God of War (2018)

After playing pretty much every Greek Saga God of War I finally played this one and I can happily say that this is one of the best games ever made. It has great exploration, satisfying combat and a good story. The game looks excellent, the world is expertly crafted and interesting.

Now this is the weird part for me, as much as I loved playing this and I think it definitely deserves a 5 star rating I have issues with the game. This aren't really issues as just comparing it to the older installations in the series. I feel like overall the older games are better in some very important core parts. I will list some of them.

Combat - While I like the combat in the reboot It is incomparable to the older games, and the main issue for that to me is the camera. I am not a fan of over the shoulder camera, it is too close in. In some instances I didn't really see what enemies were doing, not only because I cant see behind me or next to me but because Kratos body is blocking a big chunk of the screen, add in bunch of the effects that are flying around and I can't see crap. I really like the zoomed out camera where I see everything that is happening. The other thing is that there is no jump button and air juggling is not as good.

RPG Elements - The game does not need all this armor, enchantments and all the other crap. I am not a fan of looking around for loot in a God of War game, it kills the pacing for me. Of course I understand that this comes with the semi-open world, otherwise why would you explore, but most of the time I just picked up useless garbage. This also affects combat, I just grinded my gear until the game became kind of easy. I did not really need to learn enemy patterns.

Writing - I like the story but I like the way characters talk in the Greek Saga, it makes it feel much more epic and mythological. This has more of a modern way of speaking, aand I don't really think this suits Kratos to be honest, I like the previous Kratos a bit more.

God of War (2018) is a really good game but it’s hard to not be cynical, disappointed, frustrated and annoyed. This is what happens when you put presentation and story above gameplay and player experience.

First of all I have to say that anyone that ever said anything like ‘God of War is grown up now’ or ‘God of War is now mature’ has a bad memory, didn’t play the older games or is being dishonest. Second, why is this a God of War game with Kratos? I get that using that name and character brings some history, depth and built in fan base but this could have been its own new IP with new characters. We all know how much the AAA gaming industry likes to take risks so of course they are rebooting something instead. Third, why the hell is this being considered as one of the greatest games of all time and getting such high praise? God of War is the perfect game to pair with popcorn and soda. It is a blockbuster game – big budget, fun, highly polished but kind of shallow and not really special, amazing or interesting. If God of War is peak gaming then are good super hero movies peak film?

Let’s get the obvious out the way this game has really high production values. It looks and sounds excellent and made my PS4 Pro roar like a jet. The voice acting, sound effects and music is great. Everything is highly polished but it’s not that interesting. I’m not a big fan of the games art direction, a lot of the environments feel very similar and level design is kind of bland. It mostly loses the original God of War trilogy’s personality, variety, epicness, scale, over the top action and gore.

The story is fine but left me a bit cold. It starts off okay, although too slowly, and it ends well. However the majority of the game is just meh. I didn’t connect with things at all and wasn’t interested in the characters. Don’t get me wrong there were some good moments, humour and I liked seeing their take on the Norse mythology, unfortunately though it’s mostly forgettable and this why the ending probably didn’t hit as it was intended to for me. Also Atreus is annoying.

The game play has some problems and choices I just don’t get and didn’t enjoy. The commitment to the camera and the close over the shoulder view just doesn’t work for the gameplay. Not being able to see what you need too isn’t fun and it gets even worse in close spaces or near walls. Why can’t Kratos jump? It removes verticality from level design and combat and means platforming is just put in the bin. Kratos climbs so slowly too. Puzzles are underwhelming. The difficulty curve is poor with spongy enemies at first and then things just get too easy. There is all this different stuff to find and so much for Kratos to equip. Why is this crap even here, what does it add other than monotony and padding? I do like the way combat feels. The axe is fun and it hits hard. Everything feels like it has great weight and momentum to it. It doesn’t reward you for playing well though and starts to feel like you’re just going through the motions before the games end.

