Descent Into Hell – Controls & Elements, Part 1
Players control Dante, a skilled warrior who participated in the violence that were the Crusades around the twelfth century. Before embarking on the violent, sin-filled Crusades, Dante and his love, Beatrice, made a pact that he was to remain faithful to her while he was away. As a symbol of their love and the pact, she gives him a metal Holy Cross that he keeps at his side. Meanwhile, a bishop had promised Dante and all who were going into battle for the Crusades that all sins would be absolved. So, Dante and his fellow warriors committed a variety of atrocious acts in what they thought was the name of God.
Turns out, the bishop was wrong, and Dante had to account for his sins. He arrives home in time to find his father and Beatrice dead, only to be stabbed to death moments later (those of you who played the demo are already familiar with this). Death arrives, scythe in hand, to take Dante and to reap his soul, but Dante isn’t prepared to go — he challenges Death and wins, taking his soul-reaping scythe. A vision of Beatrice with Satan at her side appears, and Dante goes to Hell to chase her soul, ultimately to free it from the despair that Dante has caused it.
Freeing Beatrice from the clutches of Satan and Hell is the primary goal of Dante’s Inferno, one that took me right at twelve (in game) hours to complete. It’s certainly worth noting that the story of Dante’s Inferno isn’t so one-sided as it first seems either. Dante’s past is a little more complicated than you’re at first led to believe, something that is explained as he enters each circle of Hell and is told through animated flashbacks. We’re sure to see more of Dante soon, including on April 29th with the first DLC that adds not only an in game editor, but co-op multiplayer — wowsers.
So Dante’s Inferno plays like a classic third person action game with familiar controls and mechanics. Comparisons have been drawn to God of War, and for good reason — there’s an awful lot of familiar elements here from God of War and other classics from the genre. Many said the same thing about Darksiders, but as I said in my review of that game, I don’t have a problem with a game reusing successful in game elements from another game. I mean, if it works, it works, and while it may not be original, it’s still proven and usually quite fun.
That said, Dante’s does have several unique features that I will get to shortly. To get started though, lets take a look at the controls and some of the abilities Dante has at his disposal. And on that note, I thought Visceral did a great job of balancing all of Dante’s abilities — you’ll need everyone of them to survive. The most obvious weapon at Dante’s disposal is that huge scythe that he took from Death. The scythe is a fun to use and very beautiful weapon that has a variety of light and heavy attack combos, along with launching maneuvers, the ability to grab, and also to extend to reach grappling points during environmental platforming sequences. Dante also possesses the Holy Cross, given to him by Beatrice. You might call it a secondary weapon, but it’s just about every bit as useful (and used, for that matter) as the scythe. The Holy Cross not only provides a small beacon of constant illumination as it hangs from Dante’s belt, but it shoots out light that damages the forces of Hell.
Both the scythe and Holy Cross can be upgraded at anytime in the Pause menu, assuming you have reaped or found enough souls to spend on upgrades, that is. Similar to the red orbs Kratos collects in God of War, souls are spent on upgrading Dante’s combat abilities. What’s further interesting about this is that Dante has two simultaneous upgrade paths — Unholy and Holy. The Unholy path gives additional combos to the scythe, while the Holy path upgrades the Holy Cross. Each path has several other choices as well, including expanding the health, mana, and Redemption bars, upgrading Magic abilities, unlocking counterattack and damage reduction abilities, etc. Both Unholy and Holy paths have seven levels, and although you can see what nearly every level has to offer in terms of upgrades, you cannot unlock something from a level until you have earned it.
Further Into Hell – Controls & Elements, Part 2
How do you go about earning levels in the Unholy or Holy paths? Well, for that, you must either Punish (Unholy) or Absolve (Holy) enemies and some NPCs known as The Damned that you find during your journey through the nine circles of Hell. Not all enemies can be Punished or Absolved, but most can. The weakest of Hell’s forces can just be snatched up by the scythe and then players have a brief moment to decide if they want to Punish (X) or Absolve (B). Once you press your selection, Dante goes into a very brief, seamless mini-game whereby he either destroys the being or absolves it, sending its soul to Heaven. Depending on the type of enemy and which route you took (X or B), the mini-game will change slightly. Sometimes you need only tap B rapidly as Dante knocks down the enemy and thrusts his Holy Cross into its face, other times you will send the enemy airborne and then quickly push the left and right sticks in opposite directions to split the foe apart. There are a variety of such finishing moves, all of which are fun, cool looking, satisfying, and easy to pull off. If you make a mistake, you don’t take any damage, and you can try again quickly. Oh, and while you’re Punishing or Absolving, surrounding enemies cannot harm you, but certain Punishing motions can actually harm nearby enemies.
