When comparing The King of Fighters XIV vs Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition, the Slant community recommends Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition for most people. In the question“What are the best PS4 (PlayStation 4) games?” Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition is ranked 51st while The King of Fighters XIV is ranked 178th. The most important reason people chose Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition is:
You'll immediately notice how nice it feels to attack the enemies with each slash, strike and shot having an impact behind it. Enemies will flinch, get thrown back and get suspended mid-air from your attacks, making it feel like you're always the dominant force. It's especially amusing seeing an enemy flail about and slamming it into the ground with your demonic arm. Some of the stylistic elements add fun as well. The prime example is Nero's greatsword the Red Queen, which is equipped with a motorcycle-like gear shift. You can use the gear shift mid-combo to add a flame effect to your sword. This increases your damage and the range of your combos and also looks very nice. It's especially awesome to see your character ascend in a whirlwind of flames.
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Pros
Pro You're sure to find a character that fits your playstyle
KOF XIV has 50 playable characters, giving you many options to choose from. All of the characters have their own unique fighting styles, distinct looks, strengths, and weaknesses.
Pro Deep gameplay
KOF XIV is simple on the surface: pick a character, learn some special moves, a few combos, and go to town on your opponents. However, if you want true mastery of the game, it's going to take a lot of time and effort.
You'll have to learn things like cancels, where you stop a combo with a specific input on your controller, in order to continue in a different way than the game intends. Fighting games are often about who can break the game's engine the best, and KOF XIV is no exception.
On top of things like engine breaking, you'll also have to dedicate a large amount of time to learning your chosen character(s) in order to be truly great with them. Every character has complex combos that require precision timing and great reaction speed, and you'll have to get all of them down.
The fact that you can play this casually with a friend and just mess around for while, or practice as hard as you can and truly try to master the game really makes it fun.
Pro Fun combat
You'll immediately notice how nice it feels to attack the enemies with each slash, strike and shot having an impact behind it. Enemies will flinch, get thrown back and get suspended mid-air from your attacks, making it feel like you're always the dominant force. It's especially amusing seeing an enemy flail about and slamming it into the ground with your demonic arm.
Some of the stylistic elements add fun as well. The prime example is Nero's greatsword the Red Queen, which is equipped with a motorcycle-like gear shift. You can use the gear shift mid-combo to add a flame effect to your sword. This increases your damage and the range of your combos and also looks very nice. It's especially awesome to see your character ascend in a whirlwind of flames.
Pro Great soundtrack
Most of the battle music has the lyrical styling of progressive rock while mixing in dark electronica guitar riffs. It matches the rhythm and speed of the battles really well, spurring on your combos and devastating attacks.
The exploration sections and cutscenes have an entirely different style of music. It ranges from divine vocals accompanied with organ music to eerie pieces with harp and piano sounds creating a bone-chilling ambience.
Pro Highest level of combat depth in any hack and slash game
An open-ended cancelling system (Jump Cancelling) stacked with individual character mechanics (Dante styles and style/weapon switching, Nero ACT and parries, Vergil being Vergil, Lady and Trish are the weakest in terms of combo-ability of the 5 but you can still style with them) and system physics create a combat masterpiece that rewards practice and creativity.
Pro There's a bunch of stuff to do even after beating the game
You can replay the game on higher difficulties, try to find all the hidden missions or collect all the upgrades. You can even try to get the max style rank on all the missions. Doing any of these will award you extra collectibles or unlock new modes.
There's also the The Bloody Palace, which is an arena consisting of 101 levels. Each level contains enemies and bosses found within the main game. The first few levels are quite easy, but each level becomes increasingly more difficult. Only the most skilled players can reach the end, giving you another goal to strive for.
Cons
Con Incomplete story
KOF games are grouped in trilogies and KOF XIV is no exception. It's the first game of a new trilogy, so the endings leave most of the plot points unresolved. You'll have to play the 2 next games to get the full story.
Con Balance issues
In games like this, it's inevitable that some characters just have better skill sets, easier combos, or are just plain stronger than the others. The developers have put in great effort in balancing the game, but this problem does persist.
Con Occasional difficulty spikes
Upon reaching the first boss you'll encounter the first difficulty spike. The boss attacks a lot faster and stronger than the enemies leading up to it. Messing up means you'll die in a couple of seconds, which can be really frustrating. Especially because you have to switch gears so suddenly and adapt to a new playstyle, where the enemy stands on equal footing.
Con Recycled stage designs and lack of character-specific bosses
Capcom basically just slapped on the 3 new characters (Lady, Trish, and Vergil) and they suffer the same problems that Dante does, and that's lack of bosses designed specifically for their toolset. They run through the same bosses and levels instead of getting unique missions.