Dante's Inferno and The Hate on it

[Bat Vader]

Dante's Inferno is the rare game that offends insiders because of it's crass viral campaigns and it offends hardcore players who don't hang out on the internet by being remarkably similar to God of War in every conceivable way. What I can't figure out is if they actually read anything besides the Wikipedia entry on Dante's Inferno. They show surprising dedication to crafting the levels, but then miss the point of the original work so completely.

If they actually followed the work to the teeth.. all Dante would be doing is walking around the 9 circles of hell with Virgil, sightseeing.
It's a fucking videogame.. what do you expect?

What is the point of making the game than if they are not going to make the game exactly like the book? I expect a game developer to use good judgment and perhaps understand that there are some things that don't need to become video games.

There was no reason for Dante's Inferno to become a video game.

 

[Motakikurushi]

God of War? Oh, that fun, if a little bit overrated game...

The point here is Bayonetta was released just recently and Dante's Inferno pretty much has no place in the gaming market right now. It's an unapolagetic scathing of the original poem, a lacklustre, lazy brawler with a horrendously patronising art style (we get it, gold in the greed circle of hell; subtle) and one of the most pathetic combat systems in recent memory. Bayonetta has set the bar very high for action games and Dante's Inferno doesn't even come close to meeting its standards. Why play Dante's Inferno when you can play a game with a more fluid combat system? So, it's like Bayonetta, but worse. Why bother...

It's astonishing how so many people refuse to acknowledge Bayonetta's existance. This game does exist, and yes, it is good. God of War is not the only action game ever made. One last thing, when you base video games off of literature you'd better make sure you aren't ripping it off entirely. Take Bioshock for example. Ok, Atlas Shrugged, but inspiration was taken from it and utilised in a refreshing way. Dante's Inferno is pretty much The Divine Comedy (albeit a little toned down for the linear plot fanatics) and it makes no effort to hide this fact.

 

[lacerator]

Can people please stop complaining that Dante's Inferno "rips off" the God of War combat system - it's very similar yes but can you honestly say that Halo doesn't have exactly the same game-play as Call of Duty, or almost any other FPS for that matter?

people seem to forget that games of the same genre will almost always have similar control and/or combat systems, as they are one of the things which defines that genre

As a person who has actually played Inferno I can say that despite being ostensibly a good game it cannot hold a candle to GoW so I can't see what the problem is anyway

 

[andoc]

I think that a movie about Dante's Inferno would be a lot better.

 

[Frostwing]

I don't know why everyone is getting so angry at Dante's Inferno. It doesn't make any sense to me. First of all everyone is saying it is a God of War rip-off. It is not. Ghost Rider was a God of War rip off as it was pretty much the same game from what I heard. I admit I haven't played the game so I might be mistaken, but in stead of using swords tied to chains, you are using flaming chains. It is pretty much the same weapon. Plus I heard that Ghost Rider was a poorly designed game. Second, isn't God of War pretty much a rip off of Devil may Cry? Devil may cry did come first and even if God of War is more popular then Devil May Cry God of war took much of it's game-play from Devil May Cry. If we are comparing those type of games don't forget about Ninja Gaiden. That too is similar. If you like God of War why must you compare it to other games that are similar to it. Playing the same game over and over again would get boring, but playing games that are similar will keep things interesting because they both have the game-play you crave but are different enough to stop the monotony. Now another reason that some people seem to not like it here is that it doesn't follow the poem. SageRuffin makes a good point here when he said that neither did God of War. If you think about it God of War is so unreal but as it is fun to play we do not care. In God of War 1, Ares only gives Kratos the Blades of Chaos. While it is a powerful weapon it does not give me the super strength and god like endurance that he seems to posses. If the game were realistic he would pass out every twenty minuets or so due to fatigue from all the high intensity activity he is doing. Furthermore the developers mix and match aspects of Greek mythology to pretty much create their own version of Greek mythology for Kratos. Now Dante's Inferno may not stay true to the poem but if it did, would you really want to play it? Does anyone like Darksiders? That game is about the Apocalypse but I am sure that it does not stay true to the book of Revelations in which the Apocalypse or rather the Christan version of the Apocalypse happens. Any game involving demons or angels tends to not exactly follow whatever source it is based on either. Does that bother anyone? Plus the fact that Dante's Inferno doesn't follow the poem doesn't seem that big of a deal as the poem was pretty much him bad mouthing his enemies who were for the most part his enemies due to political reasons. If you read the poem you find that the people Dante didn't like he found in hell. While I am not saying that the poem is bad for this reason you people seem to worship it and place it upon a sacred pedestal that while it may be a good poem it may not deserve such reverence. Plus I have some issues with the combat of God of War. The really big combo moves you do you can't stop yourself once you start so if you hit and enemy they can still hit you breaking your combo, killing you, and you just have to watch because there is nothing you can do. It is especially bad if you hit the wrong button my accident to start this long combo. That is a problem, a problem that no one seems to notice. While it is not a deal breaker in regards to the game it is a problem never the less which makes God of War not the perfect game people seem to think it is.

