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Beelzebubs are insectoid lesser demons that Dante encounters in Devil May Cry.

Description[]

Swarms of these vile creatures infest the waterways beneath the ancient castle on Mallet Island. They are a type of fly said to be possessed by a hideous demon, though their true form is never seen. Two forms of this demon exist: the smaller blue type can fly, while the larger green type stays on the ground and attacks with its forelimbs or a powerful bite.

Behavior[]

The blue Beelzebubs will either cling to walls until Dante approaches or fly around erratically just above head height, in a manner very similar to normal flies.

Green Beelzebubs are rather cowardly, preferring to hang back and either feed on fallen blues or try to sneak up on Dante.

File[]

This evil spirit inhabits the body of a fly. Their hideousness is not too difficult to imagine from its appearance and movements. (Encounter enemy)
What appear to be maggots that the blue Beelzebub vomits are not real maggots. They are a form of evil power that when in contact with it, will prevent your gun from firing until they are all off. In this case, you should switch your gun to a sword. (Get hit by the maggots)
The large green Beelzebubs serve like an evil power bank for the blue airborne Beelzebubs. They seem to be stronger, since they have larger physical mass. (Witness a blue variant land on a green variant)
The green Beelzebubs eat the dead, absorb their evil powers, and become even stronger. After absorbing, they gain more agility and thus more dangerous. (Allow a green Beelzebub to feed on the body of a dead Beelzebub)
Never face your back to the Beelzebub. It will use its frontal limbs to grab and try to break your back. (Turn Dante's back to a green Beelzebub and allow it to perform its grapple attack)
When it is hit and on its back, this is when it's most vulnerable. Blast it with an aerial attack. Also, watch out for the poison it spurts out. (Knock a green Beelzebub on its back)

Strategy[]

On Easy Automatic and Normal, Beelzebubs are first encountered in Mission 06: Evil of the Waterways. On Normal they are only encountered in this mission and the next, while in Easy Automatic they are also encountered in the hallway outside the Cathedral in the final mission. On Hard and Dante Must Die difficulties they can appear in a single room, the side-room with the Divinity Statue in the corridor to the Cathedral, which can first be entered in Mission 02: Judge of Death. They can also be found in Mission 06: Evil of the Waterways after escaping from Phantom, going back into the room you just escaped from. With these conditions in mind, it is possible to complete a full run of the game without ever encountering them.

Beelzebub waves usually consist of 1-2 green Beelzebubs, typically with five or six blues per green one, though a couple of spawns have one green and eight blue. The blues will mostly sit around on walls, with only a few flying at any given time.

Blue Beelzebubs are roughly on par with Sargassos in terms of being an annoyance rather than a threat, and are just as easily killed using the Shotgun. They are a little harder to deal with than Sargassos since they circle around Dante at high speed rather than charging straight at him. Ebony & Ivory are also effective, but if a blue Beelzebub is circling it is too fast for Devil Trigger Ebony & Ivory shots to target effectively. If the player really does not want to fight them and has DT to burn, they can use Alastor's Air Raid or Vortex to quickly clear out a room.

The blue Beelzebubs have the following abilities:

  • Circle: While flying, the Beelzebub starts to fly tight circles over either a fixed point or Dante's head extremely quickly, too fast to really target with guns. It is best to either jump away and try to hit it from the side with the spread of the Shotgun, or just move away and go after another Beelzebub until it stops.
  • Projectile: The Beelzebub vomits its maggot-like magical projectile at Dante. It can do this either while flying or more rarely while on a wall. If it hits, it deals a small amount of damage and sticks to Dante, "clogging up" his gun until it falls away. Swinging Dante's sword a few times speeds this up: if multiple sets of maggots are on Dante at the same time it will take more swings to get rid of them.
  • Carpet bomb: The Beelzebub does this during circle: it will fire multiple projectiles straight down as it moves. These handle just like the normal projectile attack.
  • Claw attack: While flying, the Beelzebub lunges at Dante and performs a weak claw attack.
  • Death attack: If killed with melee damage, the Beelzebub will spray maggot projectiles.

While it is easy to deal with any number of blue Beelzebubs, it is quite tricky to do so without taking at least some damage since there is not much warning of their attacks: this is most likely why they, like Sin Scythes, are largely removed from higher difficulties.

The green Beelzebubs are somewhat tougher, but since they are slow and not particularly aggressive they are not much more of a threat. They have the following abilities:

  • Feed: A green Beelzebub will prioritize this ability. If the corpse of another Beelzebub is present in the room, the green Beelzebub will bend over it and quickly eat it. This grants it an ability resembling Devil Trigger, increasing the speed of all of its animations and also giving it a defense boost.
  • Projectile: The green Beelzebub spits the same projectile as a blue one from its mouth. It behaves in the same way, aside from the firing angle.
  • Bite: The Beelzebub approaches Dante and snaps at him with its jaws.
  • Grapple: A green Beelzebub can only perform this attack if Dante has his back to it. It will lunge at him and rip at his back with its claws, with Dante eventually throwing it off: wiggle the stick to break free more quickly. At critical health this will turn into a death animation.
  • Death attack: If killed with melee damage, the Beelzebub will spray multiple maggot projectiles.

Like a Blade the green Beelzebubs can be killed instantly if they are knocked down and then hit with either Alastor's Helm Breaker or Ifrit's dive kick: the Beelzebub is simpler since it only has one knockdown state. However, this instant kill will make the Beelzebub explode in a shower of maggots, which will tend to deal minor damage unless Dante evades immediately. It is best to just hang back and shoot it a few more times: on Normal it should only take three Shotgun blasts to kill one.

Appearances in Other Media[]

TEPPEN[]

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The Beelzebub in TEPPEN.

The Beelzebub first appeared in TEPPEN with its "Adventures of a Tiny Hero" expansion. It appears in one card.

Background[]

Beelzebub is a name derived from Ba'al Zəbûb, a Philistine god worshipped in the city of Ekron in southwest Canaan. The name means "lord of the flies." Little is known of the original god, as most information comes from Hebrew sources such as the books of the Old Testament, which mostly use the term as a generic one for false gods. In Christianity "Beelzebub" is sometimes used as an alternative name for the Devil, while in Christian demonology Beelzebub is regarded as a high-ranking demon prince.

The Beelzebub was one of the creatures designed while Devil May Cry was still a development build of Resident Evil 4. When the game eventually turned into Devil May Cry, the only change made to the design of the Beelzebub was a reduction in its polygon count to allow more to appear at once.[1] A similar fly-based enemy called the Novistador appears in the final version of Resident Evil 4.

Trivia[]

  • As with the description of the Blade, the description of the Beelzebub seems to imply that the fly creature itself occurs naturally in Devil May Cry's world.

References[]

  1. Devil May Cry: 3142 Graphic Arts. p.202: Takeyasu: As far as design goes, Beelzebub was completely unchanged. However, its polygon count was much lower than when the game was "RE 4".
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