Bayonetta 3

As I write this, the game is playing its ending right next to me. Trying to sort out my thoughts on this one. I completed this game on expert difficulty. The previous Bayonettas have all had extremely smooth and fluid combat and this one does as well, however a little less so. It doesn't feel as smooth and it feels a little cheaper against you, like you've been nerfed in this game. With all the other Bayonetta games, something clicked which made me really get into them. With this one, it never did. Anyways, to get into more details, I appreciate what Platinum was trying to do with the gameplay. They added in the whole summoning demons mechanic and the demon masquerade, which added quite a bit to the gameplay. As mentioned before though, it seems they nerfed other aspects of combat as a result and made you rely more heavily on the new aspects. It's harder to do witch time, witch time doesn't last nearly as long, and it feels like the enemies can take cheap shots at you from offscreen with no real idea if it's coming. That was frustrating to say the least, can't really say I've had that feeling with other Bayonetta games. So to summarize, while the new systems do add to the game overall, the lack of polish or maybe nerf of the other, older systems actually make this game lag behind the other two bayonetta games in some ways. To go into the Viola gameplay, I feel like she's a big step down from Bayonetta, and her witch time was much harder to use. I dreaded her gameplay sections, I just wanted to keep playing with Bayonetta, yet they forced me to use her. Then we get to the story, to summarize on it, it wasn't bad. I really enjoyed some aspects, especially the developing of the relationship between characters, I think that was great. Bayonetta's more the type of game that people don't care about the story too much and focus on action anyways. The problem comes with the new character and specifically the ending, which fair warning, from here on in this paragraph there WILL BE SPOILERS. With that out of the way, Viola. She comes off as a very unlikable character to me. I feel like they're trying to make her relatable to people, but they failed miserably. I will admit, she does have endearing traits, however from design to character she, for the most part, is insufferable. That being said, I liked her relationship with Bayonetta and Luka, up until the end where they replaced Bayonetta with her. That's right, the insufferable, annoying, whiny character is the new freaking Bayonetta. And the old Bayonetta? They killed her off. They made Bayonetta feel so damned underpowered in this game, she couldn't save anyone in front of her and then at the end, they kill off all the Bayonettas and replace them with a very crappy new character you're supposed to relate to. Yes, I'm a bit salty about that if you can't tell, and if she's the new Bayonetta, this is where I get off the Bayonetta train. While this didn't feel as good to me as old Bayonetta games, I would still give it an 8/10, maybe a 9/10 or 10/10 as I continue to play and understand combat more. Perhaps I'm the problem in that I just haven't figured something out yet. Except for the aforementioned problem with the story and a certain character, which drops this to about a 6/10 for me. Maybe as I continue to play (if I do, I don't know if I'll really want to put more time into it), that number will go up. Anyways, don't normally leave reviews but as someone who's loved this series for a long time, wanted to share my thoughts on it. Oh, and forgot to mention the Jeanne portion of the game. I really enjoyed those sections, if they were to give Jeanne her own 2-D game filled with those fun 2-D parts, I'd be all for it. Still a very solid game, especially if you're just into the action.