In Dante’s Ring, you are a firefighter wrestling with your inner demons while sledding down a volcano

I have one urgent request for Starward Industries, creators of the just-announced “anti-combat” survival RPG Dante’s Ring – don’t use the phrase “ring of fire” in your English marketing materials. I get that you’re going for a cocktail of Divina Commedia and FromSoftware associations, but you have to remember that this is the internet and we’re all desperately crude. I can’t speak for people from other English-language countries, but when I hear somebody talking about their “ring of fire”, I tend to assume they’ve been at the vindaloo.

There’s no time for such shenanigans in Dante’s Ring. It doesn’t look like it has a sense of humour at all, probably to its credit. According to the Steam page, it’s “an action-adventure RPG with survival and arcade elements, and a disaster combat theme, where you confront the deadliest forces of nature — from raging fires and molten lava to powerful earthquakes.”

You play somebody exploring an extinct volcanic mountain range that isn’t quite as extinct as advertised. Rather than fighting any individual enemies, you must “strive to survive and save as many lives as possible while facing the force of nature, the aftermath of a natural disaster, deep-seated human beliefs, social conflicts, and your own inner demons”.

To do all this, you’ll scavenge for resources and make use of “retro” gadgets such as propellor-powered sleds and vulcanologist suits, together with more basic instruments such as fireaxes. “Will you fight a frenetic fire or flee from a pyroclastic flow?” the Steam page goes on. “Break the door to rescue someone or stop and give first aid?”

That covers the immediate “disaster combat” aspect, anyway. As regards the themes of belief and social conflict, there’s talk of “complex moral choices” and negotiating between “diverse” NPC factions. The game is hub-based, with the ability to choose a loadout before embarking on a mission. The world appears to evolve from mission to mission, “with outcomes that can influence the course of the story”.

The social/religious theming here sounds laboured, if I’m honest, but I like the idea of a game about making ends meet on the surface of an active volcano. I imagine they have a propagating fire system and fluid physics for the lava. Hopefully, they’ll give the likes of Far Cry 2 a run for their money. Hopefully, they’ll also improve on their previous game The Invincible, which Julian Benson described as “an engaging sci-fi adventure that can leave you cold and confused the moment it stops holding your hand”.

Dante’s Ring will launch into Steam early access next year. If you want something weird and fiery to play in the meantime, there’s always Noita.