Oh look, another Dante's Inferno review

[Vanguard_Ex]

Yeees, I know, it's been done many a time now. I'll understand if you're sick of seeing this games name...and if you are:
Dante'sInfernoDante'sInfernoDante'sInferno
Tehe. But really, I haven't done a review in ages and I picked the game up yesterday (or should I say, an 18 year old colleague of mine picked it up yesterday for me), and am quite enjoying it. Why you ask? Let's have a look-see.
Let me start by getting out of the way the most striking half-criticism, which should be obvious to those who have played it for even 10 seconds; Dante's Inferno is an absolute, 100%, complete and utter shameless ripoff of God of War. The way Kratos Dante runs and jumps, the quicktime events, the myriad of mythological creatures and characters...oh, I mean, biblical creatures and characters. The game is indefinitely trying to imitate the GoW formula, which to me is neither black nor white. Yes, it means that those buggers over at Visceral are copying nasty-names, but fuck it, I love God of War. And I must admit, this game has copied it well. Sure, you could very easily call it 'God of War: Catholic edition' but it does enough to make itself its own game, so I can't help but love it.

Right, I suppose I should explain what the game is actually about:
The game starts with a video of Mr.Dante Alighieri having a pleasant camping session in the woods. He's got a roaring campfire on the go, and is suturing a cross from fabric into his skin. And thus begins the crazy. Before long you're somewhere in Acre fighting muslims with a halberd. You move on a bit after the fight, but UH OH: one of those sneaky islamists has crept up and stabbed you in the back! As you would expect, this kills you, and Death himself shows up to claim your soul. Dante hates having his soul taken, so it's time for a good old paradoxical smackdown!
[http://s171.photobucket.com/albums/u285/GeN_Ex/?action=view&current=death.jpg]
Bring it, queer bait!

Assuming you paid attention to what buttons do what, you'll defeat Death and take his scythe, but not before killing him with it as he pleads for mercy. Awesome, no?
http://mmomfg.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/Dantes-Inferno-Death.jpg
'Aww, nuts...
It then shows you coming home, you find some bloke dead with a cross in his eye, etc., woman in the back garden dead with her tit out, her ghost cames out and talks to you, another ghost grabs her and zooms off with her, you find her ghost a little further on writhing on an altar, you make your cross holy so it can shoot beams of cross shaped energy, and thus begins your epic quest of...something. At first you'll have no clue what's going on, more of the story is revealed throughout the game in arbitrary cut scenes.

Gameplaaay: once again, very much like God of War in its button mashing-ness, and the fact that bigger enemies can be finished off with quicktime events. You have your standard quick weaker attack, your heavy attack which does a bit more damage, your 'I said back the fuck up!' magic attacks, and your cross which seems pretty useless, but can get you out of some sticky situations. You also have your insta-kill grab attack, which can be used on smaller, weaker enemies whenever you want, and the bigger ones when you've weakened them enough. But wait, there's choice! Ok, so not much. When you grab an enemy to finish them, you have a choice of punishing them, or absolving (forgiving) them. Punishment is a brutal kill, and gives you Unholy experience, which is used to unlock higher level attacks and combos for your scythe. Absolving, on the other hand, usually involves vaporising them with your cross, and gives Holy ex-pee, which you use to level up your cross and magic. Sort of. Later in the levels I find that both chains seem to carry health and magic boosts, so, if you're thinking 'I'll only punish my enemies, and become a Unholy warrior!' then good luck. It's not impossible, or even implausible, but it's illogical.

I'm currently amusing myself with the thought that I'm punishing enemies for their gluttony, yet I'm sat on my arse at a computer and xbox on a saturday morning eating chocolate digestives.
Aaaaand I've just remembered my next point: God of War, choosing Greek mythology as it's idea bucket, had a massive, massive range of characters and creatures it could use. You'd be playing and all of a sudden be going 'Ooh, it's Pegasus!' Maybe not aloud, but you know what I mean. I feel that, much like everything else from God of War, they've tried to replicate this in Dante's Inferno, and found that they were destined to fail. Every now and then you come across a damned soul, which would be a person sat on the floor crying. When you grab them you're presented with their name, what they did to earn a place in the great abyss, and then decide whether you want to punish or absolve them. The problem is, the game acts as if you should know who these people are, but most of the time I sit going 'Who?'. I mean, come on, everyone's heard of a minotaur, but who the fuck is Charon, or St. Lucia...or Anthony?

