The format of these posts is simple: let’s discuss a specific game or series!
Let’s discuss the God of War series. What is your favorite game in the series? What do you like about it? What doesn’t work for you? Are there similar games you like? Feel free to share anything that comes up and react to other comments. Let’s get the conversation going!
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Combat peaked in GoW3 and it’s definitely the best western action game, IMO. OG trilogy badly needs a remaster and PC port, which I read is in the works, so that’s good.
I liked the freedom of expression GoW3 gave me. Like, you get one opening and you can fuck up the enemy in all sorts of ways in true action game spirit. Really good stuff and more western action games should’ve followed suit.
Frankly, I don’t think any of the originals are particularly good, and I was done with the new one just before the first one was over. They aren’t terrible, but I’ve always found the praise and hype for the series entirely disproportionate to the content.
Frankly, I don’t think any of the originals are particularly good
In terms of what? And what’s your relationship like with the character action genre?
I don’t particularly love the floaty, sloppy “just put some damage in this 180 degree arc” basis of the combat system much. I am also not at all on board with most of the early teenage edgelord narrative stuff in there. Maybe I was a bit too old by the time these came out.
The Harryhausen references are neat and some of the boss fights are cool set pieces that did set some of the groundwork for later AAA action games, but I would much rather spend time in the more expressive, free-flowing Devil May Cry side of things if I’m going for snappy, precise combat… or all the way into Musou slop, I suppose, although I’m not much into that, either.
I don’t particularly love the floaty, sloppy “just put some damage in this 180 degree arc” basis of the combat system much.
I’m not sure what this means, to be totally honest.
I am also not at all on board with most of the early teenage edgelord narrative stuff in there. Maybe I was a bit too old by the time these came out.
I don’t care what anyone says, narratives in character action games are shit 😂 I’m never gonna defend it, and always find it odd that people cared about their stories. They’re not good vehicles for storytelling, IMO.
There’s a reason GoW (2018) had to change genre to shift focus to storytelling, for example.
I would much rather spend time in the more expressive, free-flowing Devil May Cry side of things if I’m going for snappy, precise combat
Hmm… this makes me wonder how much time you spent playing around with GoW3’s combat system because it clearly takes a lot of inspiration from DMC.
They definitely moved towards… I’m gonna say better references later in the franchise.
Still, there’s also a reason they moved to a whole different genre.
GoW’s core combat premise is that you have absurd range and can deal damage in a wide arc. It was REALLY hard to tighten that all the way via iteration while keeping the way the game plays.
GoW 3 was a huge step above its predecessors in setting up big standout setpieces, and it played… I’m gonna say “better”, but it was still limited by the core framework of the series so far, and my argument is that framework was fundamentally flawed.
Hmm… sure, yes. I wouldn’t say it’s flawed, but I’d say it’s different, and I much prefer the Japanese way of doing things here where it feels I’m precisely choreographing a movie fight instead of doing as much damage as possible to anyone in my immediate vicinity.
I’d still say GoW3 is peak western action, and quite fun to play. I would not rank it on the same level as DMC5, Ninja Gaiden II, or Bayonetta, but I’d rank it fairly close—like a step or two behind.
As of the franchise as a whole, yeah, it’s not the best, but many franchises aren’t, TBH. I love Bayonetta, for example, but that franchise is all over the place. It’s almost GoW backwards… higher peak than GoW, for sure, but still messy overall.
I don’t have much to disagree with there, frankly. I mean, I like GoW 3 less than you do. I’d genuinely play the Ninja Theory DMC, if I’m honest, but at that point we’re splitting hairs.
To be clear, I don’t hate these games, I just don’t like them much and generally don’t play them on purpose. We’re coming at it from different angles but meeting pretty much halfway.
I never beat the first one (I think it was the first one anyway…)
The ps2 disc had a scratch on it and the game would freeze/crash when I got to a certain part. It was the cutscene where Kratos hurls a gigantic column if anyone remembers.
I would like to eventually replay and beat that one game for some childhood redemption.
I started playing the new god of war 2018 at one point, but couldn’t really get into it at the time. There was(is) an oversaturation of viking focused content at the time and I was kind of burnt out on it by that point.
I hear the new games are really good though, so I’d also like to give them an honest chance at some point.
It was the cutscene where Kratos hurls a gigantic column if anyone remembers.
I think Kratos does this in just about every game. I was playing Ragnarok 5 minutes ago and he was hurling pillars at enemies left, right and center :D.
As for 2018: it’s a game with a big focus on combat, exploration and character driven storytelling. I can understand feeling burnt out on the viking aesthetic, but the game feels way more fantastical than historical to me.
Ha, fair enough. I’m fairly sure it was the first game. I just looked up a video, I think it actually may have been the part where Aries throws a pillar at Kratos which impales him in the chest.
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The first one on PS2 or the version from 2018?
The originals were fantastic. The 2018 version is sublime.
