in WarGames, Miller’s Dade is rather schizophrenically between unlikeable or bland for the entire course of the film.  In fact, that could be said for almost every character in Hackers that holds any sort of prominence except for Matthew Lillard’s character, who instead shifts rapidly between disturbing and annoying.

His disinterest is shown not to really care about his future, is really rather hateful towards his mother, and has absolutely no qualms about hacking computer systems to do anything from get back at someone for a prank to falsifying documents so that it appears that a man is dead.  Quite frankly, like most of his cohorts, Dade seems to be completely uncaring in general save for a precious few scenes. Overall, there is just a very distinct lack of morality of any sort in Hackers, very much with the titular hackers having an “anything goes” mentality.  In this way, it can’t even really be said that there is a hero of the film.  A protagonist or protagonists, certainly, but there is really no one that we can identify as “good”.  The main villain of the film is certainly worse than those he is attempting to frame for his crimes, but the question is by how much they are separated.

On the flip side of the coin, WarGames does not really have a “bad guy”, per se.  The WOPR system, originally created to play games, has no real understanding of the billions of lives it could end by bringing its simulation into reality.  Neither the sanctity of human life, nor the concept of futility had ever been taught to it.  It’s not evil, it’s only doing what it knows in order to fulfill its primary objective – to win the game.  If anything, the antagonist in that particular situation is man himself, for developing a system that he could so easily use to destroy himself.

In Hackers, the entire plot can pretty much be summed up with “I Threw It On the Ground” by the Lonely Island.  The villain himself is played off as blatantly evil, but he is really not any worse than the people he is opposing.  The only difference being that he works for a corporation and thus, due to the anti-establishment sentiment of the 90’s, is clearly evil.  The system is corrupt and oppressive and terrible and the hackers are a bunch of freedom fighters against the man, man!  Except they aren’t.  They don’t do what they do because it helps people or fixes major issues in the world.  In fact, the pseudo-environmental disaster that gets brought into the plot isn’t even really elaborated on or given all that much focus, waved off by a line of dialogue during the wrap up and is left feeling very tacked on.  It’s clear that they want to get back at the guy for trying to get them all busted.  This is revenge, not a righteous and justified crusade against “the man”, plain and simple.

In the end, nothing is learned.  Fisher Stevens is arrested, the hackers apparently get all charges dropped (which is odd, considering the number of charges that should have been placed on them), and Dade goes on to have crazy hot pool sex with Angelina Jolie.  So, in other words, Dade gets to screw someone over, and then screw Lara Croft.  Nothing is learned, nothing is gained.  Dade doesn’t develop at all as a character.  In WarGames, Lightman learns a valuable lesson about not hacking into computers and bringing on nuclear armageddon (something that he’ll forget when he’s Ferris Bueller), more seriously that we get the anti-war message that sometimes the only winning move is not to play.  That ultimately, war is a futile thing and that no one really ever wins. And it’s believable.  In the end, there was actually a point to it all. Something was learned, development was had. Hackers, when you get down to it, has no point of any real substance, which hurts the whole.

That’s not to say that Hackers isn’t a good film.  It’s watchable, and fairly decent.  If you’re just in the mood to kill some time, you could at least watch it and get a laugh out of some of it (like dial up internet and ridiculously bulky computers).  You just really can’t take it seriously.  While it holds many similarities to WarGames, it is different in a number of respects, largely due to the time gap between the two films.  They represent different eras of the development of technology, and they wear well the moral standing of their decades, for better or for worse.  In the end, WarGames is the superior film, though Hackers is certainly enjoyable as well.  Just don’t take it very seriously.

WarGames becomes to MGM and is available on Netflix Instant Play and anywhere movies are sold.

Hackers is the property of United Artists and is available anywhere movies are sold.

