Bayonetta may not have been the most flawless experience when it came to video gaming in 2009 / 2010, yet despite the notable flaws (Particularly in the PlayStation 3 edition) it proved to be a highly enjoyable third-person action experience bolstered by a fantastic soundtrack, fast-paced action and visuals that effectively merged sex and action appeal. While the series’ long-term future may stem from the success of its upcoming Wii U exclusive sequel (Odd considering they never released the first game on a Nintendo console), there is still much to appreciate with what we currently have on the market and Udon Entertainment’s recent English localization of artbook / design compendium The Eyes of Bayonetta.
The Eyes of Bayonetta starts off on a strong note, highlighting each of the characters who appear in the game, from the titular character down to the citizens of Vigrid who you never really see at all while playing. Bayonetta gets approximately thirty pages dedicated to herself alone which are filled to the brim with renders of her in many poses and outfits and even more impressively, a plentiful supply of concept artwork which has all been well annotated by the design team. As someone who loves deisgn compendiums, this is probably the best annotated section out of any book Udon Entertainment have released to date. This section continues for all the other characters including Jeanne, Luka, Cereza and the other figures in the game with the same degree of detail – although with some being of greater focus than others.
While they are handled to a much lesser scale than the first chapter, the second and third chapters lend themselves to the different Angels and Infernal Demons that Bayonetta meet and destroys along her quest. Each of the enemies featured in these chapters usually come down to a single page with a single rendered piece of artwork and occasionally a single piece of concept artwork that may or may not have an annotation attached to it. They do at the very least however come with a blurb and a note from the development team regarding their designs however. The example shown above is what you should typically expect.
Chapters four, five and six detail the weapons, accessories and items that I found that I took for granted when playing the game. Most interesting were the multiple-pages dedicated to the set of four guns that Bayonetta uses when fighting (Scarborough Fair / All 4 One / Onyx Roses / Garnet Roses) which came with some interesting concept artwork / annotations and the small sub-chapter dedicated to the different devices that Bayonetta summoned when undertaking a “Torture Attack”. As with all other sections and as they aren’t too often focused upon in the game visually, there is a plentiful supply of concept artwork that makes what could have been a rather generic section quite interesting. The book ends with a selection of concept artwork detailing some of the areas encountered across the chapters, trophy/achievement designs and an assortment of packaging / promotional visuals.
While I am basing this review off a digital copy instead of a final physical release, I could see the book as potentially having some small text issues. But other than that minor qualm it is a well laid out book that is filled with imagery, text and to my utter delight came with the most annotated concept artwork and final designs that I believe I have seen in any Udon release to date. The localization was also solid and (while I haven’t read the original Japanese edition) seems to be accurate from what I can tell.
With this book being published within Japan back in 2010, it has certainly taken Udon Entertainment enough time to get this to international audiences considering it was only released the other week. While it might be questionable if they would have been able to get localization rights so soon, this is one book that would have been better released in 2010 / 2011 when the game was still in the limelight. HOWEVER, this book along with the original game might be worth checking out again before Bayonetta 2 and the feature film Bayonetta: Bloody Fate get released internationally this year.
DO NOTE THAT FOR THE PURPOSE OF THIS REVIEW I DID NOT HAVE THE CHANCE TO COVER THE DVD INCLUDED WITHIN THE FINAL COPY
Beyond the bad ps3 port what where the flaws of the game?
And don’t come to me with that “backtracking” crap because the levels looked incredibly different, and the minor bosses were terribly amusing and didn’t disturbed the flow of the game, jesus it’s like people hate boss rushes or something.