Do You Know... Stylish-Hard-Action ?

Back in 2001 when Devil May Cry was released, I read in a print mag a short Q&A with one of the producers (maybe Mikami -fuzzy memory-error) a new coined phrase to commemorate this unique breed they created. Or maybe the PR people conceived it. They called it Stylish Hard Action. And many would follow the way of the originator.

Or so my memory goes. The I-net knows nothing of it. And I long recycled the mag.

What about you?

Did you read about this, too? If not, would you think it encapsules the spirit about it? Say it aloud when no one is listening. Doesn't it have a full, rich roll? Like midnight thunder. I sure think so.

Rings a bell. I think it was Kamiya.

And I think all these terms are pretty awful to be honest. The argument still rages as to what these games should be called and no one seems to know Rising Zan was a 'stylish' action game before DMC.

I never read it. Stylish-Hard-Action can sound cool as long as you say it in the right tone.

First of all, welcome Zenyn. Despite missing in action (ha!), good to see you found a place here! I think it was Kamiya in that magazine, it was also used (quite) a bit in the marketing of the game as I recall.

The whole concept about Devil May Cry, at least from Kamiya's perspective, was to have Devil May Cry be an arcade-gaming experience at home. "Stylish Hard Action" is exactly something that would be written on the side of an arcade cabinet in a cool font. I think it captures what DMC1 was all about, but not the genre at large. I really miss the "hard" part in later DMC titles. DMC1 was really intense, especially on DMD!

We really need to have a discussion on what stylish actually means in these games.

Playing in a way that looks fancy?

I was thinking of the exact dictionary definitions.

1 - fashionably elegant and sophisticated.

2 - neat, confident, and skilful.

Going by these, pretty much every fighting and action game qualifies.

I think the style meter is the pointer here.
Don't hack 'n slash your attacks. Show off! Bring alternation. Don't get hit, finish in time, score some. S-Rank Devil Hunter.
From that on you develop your own way. That's what I take from it.

I've been thinking about all these terms recently.

>meter
When you look at DMC 1, nothing really looks fancy at all. There are tons of games without a 'style' meter that fit that bill in how they look.

I've often wondered, that if it were another game other than DMC that first popularized it, even if the mechanics were different, everyone would call that gameplay stylish too just because the game labels it as such in-game.

>show off/bring alteration
Showing off would definitely fit definition 1. Not so much alteration though. That's more of a rule in the mechanics.

>damage, time, score
These aren't really contributors in my eyes. At least not in the way I'm thinking at present.

Look at definition 2.
NG fits that perfectly if you ask me (but you should probably ask Roy). This definition also suits pretty much every action game regardless of combo potential.

I've seen someone here, forgot who, mention the concept of 'styling' in NG (somewhere SBK is groaning) BUT by the second definition, is NG not already as stylish as it gets?

I feel the style-meter plays a big role, but I also feel that is something distincly DMC. Bayonetta has its own way of doing it (and while better in scorekeeping, is also a lot less clear in how you're doing), as well as some other rip-offs i.e. GhostRider and Nightmare before Christmas that just use the letter system.

Granted, the whole idea of DMC was to emulate the arcade experience at home. Where top level players would show of their knowledge and memorization of the game by doing 'sick stuff'.

> Ninja Gaiden

A good point. Ninja Gaiden is very stylish, but mostly in how the animations are. Just look at the Gleaming Blade UT in NGII: https://youtu.be/Mf9GKNH5o10?t=10
The way he 'cleans' his blade at the end while crouching, the after images during the strike, just so much detail in his movement.

So yeah. Stylish looking game. But is the gameplay and the actions you can do with it stylish?

Going by the second definition, yes.

Hell even by the first definition you could argue watching high level play of Ryu flying all over the place.

The first definition of 'sophisticated' pertains to fashion. But take a look at the second one.

2.(of a machine, system, or technique) developed to a high degree of complexity.

So as long as a game has complexity in its mechanics, it fits the definition of sophisticated, therefore it can be defined as stylish according to definition 1 of stylish.

There's no mention of difficulty in any of these definitions either. It's irrelevant. A game can be complex without having a single thing that's really hard to do.