As for The Damned, there are twenty-seven spread out across all nine circles. You can think of them as collectibles really, to go along with the Judas coins and Beatrice Stones. Sometimes you’ll hear the lamentations of The Damned before you see them, but their appearance is unmistakable — a crumpled down individual, usually with their hands over their face. When Dante approaches them, he can continue to hear them speak or grab them. When you grab them, a brief description of who they are and why they are in this circle of hell appears. Then, you can either Punish or Absolve. When you Punish, Dante smashes through them, destroying their soul, which earns you a lot (100 or more) Unholy experience points. When you Absolve them, a mini-game pops up. Here, a cross, with each of the four directions mapped to a face button, appears. Small red circles appear from the sides of the screen at different speeds, and a timer is situated in the middle of the cross. The goal is to press the face button just as the red circle passes over it, just like a rhythm game. Any mistakes take away one from your score, and when the timer expires, the total number of red circles — which represent sins — is tallied up and multiplied by 30 to give you the number of souls you earn.
The other two collectibles are Judas coins and Beatrice Stones. There are only three Beatrice stones; I managed to find two, but had I found the third, I would have had the ability to automatically Absolve rather than having to go through the button matching sequence; it’s a neat bonus, but not a terribly useful one. Judas coins are found at the same fountains as normal souls are collected. I thought it was odd that these fountains didn’t look any different than the normal soul fountains, but they are at least hidden a bit more. There are thirty of these to collect, with each pair of five giving you a couple thousand souls or so to spend on upgrades.
And then there are Relics — there are thirty-one of these, I only managed to find twenty-five. Relics are neat artifacts that you can equip onto Dante and switch out at all will from the Pause Menu. By default, Dante can only hold two Relics at a time, but you can purchase an additional two slots which I highly recommend. Relics give Dante various bonuses, like increased scythe attack damage, improve magic damage, earning more Redemption, decreasing the amount of damage sustained, increasing the chance of a Critical Hit, and so forth. Most Relics can be upgraded by having them equipped while playing through the game. No Relic can be upgraded more than three times, and upgrades simply increase the percentage of whatever it is the Relic affects, like Holy Cross damage, etc. Besides adding some customization to the game, as well as an interesting Collectible, I liked that the Relics all had unique names and appearances (although you can’t see any change to Dante when he’s wearing one Relic as opposed to another). That the Relics can be upgraded further added to their ‘weight’ in the game.
Most Relics have to be found by finding these certain, still, beasts that are in Hell. If you can find them and get to them, you just need to Absolve them and poof, you get a Relic. Many Relics are also just given to you by Virgil, the spirit guide who was sent by Beatrice to help guide you. Virgil is pretty cool; he appears at predetermined locations and gives Dante some insight as to what circle he’s about to face, and why these souls are damned there. Out of nowhere, you get Relics from him during several of these brief conversations, which I thought was a little weird to receive them from a spirit, but hey, it works.
Dante can also use Magic. There are five or six Magic abilities in the game, some are earned and others must be purchased. These include Lust Storm, Righteous Path, Divine Armor, Sins of the Father, Martyrdom, and Forbidden Fruit. These can all be leveled up with purchases, too. Divine Armor was hugely important to me as it heals Dante while making him invincible for a short period of time. Lust Storm is great for damaging any nearby enemies, while Forbidden Fruit stuns them. I never used the Martyrdom ability that has Dante taking a big loss in Health and Mana to do massive damage to those around him, while Righteous Path is a good lunging attack.
Finally, there is Redemption. Similar to Rage of the Gods/Titans from God of War, Redemption is a meter that is built up through combat. When used, Dante is able to attack faster and do more damage for a period of time. You can purchase more meter space for Redemption and there is at least one Relic that helps Dante fill that meter quicker.
