Shadows of the Damned Review for PS3 and Xbox360

     Shadows of the Damned was the first project released after Grasshopper Manufacture acquired some new talent for their studio and larger publishers were willing to take a risk on Goichi Suda's (Suda51 (Of No More Heroes, Killer 7 fame)) eclectic and bizarre creations. I have to think that Shadows of the Damned is something Suda51 must be prideful of; It's the first game Akira Yamaoka (Composer famous for scoring the Silent Hill series) was involved with after leaving Konami to be hired by Grasshopper Manufacture as well as enlisting the talent of the great Shinji Mikami (Director/Producer of Resident Evil, Vanquish, Phoenix Wright, and God Hand just to name a few), and to top it off, it's the first Grasshopper Manufacture title to be published by a huge company, namely EA in this case. If there's a time for Suda51 to strut his stuff and show what he can do with a team of visionary Japanese developers, this game would be the right time to do so.

Mass Effect 2 Review for Xbox 360

     Why have I taken so long with this review? When you have something that is regarded as perfection in your little world, you just can't form coherent sentences. Your speech is muddled by affection surpassing that of your own mum (Simon's rubbing off on me TOO much). I didn't know how I would end up writing this review; Would I write too much? Would I write anything that someone could objectively understand? I think I'm going to try to write as little as possible, leave a lot in the unknown territory of things. I personally believe that the less you know about an amazing game, the better it is. I don't want to ruin perfection for anyone.

Gameplay

+ Take cover, aim, shoot - That’s all there is to it. Just take the gameplay of any cover-based third person shooter and you got Mass Effect 2. Find cover, press the button to cling to it, aim, then shoot as much as you can. You can also hurdle over and sprint to other cover which is new for the series.  Stats used to be the focus of the gameplay in ME1 but this time, around, it’s all about the action. It all works great too. I had problems with it but I have a loose thumbstick (thanks Resident Evil 5...) so my guy would keep going out of cover because it kept thinking I was pushing out of cover. Other than that, it somehow feels more refined or deeper than the mechanics of a "Gears" game and that's a feeling I enjoy.
     Another aspect is that every mission is not just shoot this and that. You will be presented with different missions dealing with stealth, investigation, protection, and more. All of them are completely welcome additions and none of them were annoying in the least. It's rare that you see a development team take new directions within it's formula and succeed everytime. 

+ Pro-Biotics - With biotics in their current state, you control a bit more than what you used to in Mass Effect 1. Now you use biotics to change ammo type, use psycho-kinetic powers, and utilize technological powers. You also get less of them due to the new skill trees so you have to be more strategic when it comes to what class you choose and what party members you choose to work with. Playing on normal, you don't really need biotics very much. You pretty much just use them for fun. 

     On the harder difficulties however, you really need to think about what powers to use on who and when the best time is to execute it. You also want to combine powers for maximum effect. For example, there's a move where you dash at your enemy and you make impact using your whole body and they get thrown back a couple of feet. If you want to get the most out of this though, you might want to have a party member levitate the target causing them to fly across the entire room when you crash into them. They also gain damage from the impact, the hitting of the wall and then hitting the ground. 

     Some of the biotics also have unique ways of being executed. For instance, the pull biotic will should out an energy blast that levitates targets out of cover. You can tweak the way it seeks out targets though. The blast will alway home in on the target but you can aim up hight making it curve down from the sky or shoot it to the side making it swing around corners. It is EXTREMELY satisfying. You can even advance the power to pull multiple targets at once as well.

