Posts Tagged ‘dante’
Dante’s Inferno: new trailers
Lorenzo Maitani, Last Judgement, Orvieto cathedral
A quick update on “Dante’s Inferno“, the XBOX360 game I trailed here last year. There are two new teasers for your viewing pleasure, plus an interview about the development process.
The game is based on book 1 of Dante’s epic and, incredibly, “most of the dialogue and narration you hear in the game does come from the poem”. That’s some serious research. To my eye, the game’s art direction also shares much with the Tuscan tradition of the Last Judgement, a perennial favourite from pre-Renaissance art right through to Michelangelo and beyond. No idea what Dante would have made of all this, but I can well see painters like Taddeo di Bartolo and Luca Signorelli enjoying the gorefest.
The expected release date is unconfirmed, but the game is “at least a year away”.
Dante’s “Inferno”, coming soon to an XBOX near you
Ever felt the urge to tackle the classic of Tuscan literature, the book that (partly) defined the Italian language? We do recommend it in the holiday reading section of our book. It’s a thoroughly modern tale of lust, gluttony, greed, wrath, heresy, violence, fraud and treachery. But at three volumes, 1600+ pages in total, you’d better pack your toothbrush: Dante’s Divine Comedy is a long old ride.
There may, however, be a shortcut in 2009. Videogame publisher Electronic Arts have just announced Dante’s Inferno: the game, a third-person action adaptation of the first book of the Comedy. They’ve launched a short teaser trailer. According to Executive Producer Jonathan Knight:
The time is right for the world of interactive entertainment to adapt this literary masterpiece, and to re-introduce Dante to an audience who, until now, may have been unfamiliar with the remarkable details of this great work of art. It’s the perfect opportunity to fuse great game play with great story.
Variety report that EA are also hawking the game round the major film studios. Of course, I wouldn’t bet the mortgage on EA’s version sticking too close to the 14th-century original.
