Overview- Critic & User
Reviews - Videos &
Screenshots
News- Codes
& FAQs - Gameplay
Controls - Similar
Games
Answers
Bundles
Critic & User Reviews
IGN Review of Infernal: Hell's Vengeance
As the game opens, protagonist Ryan Lennox is enjoying a drink with a turncoat blonde. When her betrayal is made clear, chugging metal music kicks in along with the militant Heavenly forces of Etherlight through the high rise bar's windows, and the game introduces you to its overly touchy third-person shooting controls. "Mittens rock," says the flippant Lennox at one point during the next dialogue scene with Dr. Claw sound-alike Lucius Black, head of the Abyss agency. Lennox joins up with the demonic outfit and is imbued with powers magical and a mission to move against Etherlight, his former employer. Paired with his ammunition, his mana pool can be tapped to unleash supercharged shots. Shuriken, submachine guns, and sniper rifles help dispatch Etherlight's cyber-robed troopers that stand in the way, and from their corpses their souls can be absorbed boosting ammunition, health and snagging the occasional security card to pass through locked doors.
The stage for a mindlessly fun videogame seems to have been set.
Intro Sequence - Watch or download the video here (HD available).
While the elimination of health packs (though they do appear in later stages) and traditional ammunition pickups might seem like a good move, the soul-sucking mechanic in Infernal, like a lot of the game, just tends to get in the way of the play experience. The game seems to aspire to be the videogame equivalent of a B movie, with cheesy dialogue that quite often veers into the territory of the absurd and a completely nonsensical game world. Yet it can't quite achieve the charming simplicity of something like Earth Defense Force 2017, because it's trying so hard. Amidst the looping of the Quake 2-esuqe guitars that grind to life during every battle sequence, Lennox's ridiculous curvilinear tattoo spikes across his chest and jacket, and the comic book henchman-like glowing insignias stamped on all Etherlight's uniforms, Infernal gets all tangled up with itself and loses its direction.
It's an older style of product, a single-player game concerned more with slow, steady progression of enemy types, weapon power, and mild puzzle mechanics than wowing you with some kind of gimmicky feature. At the same time, it doesn't particularly manage to distinguish itself. The gameplay feels monotonous, by-the-numbers, and entirely predictable, which ultimately isn't any fun to play. While not every game has to have high production values to really succeed or incredibly advanced and sophisticated game systems to stand out, it needs to at least let you gun down foes in a hassle-free manner, something Infernal doesn't get right for several reasons.
Shooting Gallery - Watch or download the video here (HD available).
Character movement just feels sloppy, particularly when you find yourself accidentally performing an evasive roll or sticking to cover, which is next to useless. Lennox's aiming, even after fiddling around with the sensitivity slider provided in the options menu, never quite feels natural enough that you're able to fall into a rhythm, so it's difficult to step into the experience and ride the adrenaline waves the game thinks it's sending out at you. To try and inject some variety into the action a few special powers have been implemented, such as a short-range teleport system and enhanced vision mode. Aside from upping the cap on the number of successive teleports you can do, this system isn't put to work in any sort of creative ways -- you'll primarily use it to interact with out of reach computer consoles, and in every instance it's used it'll never result in a satisfying experience.
An infernal vision mode will also come into play in a few sections to identify danger zones such as land mines or poison gas-triggering floor tiles, but again, it's all very basic and underwhelming. Other sequences wind up being almost laughable, particularly a gas chamber trap early in the game which springs to action around you once you discover an underground Etherlight testing facility. Deactivating it is simply a matter of spinning in circles and interacting with computer monitors that happen to be conveniently placed right in the middle of the trap room. They're even numbered with display text identifying them as locks.
The action spans a number of locales, from a moving train to an aircraft carrier, so in that sense you won't necessarily get tired of the scenery as the environment types shift around. You will, however, find that enemy routines and behavior varies little between each stage, so although the backgrounds change the battles tend to feel the same. Foes routinely post up next to explosive barrels. Once the game figures you're familiar with the same sidestep and backflip bullet evasion techniques enemies exhibit, it gives them a special power that turns them transparent. So now you only have a limited window with which to hit them while they go about the same routines. There are special types of units sprinkled throughout, including beam weapon shock troopers who you need to circle around behind to detonate their backpack and flying assault soldiers and teleporting snipers, but the encounters aren't particularly interesting or frequent and have little effect on the overall experience.
Boss fights aren't especially clever either, particularly a plodding helicopter versus rocket launcher battle near the end. Even the final encounter fails to really excite. There just wasn't enough done here to get you keyed up about starting up each successive level, or to get you interested in what's coming next. The laser pistol is just like the pistol, but stronger. The heavy flying enemies are just like the normal flying guys, but with more armor. Weapons get better, enemies get stronger, but nothing about the basic gameplay ever really changes, so you're just going through the motions the whole time until you hit the next load screen and, as you're waiting, realize you're not looking forward to anything the game might throw at you. At least the achievement points are easy to come by, if you're into that sort of thing.
