NOTE:  I AM TALKING OF DANTE FROM DMC, DMC3, and I guess DMC4....FAKE DANTE IS NOT PART OF THIS!  FAKE DANTE IS NOT DANTE!   
 
Sup demon hunters, 
 
I recently got Marvel vs. Capcom 3 and use Dante, a lot.  Dude is my homeboy, I realized he is hands down the coolest protagonist in gaming history.  All men strive to be like him, dude gets his ladies, and he's a powerful demon's son.  He has wit, he has class (DOES NOT SMOKE), and stands up for justice. 
 
Even looking at his attacks Dante can chain shit up like he's casual about it.  Fought demons a countless number of times and hasn't been scared once.  Even in the worst of situations he just acts like nothing is going on.  The only time he does cry is when he defeats his brother, both times.   
 
He's a business man with a successful company, is having sex with a hot blonde AND a cute demon hunter in a school dress, but he's also a man who will stand up for what is right.  He'd never kill a demon if he wasn't doing anything to harm humans, but he'd also never kill a human ever.  Seriously, look at Dante.   
 
Look at him from DMC or DMC3.  He is the perfection and the apex of cool.  I know no guy here would deny it, but if you could pull off the Dante look...you guys know you totally would.   
 

Smart. Keeps his stink finger covered.

no fing way, that guy is terrible for one very specific reason:
 
    

He is pretty cool, definitely up there. I wouldn't call him "the coolest", though.

I agree. Devil May Cry is a cool guy.

" no fing way, that guy is terrible for one very specific reason:
 
    

"

" @Laketown: Can you blame a man for being poetic?  He did nail her so it makes up for it, a man has got to do what he has got to do so he can score some hot demon ass. "

I agree that Dante is an excellent protagonist.
 
However, being that I haven't played DMC3 in years I looked at some pictures on google and he is way to feminine in that game.
 
DMC4 Dante is the way to go. Not just an "I guess". Straight up better. Also he has a shirt and not a tube top in DMC4.

I ain't never played no DMC games, but goddamn is he fantastic in MvC3.

Everything he does and says just makes me laugh. 
 
It puzzles me when people don't think of Dante and DMC in general as a ridiculous joke.

" It puzzles me when people don't think of Dante and DMC in general as a ridiculous joke. "

He kills aliens and doesn't afraid of anything.

Dante is a bad ass. The coolest of cool, the badass of badasses. Dante is the ONE and no one could disagree, be they haters or not.  The only reason Dante would ever be considered not the coolest of cool, is because of the people at Ninja Theory but those guys can go to hell. Seriously, if I wanted to play as the director from Ninja Theory -- you know what, no one wants to play as the dude from NT. Fake Dante is NOT Dante. 
 
Dante is my totally-not-weird-in-any-way-video-game-man-crush.

Dante is quite a badass protagonist, but I wouldn't say he's the coolest in gaming.

Dante is too smooth.

How about this guy?

Dante is the coolest because he is essentially a Mary Sue character: He can never die no matter how many times he gets impaled or smashed or chopped up, he has one-liners for every scenario, he wields both a big "FUCK YOU" sword and a pair of guns that never need reloading and kill everything (well, in cutscenes anyway. In the game the guns usually have the stopping power of an angry gnat), and he scores with the ladies without even really trying. If he ever does fall in combat it is only so he can unleash his Super Sai...errr, Devil Trigger form and then beat the shit out of everything that's left. If he was named Shadow von Darkraven Bloodstein and his story was written by some 13 year old on FanFiction.net then you probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference without a visual aid.
 
Granted, DMC3 and 4 were guilty pleasures of mine because they didn't take themselves too seriously. It's when you start to take Dante's character seriously (see: the shitty anime adaptation) that the image falls apart.
 
On a semi-related note, I find it amusing that the writers have been twisting their story into a Gordian's Knot just to pretend that DMC2 never happened, which is what I think led to this upcoming reboot.

Dante is awesome in the face of a hundred things that SHOULD make him lame.  He's a white haired, half demon pretty boy mercenary who dresses in red and black, fights for humans, uses tons of ridiculous catchphrases and hardly ever has to even break a sweat in a fight against final bosses.  He even goes so far as to have a twin brother who's evil and dresses in opposite colors from him.  He sounds, straight up, like a fanfiction character.
He still pulls it off with an amazing amount of class and style, despite the blindingly painful Oedipus complex he has going on.  Dante is pretty awesome.

" It's when you start to take Dante's character seriously (see: the shitty anime adaptation) that the image falls apart.  On a semi-related note, I find it amusing that the writers have been twisting their story into a Gordian's Knot just to pretend that DMC2 never happened, which is what I think led to this upcoming reboot. "

• DMC Anime was fairly good, the anime wasn't about Dante.  It was about his clients, that's why Dante was barely in it.  Plus Dante just owned everyone in the few seconds he would fight.  There would be no plot if Dante just fought...cause he'd win.
• There is no DMC2.  The creators don't even know of a game called DMC2.  Why do people bring up this fake game?

Shepard.

Dante is awesome. But the coolest? No. That title belongs to somebody else.  

Dante is a lot like Ash (evil dead), but....with matrix powers. 
 
there's really not much of a downside to that.

"I don't know what you're talking about. I use that line all the time.  "

Wait Dante is the coolest protagonist in gaming in a world where Mike Haggar exist ?  I find fault in your logic. Hell Dante isn't even in the top 3 coolest Capcom protagonist list.

" Dante is awesome. But the coolest? No. That title belongs to somebody else.  

"

" Dante is a lot like Ash (evil dead), but....with matrix powers.  there's really not much of a downside to that. "

Terry Bogard is way cooler.

Naked Snake is cooler because he has an eyepatch.

"

I disagree. "

" @audiosnag: No one is as good as Ash. 
 
no one. "

" @easthill said:

"

I disagree. "

"I HAVE TO SHIT SO FUCKING BAD, YOU BEST JUST LEAVE THE STALL!" "

" @audiosnag: What? How is Gordon even a character? I mean Half Life could easily be my favorite series ever but he's just a sociopathic destruction engine.  "

" @audiosnag said:

" Dante is awesome. But the coolest? No. That title belongs to somebody else.  

"

Word. "

Meta Knight disagrees. 
 

This thread makes me want to go and replay DMC3, but I'm too lazy to hook up my PS2 at the moment. 

@Make_Me_Mad

" Dante is awesome in the face of a hundred things that SHOULD make him lame.  He's a white haired, half demon pretty boy mercenary who dresses in red and black, fights for humans, uses tons of ridiculous catchphrases and hardly ever has to even break a sweat in a fight against final bosses.  He even goes so far as to have a twin brother who's evil and dresses in opposite colors from him.  He sounds, straight up, like a fanfiction character.He still pulls it off with an amazing amount of class and style, despite the blindingly painful Oedipus complex he has going on.  Dante is pretty awesome. "

are you being sarcastic?

 @Rockanomics:@xobballox:@Landon: 
Sorry but I completely disagree. Gordon Freeman absolutely has a personality, a lot of it is what you put into it which is part of what makes the silent protagonist so interesting. Instead of the developers  telling you what the character is like you can come up with that on your own. I love his background and I love his character design from a stylistic standpoint.
Dante is awesome but there's nothing unique about him. He looks like any other number of anime characters and his personality has been copied from any other number of devil may care, extreme, hey look at all this batshit crazy stuff I can do characters. Like I said, he's awesome, it's a fun character to play, but it's nothin new.
And most importantly, Freeman is my choice. So to me, that's the right one.

I'd agree to that.