While you could theoretically spam certain techniques on the lower difficulties to get through the game, you would have to frequently revisit past areas to grind for Red Orbs (which serve as the game's currency) in order to sufficiently power up your character.

You are forced to learn how to play the game early, and this combined with the depth of the system makes combat incredibly satisfying, and the game rewards you for playing well. To make matters worse, the US release replaced the traditional checkpoint system with the first game's unforgiving Yellow Orbs (think continues, but incredibly rare, meaning that most of the time you die you are going to restart the level from the beginning) and, in response to complaints that the jump in difficulty from Hard to Dante Must Die was too high, moved every difficulty level up one tier (Normal became Easy, Hard became Normal) up to Hard, which became a new difficulty and removed the Easy mode, meaning that the only mode unlocked at the beginning was the Japanese Hard mode. Combos are almost entirely freeform and can even flow between multiple weapons, but are not interchangeable due to the fighting game esque number of enemy states and large focus on positioning, enemies attack you in droves and Dante can initially take only about three hits before dying. Yes, Devil May Cry 3 has an unreasonably high learning curve. Yes, he is fighting with an electric guitar that summons demon bats from hell, why do you ask? The fact that many players reportedly could not get past the second level was also a tad off-putting.

While Ninja Gaiden Black was championed as the Xbox's superior answer to the original Devil May Cry and God of War delivered a flashy, simple alternative to the other, harder games in the genre, Devil May Cry 3 was the game from a team who had two years earlier released Devil May Cry 2 which played like a textbook example on how to ruin a promising franchise. Devil May Cry 3 came out at around the same time as Ninja Gaiden Black and God of War, and even though it's clearly the best of the three (and this is from someone who has played and enjoyed all three games, God of War less so) it is the one that is the most frequently forgotten.

Devil may cry 3 pc icon