[http://s171.photobucket.com/albums/u285/GeN_Ex/?action=view&current=anthony.jpg]
Incidentally this is Anthony. Nice face.

I can't deny that Visceral have indeed made Hell horrific, and they've done that with a sort of 'more fucked up than anything you would see on a Class A drug whilst in Japan' approach. So far I've seen massive pipes in the background which were literally spewing thousands of screaming people, I've fought shrieking babies with scythes for arms (s'apparently what happens if you don't get your baby baptised. WELL DON'T SIT HERE, FIND A PRIEST, DAMMIT), I've fought moaning women with blade-egded tenticles bursting from their vaginas, a gigantic woman with nipples that move like mouths, and a fat demon thing which you have the delightful choice of either attacking from head on and get vomitted on, or attack from behind and get sprayed with demonic shit. Either's good.

I think I'm just going to wrap this up, since I haven't played all the way through yet.
So far, this game has proven to be fun, and genuinely challenging, but not too much so. All of the things it brings from God of War are positive (maybe occasionally minus the quicktime events) and it certainly is curious to see what kind of horrible fucked-up thing I'll be facing around the corner. They could've done better though:
[http://s171.photobucket.com/albums/u285/GeN_Ex/?action=view&current=hell.jpg]
Jesus...


And now to get back to that damn portal puzzle...

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

Bumpety bump. I know, pathetic, but meh.

 

[Cherry Cola]

Bumpety bump. I know, pathetic, but meh.

That's what you PM me for. I iz teh professional bumper!

And yes, relying strictly on the poem wasn't the best thing to do. On one hand, you have people who haven't read it and don't understand everything that's going on because the game is shit at explaining everything, and on the other you have people who have read it and like to complain about how Dante's Inferno does it all wrong.

I simply hate it for being boring and a rip-off. The more I think back on it, the more I realize that even without being a God of War rip-off it wasn't that good. The story was stupid, everything was a clusterfuck, and it became a rather underwhelming experience.

Oh right, you made a review!

It was good. But play the whole game before reviewing it next time.

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

Bumpety bump. I know, pathetic, but meh.

That's what you PM me for. I iz teh professional bumper!

And yes, relying strictly on the poem wasn't the best thing to do. On one hand, you have people who haven't read it and don't understand everything that's going on because the game is shit at explaining everything, and on the other you have people who have read it and like to complain about how Dante's Inferno does it all wrong.

I simply hate it for being boring and a rip-off. The more I think back on it, the more I realize that even without being a God of War rip-off it wasn't that good. The story was stupid, everything was a clusterfuck, and it became a rather underwhelming experience.

Oh right, you made a review!

It was good. But play the whole game before reviewing it next time.

I'll keep that in mind, Hub ;D
Yes, it really is on some unstable ground, this game. And thanks, I'll make sure I do.

 

[BMWaugh]

I really enjoyed Dante's Inferno, but I'll admit that I've never played God of War. (Don't ask how it happened. I honestly don't know.) Though I still don't believe that ripping off an (from what I hear) amazing game is necessarily a bad thing. Sure, you could argue that the devs were just lazy about it, or whatever, but who cares how they went about making it? What matters is the final product.

As for them working off the poem, I see what Hubilub is saying. I haven't read the poem, and I didn't really know who all of the Damned were, or anything like that. And there are, of course, people crying about how it's "not right", how the original source material's been raped, etc, etc, *****, *****, moan, moan.

I try to think of the game as its own game. Whether it rips off one thing, or rapes another, I don't care. Neither of those facts detract from the gameplay.

P.S. Not a bad review.

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

I really enjoyed Dante's Inferno, but I'll admit that I've never played God of War. (Don't ask how it happened. I honestly don't know.) Though I still don't believe that ripping off an (from what I hear) amazing game is necessarily a bad thing. Sure, you could argue that the devs were just lazy about it, or whatever, but who cares how they went about making it? What matters is the final product.

