I’m sorry, I thought I could write a review without spoilers, but quickly found that to be an impossible task. That said, the story is so godawful (pun intended) you aren’t missing out on much learning about the presence of certain characters/events beforehand

NOTE - though a direct sequel to God of War 1, this game references events that occurred in Ghost of Sparta, and while not necessary to play it, you may end-up confused by one scene

Played as part of the God of War Collection for PS3


Every now and then, you’ll come across a work of fiction that really annoys you: whether it’s a video game, movie, or TV series, I guarantee you’ll find a project that's so vexing, you’ll want to nitpick every bone in its body till it’s laden on the ground in a puddle of splinters: deadly to the touch to anyone who would dare follow-up your diatribe.

Yes, God of War 2 provoked that kind of response in me. While I had enjoyed the first one quite a bit, it’s clear Santa Monica took the wrong lessons from its success: the end product here doubling-down on all its worst aspects, the worst being the story. In the first game, Kratos was, without a doubt, one of the most unlikeable a$$holes ever conceived in gaming: a sociopathic, screaming dipsh!t who was so unpleasant, I genuinely didn’t know if I was meant to be rooting for or against him. Still, there was an element of Greek Tragedy to his arc, and the idea of someone successfully subverting the oppression of the gods had a tinge of deconstructionism to it.

Unfortunately, you don’t get any such nuances here. God of War II had the perfect opportunity to tell a cogent tale about the wrongdoings of the Greek Pantheon, yet opts to forgo that in favor of a highly-generic revenge story made all the rottener by its protagonist being a reprehensible piece of sh!t. The premise is Zeus has betrayed Kratos out of fears the man will usurp him on Olympus, castigating him to the depths of the Underworld whilst taking away his divinity in the process.

Right off the bat, this synopsis reeks of plotholes, its conception indicating not a single second was spent on basic script oversight. For starters, why does Zeus suddenly feel this way? And if he was so scared of Kratos’s potential, why let Athena turn him into Ares's replacement in the first place? Worse yet, Kratos’s whole plea at the end of GoW1 was to die so his nightmares could end, so why not just approach the man and offer him the relief he desires?

But no, to answer these questions would require, you know, effort, something the team at Santa Monica evidently wouldn't learn until 2018.

Oh we’re not done yet - heeding the words of the Titan Gaia, Kratos climbs out of the Underworld to begin his journey towards vengeance….only, hold-up, how in the world did he accomplish this? We just saw Zeus take away his godhood, yet you’re telling me he’s still capable of clawing his way out of a (literal) hellish pit like it's a casual Sunday? This is a problem you’ll see constantly plagues the game: the notion that Kratos is capable of accomplishing inhuman feats despite being rendered a mere mortal by Zeus. During your odyssey, you’ll consistently come across a situation or monster that should have the upperhand on the deposed god, yet falter for reasons that can only be described as @sspulls.

Now I know there’ll be two counterarguments to this, the first that Kratos is granted blessings by the Titans akin to the ones he received from the Olympians (the same ones that allowed him to beat Ares), and that’d be a valid point were it not for a couple of setbacks: one, Kratos does a fair amount of crazy stuff before he even gets his first power; and two, some of the bosses he faces should be insurmountable even with such gifts. During the fight with the Sisters of Fate, for example, they repeatedly state how they can easily sabotage his past, so WHY THE F#CK DON’T THEY (one of them literally spends the game bitch-slapping Kratos like a silly nanny instead of using her “vast” power)? Another moment sees Kratos reencounter the barbarian nemesis who bested him before (and who claims to have gotten much stronger since), so why is this brute casually riding around on his horse instead of fighting mano y mano? Don’t even get me started on the final scrum with Zeus, nor the game’s comical (plot hole-ridden) take on time travel. Seriously, the amount of nonsense you have to put up with to justify Kratos’s “badassery” here is beyond laughable at times.

The second argument pertains to a twist reveal at the end, and no, it doesn’t resolve anything either (+).

Of course, overpowered protagonists aren’t inherently bad - we’ve all played titles that indulged in the power fantasy, and God of War certainly gained fame for popularizing that motif for western audiences. However, the MC needs to be somewhat affable; have a trait that makes them worth investing in for the long haul, and not only does Kratos not have that, the writers literally went out of their way to make him insufferable. There are several instances where he’ll just kill an innocent person without remorse, or do some heinous action(++), and what’s amusing is how it’s all played straight. Like, if the game had at least adopted a darkly humorous tone towards its violence ala Quentin Tarantino I could maybe see myself enjoying the man’s antics, but no, everything’s treated like Oedipus Rex and rendered worse as a result.