 

[Zacharine]

And I say again, if God of War stayed true to the Greek myths, Kratos would've been devoured by hydra before you even get into the real meat of the game (or, I'm pretty sure that's what would've happened).

But Kratos never was a well-established character in Greek mythology, now was he? He was a somewhat minor character, the son of Pallas and Styx, and the personification of strength and power and his siblings were Nike ("victory"), Bia ("force") and Zelus ("zeal").

Personification of strenght and power. On that context, the God Of War makes somewhat of a sense.

But in DIvine Comedy, Dante is a poet, that gets a tour on Hell, Purgatory and Heaven. And Yet in Dante's Inferno, he's a freaking scythe-wielding demon-slaying supersoldier.

If they had to make a game about Divine Comedy, a puzzle/adventure game would have worked a lot better, because no combat need be involved. Yet now the focus is solely on combat, an antithesis on the actual literary work.

And if they had to make a 'slaughter-them-all' fighting game, why use the name of a well-established non-violent character who is a poet, instead of say.... a previously unnamed, (non-existant in the actual poems) brother of Dante's who comes back from war X to find that Dante has bound for Hell. Fearing worst, he then sets out to 'liberate' Dante from the Nine Circles Of Hell, without knowing that Dante was receiving a tour, would eventually return unharmed and went willingly. This way, the setting stays exactly the same and actual butchery of the original works is almost halved reducing it only to God Of War level of artistic freedom. And all they would have needed to do was rename the game's main character and add a single line on text right to the beginning.

But they didn't. And the only reason I can see for it, is because they shamelessly want to ride out the fame the Divine Comedy has made during the centuries. And this irks me more than anything. Sure, I may be overreacting, but this could have been avoided with approximately 1 hour of work by a single member of the dev-team.

 

[BaldursBananaSoap]

I gave it a chance and it fucking sucked. (Top tip: if you're going to rip off another game; improve on it instead of making a shitty version of it while butchering literature in the process and making the environments unbelievably repetitive)

 

[SageRuffin]

And I say again, if God of War stayed true to the Greek myths, Kratos would've been devoured by hydra before you even get into the real meat of the game (or, I'm pretty sure that's what would've happened).

But Kratos never was a well-established character in Greek mythology, now was he? He was a somewhat minor character, the son of Pallas and Styx, and the personification of strength and power and his siblings were Nike ("victory"), Bia ("force") and Zelus ("zeal").

Personification of strenght and power. On that context, the God Of War makes somewhat of a sense.

But in DIvine Comedy, Dante is a poet, that gets a tour on Hell, Purgatory and Heaven. And Yet in Dante's Inferno, he's a freaking scythe-wielding demon-slaying supersoldier.

If they had to make a game about Divine Comedy, a puzzle/adventure game would have worked a lot better, because no combat need be involved. Yet now the focus is solely on combat, an antithesis on the actual literary work.

And if they had to make a 'slaughter-them-all' fighting game, why use the name of a well-established non-violent character who is a poet, instead of say.... a previously unnamed, (non-existant in the actual poems) brother of Dante's who comes back from war X to find that Dante has bound for Hell. Fearing worst, he then sets out to 'liberate' Dante from the Nine Circles Of Hell, without knowing that Dante was receiving a tour, would eventually return unharmed and went willingly. This way, the setting stays exactly the same and actual butchery of the original works is almost halved reducing it only to God Of War level of artistic freedom. And all they would have needed to do was rename the game's main character and add a single line on text right to the beginning.

