- Estimated achievement difficulty: 3/10 (7/10 for 1290)
- Approximate time: 8-10 hours (12-15 with DLC)
- Offline: 44/54 (1040)
- Online: 10/54 (250)
- Missable Achievements: 8 - Well done Judas, Light Relics, Dark Relics, Forbidden Love, Old Friend, The Damned, Burning Eyes, The Guide (Clear Path Not Lost in Dark Forest DLC)
- Minimum number of playthroughs needed: 2 playthroughs
- Glitched achievements: 0
- Cheats: None
Playthrough 1:
Fire up your first playthrough on whatever difficulty you want, there are no difficulty achievements, but playing on Classic WILL ruin the experience, keep it for your 2nd playthrough or if you're just looking for a quick 1000 fix.
First of all, click here for the collectibles guide and keep it close. It contains all locations to relics, coins, shades and Beatrice stones. Coins, shades and virgil (explained in next paragraph) do NOT carry over nor is there a chapter selection screen, so missing one will require a FULL new playthrough in order to get the achievement.
Save often and in different slots.
Second, make sure to talk to Virgil, the poet, every time you see him, and keep talking to him until he disappears. Some of them hand out relics and are also mentioned in the guide. There is one appearance that 'can' be missed and it's the one in the room right before your first boss. Make a small tour in the room and you'll have no trouble spotting him.
Third, pick an alignment and stick with it for your whole first playthrough, by the end of it, you will have reached it's maximum level and be able to purchase all skills in it. I recommend taking unholy first and get to know your scythe moves. If you, for some reason, do not max it out or can't buy all the skills, there's no need to worry as you carry over your stats and relics to your next playthrough.
Lastly, 'Old Friend' and 'Forbidden Love' require you to absolve the shades in question. Even when you're going for Unholy first, DO NOT punish them, but absolve them by pressing . The locations are in the guide, along with a word of warning that you need to absolve them for the achievement.
Once you entered the first circle of hell, remember to punish/absolve shades and enemies, depending on what tree you picked, for they give the needed exp to max out the tree. Enemies that can be punished/absolved will display an symbol when weakened. Minions and babies are punished/absolved by grabbing them with .
While progressing through the game, keep in mind that you have to defeat 20 enemies with a counterattack, and 20 enemies with magic. I suggest doing this on minions, as they die the quickest. The counterattack achievement requires a skill in the Unholy Tree, but it's a lvl 1 skill and easy to obtain early on.
As soon as an enemy is about to land a hit, press . If done correctly, Dante will block in slow-motion. Follow with or to finish the move.
Beating the game will unlock resurrection mode (new game+) and 'Gates of Hell' survival mode.
Playthrough 2:
If you followed the locations guide and focused on 1 tree only in your first playthrough, you should only have 3 achievements left... those for maxing out your second tree and 'Gates of Hell'.
Start a new game and you will be asked to start it in resurrection mode. Accept, choose your difficulty and rip your way through hell while finishing your second tree.
Gates of Hell:
Start Gates of Hell, pick your difficulty and play through 50 waves of enemies with increasing difficulty. You can 'cheat' your way through by spamming relentlessly. This will net you your last achievement for your original 1000
DLC
Dark Forest
This is a single player DLC and will take you a maximum time of perhaps 20 minutes. Dark Forest is a prequel to the main game. It picks up after the opening cutscene of the game where Dante has just finished sewing a cross into his chest. The level involves you walking through a dark forest that can get very disorientating. It ends with a fight against a single monster who is easy to kill no matter what difficulty you choose (you can choose any). Follow the guide here so you don't get lost for Clear Path Not Lost, and simply finish playing through it to get Dark Forest.
The Trials of St Lucia
This DLC is for completing, creating, and rating various trials. The difficulty in some of the EA trials you need to do is absolutely hellish. You will need to do some of them in co-op, so you will need to find a partner to play through with. Find a partner in the achievement trading thread found here. Start off by creating and uploading a single and two player trial to unlock Creationism and Lucy I'm Home. Get a friend to rate one of you trials at least 4 stars to get A Star Is Born. Search for trials by the gamertag "LifeExpectancy". He has made many simple trials on different difficulties. Completing these will make getting Well Played and Play Me! much easier. When searching for these, add a few to your favourites so you don't have to keep searching as often. Adding ten to your favourites list will unlock Do Me A Favour. You will get You're A Player and You're The Best Around on your way to getting these for getting cumulative points. Make sure you rate all of them after playing with any rating, as you will need to rate 100 trials for The Critic.
Finally comes the hard bit. You will be going for It's In The Trial. You have to complete all of the EA trials: 25 single player and 15 co-op ones. You can find general tips here, but be warned some of these are really tricky and will try your patience. A good co-op partner is paramount here. This will be the only achievement remaining for many gamers as it is so much more difficult than the rest of the achievements.
Conclusion:
Dante's Inferno is a very easy 1000, and the DLC makes it a very easy 1260, but the EA trials are really difficult so will give you some problems. The game has a pretty cool story and some fun game play and is pretty much glitch free.
[x360a would like to thank Corrupt x360a for the DLC additions to this road map]