Straightforward but fun
There's a certain gleeful abandon in Dante's Inferno. Throughout the whole game, I got this feeling that this game was developed by a committee of executives who really hate folks like Joseph Lieberman and wanted to create a game that would blatantly piss in their Cheerios. In that regard, they definitely succeeded, as Dante's Inferno is a veritable checklist of all the things that would upset or horrify a strict conservative. There's nudity. You kill non-baptized babies (seriously, the worst moment in gaming history for me - it's just so unnecessary and sickening for the sake of shock value). There's a blatant message about the dangers of unchecked zealotry. This should have been a disaster of a game, the Redneck Rampage of DMC and God of War clones if you will.
But in reality? I found myself having a really fun time with Dante's Inferno.
Once I got beyond the irritating "shock by committee" moments, the story's actually pretty darned good. Fighting through the levels of hell to get back an innocent woman is much better motivation than most of the games I've been playing of late, and it was almost a breath of fresh air to play something so adult-themed. It's a violent, crude story of sorts, but it's highly effective. It doesn't hurt that the voice acting is top-notch.
This is probably going to get a lot of negative comments, but I found the gameplay to be more fun than in Devil May Cry or God of War, the two games it clearly imitates. The game is practically on rails, pushing you constantly forward with very little branching. In just about any other genre, this would piss me off, but here, it serves to keep the player focused and moving through the story at a brisk rate. The game ultimately stumbles though in a bizarre late-game decision to pad the length with a series of arena-type fights, which either should have been spaced out or elimated altogether in favor of more interaction between Lucifer and Dante. That section of the game is almost enough to derail the game altogether, but thankfully, things pull together at the very end for a satisfying conclusion.
None of that explains quite why I liked Dante's Inferno more, but that's really hard to explain. Some of it is the madman's approach to literature. This is about as closely related to the Divine Comedy as, say, I'm related to a wheel of cheese.
Sure, we're both round, but come on, one's delicious and the other one's just cheese. More of it is that straightforward gameplay. There's no backtracking, and the game hasn't become a tired, regurgitated version of itself (yet - apparently there will be a sequel).
Would I buy a sequel at a $60 price point? Oh hell no. But this game has dropped tremendously in price, and is definitely worth a look, if not a full-on purchase, for those looking for a no-frills, surprisingly fun action game.