For the latest from the MadCapMunchkin, follow him on Twitter @MadCapMunchkin 

MadCap's Game Reviews - "Neverwinter Nights: Hordes of the Underdark"

This is my favorite DLC pack to Neverwinter Nights.  Period.  It may be one of my favorite stories in gaming as well.  Again, period.  An expansion that has a grand scope, and pretty much ends up like any successful Dungeons & Dragons campaign would.  It’s Hordes of the Underdark, and if you didn’t get from my enthusiasm that I love this game, I’ll reiterated bluntly:  I.  Love.  This.  Game.  I’d even argue that the storyline is better than that of the original Neverwinter Nights, while all the time still being shorter in length (if only just).  Unlike its predecessor, Shadows of Undrentide, Hordes of the Underdark doesn’t have a nice Interlude to break up the tension, and really doesn’t even need it.

The first Chapter begins in the city of Waterdeep, the City of Splendors in the Forgotten Realms setting.  In the Yawning Portal Inn, the barkeep named Durnan (by this time a Lord of Waterdeep) has organized a group of adventurers to journey into Undermountain.  Now, for the uninitiated, Undermountain is the domain of a wizard by the name of Halaster Blackcloak (or was, anyway, as for Fourth Edition, he’s apparently deader than dead).  He built Undermountain and gathered together all sorts of creatures from across the planes of existence to house them in it.  With an assortment of traps, some of which are too terrible to imagine, Halaster created what has become known as the ultimate meat grinder.

It is the Temple of Elemental Evil, Dungeonland, and the Tomb of Horrors are rolled into one…and then multiplied by three.  Sadly, you don’t get to see too much of Undermountain, but the parts that you do see are pretty cool and the assortment of creatures, magics, and traps that can be found there are more than enough to appease you while you seek out the plot.

And the plot is this, Durnan has hired a group of adventurers to journey into Undermountain, promising them the reward of one hundred thousand gold for their trouble.  Undermountain receives would be conquerors to its doorstep every day, but the objective here is more than a little different.  Drow have been attacking Waterdeep from below, and Durnan wants to find out why.  Is Halaster missing? Is he dead? How have the drow managed to navigate their way through the labyrinthine madness up to the surface?  All of these, and more, are answered.

According to in-game lore, you’re the same character that you were in Shadows of Undrentide.  However, like Undrentide, you can import any character into the game, so it’s entirely possible to bring your vanilla Neverwinter character into it.  Though in Undrentide, you could do this to hilarious effect and make the game pretty much an easy run through with a higher level character, Hordes doesn’t quite work that way.  The minimum level to join up is 15, and if your character isn’t there, it levels you up to that point.  Don’t think this will help, though, as Hordes is tough.

This point is no better illustrated at the very beginning, when a drow assassin breaks into your room and steals all of your equipment (though, for some reason, you keep all your gold)…and then proceeds to try and murder you. After killing her, you get the low down on everything from Durnan’s daughter and then are forced to re-equip yourself with spare weapons and armor from the storeroom down the hall before you can get in on the actual plot. Out of all your equipment, all you keep is a book titled “Shadows of Undrentide” and a mysterious artifact called the “Relic of the Reaper”, which serves as the Stone of Recall for the campaign…the first two parts, anyway.

After an attack on the Inn, you follow a bunch of NPCs from vanilla Neverwinter down into Undermountain and find them at certain points having gotten themselves killed and stripped of their equipment.  Don’t bother keeping them along and outfitting them all, though.  Oh, right, you can actually mess around with your henchman’s equipment unlike in the OC.

But, as I say, no real need to do that.  The only companion that can come with you after Chapter One, and indeed through all three chapters, is Deekin Scalesinger.  A quick little aside here, Deekin is just kind of awesome.  He’s a kobold bard who later becomes part dragon, and if he’s upgraded right can be a wheeling, dealing, spell casting tank to put more sorcerers to absolute shame.  And did I mention he’s part dragon? Because that, again, is awesome.  Sure, he’s rather naïve and sometimes can be rather grating, but I’d rather travel with him than literally anyone in the OC.  Ever since his first appearance in Undrentide (he becomes a companion in that game during the Interlude), that little kobold has found some bizarre way to pluck on the strings…of my heart.

And, again, he’s a half dragon.  Rule of three.

