Imagine you're sitting down with a brew, newspaper on the table in front of you, and you fancy a crack at the crossword. You get to one question and spend an age ooh-ing and aah-ing about what the answer may be. After much teeth grinding and head scratching, you give up and make another cuppa. Suddenly, for no reason, the answer dawns on you when you weren’t even thinking about it and you feel somewhat relieved. Some people call this sort of thing “a moment of clarity”.

Shinji Mikami evidently had one of these moments when he decided to take the castle-on-an-island setting and gun-based action (not to mention 3D engine) of Resident Evil: Code Veronica, meld it with the swordplay and power-up system of Onimusha Warlords, and ramp up the action tenfold. He gifted us with the sublime Devil May Cry. It had universal acclaim and was one of Capcom’s biggest sellers of 2001.

So what kind of moment must it have been when Capcom decided to ditch the talented developers responsible for the success of the original DMC, and replace them with a team of inexperienced ringers?

Devil May Cry 2 throws Dante - the uber-cool, swaggering demon-hero of DMC1 - into a situation whereby he is compelled to help a mysterious woman gather artefacts from various locations around the world. This is apparently with a view to stop An Evil Man collecting them and using them to give him immense demonic powers. And that’s your story. Don’t bother expecting any back-story for these characters as there simply is none. DMC1 was never lauded for its plot, but at least there was the notion of Dante squaring up to his father’s nemesis and settling the score once and for all. Not only have the new characters got as much personality as a blank piece of paper, even Dante has become something of a bore: gone is the “flock off, featherface!” bravado, in comes a Dante apparently struggling to stay awake, presumably reflecting the same dilemma as the player.

The complete lack of any sane or interesting plot could have been forgiven if the game was fun to play. The original game had Dante exploring a gorgeous, gothic castle, filled with all manner of creeps, upon which you were inclined to unleash a myriad of thrilling combos and weaponry. Would we have wanted more of the same from the sequel? Well, you would certainly except so. Sadly, what we are stuck with in the sequel is considerably less impressive.

Discarded are the incredibly satisfying - yet simple - combat mechanics that made the first game so damn enjoyable. There will be no situations in DMC2 where you will need to consider which balance of swords, gauntlets and guns are the best choice to dispatch a certain group of villains. The combination system has been scrapped as well, leaving the player with little more than a set of generic moves achieved by simply bashing the sword button repeatedly. The best example of this is on Mission 5: Dante encounters a group of tanks and, in a genius move, the developers have made it possible for him to simply stand right next to them and bash away with appalling monotony until the tank explodes. No rolling around or jumping out of the way, just stand still and hack and hack and hack for a minute or so. Criminally, the Ifrit gauntlets have vanished, the hand to hand fighting gone completely, leaving just a selection of swords...most of which look and feel identical to each other.

Perhaps the worst addition is the targeting system. Instead of attacking whichever enemy is nearest to Dante, the new target method places a crosshair over one enemy and no matter where Dante is standing or what is around him he will only attack that specified foe. The player must manually cycle through each on-screen adversary in order to shoot whoever poses the most threat or is closer. This is very unhelpful when there are a dozen enemies to deal with at once, as if often the case. One aspect which is nice is the ability to shoot two creatures simultaneously in an undeniably cool manner, but even this cannot compensate for having such a clumsy combat engine.

As before, red orbs are collected and can be used as currency between levels. As Dante starts the game with as many abilities as he can finish it with, all orbs can be spent on are the swords and guns obtained along the way. This may not have been so bad if they actually showed signs of improvement, but there is absolutely no visual or audio pay-off to give satisfaction at having spent your hard earned “cash” on them.

For those people with a lot of time on their hands there is Disk 2, which enables the player to tackle the game as Lucia, the enigmatic redhead who summoned Dante for his help. In similar fashion to Resident Evil 2, this takes the player on essentially the same journey but has notable differences in the route.

Finishing with one character opens up the next skill level, new costumes (Dante in his Diesel-sponsored denim outfit looks rather good) and a level select option. Complete the game with both characters and The Bloody Palace becomes available to test your mettle in increasingly difficult battles (think of the Dark World sub-game from Onimusha). Perhaps the most intriguing unlockable is the ability to play as Trish, Dante's partner from the first game who uses the sword of Sparda, Dante's legendary demon father.

Graphically the game is no improvement on the original. The locations are dour at best; the wonderfully detailed castle makes way for offices and rooftops. Although these are relatively nicely textured, they are just too bland to hold the interest. Bosses fare slightly better, being impressive, huge and well animated, it is a shame they are no fun to deal with. At least the game runs at a consistent 60fps.

It has been twelve months since Devil May Cry 2 came out and, unusually for the game industry, there has been absolutely no mention - not even a rumour - of a third game. Those who rejoiced at the original game can only hope this is Capcom terminating the (potential) franchise before its good name is sullied further, or that someone is trying to word an apology to Team Little Devils in an attempt to get them back at the helm. Perhaps those who have never played DMC1 will gain some enjoyment from the game, especially if they like repetitive slash-em-ups. Fans of the original, however, should lower their expectations to almost ground level or else they could see it as most sane people do: one of the most disappointing sequels in gaming history.