I think what makes GoW2 particularly irksome is there was so much potential here for a better tale. The idea of a human witnessing the horrors of the gods and choosing to do something about it could’ve been the source for an invigorating yarn. One scene early-on, for instance, has you meeting Prometheus (the Titan who gave mankind fire), and beholding the excruciating fate Zeus deemed fit for him was tough to stomach (no pun intended): imagine a game where such incidents formed the backbone for Kratos’s motivation over the stupid sh%t he brought upon himself (that’s right, never forget, Kratos is responsible for his own nightmares). But no, you don’t get that, the writers instead preferring to concoct ridiculously idiotic scenarios that genuinely feel like someone had a bone to pick with Greek Mythology.

No seriously, what’s up with sheer venom on-display towards the Greek World? Such lore has been home to some of the most powerful myths in human history, yet the lion’s share of them here have been stripped of their bearings in a pathetic attempt to provide Kratos with fodder to chew on: classical heroes like Theseus and Perseus are rendered lame boss fights (more on that later), the Phoenix needlessly tortured, and Typhon literally turned into a worse version of Temari from Naruto. When you put even a modicum of thought into things, the macro events underscoring every beat become thoroughly unpleasant.

And that’s really the perfect word to describe God of War II’s narrative as a whole - unpleasant. I didn’t feel like an antihero on a semi-justifiable excursion, but a complete jack@ss acting out like a toddler on steroids. While I’ll never judge anyone for liking something I don’t, Kratos’s rise to popularity does say a lot about the kind of pop culture we’ve cultivated in western society.

But look, it’s the gameplay everyone will care most about, and on that front God of War II is still a step down from its predecessor. One of the things I enjoyed most about the first game was its incorporation of puzzles - yes, a few were outright frustrating (the collapsing floor comes to mind), but overall they were nice and helped break-up the pace of the game.

Well, in designing the ones here, the artisans at Santa Monica evidently thought it better to indulge in pure annoyance -- do you guys remember that scene in GoW1 where you had to kick that stupid box across the ship deck? Well, not only does God of War II have its own version of it, but they somehow managed to make it worse via spamming the field with fire and enemies who can counter you. Another moment saw me wasting a good 10 minutes trying to deduce how to redirect light to this flame-spewing effigy, only for the solution to be to climb up a specific section of the wall to free loose sunbeams from the roof (and no, there was barely any visual distinction between the ascendable & unascendable sections of said wall, with the final icicle being hidden in a lanky corner).

I’m not saying everything is bad (there was a time puzzle later on that I kind of enjoyed), but when the quality, as a whole, is at a diminished value, it makes these moments aggravating to partake in.

Luckily, the combat remains as fun as ever, with Santa Monica programming so many new combinations, you can literally button mash to your heart’s content and STILL come away with a fresh move each time. God of War popularized the modern hack-and-slash template back in the day, and I’m proud to say it more than holds up here amidst its countless inspirees.

That said, no improvements were made to the base formula, with Santa Monica, in many cases, outright doubling-down on its prequel’s worst elements: magic attacks remain sharp bursts inorganically woven into the mainframe, executions are the same rehashed finishers you saw aplenty in 1, heavy enemies still boast vexing stunlocks, and, worse of all, quicktime events galore have been shoved into every major encounter. I genuinely don’t understand who thought these minigames would be a good idea as they are incredibly infuriating - you often only have a second to hit their respective prompt, and failing to do so will result in heavy damage (or, in the case of the final fight with Zeus, death). While nowhere near as intrusive as Fahrenheit’s, they definitely took away from any on-screen action, and I guarantee they’ll be the cause of your demise every now-and-then (ESPECIALLY during that Zeus brawl).

Speaking of Zeus, bosses make a return and they’re as mediocre as I hinted at above. True, the first game’s weren’t the greatest thing ever, but they still had a sense of grandeur and logic to their composition. GoW 2’s, au contraire, are tedious and boring, their tactics largely coming down to avoiding a stunlock-inducing attack as you wear down the enemy health bar in order to trigger a, you guessed, QTE! Out of all the clashes, the only ones I truly ended-up enjoying were Lakhesis and Atropos during the third act.

Minibosses, to their credit, fare much better, but one thing I disliked in II was whenever the game would introduce a brand new version, have you slay it, only to then immediately follow-up said encounter with the SAME boss x2 or 3 or 10(!). It begged the question of why they even designed a unique wrangle if they were just going to subvert it with a repetitive montage the second it was complete.

Lastly in the gameplay department, II brings over the upgrade system from afore at the expense of my favorite weapon the Blade of Artemis, replacing it with two slow-swinging clubs you're better off ignoring in favor of the default chains. Ditto with the magic -- sure, you're given a fair amount of spells to play with, but you're better off saving your orbs for the lighting-based Chronos Rage.