As for them working off the poem, I see what Hubilub is saying. I haven't read the poem, and I didn't really know who all of the Damned were, or anything like that. And there are, of course, people crying about how it's "not right", how the original source material's been raped, etc, etc, *****, *****, moan, moan.

I try to think of the game as its own game. Whether it rips off one thing, or rapes another, I don't care. Neither of those facts detract from the gameplay.

P.S. Not a bad review.

Thanks

 

[rastlin1985]

I really enjoyed Dante's Inferno, but I'll admit that I've never played God of War. (Don't ask how it happened. I honestly don't know.) Though I still don't believe that ripping off an (from what I hear) amazing game is necessarily a bad thing. Sure, you could argue that the devs were just lazy about it, or whatever, but who cares how they went about making it? What matters is the final product.

As for them working off the poem, I see what Hubilub is saying. I haven't read the poem, and I didn't really know who all of the Damned were, or anything like that. And there are, of course, people crying about how it's "not right", how the original source material's been raped, etc, etc, *****, *****, moan, moan.

I try to think of the game as its own game. Whether it rips off one thing, or rapes another, I don't care. Neither of those facts detract from the gameplay.

P.S. Not a bad review.

totally agree. i havent played much of god of war at all.

i'd also bet a lot that most of the people on forums complaining that the source material has been raped have never read the original, or even heard of it before the game came out...

 

[Acromatopsy]

And there are, of course, people crying about how it's "not right", how the original source material's been raped, etc, etc, *****, *****, moan, moan.

I consider it a bit funny if people ***** about "raping the source material". Having read the poem I must point out making a game loyal to the book would be an act of pure masochism if not a suicide.
Yeah, sure, Dante in the game has little ...minuscule... well ok, he has no resemblance to the Dante in the poem, the author himself that is. But seriously, if the company wants to sell more than some hundred-or-so copies worldwide they simply can not include a middle-aged sickly protagonist who faints in front of each obstacle, who stops for extended conversations with every other damned soul in the way, who freaks out at every twisted punishment Hell has to offer... Every game company - no matter how equipped with artistic ambition - wants to at least cover the expenses of making the game. So this is more a question of having the game as it is or not having the game at all, not about screwing with the plot or the characters.

Right, I suppose I should explain what the game is actually about:
[... ... ...]
It then shows you coming home, you find some bloke dead with a cross in his eye, etc., woman in the back garden dead with her tit out, her ghost cames out and talks to you, another ghost grabs her and zooms off with her, you find her ghost a little further on writhing on an altar, you make your cross holy so it can shoot beams of cross shaped energy, and thus begins your epic quest of...something. At first you'll have no clue what's going on, more of the story is revealed throughout the game in arbitrary cut scenes.

Sorry, can't let this go.
I might be a bit biased or uh... distracted from your view ...cause the backstory has some clear references to the book and I've read it yadda yadda etceteraetcetera but maybe you underlined this with a couple hundred meters wide brush made of mammoths using black holes and dark matter as ink? C'mon, even if I was unfamiliar with the source material it wouldn't require too much brainpower to figure out what's the story here. True, it is a bit abstractly presented but not that cryptic really.

 

[BMWaugh]

And there are, of course, people crying about how it's "not right", how the original source material's been raped, etc, etc, *****, *****, moan, moan.

I consider it a bit funny if people ***** about "raping the source material". Having read the poem I must point out making a game loyal to the book would be an act of pure masochism if not a suicide.
Yeah, sure, Dante in the game has little ...minuscule... well ok, he has no resemblance to the Dante in the poem, the author himself that is. But seriously, if the company wants to sell more than some hundred-or-so copies worldwide they simply can not include a middle-aged sickly protagonist who faints in front of each obstacle, who stops for extended conversations with every other damned soul in the way, who freaks out at every twisted punishment Hell has to offer... Every game company - no matter how equipped with artistic ambition - wants to at least cover the expenses of making the game. So this is more a question of having the game as it is or not having the game at all, not about screwing with the plot or the characters.

This was one point that came up in the Developer Diaries. Though I'm assuming the vast majority of people doing the bitching didn't even bother to watch them.

