God Of War: A Wild Chase To The Top
With Sony's Livestream concluded, we all got to see our first look at God Of War: Ragnarok. So this is a great time to re-visit the first God Of War (GoW) that rebooted the series in 2018. Admittedly, I play God Of War halfway, and then l shelved it for a good year or so. I know, I know totally wrong on my end and it is a great game, the good news is that I actually ended up finishing it. So I totally qualified to write a blog on it.
God Of War was great, to just get the point across. I mean it did win the Game Of The Year, the year it came out so that should tell you exactly what you need to know about it. Santa Monica studios have done a phenomenal job resurrecting Kratos from the previous installments. The first 3 GoW's that came out early in the Playstation eras were great as well, but as the series progressed it felt as if it was getting stale in Kratos's search for vengeance and his pure anger towards everything.
I know at the time the game had come out we were at a point where games generally can look very photorealistic, which is crazy considering games not too long ago were pixels or low-rendered polygonal shapes. When GoW 2018 came out it was graphically amazing, like I said it's not much of a surprise but it is always amazing to see how far we've come from that point in time. The combat system had been redefined in a sense to add a sense of freshness in the series as if to say "I'm back and I'm better".
Where the game really shines, I believe is the storytelling. The overall story is filled with dramatics, twists, turns, cliffhangers, and mystery, in a sense, it leaves you wanting for more. Though, to me at least it felt as if the pacing was slow at times and that I had to fill in more pieces of the puzzle throughout the story. Despite this, I thoroughly enjoyed going through it all, even with the break in between the game that I had.
Speaking on the story, the reason it's so compelling to me is due to the fact that Kratos, is just no longer Kratos. What I mean by that is in the first 3 games in the series, he has a purpose, he's spiteful, he's a character with a clear-cut goal in mind with what he wants to attain. In GoW 2018, he's merely a shell of himself in the sense of personality, he often tries to stay calm and collected, yet stern with his son. He has moments when he falls into his rage and man are those moments insane.
The most intriguing dynamic now though, is his relationship with Atreus, his son. Kratos embarks on a journey with his son, in which he looks to spread his wife's (Atreus's mother) ashes at the highest peak in the land. While they go on this journey, we see a whole new side to Kratos for the first time, Kratos attempting to be a fatherly figure. As he goes about it he and Atreus often bump heads, as they're often in disagreements. It's all new to him, Kratos being a father and you can see it, on how hard he's trying to steer Atreus into what he figures is the right path for his son.
The story gets seemingly more complex when we add on Baldur, I mean, to be honest, it was a little complex when we went from Greek mythology in the previous games to Norse mythology so I mean... Regardless, Baldur is the antagonist of GoW 2018, ordered to hunt and kill Kratos and Atreus by Odin as they're believed to be the reason Ragnarok is to happen. Even though Baldur was ordered to kill both of them, when he egged Kratos into a battle with him he was immediately disappointed. Even though, Kratos had tremendous power all of it meant little to Baldur as he didn't feel pain.
A spell was cast on Baldur, from Freya (his mother) to prevent him from feeling any pain or putting anything to harm him. This made Baldur furious, looking for constant ways to die or feel some sense of comfort in knowing he can feel anything. His character is a very intriguing one, as the antagonist of the story. It takes the story in place and adds pieces to it that make it more complex.
All in all, the journey to the top was filled with amazing battles, dialogues, puzzles, and storytelling. The game was amazing, it's exactly how games should be done nowadays. Sony has been on a tear with most of the exclusive IPs in the Playstation lineup and this is just one of the many great games that I've had the privilege to play. As a subtle tweet once said: "Ragnarok is coming".