I think the original God of War trilogy is better than this and enjoyed those older games a lot more. It’s sad to see God of War lose its personality and uniqueness and become another big, homogeneous, cinematic, story driven, single player experience like the others by Sony. For me God of War (2018) is kind of forgettable and doesn’t have any replay value. Of course it is a delight for your eyes and ears. Of course it is impressive. Of course it is enjoyable, worth playing and I recommend it. But it is definitely not top shelf gaming or deserving of a place next to the all time greats.

7.8/10

the game looks great and the combat is fun, but I was expecting a lot more from this game based on the way people talked about it, it's still a good game but definitely not industry-changing as people told me it was going to be, the story is cool but basic and far from one of the best in gaming, it's a plot that was nice while experiencing it but that definitely won't stay with me for long

the combat was very fun but also pretty standard for this type of game, even if I liked the combat I couldn't help but wonder what people were talking about when they said this combat was as revolutionary as batman arkham asylum when it came out

overall this is your average triple A game, it's gonna be fun, but even if people hype it a lot try not to go with super big expectations or you might be a bit disappointed like I was (but even then I overall all still enjoyed the game)

ps: I am happy a lot of people loved this enough to call it a masterpiece tough

I am a big fan of the God of war series. Although I could not play much after god of war 2 on the PS2 until it released on PC.

At first, I was kinda put off by the ambience of the game. The previous ones being all "grim and death" themed and then seeing this colourful, green environment and Kratos had become rather much sober. Plus, there were no blades of chaos, I missed them the most I think. So I was kinda disappointed at first. Yet it was fun to play but not so much. But as the story progressed I was getting sucked into it as the characters built up. And after that it was a thrilling ride. Seeing this fatherly side of Kratos - sober, but determined just as before. This put a lot of things in perspective for me with regards to the actions of the old (not age wise) Kratos.

The gameplay and combat was good nothing exceptional, as I was expecting it to be like the old GoW. There weren't many puzzles and neither were they as difficult. It was straight up hack and slash. The bosses were fairly easy to beat on normal difficulty. The side bosses are rather tough to beat, funny.

What captivated me throughout the game was the story. Oh god what a story! Seeing Kratos as a teacher just brings clarity on the things he did before and how he had learned from his actions, and was trying to be a better god. The dialogues were inspiring. I was fully immersed in the relationship between Kratos and Atreus which was building throughout the game. The interaction with other gods was interesting to witness.

This game was less of a bummer than I had feared it would be. While God of War is by no means a masterpiece of game design, it has some definitive qualities. These are my major surprizes:

•Really good dialogue and voice actors. Kratos made me laugh twice a minute with his mutterings and stark remarks. This game is comedic gold in the way it portraits harsh masculinity, and one of the few modern triple A-games that actually succeeds in having interesting in game-conversations.

•A strong depiction of the relationship between Kratos and Atreus. Even if not sufficiently told through gameplay, the cutscenes and father to son-talks when exploring the world at least manages to invest the player. You really care for Atreus by the end of the game.

•The leviathan axe feels incredibly good to use, I especially like how its throwing mechanic both has battle and puzzle applications.

That said, God of War fails in a lot of other areas. It is waaaaaaay too long for it's own good, with a lot of padding and repetitive battles and reuse of puzzles as a result. The UI lacks a unique design appropriate for the franchise at hand, instead choosing a very generic approach. The implementation of armour, experience points and character builds feel shoehorned in just because every other AAA-game does it.

All in all, there is some quality to be found in God of War, but for me it's far from one of the best games of the decade, let alone one of the best games of all time.

5/5

First played in 2018 on release on my base PS4 - while I enjoyed the game then I rushed through it to get to other games and didn't fully appreciate it.

Replayed on PS5 and it was a whole different beast. 60FPS was the ultimate game changer here, everything was far more pleasant to do, and the overall presentation improved vastly.

