Sometimes, very seldom, it happens that a game appears out of nowhere that immediately hits like a bomb – BOOOM! One that you just have to play, regardless of whether you like the genre or not. One that shows most of the other games where it’s really at, how to do something right. God of War is such a game that has been withheld from us battered Germans. But finally Sony has mercy and serves us this gem that is worth every single cent.
Storyline (MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD)
Kratos, a captain of the Spartan army , is a successful warrior who, with his men, spreads fear and terror among the enemies of Sparta. Despite the warnings of his wife Lysandra, Kratos’ desire for new conquests remains unbroken. The day comes, however, when the Spartan faces an inevitable defeat against barbarian hordes from the east.
In this hopeless situation, he calls on the god of war Ares for assistance and in return he prescribes his soul and life. The god of war then equips Kratos with two powerful blades, which at the same time tie him to Ares and thus also give expression to the alliance outwardly. With those chaos blades Kratos can kill the leader of the barbarians and successfully continue his campaign in the name of Ares.
After a massacre of the inhabitants of a village devoted to the goddess Athena , the increasingly cruel and bloodthirsty acting Kratos realizes that among the victims in the temple of Athena – Ares’ opponent in Olympus – his wife Lysandra and his little daughter Calliope are.
The pain that sets in at the loss makes him come to his senses; at the same time, the oracle of the desecrated temple places a curse on him: his body should remain covered for all time with the ashes of Lysandra and Calliope and thus make his atrocities visible to everyone. Kratos, feared throughout the country, sees Ares as the real culprit for the events and, accompanied by terrible nightmares and visions, seeks vengeance on the god of war. In the following ten years, Kratos places himself as a warrior in the service of other gods, in the hope that they will free him from his visions.
After Kratos has killed the Hydra on the instructions of the sea god Poseidon , he receives one last assignment from Athena. She promises the Spartan that the gods will forgive his deeds and erase his past if he kills Ares, who rages with his henchmen in Athena’s city, Athens . Kratos fights his way through the half-destroyed city and finally meets a mysterious gravedigger who is digging a single grave in front of the Temple of the Oracle. The old man encourages the Spartan to kill Ares and tells him that he is digging the grave for him, Kratos; however, he should be careful not to die before it was done.
Kratos saves the Oracle of Athens from Ares’ servants and learns from him that the only way to defeat Ares is through Pandora’s box . Athena reveals to Kratos that the rifle is in a temple chained to the back of the Titan Kronos , Zeus’ punishment for Kronos in the Titanomachy .
Kratos crosses the desert, penetrates into Pandora’s temple and overcomes the numerous traps and adversaries there. At the top of the huge temple he finally finds the box, a heavy golden chest. When he wants to take them to Athens, Ares kills the Spartan from there and has the rifle brought to him.
Kratos falls into Hadesdown and fights your way through the fiery underworld. With the help of the mysterious gravedigger, who once again assures him that Kratos will not only receive divine support from Athene, the Spartan can escape Hades through the now completed grave.
He goes to Ares, is able to snatch Pandora’s box from him and opens it, which gives him godlike strength himself. In a long final battle, he succeeds in defeating and killing the god of war. Athena announces to Kratos that the gods are grateful to him and forgive him for his actions, but that they cannot free him from his nightmares.
Disappointed by the gods, Kratos throws himself from a high cliff into the sea to kill himself. Athena, however, does not allow the Spartan to kill himself and elevates him to Olympus as a reward for his services.There he takes Ares’ place as god of war.
Gameplay
The game mechanics of God of War contain various elements. To reach the individual game sections, the player must on the one hand compete in action-packed battles against computer-controlled opponents and defeat them, on the other hand also solve puzzles by interacting with objects such as switches or blocks.
These action and adventure elements are often linked by passages in which the character in the style of jump-‘n’-run games must be moved through the section with as little damage as possible by skillfully jumping, climbing and balancing. The player controls them with the left analog stick of the gamepad and lets them jump by pressing a button. The camera follows the character in the third-person perspective , so it represents it in its three-dimensional environment.
The position of the camera and its viewing angle cannot be directly influenced by the player, but rather show the action, depending on the situation, mostly from a medium distance. in individual sequences from a long shot or from a particularly close-up perspective. If the game character suffers virtual death, for example because it is defeated by the opponents or falls into an abyss, it is reset to a checkpoint before the fight or the jump passage. The player can save his game status at the so-called memory points .
The most feared….
