I wouldn't be able to provide any reasons why, even under oath, but I really do like the idea of that Gothic-style mega badass priests with swords and/or guns going around the world cleansing the world of your general paranormal riffraff. Demons, vampires, giant crab spiders, your general type of fantasy demon . And, as many of you already know, the ability to gain experience and level up or buy new abilities is the reason apparent why I'll prefer any given game on the market to an obviously superior one.

You just don't know the extent to which I'm willing to go in order to kill some giant spiders

In these respects, Chaos Legion should be together like biscuits and gravy. Not only does the game boast a smattering of the Gothic architecture influence that Devil May Cry brought us in spades, but, well... it seems like it's basically the same game as Devil May Cry + 1 new feature. And, guess what, I kind of led you on. Chaos Legion IS a pretty good fit for me.

But probably not for you.

I mean, I'm the person that put nearly thirty hours into P.N. 03, a game I patently hated. I don't think it's any unreasonable feat of the imagination that I'm going to invest a similar amount in with Chaos Legion, which is actually a somewhat feasible game, even though not half that of Devil May Cry. Gamespot gave this game a 5 out of 10 and, as I was telling peccaui, that seems pretty fair. I have a long history of liking bad action games with clever gimmicks. In my third time writing a review for this website, I'll submit to you my love of Gun Valkyrie.

Chaos Legion is the story of Sieg, a very pretty man who chases after an even more pretty young man named Delacroix through fourteen levels of bare-bones Gothicity that almost rivals Devil May Cry 2 in the field of totally stark environments. You will be hard pressed to find more than one area that isn't the old 'decrepit city' standby. Sometimes it's dark, sometimes it's underground, but it always looks like some secret evil sect is going to pop out and sacrifice you to their dark god at any moment. In the future (or maybe the past?), people just didn't/won't care about architecture as much as we do now. Sieg, our hero, has the desire to either protect Delacroix or avenge some wrong committed by him. Chaos Legion doesn't really deem you worthy of knowing trivial details like that. There's a cutscene somewhere after the third or forth level that paints Sieg as a badguy and hints that there's some huge history with these two characters, but they don't really tell you anything about it until the last level. It's here that you find out that Sieg isn't really a bad guy after all! By then, though, I'd already figured out that and I didn't really care. I certainly wasn't surprised. It's kind of hard to paint someone who goes around killing freakin' GIANT SPIDERS in a bad light. Suffice it to say, the story in Chaos Legion isn't really a factor.

I'm totally okay with that. The power point of these types of games doesn't tend to be amazing and awe-inspiring plot twists. I just want to go around for a couple hours, killing whatever giant arachnids you might have on hand. Give me something like that and I'll be pretty satisfied. But not you guys, oh no! People like you are the more discerning types of gamers, I can tell just by lookin' at ya... and that's where Chaos Legion starts to go wrong in almost every respect. You wouldn't like a game like Chaos Legion, I know. Trust me on this one.

Chaos Legion, as described, really is Devil May Cry plus one. Oh, there's a tiny bit of Onimusha in there too, nevermind that right now. Sieg runs around with the standard accoutrement of 3D action game moves. He swings, he combos, he dodges (pathetically, I might add). He double jumps too, but only after the ability is unlocked. I bet you saw that one coming, sly fox that you are.

The plus one feature would be the ability of Sieg to command and upgrade the legions of Chaos that are at his disposal. The game never describes to you why these legions are so chaotic, or how they came to be that way. I guess this isn't important either, but I think I'd really like to know. The term 'Chaos Legion' suggests something quite dire to me, and I'd like to know what it was put them in this state.

Nonsexual man-crushes seem to be this game's forte

Chaotic or not, these guys really know how to throw a party! This is despite their poor AI, AI that often makes them more of a liability than anything. Each one has a name like it was cribbed out of the notepad of some high school goth. Sieg's little demonic buddies have fun monikers like 'Guilt' and 'Malice' and 'Arrogance'. You'll come to know them as 'Sword guy', 'Arrow guy' and 'Useless crap shield guy you'll never actually equip'. Oh yeah, and one's named Thanatos, so I guess the goth took a little Greek in his spare time. Whenever you feel a little bogged down in a fight -- which is often, Chaos Legion shows no qualms about throwing scores, and I'm using that word in the literal sense, of enemies at you at one time -- you just call upon your legions out and they'll totally take out the trash for you. Beware though, during this time Sieg's movement slows to a walk and his sword attacks are on the bad side of pathetic. At first, I thought this was kind of a cool way to make you think about using your allies when you didn't need them. I soon understood Capcom's clandestine mentality here. Making you weaker while you've got your friends with you isn't a reason to bring them out rarely, it's a reason for you to never bring them out at all, ever. Yeah, there's a certain pleasure in watching the burly hulks of the Hatred legion slam into your foes, but I hate that I have to stand in the background and wait it out while they're having all the fun. It's not enough that I have to sit through these perfectly melodramatic cutscenes, but now I'm dealing with not being able to actually play while I'm playing? That's not fair! Add that the legions have AI barely rivaling that of your household variety hamster and, really, by the end of the game you'll probably be using the legions only too rarely. It's true that you'll eventually unlock the secret legion, at which point the game becomes easier than playing Final Fantasy X with the summons. Until then most of the game rewards you playing with Sieg as a solo kind of guy. It's easy enough to go through this game leveling up only the bomb legion to clear out crowds and the crossbow legion to bring down the insanely armored foes that are basically immune to Sieg's sword swipes (in the last few levels you'll have a way to counteract even that, see ya later crossbow guys!).