There is no mention of how it looks, so efficiency is just as stylish as this so called 'stylish' gameplay.

More and more I think people are just going by what the game told them it was. I bet NG would be called 'stylish action' if it were the first to have a meter with that word.

Going back to fighters, they're full of insane combos and tech but were never labeled as stylish (that I know of). Why?

I've seen people arguing over ones that have huge juggles vs more grounded ones like Tekken, SC or VF though.

Birdman wrote:Going back to fighters, they're full of insane combos and tech but were never labeled as stylish (that I know of). Why?

The Vs comes to mind.
The single player is not the core of a fighter. In one-on-one, the harder your human opponent fights you the more thriumphant the victory. Bruises and limps as a plaque of virility. You can look stylish and slick fighting the other, yet when there's no resistance you come off like the schoolyard bully.
In a certain single player game, you send off devils to their circle of origin with extreme dominance and you're crowned the King of Hell.

>You can look stylish and slick
Single player or not, the dictionary definition of stylish (what I posted about the word 'sophisticated') applies to fighters as well as other action games yet they aren't labeled as such.

>yet when there's no resistance you come off like the schoolyard bully.
This is what happens a lot in DMC games. The enemies don't put up much of a fight for the most part. I don't feel this is relevant to the definition regardless of what the definition is.

>In a certain single player game, you send off devils to their circle of origin with extreme dominance and you're crowned the King of Hell.
As you do in many games that aren't designated as 'stylish'.

It seems there's another definition that players have made up which seems to be focused on how the combat looks. Like they're taking the fashionable part that we'd normally use for stuff like clothing and applying it to combat. Also, whenever there's a combo focus.

Anyone else?

Regarding the concept of 'looking cool' which is being defined as 'style'.

Seems this has become a genre in itself which is nonsense if you ask me. Pretty much every action game looks cool.

Izuna Drop is one of the coolest looking moves ever. Vanquish. Even CL looks cool. Look at Hatred's assists or just doing a sweet counter hit. Onimusha doing a sick Issen chain on a crowd. The list is endless.

I think over-exposure can have something to do with it. In games where you 'make the style' yourself, it is always novel because you can change it. In animations like the Izuna or Sam's SlideBoost...it eventually gets old no matter how great it is. I don't even notice them anymore, I've seen them so much.

So yeah, the personal touch. Think that's a good part of it.

By 'make the style' yourself you are referring to DMC's large moveset, as in a style of fighting?

The moves themselves were just examples of how nothing in DMC looks any cooler than what you do in other action games. And of course, there's more to those games than those isolated moves. Watching NG/Vanquish in the hands of a good player is nuts.

If we are going by customizable fighting styles, I can accept that as a definition. I think DMC is more customizable combos than actual fighting styles though.

Also, remember DMC1 was also labeled as stylish and was the highest combo rated yet it had barely any variety.

DMC1 started it, but the original idea was that you could 'show off' like good players would do in the arcade. That's why you could do things like enemy step and a lot of animations were made with such care and detail. A lot of it is lost in the HD remasters, but the title has a great amount of motionblur usage to make moves feel fantastic.

A good Ninja Gaiden and Vanquish player looks nuts, but only in their movement. Not specifically the 'combos'. Because let's be honest, when people talk styling they just mean endlessly long combos on a specific foe that doesn't fight back.

Then that's the truth of it. Combos. Not any form of style. Combos are a mechanic and have no style. They can look cool but no cooler than other moves or games that have combos but still aren't defined as stylish.

Over the years Ive seen comments like such and such has no style or not enough style and this 'style' they speak of defines whether a game is good or not. The definition is messed up.

As I thought, it's just combo mechanics, though strangely fighters dont qualify.

The problem with that for me has always been: why not just boot up Marvel vs Capcom then? Devil May Cry is deep, yes, but most of the combo-labbing you see in DMC4 and 5 doesn't come close to the intricasies of something like MVC. I mean, MvC:I, while dislike the most, probably has the most combo potential. How many games do you know with a combo video totalling in at 4 fucking hours:

Yet this isn't labeled a 'stylish fighter'.

This is why I hate this label. I think it means something different to everyone.
Wouldnt be an issue if they didn't attach game quality to it.