The end of Chapter One sees the revelation of what happened to Halaster, as well as the introduction of the supposed main villain of the piece, a drow priestess calling herself the “Valsharess”. Apparently she has big plans to raze all of Faerun from the Underdark, and Halaster decides that it would be best for you to head down there.  With a nice geas put on you to make you behave, he teleports you and the dark elf Nathyrra (a romance option for male characters in the module), as well as Deekin if you have him with you, to the Underdark.

Chapter Two sees the player getting involved with Nathyrra and her fellow followers of Eilistraee, a goddess of good drow, and their plan to take on the Valsharess and stop her before her plans go any further.  This requires the player to go around to either destroy the Valsharess’s non-drow forces, including mind flayers, the undead, and beholders.  There are also some side quests involving an underground city of flying elves and an island where a deep dwarf wizard made a bunch of golems that have since become sentient.  All of these can grant the player potential allies, or make the fight less difficult later on.  After a successful battle that routes the Valsharess’s force, she captures the player and attempts to bring them over to her side.  It is then, however, that the player is shown that there is a power behind the throne.

"ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?!"

The archdevil, Mephistopheles, has been bound by the Valsharess to serve her with his nigh infinite power.  However, when she commands him to kill the player, he is able to break free and allows the player to kill her before taking back the Relic of the Reaper – which apparently was a part of him the whole time, and thus why the player couldn’t be killed – and then banishes the player to Cania, the Eighth of the Nine Hells.

Chapter Three involves the player searching through the bowels of Cania to find a way to return back to Faerun.  The Reaper, the mysterious not explained creature that rules the realm where the player returned to upon using the Relic, points the player in the direction of finding out his “True Name”, which will allow him to break the bonds that Mephistopheles has set upon him and allow the player to return home.  A True Name being the name that, once spoken, will put a person completely under the control of the person who spoke it.   

Oh, yes, we’re playing with some heavy artillery here.

In fact, the entire third chapter is an endurance round.  There is no safe haven to escape through, no call back, and no mercy.  But if you survive the journey, jump through the hoops, and reach the Knower of Names, you will be well on your way to becoming a Badass out of Hell.  The Knower of Names knows the True Names of every being that exists, and will give you the name in exchange for sacrifices of gold.  So, top tip, start hording gold early…or use the console to give you more, whatever works.  This is actually an interesting feature, as it allows you to not only learn the Reaper’s True Name, but various others.  Your own, those of your companions, and even…the one that belongs to Mephistopheles.  Of course, to do that, you’ll have to pay to learn the name of the Knower, due to her allegiance to the archdevil.  But once that’s done, you can pay the fee and basically get the insta-kill button for the final fight.  I’m really going to recommend that you do get it because of the final fight.

But you return to the Reaper’s room and use his name, and he opens a door for you to return to Faerun, ending up in the city of Waterdeep where you first started. By this time, Mephistopheles has already conquered the legions in the Underdark, Undermountain, and marched with an undead army all the way up into the city where he plans to begin his glorious reign.  He attempts to taunt the player, which is when they can use the True Name to either kill him outright, send him back to Cania and bind him there for all eternity, or force him to rule under you as you make a ploy to take over the world.

...he's a man of wealth and taste...

However, Bioware took out the option to make Mephistopheles your chamber maid for all eternity, which would be hilarious.

The fight against this guy, for those who want to fight him, is hard even if you’re a high level character, Mephistopheles is far from a push over.  After all, he is essentially the second in command of the Hells, being right there under Asmodeus – who is apparently a greater deity now in Forgotten Realms…good for him, I guess? – And it shows so much.  Best strategy here? Try not to die.  I know that seems rather obvious, but really there’s nothing here.  Just have every Heal potion you can get your hands on and just tank him, because that’s really the only strategy.  And even then, you’re guaranteed to die at least a few times by virtue of it being an archdevil.

So, in conclusion, this is an epic game with an epic scale.  It’s all really good, really enjoyable and has a conclusion that is so wondrously high that I have yet to see it done so well.  From a meek adventurer to a damn near Physical God, the journey is wondrous and the stakes are through the roof. And with a satisfying conclusion to boot.  What’s not to love?