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Was DmC: Devil May Cry The First Game To Ever Go Woke?

taizuke

Member
Before you are tempted to say no, hear me out.

Appealing Only to a New Audience

Disappointed with the sales of DMC 4, Capcom wanted to expand the audience by catering exclusively to the West in their next entry. This sounds to me like wanting to appeal to a "modern audience." Basically, disregarding the existing fanbase and favoring the new one.

Adding Political Commentary To Devil May Cry

Taking an established franchise about a badass demon hunter and turning it into a social commentary on how the government is evil and everyone is brainwashed by the media.

Changing The Character of Dante

A charming character with a great sense of humor is now a wise cracking cringe swearing jerk that's supposed to be cool but mostly ends up looking sloppy.

The New Dante is a Self-Insert For Tameem Antoniades

This is about the game's director. The original look for this new Dante resembled him way more. The final look doesn't as much. This obviously has never been confirmed, but it's fun to speculate.

Trashing The Legacy of Devil May Cry and Ignoring Fan Criticism

Not prepared for the backlash over the new DmC, the game's director Tameem, when asked about the fan reaction said "I don't care." He also said, "What was cool 12 years ago isn't cool anymore," and "If Dante, dressed as he was, walked into any bar outside of Tokyo, he'd get laughed out".

New Dante Mocking Old Dante/Fans

There's a scene in the beginning of the game where a white wig falls on top of the new Dante, and he delivers the line "not even in a million years." It's funny because a similar scene happens in Rocksteady's Suicide Squad game where Harley finds her old Arkham Asylum outfit and says, "Yeah, right."

Now, the original reveal look for the game was even more polarizing, making Dante look like a cracked out smoker that seemed emotionally unstable. And, despite the team's resistance to the criticism, they did end up making some improvements to the final design of Dante and the look of the game, as well as giving Dante his iconic white hair and red jacket when activating his devil trigger.

Take in mind this game released in 2013.
 
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bruh they literally announced this game as "NOT GAY version of DMC"

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One of my favourite ips but I disregarded (and won't play) DmC because Capcom decided to hand it over to an inferior external studio.

I'd classify it as them taking a risk (which is fine), likely because they thought if a western studio made it, it would lead to higher sales in the west.
 
Sorry... but DMC wasn't woke... it was just stupid and cringe.

Case in point:

- dante forgot about his past
- dante remembers that a demon killed his mother
- the FIRST THING he tells (as a narrator) the audience is: "I'll never forget him' -> dude you just remembered about it, are you a idiot?! :-D
 
Quite a few people keep trying to apply the full concept of wokeness retroactively, but it simply doesn't work that way. I understand why you want to, it's a big hole in the ongoing culture war argument.

Keep trying I guess 🤷‍♂️
 
If you want a pure and simple wokeness example: Nadine on Uncharted 4. She is a strong black female leader because.... she is a strong black female leader. She ALWAYS win any cutscene she is part of because... she is a strong black female leader. Nate always loses a fight (any sort of conflict against her, to be honest) just beucase... you got the idea. God, my mother (she always like to see me playing and we discuss a lot about game narratives :-D) cannot stomach UC4 because of that :-D
 
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blacktout

Member
Not every example of misguided trend chasing is wokeness. They share a common cause (out of touch corporations misjudging the zeitgeist), but they're not the same thing.
 

Humdinger

Gold Member
No, woke is associated with identity politics, particularly the gender-obsessed forms of it. None of that here, afaik.

Tameem Antoniades. That's the guy behind Hellblade, right? I didn't realize he worked on DMC.
 

Ceadeus

Member
It went Emo, not woke lmao

Edit: I'm not laughing at you OP. It's just funny. I think the older game I can remember doing something to please the whole crowd could be Battlefield 1 in 2016.

They wanted to be historically accurate but also introduced women on the combat field . But in retrospect, they made them really bad ass and good looking. So we're super far away from today's DEI craziness where the developers are trying to introduce all kind of monstrosities.

Monstrosities that could very well be in some of the dark fantasy game bestiary 😂😂
 
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Loomy

Thinks Microaggressions are Real
I am genuinely trying to understand what woke is, but I swear to god the definition keeps changing or expanding everytime someone talks about it.

