Bayonetta

[Chux]

Also, I don't think videogame controls get any better than this game.

Megaton mashing is annoying, but other than that I agree.

[A Robot Bit Me]

Why do I have to mash to shoot during the twirl analogue stick + punch/kick shooting thing? And why doesn't the shoot button activate this? Weird and annoying choice.

I still don't get the point of all of these combos, but at least the unlockable moves seem to have specific uses and set themselves apart from all the mashing.

[Rumpy]

I still don't get the point of all of these combos,

I think you just have Old Man Syndrome.

[Seik]

I found a few favorite combos and then delegated each of them to killing their respective baddies. I suppose there are a lot of combos, but after the first hour I kind of learned my favorites and quit mashing. When I mashed I died usually, or I was too concentrated on mashing to worry about WT and then I did crappy. Sometimes I'd drift off into a Dynasty Warriors mish mashy zoned out state of mind and the game would always punish me for it.

As for the twirl stick shooting maneuver, if you activate it with Y, then Bayonetta shoots with her hands, and if you activate it with B then she does an upside down handstand and shoots with her feet. Both are awesome, but I prefer the upside down foot shooting move because I think her legs are sexy - SO MUCH FLEXIBILITY OMG!!! (OMG) It would make more sense if it was activated with the 'shoot' button, but if it was that way, maybe she wouldn't be able to shoot upside down with her feet. Just saying.

[A Robot Bit Me]

As for the twirl stick shooting maneuver, if you activate it with Y, then Bayonetta shoots with her hands, and if you activate it with B then she does an upside down handstand and shoots with her feet. Both are awesome, but I prefer the upside down foot shooting move because I think her legs are sexy - SO MUCH FLEXIBILITY OMG!!! (OMG)

See, this is exactly what I mean. Is there a difference between doing it with kick or doing it with punch? If the only answer is "because it looks different," then it's a needless rule. This would be like a shooter with two Shot buttons that functionally fire the same bullet, but one shoots red bullets and the other shoots green. Or a racing game with 300 cars that look awesome and diverse, but drive exactly the same. That's not variety. That's the definition of bloated design.

I'm not saying I want less attack options, I'm saying I want the game to give me reasons to do a given combo in some situations and not others. Not JRPG/Scurge Hive Because Ice Works On Fire Guys bullshit cop-out design, either. I don't think this is too much to ask. Hell, Devil May Cry 1 did a better job with it than Bayonetta.

So far, the only person who has been able to give me an answer aside from bbobb's "Uh, it's real deep. It just is, don't worry about why," was Dipstick saying that it suits your score to vary it up. This isn't really a good reason. It doesn't encourage better choices, just different choices.

[A Robot Bit Me]

Oh yeah, and just to be clear, I'm not trying to discredit anyone's taste for liking Bayonetta (especially Dipstick, who always knows precisely what the fuck is up), nor am I trying to bash the game itself. For all of its flaws, I'm not scrambling around for my receipt, and it's certainly more tightly designed than a lot of the trash on my shelves I admit to enjoying. It's way, way past No More Heroes for example. I just think it raises a lot of interesting questions about design theory.

[Yoshi]

I have Old Man Syndrome too and don't get why there are 7,000 combos, but it doesn't lessen the game at all. I use a small handful of them, and every so often I'll accidentally do a different one. Combos for the sake of combos has been stupid since Killer Instinct, but complaining about flexibility doesn't make sense either.

[kingoffighters]

The difference between twirl stick Y/B shooting is you are either looking at her crotch or her head. I prefer crotch.

[Shin Johnpv]

I'm up to chapter 4, and so far I'm liking the game. I dislike some of the instant death quicktime bullshit, but I can live with it. I definitely need to get better at WT, I still kind of suck a bit at the timing with it.

[FuryFox]

Since you can equip different weapons on your hands and feet, it seems pretty obvious why you have moves for each. The same command works with melee weapons too, albeit with a different effect.

Different combos definitely have different uses, and without getting into a long dissertation on it, different enemies have different block/dodge points that you can circumvent careful combo selection. There are plenty of long distance attacks to interrupt the actions of periphery enemies mid combo as well.