Devil May Cry 5 is the sort of video game where it’s impossible to think of a single moment my mom wouldn’t shake her head at as she folded laundry in the basement circa 1988. And that will never stop me from absolutely loving it. Inspired by the beautiful friction experience that is this game, I made a video about what it’s like to be an adult who thinks Little Caesars Pizza deserves a Michelin Star.
In this video I also talk about playing God Hand at my desk at seven o’clock in the morning with Shinji Mikami.
I’ve only ever hinted at this in a couple of videos that I’ve made here at Kotaku these past couple of years, so today I’ll state it clearly: in the mid-late 2000s, I worked at Grasshopper Manufacture in Tokyo, Japan. I’ve sat through dozens of brainstorming meetings in which a room full of developers yell any stupid idea that comes to mind. My life experience outside those meetings had led me to believe that there would be no way 99% of those shouted ideas would make it into the finished game. In this video, I offer some insight into how and why I think perfect hardcore action games like Devil May Cry 5 end up never forgetting their silly inspirations, with their final versions emerging so densely full of mismatched cultural references and labyrinthine in-jokes.
Also in this video, I tell a somewhat long story about a BMW M3 that used to be parked under a citrus tree across the street from my house in Emeryville, California in 2013. I promise the story ends up being related to Devil May Cry.
I put a clip of a SSS combo on top of said BMW story, so you can always mute me and just watch some hot Dante action. Don’t you dare tell me if you muted me, though.
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