Blair Loveday
The Bayonetta series has gone from strength to strength. The incredibly stylish action mixed with the absolutely insane and bonkers story lines have made all three releases so much fun when they drop.
So now Platinum has decided to take this brilliant action game, and make a strange small scale prequel that changes everything about what makes the series work. And yet somehow, it still works!
Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon drops us into the history of Bayonetta.
Cereza (a.k.a. Bayonetta) is still young and wants to save her mother. Bayonetta was born in a unique situation, her dad was one of the Lumen Sages of light and her mum was one of the Umbra Witches of darkness. These two are absolutely not allowed to make babies together, and so her Mum is imprisoned.
Cereza, being a person with feelings, wants to save her mum.
Cereza is in the process of being taught how to be an umbral witch but she has a dream that she needs to go to a forbidden forest to meet a white wolf to get the power to save her mum. So she sneaks off to follow her fate.
Since she is still a witch in training she hasn’t really mastered summoning demons. When she is in a pinch she tries anyway and pulls forth a demon she can’t control. This demon accidentally gets fused with her soft toy Cheshire and before we know it, we have our two protagonists for the game.
When it comes to gameplay, the best game with gameplay analogous to Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon would be Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons.
If you played this indie darling in 2013 you will remember two things, The impactful brutal story, and the quirky gameplay where one analogue stick moves a character and the other moves another. It is kind of weird to go that far back to reference a similar game, but I haven’t played another one like this for 10 years since.
Cereza is on one stick and Cheshire is on the other stick.
There are obvious puzzle types where one character does something so the other character can move on, but the game gets much more creative than that.
Cereza can pull Cheshire back to herself and gain additional demon powers like being able to stretch out and grab things. The levels are cleverly designed with certain things that Cheshire can’t walk through and areas Cereza can’t climb up to. It’s just complicated enough to be satisfying, but not so complicated as to be frustrating.
Combat is fine.
It has its moments, but if viewed as more of another part of this puzzle it stacks up better. Cereza can’t do much but Chesire has a mean slash on him. Getting Cereza to hold an enemy in place with thorns while Chesire slashes the bejesus out of them is satisfying as hell. When you get swarmed with enemies trying to keep the weaker Cereza safe while attacking with Chesire can get complicated, but fun.
The art style is something that really adds to the quirky unique vibe. It has a beautiful story book vibe from the scenery, to the character design and it just oozes charm. Cut scenes are also presented like story books with some minor animations as the words appear. The whole thing is just a treat to watch and enjoy.
Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon is not what I expected from the latest Bayonetta game.
It’s not always perfect but it is so damn fun. It may not appeal to every Bayonetta fan, but may appeal to people who haven’t been a fan of the previous games, so potentially a win win. It’s just a damn good, damn clever, quirky prequel.
Released: March 2023
Rating: PG
Platforms reviewed: Nintendo Switch
Genre: Action
Developer: Platinum
Publisher: Nintendo