If you want a pure and simple wokeness example: Nadine on Uncharted 4. She is a strong black female leader because.... she is a strong black female leader. She ALWAYS win any cutscene she is part of because... she is a strong black female leader. Nate always loses a fight (any sort of conflict against her, to be honest) just beucase... you got the idea. God, my mother (she always like to see me playing and we discuss a lot about game narratives :-D) cannot smomach UC4 because of that :-D
  • She is a strong black female leader because.... she is a strong black female leader.
    • I think it was because she was the leader of a PMC. And she's South African, so flip a 10 sided die on the race where 8 of the sides are black.
  • She ALWAYS win any cutscene she is part of because... she is a strong black female leader. Nate always loses a fight (any sort of conflict against her, to be honest) just beucase... you got the idea.
    • Trained leader of a small army vs a retired treasure hunter and his older brother who spent almost 15 years in prison and smokes like his life depends on it. So yeah, she won all those physical confrontations. Nadine never won against Rafe until the very last cutscene she was in for UC4.
I'd suggest you play Lost Legacy to see how the character evolves but I don't think you'll like Chloe either lol

Im anti feminist/anti woke as humanly possible, and i actually enjoyed that DMC game, still got definitive edition/remaster copy for my ps4 :)
It's an enjoyable, but flawed, game. In other words, like almost every other game out there. I can appreciate wanting to try new things and I really enjoyed it as well.
 

Begleiter

Member
Emphatically not. Despite the cover it got from games journalists, if an actual feminist played it they'd be pissed. I don't think there's any way to frame the sniper rifle abortion as empowering.
 
I'm not a die-hard fan of Devil May Cry, but DMC was actually my favourite out of all of them. I preferred the gameplay and world by a great deal in it, even the control scheme was better.
Going from that to DMC5 was rough for me, I couldn't finish it. I liked DMCs approach to NG+ too. I did enjoy 1-3, 4 was ok from what I remember, but 5 just sucked.

Don't get me wrong, I didn't care much for the protagonist, but the original character was fucking awful at the start, then got slightly better (for my tastes).

I dont remember anything "woke" in it (not that woke and anti woke was a popular catchphrase / excuse then) and what you are highlighting doesn't seem woke, just based more in the real world.
 

rm082e

Member
My son (13) played DMC 1-5 and DmC over the last 18 months. He spent a lot of time with 5 and I assumed that was his favorite. I asked him a few weeks ago and he said "No, no - DmC is the best, then DMC3, then DMC5. The other ones are just okay."
 

Generic

Member
I wish Itsuno made DmC2 instead of DMC5. He wanted it.

There's a scene in the beginning of the game where a white wig falls on top of the new Dante, and he delivers the line "not even in a million years."
I remember this scene, it was pretty funny.
 

realcool

Member
I am genuinely trying to understand what woke is, but I swear to god the definition keeps changing or expanding everytime someone talks about it.
  • She is a strong black female leader because.... she is a strong black female leader.
    • I think it was because she was the leader of a PMC. And she's South African, so flip a 10 sided die on the race where 8 of the sides are black.
  • She ALWAYS win any cutscene she is part of because... she is a strong black female leader. Nate always loses a fight (any sort of conflict against her, to be honest) just beucase... you got the idea.
    • Trained leader of a small army vs a retired treasure hunter and his older brother who spent almost 15 years in prison and smokes like his life depends on it. So yeah, she won all those physical confrontations. Nadine never won against Rafe until the very last cutscene she was in for UC4.
 

Kacho

Gold Member
Damn that’s actually pretty deep. Good read.

But no, it’s not woke like modern western games are. That was a ‘before times’ video game.

DmC, despite being try hard and edgy, was a pretty good game. Great cutscenes and performances which is Ninja Theory’s bread and butter. My only complaints were some of the combat mechanics and the platforming sections that dragged on.
 

Pimpbaa

Member
I wish Itsuno made DmC2 instead of DMC5. He wanted it.

What the fuck is wrong with you man?! DmC pure garbage. DMC5 had one cringy character, everything about DmC was cringe. They couldn’t even do the gameplay right. Game is a fucking joke as is the developer who made it…sorry, this i really loath DmC.
 
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kevboard

Member
it was the opposite of woke, it was a tryhard attempt at being edgy.

their literal quote was that og DMC is too gay, and the new DmC is cool and hardcore.
 
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