By far my favourite component of this game is the exploration. I didn't take the time to do this in my previous playthrough, but this time I explored each nook and cranny of every area as they were unlocked, and found there was so much side content and loot to get to. A great example is the Lake of Nine which has a huge amount of places to explore and things to do, which periodically expands as you progress through the story. The level design shines here as they makes the islands work with different water levels. Other parts of the game also have metroidvania-esque components to them and neat loops back to earlier areas which I love. I also loved the puzzles in this game - they were never mind-bendingly hard but consistently satisfying to solve. The most important part of the exploration is that it was rewarding. I came across really strong enchantments, armor and other goodies that made my gameplay more fun. I love the armor system here - useful armor that looks cool and can be upgraded. You make choices on which armor you want based on how you want your Kratos to be built. Far better than a loot overload of meaningless armor that can be boiled down to numbers (CP2077). I didn't 100% the game this time but I've done basically all the things I wanted to - including the Valkyries, upgrading the weapons and doing all the side quests.

I started the game on Hard dificulty but had to turn it down to Normal due to struggling with so many of the early battles. I found that this is one of those games I enjoy a bit easier, I can feel way more like a God of War. The combat of the game is very engaging, loads of different moves and weapons to choose from, plus Atreus is a genuinely integral part of fighting, particularly helping with crowd control. I think the camera is a little close to Kratos which makes some of the fights a bit finnicky but the quick turn around helps with that, although I never used it. I think the difficulty is a bit too punishing on Hard, especially with how hard it is to crowd control in the early game. Overall the combat never gets too boring (except for some of the Musphelheim challenges) and the skill progression is fantastic.

The story was amazing the first time and it was just as good here on the second playthrough. Love all the characters and the dynamic between Kratos and Atreus is brilliantly developed. Can't wait to see where this goes next.

This game looks absolutely stunning, the environments are well designed and it flows incredibly well because there is no disruption between "cut-scene" and playable game.

The story is definitely a highlight, it's well narrated and we want to know more about Kratos, Atreus and the world around them. The NPCs we get to meet during the journey are not so many and don't play particularly big roles and yet they are all really interesting and fully realized characters. The relationship between father and son it's so well conveyed and it was really refreshing to see a character like Kratos getting so much character arc and powerful emotional moments aside from just slaying everything that comes his way.

It is a bit more linear than I expected when it comes to a more or less open game, but I'm not mad about since the story and the world are so well presented. Awesome PS4 title!

I don't have a lot of faith in Santa Monica studios. I didn't enjoy the first two games of this series and I just barely trucked through God of War 3, but either by some act of the gods or just the most beautiful storm, God of War 4 managed to be a truly great experience. It manages to get so much cohesively right despite a multitude of rough edges and interior flaws.

The combat was the first thing that brought me in, using a genuinely competent system of kiting enemies and managing your position. You have a good berth of tools to use and all of them have specialized use, whether that be keeping space, juggling enemies, or managing hordes. Enemy encounters are generally well designed to boot, with many of them keeping you always moving and continuously judging opportunity costs to what you decide to do. Other than a couple stinkers, all the enemies have interesting movesets to manage. Cooldown abilities are done here well for probably the first time I've seen outside multiplayer games, in that they have a clear cost of use and don't just steamroll or fully limit your options. You also have weapon swapping and Atreus's bow shots to always keep your hands busy and use a genuine amount of depth.

The boss fights in tandem are hit or miss, with a couple genuinely good story bosses that actually use the system, a couple spectacle bosses that serve as a nice visual treat, and then a bunch of really boring annoying troll bosses reskinned with an elemental buff. That sounds more negative, but the game makes up for it with optional bosses known as Valkyries, which maximize to the fullest extent what the system of mechanics is capable of. Each valkyrie has a great moveset and offers a fantastic difficult challenge.

The rest of the gameplay unfortunately is much less than graceful. The puzzle rooms range from somewhat earned downtime to incredibly boring endeavors, and pretty much almost all of the side content other than the valkyries is a waste of time that perpetuates the singlehandedly weakest component of the whole game -- The Gear. In short, God of War did not need a gear system, or a stats system. It has no depth to it and only adds problems, especially when the difficulty is put up when level scaling is introduced, to make matters worse. It really should've stuck with story-progressed unlocks rather than this level bullshit, but apparently they needed something to stretch out that exploration aspect and this is what they decided on.