Somehow there must be something special about a game when the hero is the very first to fall from the highest mountain in Greece, accompanied by a bombastic chorus – while the mystical announcer oracles that death is his only escape from madness. What happened? How could it come to this? The best way to find out is: experience it for yourself! So the game jumps three weeks into the past to show the player the tragic story interactively. Ladies and Gentlemen, Enter Kratos, the Spartan – the best
Kratos is feared even by his friends, sleeps (interactively!) With two women and carves everything he comes across without hesitation. Between the beginning in the Aegean Sea and the final jump from the mountain there are easily eight to ten hours of the best 3rd person action that the good old PS2 was ever allowed to experience. You will fight the hydra, shred minotaurs, cut Cyclops one eye, grapple with deadly sirens like Odysseus once did, avoid insidious traps, cross the gigantic palace of Pandora, get to know Hades – and in the end even challenge the god of war personally!
God of War is not a game of false modesty. There is a reason why Sony Germany has so far hesitated to publish the work of the Santa Monica Studios in this country – it’s really getting down to business! Opponents are torn to shreds, necks broken, eyeballs sawed, heads torn off, bodies torn to shreds or undead soldiers pleading for mercy sacrificed to a fire trap.
A lot of hurdles in the conquest
On the way to your goal, an estimated two billions of enemies stand in your way, all based on Greek mythical creatures: Cyclops, minotaurs, sirens, Medusa, harpies or hellhounds – there is screeching, there is howling, there is roaring, of course befitting in Dolby Surround. You almost always compete against several enemies at the same time, which usually also approach in different waves. In addition, there are often arena fights: You come into a larger room or area, all exits are magically locked and the enemy rushes at you screeching. A short time and a lot of blood later, the doors open again and we continue.
Absolute Beauty…
At first glance, the action world of God of War is one thing above all: brilliantly presented! It starts with the soundtrack, which starts bombastic, pompous and powerful from the first second with thick choirs, even thicker horns and a force that you rarely get to hear in a video game . Just the end song … be sure to turn it loud! Or even better: order the soundtrack immediately, which transports you through the game like an audiobook!
While the ears are pampered, there is one feast for the eyes after the other – the optics are in no way inferior to the acoustics: brilliantly and imaginatively designed, wonderfully detailed and impressively animated figures crash into each other in dreamy levels. From the burning Athens, where a gigantic Ares rages in the background, to the nested palace of Pandora, which is furnished with a number of completely different styles, to the shiny gold Olympus, the game offers a splendor that one would hardly expect the Xbox to be, and certainly not the one aging PS2!
Shiny marble floors, noble frescoes in buildings, fine statues on stairs and walls – the superlative lexicon has to work overtime here, God of War simply looks good enough to drive you crazy! The camera angles are fixed and often show what is happening from the most dramatic perspectives – but one wishes occasionally being able to adjust the setting yourself. Only very rarely does the splendor stutter minimally, and reloading is even less frequent: The whole game is basically a gigantic, coherent world, which is only interrupted by cutscenes that continue the dramatic story
Technical Aspects
The engine that was developed from scratch by SCE Santa Monica Studio for their previous Kinetica project was used as the game engine . In Kinetica (2001) is a published only in North America for the PS2 futuristic racing game. According to lead programmer Tim Moss, the engine used in it already offered good support for the animation and effects for the planned God of War , but still had to be adapted to the requirements of a third-person game. Looking back, producer Studstill explained that the development of the engine had taken some time, but that it was well invested, because the team wanted to get the PS2 “legs up and running” beyond the first game, Kinetica .
According to Moss, another important decision from a technical point of view was to use Maya software throughout for the 3D modeling . The main objective of the programming team of around seven people was to provide the designers with tools with which they could implement new elements and special cases independently, and thus shift the main burden of the development process to the design area.
The version management system Alienbrain was used to coordinate the files . The full-screen method , which was used in the original version in the NTSC television standard for image construction, could be used in the European PALVersion cannot be implemented for technical reasons.
Bottomline
Pick a god of your choice and thank him on your knees or offer him a sheep for the fact that God of War is finally officially available from us – even if somewhat outrageously at full price instead of at mid-price like the rest of the world. Because this game is a highly polished action masterpiece that clearly shows what is possible on the PS2 when real experts are at work. It looks amazing, it sounds even better, it features furious action and some of the most brilliant boss fights ever.
And while it’s a slaughter, it feels bigger and more epic than most RPGs I know. Some sections, such as Pandora’s Palace, are simply masterpieces: nested inside one another, gigantic in size, full of pitfalls, traps and puzzles – wonderful!
Others like Hades just pissed me off and shortly before the final, the game noticeably loses its verve, which has cost a lot of sympathy and a lot of nerves. And as action-packed as God of War may be – friends of pure butchery are perhaps better off with Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks, which is very similar in terms of play, because a damned number of, sometimes damn nasty puzzles are waiting for you here! In case of doubt, you should still use GoW – even if it’s just about wanting to learn something about Greek mythology. Because the best action game the PS2 has ever been able to experience lurks here.
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