Bayonetta was a game I owned back in 2010 for the Xbox 360. It's similar stylish combat mechanics reminded me of my love for the Devil May Cry series and I wanted to give it a shot. For reasons I cannot remember, I never got around to finishing the game and once the sequels became exclusive to the Nintendo Switch, I never tried to replay it. Now that I have a chance to play the sequels, I wanted to start again with the original Bayonetta and see if I could get back into it. And while I was able to complete it this around in around 7 hours, I found majority of my experience to be lackluster by focusing on just finishing the game instead of enjoying it.
Story
You play as Bayonetta; the last remaining of the Umbra Witches. Long ago the Umbra Witches declared war against the Lumen Sages for control over the balance of the universe. In opposition fashion, the Lumen Sages controlled the power of light through the god of Paradiso while the Umbra Witches control their power from the demons of Inferno. In present day, Bayonetta is looking to stop the rise of the Lumen Sages from destroying the universe as we know it. The highlight of the story is Bayonetta herself; a fantastic female character that you never really saw pack in the late 2000s. / early 2010s. Bayonetta is a quadruple wielding weaponry witch that summons demons from the Gates of Hell...through the utilization of her hair that also acts as her clothing...to each the enemies she battles. Yes, Bayonetta is a crazy game when you really think about it. And that is why you play this type of game and it shows because the narrative / storytelling is the weakest part of this game. The characters outside of Bayonetta are pretty forgettable and the plot is pretty much all over the place. Outside of Bayonetta, the game is unable to show why the other characters are here outside of being extras on set. This also does not help through Bayonetta's direction. While Bayonetta's story is told through cutscenes, they alter through cinematic to showing a sequence of film reels. The film reel portions (that I would say take up over 50% of the story) takes the gamer out of the environment, which makes the story even less interesting and more of a chore to get through.
Gameplay
But let's be honest with ourselves - you pick up Bayonetta for its combat. While not developed by Capcom, Director Hideki Kamiya took the helm for this game and you see quite a lot of similarities to his genre-defining series, Devil May Cry. In Bayonetta, the combat system is super stylish like DMC. When you attack an enemy, you receive stylish points that is added to a ranking for the current battle you are experiencing. If you are hit, it negates your rank. If you do crazy combos, your ranking goes up. The combos themselves are yours to create. At the beginning of the game, Bayonetta begins with four firearms: two strapped to the back of her heels and the others she carries in hand. As you unlock more weapons, you are able to attach them to Bayonetta's arm or leg. This means would technically have a combat boot, a gun, a sword, and a whip on you at the same time to carry out crazy combos against your foes. That's insane if you think about it.
But while the combat system is the highlight, it does not mean it is perfect. The combat can be very repetitive very fast. Upon entering a new area, I knew a battle sequence would happen. And while it is fun to explore new combat combos at first, it can get exhausting to go through. Towards the end of the games 16 chapters, I was button mashing just to get through the battle to get to the next boss. It is a feeling you never want to have for a game where combat should be treasured. The game tries to switch it up through bike missions but poor controls along with extremely long mission lengths add to the level of chore. The other challenge I had with Bayonetta was with the quick time events. Perhaps this was not ported well onto the Switch version but I found these quick time events to be unresponsive almost to the point of me turning off the game.
Graphics / Audio
Since this game is over 10 years old, I cannot honestly go into the level of detail I do with current titles. But that being said, Bayonetta could use a little more color in its environments. There are a couple of scenes where the game shines for an older generation game but most of time the game looks gray and bland. Of course during combat the graphics shine through the blood splatters and the animation of your demon hair partners. Rarely did the framerate drop for me (only for one boss) so I don't have a lot of negativities for that.
The sound is pretty impressive. The soundtrack is fun at first but, again, gets repetitive through the numerous battles you partake in the game.
Verdict
Overall, I have to say I'm a little disappointed. The combat system is great but awful vehicle missions, repetitive enemies, and unresponsive quick time events bring it down a little for me. That and the story failed to draw me in either through lackluster characters outside Bayonetta herself or in the direction of the story's cinematics. Bayonetta is not a terrible game - not by a long shot. But compared to other great stylish action games (and also the level of praise this game initially got), Bayonetta is a let down.
Score: 6/10