On the other hand, what ended up coming as a surprise to me a few hours in was the great story and characters on offer. The story in short is very simple, but what it offers is excellent characterization brimming with personality. The banter between Kratos and Atreus is well written as it is characterizing and pushing the relationship between them forward in a natural almost entirely organic way. There is a low point to this, in a single rushed instance where Atreus becomes a massive egomaniac in the span of a few minutes, but the purpose is there and it rights itself up to bring a fantastic ending at the end. Another character is brought in at the halfway point to make the worldbuilding and lore parts of the story more interesting, as well as make the banter more humorous.

It also needs to be said that the game is a visual and auditory treat, but I think that ends up being a massive understatement. There is, to my knowledge, no game in the triple A spectrum that has as good cinematography, visual design, and direction as God of War 4 does. It earns the one-shot gimmick that most mediums fail to do, as well as nail almost every setpiece. There are a few scenes in here that will stick with me for a while in a way Naughty Dog and Rockstar games fail to capture. Probably helps that the director of the game is a massive film nerd. The music is also solid and fitting for the game, although in contrast I probably won't be listening to it much from now on.

Overall, while it has a few shaky steps and some monikers of the triple A pitch the developers are limited by, God of War 4 is an excellent game that kept me engaged enough to finish as soon as I could. I honestly am just crossing my fingers that they don't fuck up the sequel. (8.5/10)

Who would of thought such a simplistic plot could harbour one of my favourite gaming adventures, the word masterpiece shouldn't be used lightly but this without a doubt is one. Fantastic voice acting, badass soundtrack, addicting combat aided by the beast Leviathan axe, interesting side quests opening exploration on all ends of the map with some fun puzzles, tons of lore hidden around waiting to be found and read. Santa Monica, bravo.

First, a note about spoilers: I will do my best not to give away any of the major plot points or exciting discoveries in this review. Apart from plot points you discover in the first few minutes of the game, I hope it remains spoiler-free.

I played the hell out of the original trilogy on the PS2/PS3, and I thought the games were enjoyable, equal parts challenging and enjoyable. But when I first saw the trailer for God of War (2018), I knew this was on a whole other level. It's a perfectly logical progression for the series: having dissassembled the entire Greek pantheon of Gods, Kratos escapes to far-away lands. There he finds something he never hoped to know again: love. He settles down with a woman and they share many happy years together. They start a family, and Kratos names his son Atreus.

Things never last forever though, and the game starts with preparing Faye's funeral pyre, and then gathering her ashes for her final request: to spread on the highest peak in the realms. Kratos and Atreus set out on their quest, uncertain how to get along together but trying in respect of Faye's memory. The Norse gods don't take too kindly to an outsider on their turf, and they get into all kinds of trouble with a new mythology.

For the first time in the series, Angry Dude Kratos has someone he cares about, and the slowly unfolding relationship with Atreus brought me to tears and laughter many times. There were so many pivotal moments in their quest together where they both delved deeply into vulnerability and trust, and there was nothing more rewarding than seeing them learn from one another what it means to love.

One of the central themes of GoW is the war (forgive me) that wages inside of Kratos. Though he's travelled far to escape his past, he has never truly forgotten it. In fact, as wonderful as his new life is, he sees it as a self-imposed exile where he can live out his days without doing any more harm to anyone. As their quest takes unexpected turns, Kratos is forced to face the life he tried to leave behind, the life that never really left him. The weight of his godhood shifted the balance of things, and the consequences lead Kratos to contemplate whether he'll ever be more than just a monster whose only skill is death. He longs desperately to break the cycle, and through Atreus he begins to believe that he might.

