Reviews
[Review] ‘Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition’ Brings the Definitive Version of a Fantastic Game to Switch
If last year’s Devil May Cry 5 was your introduction to the long-running demon-slaying series, you could be forgiven for expecting a 15-year-old PS2 game to pale in comparison.
5 gave players three characters with wildly different movesets to master. The versatile, series mainstay Dante. The impulsive Nero, with a seemingly limitless supply of powered-up prosthetic arms. The brooding V, who functioned more like a poetry-reading Pokémon trainer than a traditional stylish action character. The game was approachable for newcomers, but rewarded time spent plumbing its systemic depths.
But, Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition on Switch may have even more to offer.
As a prequel to the original Devil May Cry, DMC3 introduces us to a young Dante, settling in for a slice of pizza in his as-yet-unnamed business. When it’s attacked by demons, our hero has to set off for a massive tower, shrouded in clouds, to whoop his twin brother Vergil’s ass. Over the course of his adventure, he’ll beat up a jester, confront his twin and hack-and-slash through hordes of demons using a small arsenal of weapons and a suite of ability-granting styles.
Those styles are, in large part, what afford Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition its impressive depth. Trickster style grants Dante a very useful dodge. Swordmaster gives him a second attack. Gunslinger brings in another ranged move. Royalguard lets him block. All of these can be upgraded, so to have the right playstyle for every occasion, you’ll need to keep each leveled up as you progress. I stuck with Trickster for most of the game, but I’m looking forward to further exploring each of the playstyles in a subsequent playthrough.
That’s easier than ever thanks to Capcom’s decision to incorporate a feature introduced in a fan-created mod into this official release. Style-switching, which allows Dante to move seamlessly between Trickster, Swordmaster, Gunslinger and Royalguard, was first introduced in 2008’s Devil May Cry 4. Now, Capcom has officially added it as an option in Devil May Cry 3, and the game is all the richer for it. While players have the option to play the game as it originally released — with style swaps limited to checkpoints — they can also swap on the fly, if they choose, opening up potential for some gloriously lengthy combos.
The inclusion of style-switching is only the most obvious aspect of an overarching ethos that makes Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition so good: its willingness to offer players an enormous amount of different options. You play the game as Dante, but once you’ve completed the campaign, you can replay it — with additional story content — as Vergil, who has an entirely different moveset. You can alter the way that checkpointing works by playing on Gold mode (which gives you infinite continues) or Yellow (which sends you back to the beginning of a level upon death). Multiple difficulty options and the ability to go back and play previous missions to grind for currency allow you to tailor the challenge to your ability. And, most fundamentally, Dante has a ton of weapons at his disposal, and multiple styles to master. DMC3: Special Edition genuinely wants you to play this game however you want.
And, if you enjoy challenging, varied boss battles, you’ll have plenty of reason to continue playing. I’m generally pretty boss battle agnostic; I mostly only care about them when their difficulty prevents me from progressing in a game I’m enjoying. But, Devil May Cry 3 is the rare game that had me fully invested in mastering each encounter. A giant pair of headless twins. A demon who commands a legion of shadows and bats. A deathly, charging carriage. No boss battle is like another, and each demands your full attention. It was deeply satisfying, after spending an hour learning a difficult enemy’s tells, to finally exploit their weaknesses and take them down with ruthless efficiency.
The game does show its age in some ways. The re-release has added quality-of-life improvements and new features, but the graphics look the same. Additionally, the camera, which incorporates the fixed perspectives of early Resident Evil, takes some getting used to. Despite the lack of player control, though, it follows the action well. There were a few moments where the perspective shift caused me to briefly walk in the wrong direction. But, after an hour or so, I never worried about the camera in combat.
It helps that the framerate is silky smooth. I never noticed any stuttering or drops, and if you blink, you’ll miss the post-death load times. There have been a decent amount of last-gen (or last-last-gen) games that have suffered in the port to Switch. But, Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition runs great. It also helps that Devil May Cry 3 holds up substantially better than other character action games of the same era. While it released just a month before the original God of War, Capcom’s action game feels miles ahead in terms of design. God of War got bogged down with bad platforming, tricky puzzles and frustrating climbing sections, but Devil May Cry 3 is laser-focused on its excellent combat and encounter design. It may look like a game from the Bush era, but after a level or two, it sure doesn’t feel like it.
