I doubt Sony paid them off, but I would be willing to believe that people took their opinion of God of War into the reviews (similar to taking their opinions of GH/RB into their review of Wii Music). And that has been a problem in a lot of the industry lately where the elitism of an existing franchise makes it hard for a newer IP to reach similar levels. And at times those new IPs don't need to be on the same level review wise, but animosity shoudn't be taken out on them just because of their similarities.
But know, I doubt Sony contributed any money to the review scores that Dante Inferno got and really I doubt they cared haha.