I just think it's funny that all these people seem to think the developers had no idea what they were doing. As if they completely disregarded the poem. Maybe we should suggest that they do watch the Developer Diaries, if any of them start moaning. It explains everything.

 

[IamQ]

I mean, come on, everyone's heard of a minotaur, but who the fuck is Charon, or St. Lucia...or Anthony?

Say that in Sweden and you'll make a fool out of yourself.

OT: Good review, I enjoyed reading it and...stuff.

 

[RentCavalier]

It's a bit of a chaotic review, and you are strangely top-heavy with your pictures (and also the pictures are too big). But it's well enough, you give us a good indication of what you felt of the game and I like that you opened the review with a summary of your opinion, then detailed it in the body. That's the way a review is SUPPOSED to be written, so kudos.

In the future, I'd advise making your pictures smaller (you can resize them in Photoshop or most other photo manipulation programs, an ideal web width/height ration is, like, 455/300 or something similar) and, as was stated before, FINISH the game before writing a review, or at least get damned close to the end.

Also, for irony's sake: you complain that this game uses lots of Catholic folklore characters, and that you don't know many of them...but your list includes Charon, who is, in fact, a GREEK mythological deity. So, eh...

But all in all, good work. Resize the photos and maybe make the review more cohesive, and you'll be golden.

 

[presidentjlh]

Also, for irony's sake: you complain that this game uses lots of Catholic folklore characters, and that you don't know many of them...but your list includes Charon, who is, in fact, a GREEK mythological deity. So, eh...

Indeed. A number of the NPCs in the game were well-known figures from history (although, yes, many were also people that were only famous in Dante's time)

Spoiler

The game included and/or mentioned historical and mythological people and creatures like Lucifer, Pontius Pilate, Orpheus, Charon, King Minos, Cleopatra, Marc Antony, Cerberus, Pluto (The Roman God of the Underworld, not the cartoon dog), Attila the Hun, Mordred from the story of King Arthur. Most of these people/creatures were in the original poem.

 

[RentCavalier]

Also, for irony's sake: you complain that this game uses lots of Catholic folklore characters, and that you don't know many of them...but your list includes Charon, who is, in fact, a GREEK mythological deity. So, eh...

Indeed. A number of the NPCs in the game were well-known figures from history (although, yes, many were also people that were only famous in Dante's time)

Spoiler

The game included and/or mentioned historical and mythological people and creatures like Lucifer, Pontius Pilate, Orpheus, Charon, King Minos, Cleopatra, Marc Antony, Cerberus, Pluto (The Roman God of the Underworld, not the cartoon dog), Attila the Hun, Mordred from the story of King Arthur. Most of these people/creatures were in the original poem.

All of whom, by the by, are referenced in the original poem. So, cool. Makes me want to get this game even more. I've wanted to slaughter Hellbeasts and Saints far more than I have Greek gods.

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

It's a bit of a chaotic review, and you are strangely top-heavy with your pictures (and also the pictures are too big). But it's well enough, you give us a good indication of what you felt of the game and I like that you opened the review with a summary of your opinion, then detailed it in the body. That's the way a review is SUPPOSED to be written, so kudos.

In the future, I'd advise making your pictures smaller (you can resize them in Photoshop or most other photo manipulation programs, an ideal web width/height ration is, like, 455/300 or something similar) and, as was stated before, FINISH the game before writing a review, or at least get damned close to the end.

Also, for irony's sake: you complain that this game uses lots of Catholic folklore characters, and that you don't know many of them...but your list includes Charon, who is, in fact, a GREEK mythological deity. So, eh...

But all in all, good work. Resize the photos and maybe make the review more cohesive, and you'll be golden.

Thank you for your constructive criticism. Although I have to state that I didn't find a problem with the heavy use of Catholic folklore characters; rather, I felt that God of War's method of including hundreds of mythological figures was attempted at being replicated with Christian folklore rather than Greek mythology, but was very much lack-lustre in comparison.

Oh, also, a question: please elaborate on "chaotic"?

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

Right, I suppose I should explain what the game is actually about:
[... ... ...]
It then shows you coming home, you find some bloke dead with a cross in his eye, etc., woman in the back garden dead with her tit out, her ghost cames out and talks to you, another ghost grabs her and zooms off with her, you find her ghost a little further on writhing on an altar, you make your cross holy so it can shoot beams of cross shaped energy, and thus begins your epic quest of...something. At first you'll have no clue what's going on, more of the story is revealed throughout the game in arbitrary cut scenes.