+ War has changed - Guns ain't like they used to be. Now you use thermal clips or what a normal person might call regular ammunition clips with a set amount of ammo that you have to reload. In other words, they work like normal guns now with the exception of universal ammo. They no longer overheat and have infinite ammo... Well they do still overheat but that's only in the story's context. Sorry, I'm confusing things. Anyway, now you need to look in the environment and around fallen enemies for ammo clips. This was extremely hard to get used to as I had JUST came out of Mass Effect 1 and you never had to pay attention to ammo. The clips themselves don't call a lot of attention to themselves either if you're not specifically looking for them. They do make a extremely visible flash to show themselves to you, but once again, if you're not looking for them you won't see them. I played the first 20 or so hours with a good friend of mine watching me and he was constantly pointing out during the entire 20 hours that I had missed a lot of ammo clips as I progressed. This doesn't even come close to being a problem, but it's worth noting. Should you come into ME2 without playing ME1, I don't think you'll have any problems with this.
     Guns are also more strategic in ME2, at least they appear to be. Certain guns work better against shields, barriers, and armor so you have to think of what guns you want to use in certain situations. And instead of constantly getting better guns, you normally just get a few different guns for each type there is, i.e. 3 different snipers, 2 handguns, 2 shotguns. They instead choose a different feel in exchange for different power stats. This sniper rifle could shoot faster, have more ammunition, but will be balanced with less power and less accuracy, or you could choose the other sniper with opposite stats. All of the guns and their variables are purpose built and are designed to take the specific play of your character and his/her biotics into account. There's a deep layer of strategy that comes into play when you get on the harder difficulties and it's EXTREMELY satisfying when you get everything to work seamlessly together. It's likely, however, that you won't notice any of this if you play on a lower difficulty setting.

+ Choose your destiny - There are numerous missions in ME2 and they all feel like they have some substance to them unlike the side missions in ME1 which just felt repeat missions with different contexts. Also, along the path of the game, you need to make heavier decisions than you were faced with in the first game. It felt as though a number of them had consequences that would lead to being further explored in the next game. And one more thing, you always know where you're going now. All of the major hubs are marked on your star charts and all of your missions, both main and side, are marked next to the corresponding planets and galaxies associated with them. You always know where you're going and how much you need to do.

= Less RPG, more action-adventure - If there was something to be disappointed about is that the RPG elements that were present in the first game are almost not even present here. They've either been streamlined or omitted which, even though some of them were good, the result feels like a more polished game. They also left enough of it in to still customize characters the way you want them to be for your preferred performance and style. Anyone that loves stats and equipment shouldn't be expecting it here. Expect a moderate choice of skills and a deeper real-time action experience.

- Scanning... Anomaly detected... - They replaced exploring worlds in the vehicle with scanning planets for resources. The only thing the resources are good for are upgrades but it's so annoying and slow that you would never do it if you didn't need those upgrades. Just the fact that it's bland and slow and needs reworking for ME3 is all that really needs to be said about this.

Story and Presentation

+ And our hero's struggle continues - The story is very deep, very emotional, and very intimate. Even without having choices to reflect on from the first game, you could still believe the story was custom tailored just for you. Should you have data from the first game, your choices will indeed be reflected in ME2's story making it that much more personal. Running alongside of the main cannon for ME2, I had a deep, personal struggle within the game. Because I made an uninformed choice in the first game, I performed a great deed but with a large cost and now the galaxy loathes humans and doesn't trust them. So at the same time that I'm trying to save the galaxy again, I'm dealing with my mistakes from the past and trying to correct them by proving humans aren't these hidden-agenda, meat-bags. I haven't tried different story paths yet but I believe the game is structured in a way that would not have the galaxy hating human beings if you had gone in a different direction. I really don't want to say anything more specific than I already have, just know it's worth all of your time and that you won't be able to resist late-night excursions through the game just to find out what happens next.


+ Our choices shape the future - Almost everything you did in the first game is reflected here, some in larger ways than others. It also leads you to think very carefully about the choices you make in this game. The fact that your decisions are so much larger this time around also adds to the previous statement. I cannot imagine how my choices will take shape in the third installment but I'm dying to find out.


+ A dream come true - I believe that everyone has at least one sci-fi, fantasy, or anime that features a large cast of characters working towards a shared goal; Whether it be Serenity, Cowboy Bebop, Stargate, Outlaw Star, Star Trek, Buffy, Xena, the motions that those characters go through are all represented in Mass Effect. If someone said you had the opportunity to build personal relationships with those characters and to work with them to achieve your goals, would you let it pass you by? I don't think so. Then why aren't you playing Mass Effect already?


