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Critics of upcoming hack and slash Dante’s Inferno’s treatment of source material The Divine Comedy are missing the point, Visceral Games has said.
Speaking to VideoGamer.com, executive producer Jonathan Knight called the 700-year-old Italian poem on which the game is loosely based a “fantasy”, and described it as “basically Chronicles of Narnia or Lord of the Rings”.
In the God of War-style game, players assume the role of Dante, who battles through the Nine Circles of Hell after returning home to find his beloved Beatrice murdered.
Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy is one of the central poems of Italian literature and an allegorical vision of the Christian afterlife. The video game has led some to accuse Visceral Games of taking liberties with the source material.
Knight, however, dismissed this view, and said “true” Dante fans are “over the moon” with the game.
When asked if critics concerned with Visceral’s treatment of the poem were missing the point, Knight replied: “I think they are. Generally those critics are often people who weren’t fans of the poem and weren’t that familiar with it until they heard we were doing this. What we’re finding is, a few people anyway, quite clearly didn’t know it well, and now have gone off and read it and they’re looking for ways to go, oh you’re taking liberties here, or you didn’t do this, or whatever.
“But the reality is that true Dante fans, people who actually have spent time with the literature and care about it are over the moon with the game project.”
Knight said Visceral was working with a rare bookseller and ex-schoolteacher who owns a collection of rare Dante editions and used to teach Dante.
“I like to say the game is a celebration of Dante,” Knight said. “There are more people going to actually read the poem, learn about The Divine Comedy, read up on Dante and what he meant to western culture, than otherwise would have. That’s a good thing. The game’s not meant to replace the poem. It’s not meant to like, hey, play the game and you don’t have to read the poem. The cool thing is the opposite is happening. More people are reading it, not less, because of the game.”
Knight added that confusion may have been caused as a result of some believing the poem to be a religious text and not a work of fiction.
“It’s always been a work fiction, for seven hundred years,” he insisted. “There’s never been any legitimate or official position from anyone otherwise. The Catholic Church has always regarded it as a work of fiction from day one. And it is. It’s a fantasy. It’s basically Chronicles of Narnia or Lord of the Rings. It does hit a little closer to religion, in the sense that it is a medieval Christian mythology.
“But if you read it, it’s a mishmash of ancient mythologies, with Christian mythologies, with Catholicism, with Italian folklore. It’s also highly political. Dante was casting a bunch of his political enemies into hell, and then meeting there and talking to them. So there’s a lot of contemporary politics involved. It’s an incredible mishmash.
“But the one thing it definitely is, is fantasy. That’s without question. If people throughout the centuries came to believe in Dante’s vision of hell, it’s equivalent to people believing in Middle Earth. I’m not saying you shouldn’t believe in heaven or hell. It’s just that his particular vision of it quite clearly is a crazy fantasy. That’s what we focus on for the game.”
For all the latest screenshots, trailers and previews, head over to our Dante’s Inferno game page.
What do you think? Is Dante’s Inferno taking liberties with The Divine Comedy? Let us know in the comments section below.
