Are #50 games a milestone now that I reached #1000? Maybe.
Firstly, I love how Bayonetta looks. The sleek, black catsuit with gold accents, her hairdo, the glasses, the Slenderman proportions, the fact that she can turn into a panther or a crow... I love how she looks. I think Bayonetta is one of the coolest looking character designs out there. On the other hand, the fanservice is completely insane, most cutscenes try to find ways to focus on her bust and on her butt, a secondary character even gropes her when she rescues him... it's as if the game is trying its hardest to make me dislike the character. Heck, her gimmick is that she uses her hair to attack and her outfit is made out of her hair, so her most powerful attacks also leave her naked. It's so forced that it could've only have come from Japan. So if you get your kicks out of 2-D or 3-D women, you'll probably like Bayonetta. If you find it dumb... well, in the end I could tolerate it since the rest of the game is SO good.
Speaking of cutscenes, it seems the budget wasn't all that high, as some cutscenes are fully animated while others... others are more comic-book style, with voice overs over still images. It's not the best alternative ever and these latter cutscenes do feel like they drag on for too long, but if it was necessary in order to polish other parts of the game, such as the combat... I guess I can live with it. On the other hand, the soundtrack is GLORIOUS, the theme song being a remixed cover of 'Fly me to the Moon' which I think is superior to the original. Since I'm covering the presentation, both the sound and art design make it feel like a PS2 game, and I mean that as a compliment. The game has this PS2-charm to it that latter PS3/X360 games just lost as they got more and more homogenized.
Now that I'm done with the fluff, onto the real meat, the combat... It's brilliant. Bayonetta has three offensive buttons: Guns, Punch and Kick, and her moveset is MASSIVE. There are a ton of combos you can perform by mixing punches and kicks... and then mixing punches, kicks and wait-times between certain attacks. You can also perform variant attacks by holding down the punch or kick button when you press it. I'm not kidding when I say that the moveset is ridiculously massive. And as you play through the game you unlock WEAPONS you can equip, you can have up to two weapon sets equipped at a time, but you can customize this sets at any time. I call them sets because you equip weapons to hands and feet, and depending on how you mix and match weapons... you get different combos. Most button inputs are shared between weapons, for instance, Punch - Punch - Kick - Kick - Kick and Punch - Punch - Punch - Kick - Kick is pretty much identical whether you are using your fists, the katana, the whip or the gauntlets, but every weapon has different properties. The Katana is fast and strong, features some pretty nasty combos that involve waiting between attacks and can charge every punch into a Iai strike. The whip causes very little, if any, stagger to the enemies, but has great range and can pull enemies towards you. The Gauntlets can change modes, between slow and powerful or fast and weak. In my case, I found the Katana to be the perfect mix of strength and speed, while I used the gauntlets for variety's sake since I found them very interesting. And, of course, you can swap sets mid-combo, so you can pull off all kinds of shenanigans. Not gonna lie, in some ways, I think Bayo's combat is much superior to Devil May Cry's single attack button affairs. Bayonetta's moveset offers so much variety. Add to this the fact that some enemies can leave behind weapons you can pick up and use for a short while before they break.... yeah, Bayonetta's combat is mighty impressive.
And then there's the magic system. Landing attacks charges your magic gauge, once full you can perform a Torture attack that insta-kills any weak enemy or deals massive damage to the stronger baddies. Getting hit costs you magic, so you gotta try your best to avoid damage and deal damage. You can dodge attacks with the R2 button, but spamming R2 will eventually make Bayonetta perform a high jump, leaving her vulnerable upon landing, in order to punish you for not learning how to dodge! If you press Dodge JUST before getting hit, you'll activate Witch Time, slowing down enemies around you. Man, Bayonetta's got Devil May Cry beat when it comes to combat, and I hate to say that because I ADORE Devil May Cry and actively avoided Bayonetta for so long.
Beating enemies and performing lengthy combos rewards you with Sonic Rings(really) which you can then spend on more techniques, support items, more health, accessories or the ability to dual wield a few weapons(Meaning, equipping them on both arms and legs). Just like with Devil May Cry, do remember that Hideki Kamiya directed both the first DMC and the first Bayo, levels have heart pieces and pearl pieces hidden everywhere, as well as hidden challenges that will reward you with either, in order to extend your health bar and magic gauge.
The game is pretty lengthy, bordering on 9 hours(And I suspect the game's internal clock stops ticking during cutscenes), and while some environments are reused you don't traverse them in the same way, heck, you could say that it reuses parts of environments, but not wholesale. Beating the game under certain conditions(Or which cheats...) lets you unlock costumes or the ability to play as Jeanne, which is identical to Bayonetta but with few quirks(Deals and receives more damage, can spam R2 indefinitely, etc) which are all great extras to top the game with.
But well, Bayonetta couldn't be all that perfect, now could it? QTEs, and some of the worst I've seen. The time is pretty rough, a lot of times I could've sworn I pressed the button but it didn't count. One time I knew it was coming so I was mashing the button beforehand... and it didn't count, so you can't be too early either. And failing a QTE means death, which will sap you points from your chapter total, it's very unfair. And since missing a QTE translates into a death... it means that you have to sit through another loading screen before you can try again, and this is the PS3 port, for you see....
...the PS3 port was outsourced, and it's terrible when it comes to framerate and loading. I've said it before, while I like a smooth framerate, I can forgive a choppy framerate if the game is really good. So yeah, the game caps at 30FPS, unlike the other ports, and there are some very nasty drops here and there... but the real issue are the loading times. Loading a chapter is much lengthier than on other consoles, that in and of itself is bad enough, but it also has loading times that the other ports do not have. Pausing the game needs a loading screen. Opening the equipment menu needs a loading screen, when you pick up items, the description needs a loading screen. And I remind you, the other ports do not have these. Mind you, it doesn't break the game, but no other version of Bayonetta has this issues, so playing the game on PS3 is the worst way you could experience Bayonetta by far.
Well... I regret not having played Bayonetta before. The rampant fanservice is stupid, the QTEs are annoying and the PS3 exclusive features, namely more loading screens and lengthier loading times, are awful, but the game itself is fantastic. Heck, it has better combat mechanics than even Devil May Cry V, one of my, if not MY, favorite game of the PS4 era(So far). I think if I had played one of the superior ports, Bayonetta might've become one of my favorite games in the genre. Dante might be the king of combo-based action games, but Bayonetta is the queen, and from what I've heard they removed the QTEs from the sequel so... I can't wait until my sister returns me my Switch and I can play the sequel.
8.0
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