+ Encyclopedic knowledge of the galaxy - I read it all, every word. In the game, you have access to a codex which will inform you about nearly every imaginable aspect of Mass Effect's world: How it's weapons work, classifications of space ships, different races' biologies, religions, governments, technologies, wars, militaries, etc. The thing that's so great about this is that it's not throw-away information like in Final Fantasy 13. It gives context to the way the game and the story plays out. Here are some examples:

• Guns now use heat-sink clips because it has been researched that a soldier can reload his gun faster than waiting for the entire thing the cool down. The result is now reloading your guns instead of having infinite ammo and overheating weapons. They also explain how the ammo is universal.

• Element zero takes extremely high heats to form. The result is that if you're looking for that resource, you might want to look for planets that are closest to the suns of their respective systems.

• All of the bios on the different races will explain how they react in certain situations and conversations as well as explaining why they normally take certain roles within a community. It allows you to feel more informed when communicating with other species. Why are there so many Turians in Citadel Security? Because Turians are a race that believe very highly in serving out justice. They almost have no crime on their planet because justice is such a revered thing where they come from.

     It's not as detailed as in the game but you get the idea. Your codex is something that if you take the time to read, you're almost instantly rewarded for it. It just adds so much to the overall experience that it's definitely something not to be skipped over. 

+ Oh, all the places we will go - All of the environments are a bit smaller than they use to be but as a result of that, they end up having more personality and life within them. I would say that it did slightly suck not being able to go around the Presidium at the Citadel anymore. I might suggest that if you want a closer feeling to the environments in this game, at least a closer one than what's offered here, do play the first Mass Effect. It helps build the worlds around you in your mind. I wouldn't say it's required at all though. 
     The places you go in ME2 are also a lot darker and in-depth. You're given the feeling that you are thoroughly exploring all there is to any given environment and it connects you even more to setting of this epic story.


+ Tell me what I want to hear - The dialogue is priceless in this game. It never gets old or boring. Having already gone through the game, I'm trying to speed through the harder difficulties but the longer I play, the less I skip the conversations. Now I sit there listening to every single one another time, just as interested as I was the first time I heard them all. The voice acting and dialogue is amazing.


+ Everyone is different - The characters and their personalities are so varied and different this time around. And they're all so interesting that any time you have something you can do to find out more about a character or gain a new one, you'll do it as fast as you can. I assure you that you'll rarely skip out on any conversations you could have with them since every one of them are so interesting. You can also do what are called "loyalty missions" which serve as buffers for that given character's background. Once completed they will gain a new ability and appearance. There should be a good handful of characters that have the ability to appeal to everyone who plays this game. There's someone for everyone, and I wouldn't dream of spoiling any of them... Well maybe one...

+ GARRUS!!!!! - He's ****ing back and just as badass. He's one of the characters that I share an extreme camaraderie with. Unfortunately, he's one of the characters with the least amount of conversation pieces. I do feel something deep with this character though. He just feels like a friend I've known my entire life and I feel compelled to sacrifice anything if it meant his well-being. Without spoiling too much, I actually felt compelled at one point to go back in time (play a previous save) just to see if I could make things swing more in his favor only to be saddened that my efforts could not change the future. If you love this character as much as I do, Bioware's going to have a field day with your heart in ME2. I'm not suggesting anything rash happens, you'll just have to play the game and find out what I mean.


+ All you need is love - I'm not going to dive into this one very much at all but this time, with the exception of just a couple characters, no one is off limits when it comes to romance. I will say that there's a lot more choice as a male Shepard than a female Shepard which is disappointing. Sorry, ladies...

Graphics

+You're gonna want an HDTV for this one - Character models are very detailed. One of which is a krogan that is so well rendered that I feel like it's a high-res cutscene every time I talk to him and see the way his face moves and what his skin looks like. There's detail in every nook and cranny of this game and I can imagine feeling very left out if I couldn't view it all in HD. 

