Dante's Inferno: Video Game Review

Dante's Inferno is a classic work of literature that has changed both the literary and christian world.  Did you know that the Bible makes no real mention of the structure of Hell as thoroughly as the Hell depicted in Inferno? So everything taken as common knowledge about Hell is taken from the pages of a poem written some 700 years ago. Amazing huh?



Okay, history lesson over.



WHAAAAAAAAA!!!!!





The game in a nutshell follows the story of the Inferno, though it has been tweaked a little bit to enable plot twists, naked women being captured by Lucifer and of course massive amounts of beating up demons. 

Numero Uno: The Good Things

1) It's beautiful. Never to be outdone EA Games (Medal of Honor, Rock Band) and Visceral Games (Dead Space) really worked their booties off to create a game whose cut scenes are gorgeous, lifelike and almost like watching moving artwork.  There's a scene where Lucifer is floating around gloating over his "marriage" to Beatrice and *shudder* he's so creepy looking! This coupled with the complex and layered scenes depicting Hell as Hell-ishly as possible makes the game a joy to look at and each scene more interesting than the last. You've got "souls" hanging off spikes that actually move their arms and legs when you get closer to them. The depiction of demons is beautiful and horrible in its execution---really gross looking demons and boiling blood rivers....very Hellish. I never really saw two settings that looked the same as the last.



I really want those shoes

 2) It's clever. I really like the Absolve/Punish feature which adds a personal touch to the gameplay. I always felt really bad when I had to punish someone but absolving Pontius Pilate made me feel all good about myself. But there are some really cool characters in there, including some from Classical Literature like Orpheus, Mordred and Hecuba. There are also some cool historical characters like Boudicca, Emperor Frederick II and Attila the Hun. There are minigames to capture sins and all that. It's great. The Virgil element adds a bit of class to all the demonic blood-shed and I completely fell in love with the direct quotes from the original text. Really quite an intelligent game.

3) It's fun. I like hack/slash games because of their pick-up and play mentality. I like being able to kick the crap out of some demons at the end of the day. I like how cool and fluid the actions are behind the combos. I also like the relic-collecting and upgrading along with the combo-tree aspect you can enhance your character with as you free more and more souls. As a fan of platforming I also like the puzzle aspect of the game and how you really have to figure out where to go next to get to the next level--this interwoven with beating up bad guys makes the game a lot more fun.

Numero Dos: The Bad, Bad Things.



TAKE THAT!

 1) Okay. Here's my problem. The game is really, really, REALLY repetitive. I thought Assassin's Creed was repetitive but this is just ridiculous. The first level is great because the demons are cleverly constructed in how the kick the crap out of you. They're hoochies with crazy man-eating lady-parts.  Because that level is Lust. Get it? And Gluttony is full of big wormy eating things. Because its eating stuff, get it? And even Greed...Greed is full of molten gold and spinning guys full of coins.....wait...what? And beyond that? It's mostly just angry angry demons that get different shades of paint for each level. It gets really old after a while. Old in the way "I just want to finish this part because I know the boss will be something cool." Which, granted is generally true. But I felt like I was doing a chore...like I'd seen everything I was going to see.

2) The mechanics were pretty irritating. Sometimes I really had to trick my character into doing what I wanted him to do...like jump straight up. And it was often unclear just where I was supposed to go next. This coupled with unforgiving environment (it IS Hell after all) led to a great deal of very fatal accidents involving cliffs and me falling off them.  There was one point in particular---and I will clarify something first if only to mollify my pride. I've been playing video games since I was 5 years old. I know how to jump over somewhere that will kill me. But I "misjumped" into lava like 20 times because the edge mechanic and the AI controlling how my character reacts with the environment is retarded. I would land on the edge of a rock and just slide off. On top of this, there is no camera control. I can't zoom in, rotate, even 1st person the scenery which makes the game feel really difficult to explore and makes my character hard to maneuver sometimes---especially when something I need to jump on is off screen. Talk about leap of faith.

3) No saving. You only save at specific points. Which is lame. Because if I die (constantly like that lava thing, which wasn't the only time kiddies) I go allllllllll the way back to my last save. Unless there was a random cut-scene or whatever. As a goody-hunter this is a little irritating--which brings me to my next point.

4) No backtracking. I don't like how there are all these things to look for and they're constantly hidden randomly all over the place in these "off the beaten path" locations and WE CAN'T GO BACK FOR THEM! There are only 2 points in the entire game that you can backtrack and of course those two points? There isn't anything for you to go back for. GAH!

All-in-All I really liked this game because it gave someone like me, a huge history and literature nerd, something squeal about. I like the beauty and horror tied in with the hack/slash platforming aspect. While a little bit rough around the edges the game is certainly worth playing and definitely make a worthwhile effort to beat. Give it a shot most definitely. I have it on XBOX 360 if anyone wants to borrow it!

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