Review: Dante's Inferno (2010) (Xbox 360/PlayStation 3)

• June 9, 2011
• James Skemp
• gaming, review

Enjoyable, but quick, with some annoying platforming

As I continue playing games that received less than critical acclaim, I found myself playing Dante's Inferno for the Xbox 360.

Dante's Inferno tells the story of Dante who journeys through Hell to save his beloved Beatrice. As we progress through the story we learn more about Dante himself, and why it is that he doesn't seem so out of place in this land.

The story is rather well done, with a mix of CGI and animation telling parts of the story. The cast is fairly strong, with each character having a rather distinctive character.

The play style is similar to God of War, but the button mashing sequences are relatively few and far between, with the majority of them being rather easy. For this reason, if you enjoy God of War, but find it aggravating, you may find comfort in this game.

Moves include a weapon, long range cross, magic, dash, and a basic comboing system. There are two distinct trees containing skills and bonuses that can be unlocked, with both trees being completely unlocked if you play through the game more than once. Relics can also be found and equipped granting various bonuses.

Altogether this resulted in a fairly enjoyable experience.

The one thing that I didn't necessarily care for is the platforming, which due to a 'stationary' camera, can get rather annoying, rather fast. However, save points are such that only one area drove me to replay approximately 30 seconds of an area almost a dozen times.

Seemingly the PlayStation 3 version is slightly superior, but for the price at which it is currently available, I'm happy with my 360-version purchase.

Over the course of 5 days Dante's Inferno provided a little over 7 hours of gameplay, and 850 of 1000 achievements. I played only the first half or so on the normal difficulty, switching down to casual only to move through the game faster.

I'll give this game 3 of 5 stars since it's enjoyable, but may not stay in my collection after I pick up the last few achievements, if I decide to do that (which I probably will).

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