God of War (2018)

Finally got around to playing God of War (2018) on my PC after picking it up during a summer sale.

Background:

I played a bit of 1 and 2 back in the day but never fully completed either.

Story: 9.5/10

The story of Kratos struggling to be a father to his son is told very well. Seeing Atreus grow in skill and abilities with you as you progress is great to see and especially noticeable from the first major story battle to the last.

You see Kratos struggle to bond with Atreus a few times early on, but slowly get more comfortable as the story progresses.

The story telling feels very organic with a lot being told as you’re navigating between different areas of the map. Cut scenes play an important role but don’t happen too much.

My only knock is very slight in that I did lookup the previous games stories so that I fully understood the ramifications of some scenes. You can infer most things from the story alone but it isn’t fully impactful as a standalone game just as a heads up.

Playability 9.5/10

As someone who can’t always play super consistently the journal that Atreus keeps helps catch you up to things you forget and when looking at Kratos “special” attacks it’ll demonstrate the buttons you need to hit as well as visually show you what happens with the basic form of the attack which is helpful when you come back after a short break. Key Mapping of attacks on PC is also very good.

My small complaint is it won’t show you how upgraded forms of special attack play out. Also when loading a previous save it isn’t exactly where you previously left off but ends up being the last minor “checkpoint”.

Summary:

I would have definitely paid full price for this game and enjoyed it so much I plan on buying the sequel almost immediately when it comes out in September unless there’s some major issues with the port.