Sound

+ Flawless Victory - Just as it were in the first game, sound was obviously important to BioWare when it comes to Mass Effect. It seals the deal when it comes to how believable, visceral, and tangible the world around you feels. Prepared to be blown away by earth-shaking explosions and seduced by detailed voice work.

- Where'd you go? - There is a problem in a few copies of the game where in one scene on disk 2, the dialogue just cuts out. It's not a widespread problem so I wouldn't be worried about it if you go to pick up a copy. But the problem exists and there's no known fix for it. It did kill the mood for me... *Weeps...*

Should you buy it?

     YES, a billion times over, yes! And if you haven't played Mass Effect 1, pick that up too. This is one of the greatest games I've ever played. BioWare officially has me sold on anything that has Mass Effect on the cover. I loved the game so much that I actually bought it twice! I bought the game for $30 around the time of it's release (I got lucky getting it that cheap) and I felt terrible that I didn't get the limited edition. I recently came across one for $100 and I snatched it up immediately without hesitation. I have no regrets. This game is worth almost any amount of cash.
     Despite how much I wrote, I left out A LOT of things. I could go into a lot of detail about the many aspects of Mass Effect 2 but it's very important to me that people feel like they discovered this game. If you can't get the personal feeling that goes with this game you'll miss out on a lot and that becomes a greater risk when you know too much about it. So I hope I didn't spoil much at all while convincing every one of you that if you don't have this game, there isn't even a way to express how lame you are as a person. Seriously, play it. NOW!

Mass Effect 2 was developed by BioWare and published by EA for the Xbox 360 and PC. Played through normal mode as a Vanguard Paragon for 50+ hours and still struggling to finish the game on Insanity mode, clocking in at 20+ hours so far. That's a lot of playtime for one game.

Dante's Inferno For Xbox360 and PS3

     Okay, imagine a HUGE museum. Alright, maybe a zoo... Okay, I really don't care what type of public display it is, just fill it with everything that's ever been compelling or interesting to you. It'd make this museum or zoo one you want to visit and spend hours everyday looking around at all the displays. Think of all the awesome things you could learn and see. Now imagine that the museum has a see-through floor and you're in the basement, looking through the floor at all of the displays. And then imagine that instead of trying to get the most out of your experience, you're running through the tight and dark corridors of the basement at such a speed Sonic the Hedgehog can't imagine. You turned your favorite place filled with hours upon hours of study into a 2 minute marathon. When you finish, you don't remember anything but running through the basement and some slight colors washing in from the displays above. That's what Dante's Inferno is like. This review is going to be short because I feel that there's so much that I didn't like, it'd be best I only stuck with the main points.

Gameplay

+ You're good at this. - I heard this somewhere before and I feel like it should be said again and again because it's true and it's actually the only positive I can think of. Visceral Games is really good at transplanting exact game mechanics from popular games and putting it into their own. Dead Space is just like Resident Evil 4, Dante's Inferno is just like God of War. You could easily jump from one of those games into one of Visceral's games and you'd feel right at home! Think of how many people try to make their games like popular ones to make some money and they normally fail and nailing the feel. Visceral hits the nail perfectly on the head.

= Fear me, I am the God of War! - I can and I will be making God of War comparisons all day long about Dante's Inferno. Why? Because that's exactly what Visceral was trying to do. They wanted to make a God of War game in sheep's clothing. What they did is copy God of War for everything that made it good and exactly what made it bad. And for me, that's really bad.

- Mortal Combat - After the release of Bayonetta, Dante's Inferno just doesn't feel as good as it could be when it comes to combat. It's slow and shallow. You get SOME combos if you choose to go down the unholy path except that you won't do that because Dante will have a hellish time getting through the game if you don't go down the holy path. Therefore, you just won't have any options to choose from and you'll get bored.  Also, the enemies have the ability to become your worst nightmare. If you get knocked down, you better start prayin' because these guys will attack you again and again before you can ever hope to start to get up. Why is Dante such an acrobat when he's fighting, whipping around and such, but then suddenly turns into a septuagenarian with the worst case of arthritis ever recorded in history? GET. UP. If you killed Death to get into Hell, then you can get the **** up!

