Limbo City, DmC: Devil May Cry
The game version of Genoa is also often suspended between two worlds. In DmC: Devil May Cry, Limbo City reflects this representing both an oppressive metropolis, dominated by demons and populated by terrible monsters, and a place of nostalgia which the artistic director Alessandro Taini based on his home town. In his thrilling adventure to save the inhabitants of Limbo City from evil, the main character, Dante, parries demons, sword thrusts and gunshots in the caruggi, the alleyways typical of the historical centre of Genoa. Here in the caruggi, the city relives its past as it intertwines with the present: the small squares that link them together, the courtyards opening out in the midst, the pervasion of a combination of smells, tastes and cultures, their narrow streets conserving precious works of art. These alleyways proffer an amalgamation of styles, in addition to a melting pot of cultures and influences: medieval walls, 15th century buildings and Gothic loggias combine to describe a fascinating and multi-faceted past that in DmC is forced to tackle an oppressive and threatening future where mass media is controlled by demons.
Before leaving Dante’s Limbo City, we walk down via XX Settembre. The thoroughfare is today one of the most popular places for a walk in the city with almost a kilometre studded with porticos and shops and paved with mosaics, the very same that Dante strides quickly across as he leaps from one challenge to the next. It ends at the Ponte Monumentale, the imposing marble construction that provides access to the tunnels and caves of Genova Sotterranea (Underground Genoa) – the perfect setting for another encounter with demons that Dante, however, manages to avoid (and so we can but imagine it.)