Epic Boss Battle - Watch or download the video here (HD available).
The visuals, while essentially the primary merit of the 2007 PC version, aren't as impressive anymore, though for a budget priced game it's probably better than you're expecting. Slowdown, some ugly character models and animation, as well as noticeable framerate issues do tend to occur, but a few of the battle arenas can be easy on the eyes.
©2009-07-07, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved
The stage for a mindlessly fun videogame seems to have been set.
Intro Sequence - Watch or download the video here (HD available).
While the elimination of health packs (though they do appear in later stages) and traditional ammunition pickups might seem like a good move, the soul-sucking mechanic in Infernal, like a lot of the game, just tends to get in the way of the play experience. The game seems to aspire to be the videogame equivalent of a B movie, with cheesy dialogue that quite often veers into the territory of the absurd and a completely nonsensical game world. Yet it can't quite achieve the charming simplicity of something like Earth Defense Force 2017, because it's trying so hard. Amidst the looping of the Quake 2-esuqe guitars that grind to life during every battle sequence, Lennox's ridiculous curvilinear tattoo spikes across his chest and jacket, and the comic book henchman-like glowing insignias stamped on all Etherlight's uniforms, Infernal gets all tangled up with itself and loses its direction.
It's an older style of product, a single-player game concerned more with slow, steady progression of enemy types, weapon power, and mild puzzle mechanics than wowing you with some kind of gimmicky feature. At the same time, it doesn't particularly manage to distinguish itself. The gameplay feels monotonous, by-the-numbers, and entirely predictable, which ultimately isn't any fun to play. While not every game has to have high production values to really succeed or incredibly advanced and sophisticated game systems to stand out, it needs to at least let you gun down foes in a hassle-free manner, something Infernal doesn't get right for several reasons.
Shooting Gallery - Watch or download the video here (HD available).
Character movement just feels sloppy, particularly when you find yourself accidentally performing an evasive roll or sticking to cover, which is next to useless. Lennox's aiming, even after fiddling around with the sensitivity slider provided in the options menu, never quite feels natural enough that you're able to fall into a rhythm, so it's difficult to step into the experience and ride the adrenaline waves the game thinks it's sending out at you. To try and inject some variety into the action a few special powers have been implemented, such as a short-range teleport system and enhanced vision mode. Aside from upping the cap on the number of successive teleports you can do, this system isn't put to work in any sort of creative ways -- you'll primarily use it to interact with out of reach computer consoles, and in every instance it's used it'll never result in a satisfying experience.
An infernal vision mode will also come into play in a few sections to identify danger zones such as land mines or poison gas-triggering floor tiles, but again, it's all very basic and underwhelming. Other sequences wind up being almost laughable, particularly a gas chamber trap early in the game which springs to action around you once you discover an underground Etherlight testing facility. Deactivating it is simply a matter of spinning in circles and interacting with computer monitors that happen to be conveniently placed right in the middle of the trap room. They're even numbered with display text identifying them as locks.
The action spans a number of locales, from a moving train to an aircraft carrier, so in that sense you won't necessarily get tired of the scenery as the environment types shift around. You will, however, find that enemy routines and behavior varies little between each stage, so although the backgrounds change the battles tend to feel the same. Foes routinely post up next to explosive barrels. Once the game figures you're familiar with the same sidestep and backflip bullet evasion techniques enemies exhibit, it gives them a special power that turns them transparent. So now you only have a limited window with which to hit them while they go about the same routines. There are special types of units sprinkled throughout, including beam weapon shock troopers who you need to circle around behind to detonate their backpack and flying assault soldiers and teleporting snipers, but the encounters aren't particularly interesting or frequent and have little effect on the overall experience.
Boss fights aren't especially clever either, particularly a plodding helicopter versus rocket launcher battle near the end. Even the final encounter fails to really excite. There just wasn't enough done here to get you keyed up about starting up each successive level, or to get you interested in what's coming next. The laser pistol is just like the pistol, but stronger. The heavy flying enemies are just like the normal flying guys, but with more armor. Weapons get better, enemies get stronger, but nothing about the basic gameplay ever really changes, so you're just going through the motions the whole time until you hit the next load screen and, as you're waiting, realize you're not looking forward to anything the game might throw at you. At least the achievement points are easy to come by, if you're into that sort of thing.
Epic Boss Battle - Watch or download the video here (HD available).
The visuals, while essentially the primary merit of the 2007 PC version, aren't as impressive anymore, though for a budget priced game it's probably better than you're expecting. Slowdown, some ugly character models and animation, as well as noticeable framerate issues do tend to occur, but a few of the battle arenas can be easy on the eyes.
©2009-07-07, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved