Dante's Inferno is a game that I have many feelings over. Some of those feelings are good, others are simply just not at all. The story starts and finishes strong, though I am a little confused at exactly where the ending finishes or even leads to.
The combat in Dante's Inferno is very reminiscent of a God of War type game, in fact, with the addition of Death's Scythe, it is very similar to that of GoW.
That being said, one of the differences between GoW and DI is going to be the addition of the cross ability. This ability adds a different mix to the standard light and heavy combo's you normally do. I did love this at first, but as Dante grew into more powerful abilities, it became my main attack and the game flowed into the realm of a single dimension without any variation needed to win.
It was too simple, and this became one of the biggest downfalls of the game for me. Basically, as Dante grew more powerful, his attack began to overwhelm enemies and the game was entirely too easy. It felt as if I was level 10 fighting things level 10. I then hit level 50 and everything else is level 10. It just wasn't that difficult.
All of that said though, I do appreciate the skill system and how they are trying to add more dimensions to the genre. It was very welcome, and with a little more tuning will turn out to be an awesome and welcomed addition to it.
The story in DI is suitable, fits, and does well to tell the tale of Dante. I really feel it could have been more fleshed out and developed, but it wasn't horrible and did a suitable job of making the story move and along and get you into it. In fact, this is the only reason I kept playing. I wanted to see where the story went, how it ended, and eventually what I would have done through it.
The ending felt unfinished. I am still unsure where he was... purgatory!? I don't know what he will do; I am looking forward to its expansion to see where it will end up.
I am unsure if I totally agree with the game play in the heart of it. I don't understand how you can damage demons and other demonic things with demonic, dark, or evil powers... it doesn't compute. It's like a firefighter using flames to fight fire, I just don't get it. I do understand that it is just a video game, but some things should just make sense and be sensible. Oh well.
The game play was fun at a lot of parts, but entirely boring in others. The puzzles weren't hard at all, and quite honestly felt as if they were a last minute thought. I know, or at least don't think they were, but that is how they felt.
The platforming wasn't difficult at all. I counted the amount of death's from falls, 3 is the number. That doesn't seem like a lot to me at all. Even the challenge in Fraud was simple, and they clearly put in obstacles for difficult transition from the save point to the platform which you fought on. It just seemed too easy, not that I want to fail each time, but there was no imagination, no added features to make it tougher or thoughtful.
A lot of the general level design and game play just felt very generic and uninspired. It felt as if they almost took levels from multiple games, added some demon graphics and called it a day. Just very uninspired.
I really appreciated much of the design of the game. Some of the areas felt copy and pasted, but a lot of it felt like it went in with the story quite well. The first 1/3 of the game felt fresh and new, and I really loved the atmosphere, but later levels just felt reused and recycled. I am unsure if they have Captain Planet working for them, but if they do, they need to fire him. His reduce, reuse, recycle motto just doesn't fit in with a video game design...
In general I thought there were many good parts of Dante's Inferno, but also I felt as if they rushed it out, got lazy, or didn't think things through enough before releasing the game. It could have been great. The setting, theme, and just general idea of the game could have been great, but it just didn't feel fully fleshed out.
Rent this game, but I don't suggest you buy it.