- Holy war - There are two skill trees in Dante's Inferno; The holy and unholy skill trees. Holy powers will make your cross stronger and the unholy path will give you more combos for your scythe. I don't know how anyone is expected to beat the game if they don't dive really deep into the holy path. I don't see myself as bad at games. I have plenty of difficult gaming achievements including beating Devil May Cry 3 on Dante Must Die mode, but I can not for the life of me imagine how you beat the final boss if you did not get the high level powers of the holy path. What do the holy powers do exactly? They literally make you invincible. You can make it so no one can interrupt your cross combos, you can get powers and items that make it so that you only take damage from 30% of all hits you recieve, you can stun huge groups of enemies for 15 seconds pretty much whenever you want. And then, if you happen to take any damage, you just activate a healing spell that heals you for a damn long time and reduces the damage you take for a godly amount. So no one can stop you from attacking, you can't take any damage, and should a miraculous event occur where you do take damage, you can just heal it back. Add in a reduced use of magic to increase the number of times you can heal and the ability to make enemies heal a quarter of your health bar every time you kill something and you just sucked all the FUN out of your GAME.

- I am the Devil! - God, you must be because it takes a lot of effort to even put a dent into the health bar of the last boss. And then he does tons and tons of damage to you with every hit while he also attacks you WHILE YOU'RE DOWN. His difficulty lies in how cheap he is. The last time I got this frustrated was the broken boss battles in Ninja Gaiden 2 on the Xbox360. Mind you I even went down the invincible holy path and he was still managing to bleed me for every drop of health I had. To anyone who ventures down the unholy path, good luck with your combos. I have a feeling you won't have too many uses for them.

- We are Legion! - Yes and you're all the same! I dunno if you've seen the trailers or the developer diaries where they show off special demons on each layer, it's better if you didn't because it's all a trick and a farce. Let's put it this way; Left 4 Dead 2 had more enemy variation than Dante's inferno. That is unless you count different colors as being different enemies. And you shouldn't. You really shouldn't.

- Please board the platform... PLEASE! - I hate God of War for it's platforming and puzzles. They're not clever. When it comes to puzzles, they just choose something mundane and stupid and then make it artificially harder by tossing in infinite enemies to halt and destroy your progress. Also, Kratos is slow, clunky and sucks at jumping. Mix that in with some terrible platform placement and you have a recipe for frustration. Dante's Inferno though God of War did a marvelous job on these points and copied it to the proverbial "t". Dante's Inferno is better for it's lack of frustrating "puzzles" and worse for it's worse use of platforming gameplay. 

- Humpty Dumpty was broken in my day - When you absolve a special character in hell, a small minigame starts when you have to time your button presses as "sins" glide closer to the corresponding button you need to press. It's broken. Sometimes it will accept your button press before the sin ever reaches a button, sometimes it will punish you for absolving sins in rapid succession or simply for just timing your button press correctly. It just depends on how much the game feels like messing with you at the time.

- Harry Potter, I am not. - But I am God of War. Remember the magic spell you spammed in God of War to save yourself from the evils around you? Sometimes it wasn't even necessary to use spells at all. I mean, really, they could be pretty useless too. Dante's Inferno is more useless than that. I didn't feel like my spells did damage for jack ****. The only one I ever truly used was the healing holy armor.

Story and Presentation

= It's a game about hell and... - Well they made it apparent through colors, words and advertising that it's about hell. And that's good enough I guess from this game. The Devil May Cry games were barely about hell and I think they gave a much better idea about what hell could be like. Even Silent Hill 2 was extremely more hellish and you came to the conclusion that you were in hell and they never even had to tell you that.