But they didn't. And the only reason I can see for it, is because they shamelessly want to ride out the fame the Divine Comedy has made during the centuries. And this irks me more than anything. Sure, I may be overreacting, but this could have been avoided with approximately 1 hour of work by a single member of the dev-team.

Looks like my rebuttal's are little more than those of an ignorant fanboy.

Very well, I give. I don't want this to get bloody.

 

[DigitalSushi]

Also having read the original book by Dante Aligheri i know what parts they've changed and parts that have been taken out,

The majority of people who say they have read the book are lying.

 

[Riobux]

Wait, didn't Devil May Cry come before God Of War?

 

[ssgt splatter]

OP...THANK YOU! I'd say I love you but I ain't that kind of guy. That is exactly what people need to realise about games like this.

 

[mysterj]

Well the game have excessive amount of boobs, mostly grotesque and serve no purpose. Lack of variety after first few levels, looks dull after awhile but the initial presentation was god.

Basically is an 8 hour game that had 2 hours of variety put into it, and then you replay the levels three times. The actual length of the game is not really 8 hours, it is stretched out by trial/error death followed by massive set back due to long distance save point.

Average and repetitive would be the way to put it.

 

[Xanadu84]

Also having read the original book by Dante Aligheri i know what parts they've changed and parts that have been taken out, but when i saw this game i went into it knowing that it wouldn't be the exact adaptation of the story.

The parts they have kept the same? You mean there's a guy named Dante and he is in hell, and...that's pretty much it...

Seriously, I don't really care about God of War, and am welcoming to any contenders. And even though they decided to go with some incredibly asinine marketing gimmicks, I would be willing to give it a shot. My issue is that they really need to stop comparing the game to the book. If you call it the same thing, hey, no big deal, its just kind of funny. But they go so far as to put game art on the cover of the poem. This...it's not harmful, but it's so, so silly.

 

[Frostwing]

I said that first about devil may cry comming before God of War

 

[katsabas]

I will give this a rent once I am done with Brutal Legend, Wipeout and Fallout 3. The only who would have to ***** about this game is someone with higher standards than Yahtzee or anyone from the Vatican. Fun is underrated nowadays. A developer's next game doesn't have to be the worst ever or the beginning of the end. Sometimes, it is just another game.

 

[sheogoraththemad]

I think Dante's inferno is pretty sweet, the story of going trough every ring with its own theme is just sick

 

[Frostwing]

There is no reason to hate the game so. If you don't like it don't play it. It is as simple as that. Most of the hate is that it differs from the poem. While a lot of people may have read it or might read it in the future, a lot of people will never read it. They might enjoy the game. You should give them the chance. Don't say it sucks because it differs from the poem. Just say that it does differ from the poem. Let people know, but let them make their own minds as to whether or not they want to play it.

 

[secretshadow90]

Hi folks, I'm a literature major so I'll throw in my two cents. I'm excited about Dante's Inferno. It's on my wishlist right next to Bioshock 2. I haven't read the poem yet, but all of the Divine Comedy is sitting on my desk waiting to be read when I have free time. Now, I can accept that the changed the concept of the poem somewhat to fit a video game, because it's a video game and I want it to be fun. They took a well-established concept and put a twist on it, which I whole-heartedly endorse. Let's face it, in the poem Dante's a wuss. The video game Dante is not anything like poem Dante (poem Dante was never a crusader and also had a bit of an ego ie he put a man in hell because of a feud and placed himself among the great poets [learned that last bit in my Canterbury Tales class]). I'm going to wait and see what happens. If they do this well, it will be a great game. If they do this poorly, it will generate as much rage as the end of the movie version of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. And if nothing else, the poem is about to get a lot of publicity which is good for keeping classics alive. (Yes, there is always an ulterior motive :3)

 

[Zacharine]

Looks like my rebuttal's are little more than those of an ignorant fanboy.

Very well, I give. I don't want this to get bloody.

Ignorance is rectified with knowledge. Now you know and can choose what to do based on that knowledge.

Though your message implies that you have already chosen the mature path and I congratulate you for it. I neither had or have any wish for this to get bloody, but I simply feel strongly about one of the best literacy works I've read and the issue is making me.... emotional.

 

[reg42]

Please people, stop calling it a book. It's a fucking poem.
OT: Yeah, I haven't played it. I was looking forward to it, but now that I look at all the reviews (and I've looked at a lot), the impression I get is that it's God of War with a different skin.