Devil May Cry 4 interview - the men behind the mayhem

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We travel to Japan to speak to two of the masterminds behind the latest in next-generation action-adventure

GR: If you're going to talk about the core of the Devil May Cry series is, like what it stands for - what would you say that is?

HK: It's a game that feels good to play. It's something that you can just let it rip - basically I just wanted something that you can destroy things with. The smoothness of it, the gracefulness of it, just the beauty of the fighting.

GR: This is the fourth iteration and the series has gone through some ups and downs. What have you learned in the process of building the series and how does that apply to the new game?

HK: Actually, the only game I've worked on besides this one is the first one - the successful one. I've got to see the progress of the other two, but basically my role in this game is to build and reinforce the story of Dante. Because he's a character that has been loved by the fans up until this point. That's what I'm doing in this game: keeping the original Dante character alive.

It's important that we build a character and have him easily recognizable to the fans. When we make the character too complex or difficult for fans to understand, of course popularity drops and things like that, so I feel my role in this is to really define the character of Dante.

And, coupled with keeping the character is making the gameplay really feel good type fighting, keeping the graphics nice. These are points we'll be graded on, so we really want to keep the quality high in those areas.

Something we learned from DMC3 is that it's important to present the story nicely, kind of in a cinematic way, so we used the same director who directed DMC3, he's a cinematic director. So you can almost play it as if you're watching a movie. So we've taken that element from DMC3 and implemented it in this game.

To answer your question once again, the things that we've learned over the course of these four games, is keeping the character consistent and easy to understand, focus on the action and gameplay, and the way the story is presented in a cinematic way.

GR: When the first one came out, it was like, "Wow! Really impressive!" It was a new thing. But since it's come out, a lot of games copied its style. What are you working on to keep the series fresh, a step ahead?

HK: I guess the freshness lies in the scenery and the graphics, and also the gameplay - adding new elements like the Devil Bringer (the right arm of the devil). One of the issues facing us now is how can we convey the goodness of this game in print and through magazines. It's kind of a hard challenge for us - we'd rather you just play it.