Despite only having one real weapon, the combat in God of War was by far the best it's ever been. Even bare-handed, Kratos' attacks had a weight to them, where each punch, each thud of the axe really felt like it could do some damage. It was exquisite mastering the combat, chaining together combinations, stuns and finishers in a bloody and intricate dance. I really enjoyed the combat challenges that I accessed by unlocking other realms, and my favourite moments in the game (apart from the poignant story-telling) were encountering bosses and spending up to an hour learning to fight them until I could sufficiently read their attacks and respond appropriately. In these fights, the game punished me for just spamming the attack button, and required me to truly master the arts of dodging, parrying and knowing when to attack and when to block.

Those fights were a lot tougher than they needed to be though. The game has a curious levelling system that increases your level depending on what gear you have equipped. Despite being able to access high-level combat challenges quite early in the game, they were ridiculously hard until I'd progressed the story enough to find higher-level enchantments to equip. Neither could I upgrade my existing equipment any further: I didn't have access to the resources I needed until I'd progressed further in the world. While I can see the benefits of getting players to go back and forth between story missions and side quests, it clashed with my completionist mind-set, and I wish they hadn't made such challenges available so early if they would be impossible to complete.

Speaking of completionism, there was so much to discover and enjoy; chests to discover, artifacts to find, resources to collect, treasure caches to uncover, and a hefty bit of lore. I poured over every nook and cranny of the world, and I loved every second of it. Midgard had so many secrets, and many of them were so cleverly hidden that it brought a great sense of achievement to solve them. Somehow the puzzle-solving continued to impress me with its freshness and originality, despite me playing these sorts of games for a long time now.

Something else that must be mentioned is the incredible score. Ever since that first announcement at E3, it's been abundantly clear how passionate the developers are in taking the music seriously, and they did an outstanding job. In particular, hearing the classic God of War theme weave its way into pivotal story moments gave me chills.

God of War (2018) is one of the greatest games I have ever played. At the heart of it were the characters that I came to care for deeply - I even rewatched cutscenes on YouTube just to relive the thrill of elation and the depths of despair. And (I can't believe I haven't mentioned this yet), it's an absolutely gorgeous game, and I felt compelled to pause it many times to take screenshots. This gave deserves every accolade and award it's received, and I hope many more people get to experience this incredible piece of interactive art. I'm at a loss for what to do with myself now that it's over, and I guess I'll try and resign myself to waiting for news of a possible sequel. 10/10, top shelf game.

Gameplay: 5 /5 Story: 4.5/5 Presentation: 4.5 /5 Difficulty: 3 / 5

Basis:

Story= plot progression, intrigue, characters, world

Gameplay= Mechanics, gameplay options (freedom), repetition, goals, difficulty

Presentation= graphics, animation, environment/character design, Art direction, Script, music

This is by far the best entry of the series. That being said I feel it wouldn't be what it is if not for the previous titles. The first hour of the game just got me hooked. The music along with the beautiful graphics really engross you into the Norse world. The character development of Kratos up to the point of the game as well as throughout is superb. I love the relationship dynamics with him and his son. The combat in the game was superior to the hack n slash feel of the previous games. The new RPG elements such as armor builds and enchantments do make you grind for good gear or else certain enemies will be impossible to defeat. Farming for currency isn't a very long process like other games often are. There is too much that makes this game amazing to put into the review also I am trying to keep from including spoilers. Highly recommend the game whether you have played previous titles or not. If you have played the others definitely play it.

This game is easily already in my top 5 games of all time, So I am going to make this a very short review because the game is best played blind.

The basics of what you should know are....

1. You do not need to play the previous games, but if you have you will have a few references to look forward to.
2. The combat in the game is some of the best to date! You will not be disappointed.
3. If you are a trophy hunter there are no trophies based on the difficulty and none are miss-able.
4. The length of the game depends on how you are while playing I myself took my time a bit more and clocked in around 25ish hours when I finished the main story and to platinum the game I would guess it took some where between 50 and 60 hours.

Have fun hopefully this helps out on your decision on if you should pick the game up or not!