Sexy Videogame Land blogger, writer, journalist, and drunken podcaster, Leigh Alexander, opened the gates of hell, actually, she critiques EA Visceral Game's Dante's Inferno for being, wait, she actually does
not critique it all. Leigh only points to other sites, like
Kotaku's Brian Crecente,
First Wall Rebate and
Chris Remo's posts successfully pulling apart the foundation of what the IP is based on. Very gory, yet insightful posts. (Visceral Game's are known for Dead Space, The Simpson's Game, James Bond, Lord of The Rings, Road Rash, and the 16 bit Strike Series.)
But are we not putting the cart in front of the horse a little bit? The Dante's Inferno, the game not the poem, is not even out yet, as it may be possible, the story can change during any moment in a game's development cycle, especially if it is a cut scene heavy type of game (God of War, Devil May Cry series were) they may be pulling the wool over our eyes this entire time. It is too early to pass judgment. Or is it?
I will, of course, criticism aside, jump in the pool since it is all warm and filled with chlorine.
One of the core arguments is the usage of the literally work being done so freely, as without any historical and literal context, as being wrong, "anti-intellectual" and uninspiring. I do agree, using the term adaptation is fool hearty, a better term would of been interpretation, as this is Visceral Game's interpretation of Dante's Inferno. Boobies and all. It is possible, since the greek god shtick is taken, what other religions did the team at EA could of use for their God of War clone? Egyptian? Uto-Aztec? Maya? Inca? Catholicism! A Call of Onuris game sounds compelling, fighting a ton of demon like creatures with the pyramids as Giza as backdrop, it does not have to be historically accurate, does it? Since Ubisoft has that 3rd Crusade thing going on for them, doh!, they also took the Renaissance, a warrior poet fighting the legions of hell sounds cool and all.
***
My wishes for the game are a bit different than the rest of us criticizing it, I would of like to have seen, the sins (demons, lust minions, babies) cast into hell were of videogame cliches, for example, when in the sixth circle of hell, a group of enemies will spawn behind the avatar and the camera or in the seventh circle we are shot by fireballs from an unseen enemy or in the eighth circle, death closets and shot kills! Do not forget grenade spamming, oh I hate that! That is how I imagine videogame Hell to be like, and to spoil the ending, instead of Lucifer chewing on the heads of the traitorous Brutus, Cassius and Judas it will instead be, Master Chief's, Mario's and Solid Snake's heads. Interpret that as any way you may!
***
The God of War comparison is not fair, because no one held any type of criticism to its revenge story, but there may have been thought provoking commentary if it was named the as the classical, Virgil's Aeneid. It was not. Dante's Inferno may get skewered and grilled, not for creating a work on a classical poem, and missing the ironies that made the said poem so celebrated, but only because God of War 3, and Bayonetta seem so compelling.