If you enjoyed the excellent combat and delightful anime bullshit of Devil May Cry 5, Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition has successfully brought that formula to a handheld system. Some remasters succeed on the strength of their source material alone. But, Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition pairs a stellar game with an equally stellar re-release.
Devil May Cry 3 Special Edition review code for Nintendo Switch provided by the publisher.
Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition is out now on Nintendo Switch.
Reviews
‘The Mouths’ Review: Takashi Shimizu’s Cursed Tree Horror Stumbles at the Finish [Fantasia 2026]
Director Takashi Shimizu’s latest, The Mouths, has a pretty straightforward premise: what if an enormous, threatening tree at the edge of a cemetery contained a killer curse? Touch it, make a wish, and let the horror begin.
As fans of Shimizu’s work know, it’s never quite so straightforward. The Japanese director, best known for the Ju-on films, delights in non-linear narratives and haunting specters. In this capacity, The Mouths more or less adheres to formula.
The screenplay was written by Masahiro Yamaura and adapts Sesuji’s novella A Questionnaire About the Mouth. The source material provides a framing device that opens the film before it is swiftly forgotten, only to return in the film’s closing moments in highly amusing fashion.
In between, the film tells the story of four friends who investigate an urban legend of a cursed tree, including soft-spoken Shota (Rihito Itagaki), sensitive Mirei (Momona Kasahara), outgoing Ann (Ai Yoshikawa), and her boastful boyfriend Tatsuya (Keito Tsuna).
Initially, the action seems straightforward: the four teens drive to the cemetery, discussing what Shota heard about the tree with a brief pause at a convenience store in between. Throughout all of these early scenes, the interaction among the teens hints at a complicated dynamic, including a minor spat between Ann and Tatsuya, and Shota’s brief but meaningful glance at Ann in the rearview mirror. These sequences are regularly interrupted by direct address police interviews as present-day Shota, Tatsuya, and Mirei make ominous declarations about the events of that evening.
The first act works because The Mouths is slowly building tension around what happened. It’s obvious from their statements that things will go awry, but Yamaura’s script teases things out. Even when they arrive at the cemetery, rather than proceed directly to the cursed object, the action pauses so Shota can propose a specific course of action: they will proceed to the tree, individually, in a specific order. The wait for the action to kick in is both tantalizing and agonizing.
First up: Shota, followed by Tatsuya, then Ann. Mirei, meanwhile, becomes increasingly reticent, which alarms the others who have already noted her sensitivity to otherworldly phenomena.
When Ann disappears, the film moves into a new act as the remaining members of the group search for her while seemingly being haunted by both her and the tree. This is where Shimizu’s penchant for ghostly figures lurking in the background and peeking around corners comes to the forefront, including one stand-out moment that leans into the curse’s origin: the visual of a hanged woman with a grotesquely stretched neck.
The middle stretch feels a little too familiar to the director’s work, however, so it’s exciting when the last act upends much of what we thought we knew. There is a reason that the film is called The Mouths: not only are most of these people revealed to be unreliable narrators, but it is revealed that several interactions throughout the film were manipulated by characters with malicious intent. These people are not quite what they seemed.
This revisionist filter on the events of the movie’s first half is provocative and enticing, though the creative team struggles to execute it without devolving into messy confusion. There’s at least one plot beat that should be a massive revelation, but both the visuals and the dialogue render it quite confusing, which robs the moment of some of its power. This is a shame, because the last act is what makes the film stand out from other curse/ghost movies.
The performances of the main four teens are solid, with Itagaki getting to show the most range. Many of the supporting characters, including a pair of frenemies who also become involved in the curse, as well as the detective investigating the case, feel a bit superfluous; the film would have benefitted from cutting back some of these scenes or, alternately, beefing up a few of these roles to justify their inclusion.
The Mouths’ other big element is its sound design. The area around the tree is surrounded by wet mud that slurps and sucks at shoes, while the cursed bark is covered in cicadas, whose distinctive buzz and crunchy shells provide evocative foley.
Overall, The Mouths is a solid but slightly inessential addition to Shimizu’s filmography. For the auteur’s fans, there’s plenty to appreciate, particularly the way the Japanese master sets up scares and pays them off, including good moments in a library and later when the detective is driving. On the other hand, the film’s big reveal is handled so clumsily that its potency is disappointingly muted.
The Mouths is a decent time, but it’s hard to overlook some of its weaknesses.
The Mouths made its North American premiere at the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival. Release info TBD.
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