- Dante's action-adventure - I never read Dante's Inferno. I can't bring up specifics about what was different or the same. Let me say this. I don't care what they say about the game being so inspired by the book and how they kept everything close to the source material, they used the book as an excuse because it's easier to show that your game is going to be violent and that it will tap into the minds of the mainstream violent gamer so much easier than a new, unknown IP (intellectual property - a new series, premise or concept for a game) would.

- How could you go wrong? - You guys had ****ing WAYNE BARLOWE on your design team!!!! How is it possible that I don't feel like I'm in hell?!?! Seriously! Wayne Barlowe even has a book called Inferno and it's all about HELL! How could you not use those creatively disturbing ideas? I mean, even all of Dante's Inferno's monsters felt more disconnected from the source material than God of War's! Just because God of War opts out for boobs at every turn and makes it work doesn't mean you should try too. You're making a game about hell. The only thing that really made me feel like I was in hell were the unbaptized babies.

     Dante's Inferno also has a fixed camera that is supposed to act like God of War's to show these epic set pieces and it kills the experience. I can't look around hell. I can't observe all of the different things going on in each circle of hell. I guess that's fine enough though because there's really nothing to look at. Everything just feels cramped and small. It's like you're on a cave expedition and you see different colors of lava. Anything being tortured is either hobbled in a corner the same way as the last person who was hobbled in a corner, or is shown as a low-resolution picture of thousands of souls swirling together inside of a wall, repeating itself over and over. That's what you guys came up with? a scared person and a choppy image? 

     To be fair, it's easy to tell that Wayne Barlowe was utilized. And those designs that he worked on were cool enough. A good majority of them suffered however, due to the low amount of detail put into the game's aesthetics. Visceral essentially went with the same graphics as (2008) Prince of Persia's with the difference being that Prince's aesthetics soared with beauty and detail in the art. Visceral put only as little attention as needed into the number of creatures in their game.

- Real or Fake? - I never liked a lot of Sony's first person exclusives for visual reason but I could never figure out what it was. I do now and it's because when they do something realistic, they still make it look like a cartoon. Kratos in God of War doesn't look realistic yet everything else in the game seems to try to shoot for realism. Seeing a character from Jet Set Radio in Mirror's Edge will not look right unless you fit that character to Mirror's Edge's art style. It's why Sonic doesn't look right next to real people. Dante's Inferno does this. They push a lot of realism in this game, especially when it comes to the cinematic sequences that aren't cartoons. And then when you start playing, everything looks fake compared to Dante. 

- Go on... - If you want to know about Hell, Virgil will tell you about it. You'll just have to ask him about it after every sentence he finishes. I got an idea. What if he told me everything about it without me pressing a button 5 times?

Graphics

= Needs more... Hmm... - If you liked the way God of War 2 looked graphically, then you'll like these graphics. They look almost the same. They're nothing special and they looked like they could be pushed pretty easily on a PS2. Doesn't mean they can be, it just means they look like they could. So, yeah, it looks dated.

Sound

+ I'm in Hell! - Souls scream, people beg for your help, they confess secrets, they tempt you with deals, screaming, shrieking, agony! Imagine how Hell sounds and this game will really replicate that.

Should I buy it?

     Hell no. If you really need to, rent it. If you really like it after that, sure, buy it. But honestly, you could do so much more with your time. If you played a good game like Mass Effect or Bayonetta or anything else that just came out recently and then looked at Wayne Barlowe's illustrations, you would feel like you got a more full experience out of being in hell than playing Dante's Inferno. I actually wish I could get my 6 hours of gameplay back to put into my beloved Mass Effect 2. At least I can save you by telling you this is nothing to get hyped at. It's not even really something to play to say you played it. You're not going to talk about it really. Just play it when you really have nothing else to play. And there's plenty of great games out there before you get to Dante's Inferno.
     Otherwise, you're looking at 2 playthroughs at best, a survival mode like Devil May Cry 4's Circles of Hell where you just fight wave after wave of baddies. Eventually, they will add a co-op play mode where players can edit their own arenas and design their own enemy waves. Kinda like Castlevania on the DS (which also portrays Hell better than Dante's Inferno and is a ton of fun).
     If you're interested in Wayne Barlowe, check this out: Wayne Barlowe's Inferno. Any of his stuff could have easily fit into Hell.

