Dante's Inferno Preview Page 2

10 Dec 2009 at 17:04:36 by Richard Walker

Pressing on through Hell’s reception area (there aren’t even any coffee table magazines to read – rubbish), we come up against yet more zombie creatures that get to see the business end of Death’s blade and some even get to be punished or absolved as we see fit. At one point, we have to fight on while avoiding the path of a crushing wheel and intermittent sheets of flame spewing through fissures in the walls.

Those God of War comparisons still fail to go away, but at least we’re beginning to get a real sense that Dante’s Inferno could very well be a slightly different beast to Sony Santa Monica’s mythological epic even if the two games do undeniably share the same DNA.

First and foremost, the oppressive setting is unique in design with Wayne Barlowe of Hellboy movie fame and the rest of the Visceral art team bringing Dante Alighieri’s vision of Hell to startling life. The gameplay mechanics feel both tight and fluid, enabling you to string together gore strewn combos with minimal effort. More importantly, the game is obscenely fun to play, even if it does play incredibly fast and loose with the poem’s original content, transforming Dante from powerless spectator into hard-bitten warrior who’s seen more than his fair share of action during the Crusades.

The final area of the demo unlocks Dante’s first magic ability, an ice spell called Righteous Path that creates a frozen trail that both damages and slows enemies. It proves useful for the last challenge, which involves fighting off countless foes including goat-horned beasts with serrated blades. It’s not long before we’re decapitating and ripping them apart using a QTE that involves a single outward thrust of the analogue sticks sending two blood-drenched chunks of flesh spraying through the air. And then one more arrives, riding on the back of a hulking great upright demon that pounds the ground with his fists and stomps around in an attempt to mash us into puree.

Hacking at his legs for a while soon makes him vulnerable enough to prompt a QTE finisher, initiated by a press of the right trigger followed by a string of face button presses that sees Dante ultimately slam the blade of his scythe into the creature’s brain, allowing us to ride around and manipulate the giant beast. After breathing a few jets of flame from the creature’s mouth to finish off the stragglers on the ground, we march on through the huge stone doors, entering Hell’s first circle on the back of an enormous Hell beast.

The screenlack anD we&rsqqrack of ew erormo;re told to Go To Hell. Welcome to Dante’s Inferno.

The Dante’s Inferno demo is available on PSN on 10 December with the Xbox 360 version following two weeks later. The full game is slated for a 5 February 2010 release.

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