Navigating the Circles
Dante’s path is a treacherous one that takes him from the Surface, to Limbo, and then through Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Anger, Heresy, Violence, Fraud, and Treachery. Each circle has an overall unique look to it, although there are some reused textures and ideas from one to another. I thought Anger was perhaps the coolest looking, it’s one you’ve probably seen in screenshots and trailers by now. The River Styx is awesome, and all of the hands reaching out from the murky water — really neat stuff. Greed has a golden mechanical look to it, and Gluttony, probably my least favorite thanks to those darn worms (and the gatekeeper), has a fleshy visceral look to it (no pun intended). I thought Violence was really well done too; it’s broken up into three sections, which I won’t spoil for you, each unique and interesting.
Each circle presents one or two new enemies, and most have a boss of some kind as well. The enemies and boss fights are typical, but that doesn’t make them boring. Enemy types include the “throw away” kind that attack in bunches and have weak attacks and low health. You’ve also got a few tougher foes with lots of HP and some damaging attacks. There is a ‘priest’ character that you start to see in Heresy that can make nearby enemies invincible until you defeat him. Expect some flying enemies in the form of bats (right outta Hell, mind you), as well as fast moving female characters like we saw in Darksiders and the Medusa’s of God of War. Boss fights come in a few varieties too, including challenges where you have to do something with the environment to beat the boss as seen in Lust, and those where it’s simply one on one, as during one part of Violence.
All of the combat and controls and so forth work out very well — it’s a competent battle system that includes counterattacks, light and heavy attacks, ranged attacks, magic, evades, and even some throwing of minions with the scythe. Most of the available upgradeable moves are interesting too. Most attack moves have purchasable upgrades, too. For example, say that you’re doing LT + Y; if you bought the upgrade, and you press LT + Y again while he’s doing the attack, Dante will finish with a devastating Critical Hit. I believe the latter is the Diabolic Guillotine which is just awesome to see.
My only gripe with the controls would be in some of the jumping or platforming sequences, of which there are actually a healthy dose of, especially in between each circle of Hell. I’m not sure what it was, but many times, just tapping A to jump would have Dante jump up and swipe with the scythe, rather than just jump. I was a bit confused by that and it made double jumping — required to reach a lot of platforms — a bit of a trick at times. Additionally, I thought there were two particular boss fights (gates of Gluttony and the final boss) whereby having to wait, repeatedly, for a button prompt, was a bad idea. It really did a lot to break the player’s immersion because you’re basically ‘stuck’ until you can get the prompt to appear. I’m being vague here, I know, but I don’t want to risk spoiling anything for anyone. Now on the other hand, I did like that Visceral put in small glowing orange markers to indicate where Dante needs to go. You’ll see these either on the edge of cliffs, indicating that Dante needs to go over to the edge and hop down, on grappling hooks, or on vertical objects that Dante can climb on. I thought having those gave players a subtle point of direction without having to do a map or compass or something like that.
Punished (A Few Things I Didn’t Like)
For the most part, Dante’s Inferno is a great game that I really enjoyed and that I will probably play through again thanks to Resurrection Mode, which allows you to play through the 9 circles (so not quite 100% of the game, but nearly) with all of your upgraded abilities (and a new Crusaders costume) from your first play through. Plus, players have the option to max out the remainder of Dante’s skills in this mode.
Now, what about the bad stuff? I noted several things during my play through that I didn’t like. First, I thought some of the Circles were really brief. Some Circles, or at least what are built up as major parts of a Circle by Virgil and the appearance of the environment, are like five to ten minutes long. It was just a bit jarring that here I am, about to step forth into this next part of Hell expecting a slice of epic pie and suddenly I’m onto the next area. I just wonder if maybe Visceral should have spread out the adventure a little more to make each Circle more detailed and larger, making it more captivating and memorable. It’s not that the Circles aren’t memorable, but they often felt brief, although not rushed. Maybe some DLC will allow us to spend more time in certain Circles, further exploring Hell.
