By Montreal Spencer/south news editor
Sega’s self-titled Bayonetta is the new sexy heroine in video game land, and she is a real witch.
Actually, she is an Umbra Witch, a clan of witches that draw their power from the darkness. She was entrapped in a coffin at the bottom of a lake for 500 years and awoke 20 years ago.
She has a terrible case of amnesia, and she’s on a journey to discover why she was imprisoned. While doing so, she is constantly attacked by demon-like angels trying to send her to hell, so she has to kill them all before they kill her.
Bayonetta is helped by an arms-dealing bartender in the Gates of Hell named Rodin. He keeps her stocked with energy-giving lollipops, swords and guns galore.
Throughout the game, she is followed by a journalist named Luka who is out to prove Bayonetta killed his father when she awoke from the lake.
Jeanne, another Umbra Witch Bayonetta bumps into several times in the game, is one of the keys to Bayonetta’s past.
The plot is the most confusing part of the game. What is not confusing is this game’s finger-cramping fun. Bayonetta is locked and loaded with a gun in each hand and each stiletto.
From the moment the game opens, it’s action-packed, and the gamer gets a chance to get a handle on the controls during tutorials. Gamers also must get used to the camera, which at times can be hard to keep up with.
The tutorials give gamers a chance to learn different combo moves necessary throughout the game.
Timing is everything in Bayonetta. When players dodge an enemy attack right before they’re hit, the game will go into hyperspeed briefly while everything else is slow. Perfecting this is a must with boss battles and traveling the world.
Bayonetta makes Tomb Raider’s Lara Croft look like “Lara Soft.” Not just Bayonetta’s fighting style but the actual game theme is dark. The game world looks, for the lack of better words, beautifully gruesome.
The game can be pretty sexual and has brief nudity. Between this and all the violence, what’s a mannish gamer not to like?
The boss battles, which a lot of times means fighting huge angel monsters, are sometimes difficult and may take several plays. “The Witch Hunts Are Over” instead of “The End” will be seen on a gamer’s screen throughout the roughly five-hour game play of Bayonetta.
However, it’s not all good. Sometimes the dialogue is corny, and some of the cut scenes don’t have any lips moving. It is also rumored the PS3 version is slower and takes too much time loading.
But overall, this offensive, degrading game is a must-play for any lover of action games. The makers of the original Devil May Cry and God of War should be proud.
