Capcom: we knew Ninja Theory's Devil May Cry would "scare" people

Hands up if you thought Capcom thought that Devil May Cry fans would have absolutely no problems with a juvenile, Western-developed Dante who's closer to R-Patz than the silvery gunslinger of yore? Believe it or not, they aren't that stupid. Here's supervising director Hideaki Itsuno to explain how the company handled the backlash against Ninja Theory's pouting reboot.

"We knew from the start that whenever you change something like this, there's going to be some people that will be very interested in that," Itsuno told Destructoid earlier in the week. "But it will also scare some people, and make some nervous. We kind of knew that going in, and we steeled ourselves for it.

"What we didn't want to do is lose sight of our core concept. If you panic and change direction you might forget what you were trying to make to begin with and a lot of times that's how bad games get worse.

"What we really needed to do is stick to it, and then wait until we could get the game in front of more people and get them to understand what it's really about."

We've been very impressed by what we've seen of Devil May Cry in motion. And we have absolutely no problem with the new stylings - quite the contrary. Score one for you, Itsuno. But does this mean the end of the classic Dante, with his white mop, leather cape and gothic gear?

"We do hear from the press a lot," Itsuno went on. "We want to emphasize that we're firm believers in that opening one door does not mean that another has to close automatically. We are leaving all options on the table, so to speak."

"We are excited about this new iteration of DmC and are eager to get this into your hands, and we want people to play it and enjoy it. If people are still interested in exploring the other world of DmC that exists, we're happy to go back to that as well."

Just to underline the point: "we view this not as a replacement for the Devil May Cry world, but as an expansion of it. No one knows where it will head, but we're open to all possibilities."

Capcom has said it plans to release a new Devil May Cry game every 2.5 years, going forward. As for Ninja Theory, the Enslaved developer has said of the reboot that it isn't "pretending" to be Japanese, or "apologising" for it - despite being sent death threats by outraged fans.