Dante's Inferno was developed by Visceral Games and published by EA for the Xbox360 and PS3. Played through normal difficulty with a playtime of 6 hours. Review based on the PS3 version.

If you want another opinion on Dante's Inferno, check out Simon's review here.

Dante's Inferno Review for Xbox 360.

Dante Alighieri was born in the mid-1200's and is, without doubt, responsible for one of the finest pieces of literature ever written. The Divine Comedy was Dante's personal interpretation of hell. Or to be more precise, the differing levels of hell where the souls of the damned suffer. Anyone who hasn't read The Divine Comedy, I urge you to find a copy of this haunting masterpiece either before or after you've played Dante's Inferno.

Dante's Inferno is based upon Alighieri's masterpiece. Dante's Inferno (or DI for the sake of this review) is an action-adventure game with some platform and puzzle elements. You play as Dante (shocker), a crusader-knight (and not a very nice person to be honest) who has rushed home from the Holy War to protect his beloved wife: Beatrice. He returns home to find his wife and father dead. To make matters worse, after discovering Beatrice's body he then finds out that her soul now belongs to Lucifer. I won't say how or why here as it will spoil the game later on for you. Certain liberties have been taken in creating this game. In the book, Dante was a simple traveller, not a warrior. However, this is forgiveable given the context of the game.

PRESENTATION

+ We're not in Kansas anymore!! Wow! Just......wow! The scenery and presentation of this game are superb. The art team from Visceral Games have some really screwed up imaginations and I'm all the more thankful for it. Every circle of Hell you traverse through is stunningly grotesque. From rivers of molten gold, in the Circle of Greed, where the dead wade in constant agony to the River Styx where statues of the damned pose in intolerable suffering. This game drags you kicking and screaming through it all. Even the most basic of walls is a disturbing sight, with the souls of countless people trapped within, writhing to break free from their eternal suffering.

= This is on the 360 right? Although the presentation is spot-on, the in-game graphics are a slight let down. They look like high-end PS2 in the same vein as the God of War series. It's not game-breaking but it is a missed opportunity to really push the graphical power of the 360 and bring Hell to life even more.

+ Saturday night at the movies. CGI cut-scenes are pretty at the best of times, DI's CGI is nothing short of bloody breath-taking!! Never have I seen character emotions portrayed so well in Full Motion Video! Do you hear that Final Fantasy? This is how it should be done!!! Although the CGI scenes are few and far between, they are done so well it would be a crime not to give them the credit they deserve.

= Not one for the kiddies! DI is graphic in the extreme and is definitely not one for parents to buy their children. Nudity, language and violence.....oh, and more nudity. Parents, you have been advised! :-)

- You again?! Ah yes, DI falls into the same trap as many other games. There are only a handful of demonic designs to contend with. Considering you're travelling thorugh 9 circles of hell, you would've thought that their would be more variation. Apparently Satan doesn't like change!

- Where are we now? Although the 9 circles of Hell look fantastic, the transition between each one feels forced and un-necessary. There's no gentle flow between each circle and you'll know when you're descending to a different area.

SOUND

+ Rinse and repeat. Anyone who's read one of my reviews should know that I detest repeated voice and sound samples in games. It's just a bit lazy in my eyes. I'm now going to eat my own words and say that DI uses repeated sound loops to absolutely magnificent effect! The groans, tortured howls and pleading voices are both haunting, disturbing and upsetting in equal measure. It really is a perverse pleasure to listen to the agony of the damned until you release that if you fail in your mission within Hell, you'll be one more voice to the choir! ;-)

= You said what?! I'm really not sure what to feel about the voice acting in DI. Dante and Beatrice are okay while the Bosses in the game are defintely the strongest aspect. I can't put my finger on what's missing but it just feels like some of the scripting doesn't quite "click".