Sorry, can't let this go.
I might be a bit biased or uh... distracted from your view ...cause the backstory has some clear references to the book and I've read it yadda yadda etceteraetcetera but maybe you underlined this with a couple hundred meters wide brush made of mammoths using black holes and dark matter as ink? C'mon, even if I was unfamiliar with the source material it wouldn't require too much brainpower to figure out what's the story here. True, it is a bit abstractly presented but not that cryptic really.

You honestly think I'm that stupid? Of course I know what the damn story is, just at first, as I stated, you will have no idea what's going on. I didn't say it was cryptic or even hard to understand at all.

 

[RentCavalier]

It's a bit of a chaotic review, and you are strangely top-heavy with your pictures (and also the pictures are too big). But it's well enough, you give us a good indication of what you felt of the game and I like that you opened the review with a summary of your opinion, then detailed it in the body. That's the way a review is SUPPOSED to be written, so kudos.

In the future, I'd advise making your pictures smaller (you can resize them in Photoshop or most other photo manipulation programs, an ideal web width/height ration is, like, 455/300 or something similar) and, as was stated before, FINISH the game before writing a review, or at least get damned close to the end.

Also, for irony's sake: you complain that this game uses lots of Catholic folklore characters, and that you don't know many of them...but your list includes Charon, who is, in fact, a GREEK mythological deity. So, eh...

But all in all, good work. Resize the photos and maybe make the review more cohesive, and you'll be golden.

Thank you for your constructive criticism. Although I have to state that I didn't find a problem with the heavy use of Catholic folklore characters; rather, I felt that God of War's method of including hundreds of mythological figures was attempted at being replicated with Christian folklore rather than Greek mythology, but was very much lack-lustre in comparison.

Oh, also, a question: please elaborate on "chaotic"?

You jump around a lot, or give the impression of doing so. Maybe it was just because I found the pictures distracting, but the whole review seemed like you'd slapped a lot of information indiscriminately together. Looking back, though, I can't find anything specific about your review that is indicative of this (though I'm certain I'd seen something at the time.) This might just be a nitpick, but I'd keep it in mind for future reviews--everyone likes organization. It eases the read. If you are going to use pictures, try to distribute them evenly throughout the review.

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

It's a bit of a chaotic review, and you are strangely top-heavy with your pictures (and also the pictures are too big). But it's well enough, you give us a good indication of what you felt of the game and I like that you opened the review with a summary of your opinion, then detailed it in the body. That's the way a review is SUPPOSED to be written, so kudos.

In the future, I'd advise making your pictures smaller (you can resize them in Photoshop or most other photo manipulation programs, an ideal web width/height ration is, like, 455/300 or something similar) and, as was stated before, FINISH the game before writing a review, or at least get damned close to the end.

Also, for irony's sake: you complain that this game uses lots of Catholic folklore characters, and that you don't know many of them...but your list includes Charon, who is, in fact, a GREEK mythological deity. So, eh...

But all in all, good work. Resize the photos and maybe make the review more cohesive, and you'll be golden.

Thank you for your constructive criticism. Although I have to state that I didn't find a problem with the heavy use of Catholic folklore characters; rather, I felt that God of War's method of including hundreds of mythological figures was attempted at being replicated with Christian folklore rather than Greek mythology, but was very much lack-lustre in comparison.

Oh, also, a question: please elaborate on "chaotic"?

You jump around a lot, or give the impression of doing so. Maybe it was just because I found the pictures distracting, but the whole review seemed like you'd slapped a lot of information indiscriminately together. Looking back, though, I can't find anything specific about your review that is indicative of this (though I'm certain I'd seen something at the time.) This might just be a nitpick, but I'd keep it in mind for future reviews--everyone likes organization. It eases the read. If you are going to use pictures, try to distribute them evenly throughout the review.

Ahh, no I'd agree with you there. I tended to start a point and then veer to another as soon as it popped into my head. Thank you, I'll be sure to better organise my information next time.