That brings me to my second point, which is minor compared to the first — players can’t adjust the camera. This isn’t too uncommon for the genre I suppose, but I would have loved the ability to stroll through Hell, looking around as I pleased. Most areas wouldn’t deserve, you know, much of a second look, but there are some, especially during Anger and Violence, that would have been interesting to further explore. That said, trying to manage a camera during the frantic combat would not have been cool, although I will say that the auto-aiming Dante does can make using the Holy Cross a pain to use at times when there are weaker (flying) enemies and stronger enemies attacking you at once. It can be a pain to get the brunt of the Holy Cross’s attack aimed in the direction of the bats because Dante seems to prefer to attack the higher HP enemies on the ground first. Anyway, if Visceral implemented a basic manual camera, whereby you had to hold down the LB and RB, for example, then I think players would have had the best of both worlds.
There’s also a part late in the game that I didn’t like where players must go through nine or ten challenge rooms. It seems out of place and I thought it was really annoying. Most of the nine challenges are pretty easy, but some, like staying in air for eight seconds and doing a single, uninterrupted combo, were really frustrating. Hanging in the air for eight seconds isn’t the way I play, nor is stringing together a single, really long combo because I like to evade and I tend to take hits here and there. That final challenge took me the better part of twenty minutes and I just felt like the whole ‘challenge room’ design was completely unnecessary and out of place in what is otherwise a smooth campaign.
Speaking of things out of place, there are a bunch of lever, or switch, puzzles. One of these even revolves around a Portal puzzle in Gluttony. It’s hard not to smirk or shake your head at the amount of switches in Hell, you know? Just didn’t feel right. Same goes for the handful of ‘slider’ puzzles whereby Dante must grab an object and slide it around the room to create some kind of effect. That’s one old school genre design element that I wouldn’t mind seeing less of.
Finally, I had two glitches occur. One was after the boss in Violence, when I was riding down an elevator and had a ton of enemies to fight. The game locked up, and I had to reboot my system. Unfortunately, there was no auto save after the boss fight so I had to fight him again, which wasn’t too bad thankfully. I think it’s reasonable to attribute that lock up to a fluke though, but I did want to mention it. Secondly, in Greed, there is a switch puzzle. However, if you enter the room, clear it, and then run back out to the save spot and save, the switch no longer works. Fortunately — and this is why I always do this in every game I can — I had multiple save spots so I was only about five minutes back.
Presentation, Final Thoughts
Just a couple of other points to make about Dante’s Inferno before hitting the summary. First, there’s reason to come back after the journey is through. When you complete the game, Resurrection Mode is unlocked, along with a new costume, the Infernal difficulty, and the Gates of Hell challenge room. Speaking of difficulty level, I started the game on Hellish, aka, Hard. I played on Hellish for the first few hours, which got me to Gluttony. Damn, it was tough — thankfully, you can change the difficulty at anytime, so I dropped it back to Normal (Zealot) and played most of the rest of the game on that skill level, changing it back to Hellish a time or two. I had a lot more success, and fun, on Zealot than on Hellish. The amount of damage enemies do to you between the two is almost night and day, and the enemies have less HP on Zealot. I think the actually quantity of enemies is the same though. With Resurrection Mode, I feel like I’m a whole heck of a lot more prepared to play through on Hellish, possibly even on Infernal, but I doubt it.
The Gates of Hell mode is pretty neat, but not really my thing since failure = starting all over from the start. Gates of Hell puts Dante in a challenge room with whatever abilities that you finished the game with. Each room gets progressively harder and not only are you fighting to survive, but you’re fighting against a timer. When either your health or the timer expires, the challenge is over. I made it to level fifteen on my first attempt and haven’t gone back for more, choosing instead to poke around in Resurrection Mode. Plus, there will be DLC for this game, and probably lots of it. There’s a trailer for the St. Lucia DLC due on April 29th included on the disc, as well as a lot of concept art and the option to revisit the flashbacks and movies from within the game.
And to wrap up, how about that presentation? Visceral did a great job with the cutscenes, voice acting, and graphics in the game. Framerates are great, there’s a lot of nice detail in the game world, and the animations are smooth and varied. I wasn’t as keen on the soundtrack, but it certainly gets the job done. The effects are good, you’ll hear plenty of moans and lamentations from The Damned as you work your way through Hell. Dante sounds good in combat too, I especially like his ferocious yell when performing some of his heavy attacks.
With that, let’s get to the summary…