Dante's Inferno Preview

While we can't bring you our hands-on impressions of the console versions of Dante's Inferno until Monday, we can give you our first impressions of the PSP game. Announced at the EA Games Label and EA Sports EU Showcase event earlier this week, the portable edition was being played next door to the showcase console version. We didn't get a chance to get a feel for how Dante plays on PSP (according to EA the game isn't quite as far along as its console big brother), but we did get a sense of what the final game will be like come its 2010 release.

For those who haven't been following the game since its announcement, Dante's Inferno is a third-person God of War-style action game based on part one of Dante Alighierei's 'The Divine Comedy'. The game will take players through the nine circles of Hell (Limbo, Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Anger, Heresy, Violence, Fraud and Treachery) as Dante battles through unimaginable evils on a quest to recapture the soul of his beloved Beatrice. We were certainly a little unsure about the whole thing, but having seen what EA is trying to do we came away really quite positive.

The good news for PSP owners is that EA Redwood Shores and Artificial Mind and Movement (brought in to co-develop the handheld game) are trying to make the handheld game as close to the 360/PS3 version as possible. This means that the game will feature the same levels, a very similar combat system, and more or less the same story as console gamers will get.

Dante is very much, from what we've seen so far, your typical hack 'n' slash video game character. We don't want to label this as EA's God of War, but it certainly has a few strong similarities. Dante has ranged attacks through the use of his holy cross and magic (something we haven't seen in action yet), and melee attacks (weak and strong) using a large scythe. The PSP game looked early, with the roughness you'd expect from a game with months and months of development left, but the combat already appeared fast and fluid.

One thing to note is how the roll mechanic works in the PSP game. Just as in Chains of Olympus on PSP, rolling can't be handled by a flick of a second analogue stick (as the PSP simply doesn't have a second), so it'll be mapped to the single analogue stick when you're holding down the two shoulder buttons. This wasn't implemented in the build on show (it's a way off remember), but it was a perfectly good system in God of War so there's no reason it won't work just as well here.

On show at the event was a very early build of the vaguely medieval-style Limbo level, the first and tamest circle of Hell. Although still part of Hell, Limbo is said to be quite pleasant in comparison to the other circles, so based on what we've seen we can only imagine what we'll come across later. Enemy names are still a work in progress, but we did see a few of them and they come in all shapes and sizes - a particular favourite of ours being the so-called unbaptised babies: freaky infants with scythe-like arms. They're hardly what we'd call pleasant, so who knows what kind of horrors await in the other eight circles.

There's not a whole lot we can say about Dante's Inferno on PSP (expect a lot more on the console versions next week, as we got to play that for a good chunk of time), but we can report that it's already looking pretty impressive. It'd be unfair to compare it to the finished version of God of War: Chains of Olympus, but the game already features extremely large areas, impressive enemy models and plenty of scenery. We're slightly sceptical about EA's claims that the PSP game will be the same as the console versions (albeit not nearly as graphically rich), but so far so good. There's even slightly muted talk about PSP exclusive features, but this is still very much at the ideas stage at the moment.

So, it's got a very long way to go before it can stand next to Sony's own God of War, but Dante's Inferno on PSP has a lot of potential. From what we've seen EA certainly isn't bottling out when it comes to delivering a handheld game that matches its vision, but only time will tell if the final game will be devilishly good or just utter purgatory.

Dante's Inferno is due for release on PSP, PS3 and Xbox 360 in 2010.