= Where's Beethoven when you need him? Same problem as the voices. There's nothing wrong with the music but it doesn't grab you like you would've hoped. Maybe it's just me! :-)

GAMEPLAY

- Are you sure that's right? Okay, minor spoiler here!! At the beginning of the game, you beat up and (kinda) kill Death. Yep, that's right.....DEATH!! You know, the man with a big scythe. One of the most powerful mythical entities EVER!! Just doesn't seem right. Visceral Games should've chosen another way for Dante to enter Hell.

- You're not the boss of me! Perhaps I've been spoilt by games such as Shadow of the Collosus but I really was expecting same amazing boss battles in this game (c'mon! I'm in Hell dammit). Alas, it was not to be. :-( Some of the bosses certainly look the part ie: Minos and Cleopatra but everyone else is a let-down. Attack patterns that even a blind monkey can see coming do not help matters either.

= Kratos is that you? I promised myself I wouldn't join the masses and compare this to God of War. Sadly there ARE a lot of similarities between DI's combat system and GOW's. It's not a bad thing as it works fairly well but at times it feels quite clunky compared to GOW. You have a standard light and heavy attack plus a grab button which will allow you to absolve or punish certain enemies. What does that mean? Read below!

+ I DECIDE YOUR FATE! One of the guilty pleasures of combat is grabbing an enemy and deciding whether to absolve them of their sins or punish them for trying to stick 3 metres of steel into your head! Initially it is very tempting to just punish but there is an upside to doing both. DI gives you 2 skill-trees. One Holy, one un-Holy. Each tree will give you different advantages and upgrades. The Holy tree is generally useful if you want to upgrade your Cross attacks whilst the un-Holy side is useful for making your scythe attacks more powerful.

- But I want them all! Sadly it takes 2 playthroughs to max out both sides of the skill tree. You will definitely want to max out Holy first as it makes achievement hunting easier. ;-) It's just a shame that the player cannot have the best of both worlds and is essentially made to choose.

+ A present? For me?! Throughout your adventure you will come across, and collect, Relics. These items can be equipped and levelled up to give you more of a chance of surviving the denizens of Hell. Abilities such as: more powerful attacks, unable to be interrupted during combos and even absorbing damage are here to make things that little bit more interesting for you. They work well without upsetting the balance of the game too much and are a welcome addition.

+ Abracadabra! It's GOW comparison time again but this time DI comes out on top with it's use of magic. I actually used the spells in this game!! I barely touched the magic in GOW so again Dante does something right. From magical shields to a smart-bomb style spell, there's something for everyone here but it is worth mentioning that there are only half-a-dozen or so spells in the game.

= Do you know War, perchance? What is it with this type of game and puzzles? They're almost insultingly simple and not necessary in this game type.

- Hop, skip and......bugger!!!!! The jump mechanics in this game are bloody awful. It's hard to gauge distancing which means you're gonna die a few times trying to do the most trivial of tasks. Sounds like a small gripe but when you've traipsed through a level only to make the tiniest of errors and re-start from the last save point........well, you can imagine how frustrating it becomes.

- Speaking of which. The save system in this game is horrible (as hinted at above). There is no checkpoint system as such. If you die, then it's back to a save point with you. This wouldn't be so much of a problem but any items you collected before dying will have to be re-collected! Saving is more of a relief than a necessary feature of any game!!

= Wait. That's it? DI is a short game. Plain and simple. It took me 10 hours to do everything this game had to offer although there is DLC coming in the future. That's little comfort for those who paid full-price for this though. I think Dante's Inferno is best summed up as: short but sweet.

Should I buy this?

No. Don't get me wrong, despite all its little faults, Dante's Inferno is a really good game and I thoroughly enjoyed playing it to the end. But when a game is 10 hours long with 2 playthroughs it is advisable to rent first.

Dante's Inferno was developed by Visceral Games and Published by EA Games. Hours played: 10+. Review is based upon the Xbox 360 version

If you're interested in reading another opinion, check out Ashton's review here