Which brings up the topic of the well thought-out but ultimately futile experience and upgrading system. On any given level you have the ability to take legions along, and they'll get experience from the monsters you kill in said level. Something like this is basically all I need to play a game, did you guys ever play that game Tyrian? Shit, that was awesome! ...but Chaos Legion is NOT Tyrian. In Chaos Legion most of your friends are so worthless that there's no real reason to level them up anyway, as you're not going to to be using them! The legions do provide you with abilities, though, so its sort of another trick by Capcom to try and get you to use them... but I'm wise to their game! Some of Sieg's friends are just so god awful that you really don't care if they give you a double jump or a counterattack, you still won't get anywhere near them! And that's okay, because with enough leveling you'll be able to use every legion's special abilities without actually using the legion itself. This is good, because it's not fun in a 3D game unless you have a double jump, and I'll be damned to hell if I ever pull out those moronic ninjas again in order to get it. I know, I shouldn't be ripping on ninjas, any ninjas, like that... it's just... these ones definitely did not train at the school of Ryu Hayabusa and company, as they seem more content to stand around idly picking their oversized claws than they would to go around destroying the evil minions of Jaquito.

To Capcom's credit, the legions do at least look pretty and move pretty good, AI issues aside. Many of them appear to be floating above the ground, their feet made up of burning flames. Malice, the blue imps with giant crossbows, seem particularly inspired to me. The only complaint I have is that Blasphemy, the bomb guy, is too reminiscent of the 'retarded kid in a football helmet' stereotype. Maybe it's just the way it flails its arms as it lies on the ground, waiting to blow up. I don't know, I'm not someone who's qualified to make that decision.

I don't know what the shield guys even DO. Frankly, I don't think Capcom does either.

The human character designs aren't bad either, but scary monsters are where this game really soars. All crab-spider monsters and giant spiked balls running around on two fleshy legs look exactly like how you'd expect them to look. Like everything else Chaos Legion contains, though, is beauty is only skin deep. Gamespot mentions how the characters seem to jump between their actions instead of being fluidly animated, they're totally right. This seems almost valid with the legions, who move like jerky little Pinocchios on strings. But, if you look at the motions of Arcia, the requisite female lead, you'll agree with me. When she's firing her gun she isn't animated. I mean, you watch as she actually jumps from frame to frame. Isn't stuff like this usually left on the cutting room floors? It's not the least of Chaos Legion's flaws, and it's still a pretty big one.

So what IS so wrong with Chaos Legion? Oh, I don't know, EVERYTHING! The game rewards the patient player who doesn't mind hours upon hours of monotony, but ask yourself if that's the kind of reward you want. Here's a hint: you don't. Lucky you, you won't be bored all the time! There's plenty of screamingly irritating moments to deal with peppered through the game. You'll be cursing at every single laser totting zombie you see. When you're not dealing with that you'll be screaming your head off in regards to the lackluster collision detection. In the exact same circumstances a single hit seems just as likely to hit you as it is to miss. This is kind of lucky though, because you won't be doing any actual dodging, per se. The manual dodge is one of the more useless moves conceived since P.N. 03's ridiculously exaggerated cartwheels. More truthfully, it's not the dodge itself that's crappy, Sieg moves with the grace of a swan. The problem arises in that Sieg cannot, for the life of him, be bothered to interrupt a combo attack, even to save his own skin! With a full six hit combo becoming the only way to do any actual damage by the end game, this puts you in a the sticky situation of having to know exactly what's coming before you start even your first swing, not helping is that you have to press down on the "center camera button" to dodge, which means the camera is going to be swaying around like crazy and you'll probably just get hit anyway. Listen, I like holding out for the sixth hit of the combo to watch my enemies scatter like the rag dolls that they are, but a few levels into the game it just becomes plain impractical. Who thought up this crazy control scheme?

Why it was the exact same people who decided to describe buttons by what they do, not what they are. "Just hit the 'assist' button, huh Capcom? Well I'll get right on it!" It was probably the third or fourth level before I had even a basic idea of what the controls were, as I had learned to ignore the tutorials when I figured out they were lying to me. The game says you'll get an item every 100 enemies you kill. You don't! What kind of quality control was this game under? None is the obvious answer. The flaw was overt enough to be spotted by the end of the prologue level. The controls aren't really all that bad, should you manage to get used to them. Lord knows I've played games with worse! But you should probably ask yourself if something that's considered recreation should require for an hour or two of your time upfront just for you to learn how to play.

In the end, Capcom does bring a few cool things to the table with Chaos Legion, it's just not nearly enough to satisfy even your more accommodating gamer. You'll play as the gun-slinging Arcia in one level and it really is a nice break from the monotone life that Sieg leads, but it really comes as too little too late. Aiding us here is that Arcia has some seriously nice moves, such as the ability to fall on to her back and roll around the ground while firing upwards. Much akin to all the other moves in the game, it'll just take you an hour of playing with her to figure out how to do it without using a supermove first. Once again, Capcom doesn't actually tell you how to do anything. Once you figure it out though, it's totally awesome! And some say the journey IS the reward, right?

That's as apt a description of Chaos Legion as I can give you. It's a pretty fun game to play, if you're willing to put in all the time it demands of you to decipher every little Byzantine idiosyncrasy. Chaos Legion is a game with a lot of heart and a total lack of any kind of production values, or even a more than mediocre source of inspiration. While I'll never outright shun a game that gives you rankings and rewards based on your performance throughout a level, you're a little different I think. Chaos Legion, not exactly for the gamer who cares about things like fun, not for the type of gamer that plays games to get away from the stress of the day. It's not the most conspicuously bad offering Capcom gave us in 2003, but it ain't no prized pig either.