For all my harping, the one area God of War II has unilaterally improved upon its forebearer in is the graphics. Once again, I played the PS3 remaster, and once again I was blown away by the sheer crispness of the visuals: you got non-blocky 3D models, top-notch anti-aliasing, reflective surfaces that actually bend light, and some of the best artistry I’ve ever witnessed in gaming. When Santa Monica began development, I have a feeling they really wanted to take players to places they had never dreamed about before, and on that front they more than succeeded: from the fiery heat of the Great Chasm’s interiors to a sprawling flesh-composed dungeon to the streams of blue thread that adorn the Loom Chamber, this is a diverse and thoroughly-awesome treat for your eyes. Even places commonly-used in video games like marshlands and lavapits are often transfused here with some additional element that bears them apart from the crowd, such as blood red swamp water and spiderweb meshing respectively. And for all my harping about the story, the artists clearly did their research on Greek architecture, resulting in those gorgeous columns, bricks, and painted murals commonly-associated with said culture (every temple is a stunning masterwork).

Unlike GoW1, where the developers were unable to boost the cutscene files, here Santa Monica must’ve found the corresponding folder cause these babies look consistent with the base game, their resolution easily rivaling early-7th gen prospects whilst providing expansive grand spectacle….in some cases too grand. See, like I said in my review of the first game, the God of War series was always used by Sony to push the boundaries of their console, and while they certainly achieved this task, a lot of the cinematics you’ll witness on-hand can’t help coming across as self-indulgent to a fault: each scene seemingly showcasing a new physics-rendering capability of the Kinetica. You’ve got the naturalistic flow of liquids, collapsing of buildings, movement of the Titans, surging of velocious air -- one of the best feats I ever saw entails you witnessing the actual regrowth of Prometheus’s innards as he heals overnight. And yet, such pageantry can’t help coming across like someone at Santa Monica did this purely out of an initiative to pat themselves on the back.

Other miscellaneous graphical bits I liked included the Chains of Athena changing color as you upgraded them (more on that later), the lightsaber-hued orbs found in chests, and the incredibly-fast loading times.

The only derogatory hit on the whole system has to do with any depictions of penetration. The PS2 simply was not capable of accurately generating this for weapons, and given that many of Kratos’s executions rely on it, you’re going to be noticing a lot of haphazard merging that walks the line between clipping and blended simulacra.

Sound is where the game dips the most in stature, starting with the music - it is bombastic to a fault. Once again the work was outsourced to a bunch of composers, yet unlike before where they managed to create something unified and cohesive, here it’s just loud for loudness sake. 90 percent of the tracks employ horns and vocals to mimic that stereotypical brashness typically associated with Greek Hymns, but the boisterous volume combined with the repetitive melodies ends-up making it all unnecessarily overbearing. This is the only time I’ve had to constantly pause an OST while listening to it, and that speaks to the score’s inherent obnoxiousness.

Voice acting continues that trend, with TC Carson giving a headache-inducing performance as the titular character. Yeah, as if I needed to tell you guys, God of War II emphasizes Kratos’s angrier-side, meaning you get A LOT more b!tching yelling from the ousted deity than before, and it is painful to listen to. It truly is a shame because Carson is a talented actor: there’s a part in the back-half that lasts all of 10 seconds, but which showcases the kind of dramatic delivery the man is capable of doing, yet the simple fact is he’s just not granted many chances to do so. To pour salt in the wounds, the devs rehashed some of his dumber grunts instead of re-recording them, meaning you’ll be hearing a lot of mooing while moving stuff.

Despite his limited screen-time, Zeus is somehow worse, and just like with Ares, you’ll be shocked to learn his voice actor is a noted thespian in the form of Corey Burton. Fans of DC-based works know Burton’s given plenty of wonderful performances elsewhere, yet here comes across like a senior resident whose cords have been clogged from smoking too much weed.

The others are fine, serving their roles well-enough, but the overarching quality does feel like a step down from 1 where it truly came across like a cast of Royal Shakespeareans doing their best job according credence to the project.

SFX has its good-and-bad: slicing enemies never gets tiring, and I appreciated the spark-chinking that resounded whenever you hit boulders and walls, but none of the non-singing monsters were memorable, and there were times where the developers outright faltered in terms of synchronizing appropriate noises. For example, one scene has you walking along a giant chain that sways like a fiber rope; another has you facing dog-like beasts that bark like a regular ole hound. Overall it’s sufficient, but could’ve been more.

Unfortunately, that sentiment isn’t applicable to the entire game as I did not enjoy it. It’s a technical marvel done at the expense of the most important tenets of a video game, and while it did a lot for the industry and PS2’s legacy, it’s best left forgotten.


NOTES
+Kratos is revealed at the end to be Zeus’s son and, consequently, a demigod. This is no doubt an instance of the writers ripping-off paying homage to other popular figures like Herakles, but the problem is they clearly didn’t do their research as even those individuals with divine heritage were severely handicapped compared to their Olympian parent.

++Using the Argonaut to stop the cog, torturing/murdering the Priests, tearing off Icarus’s wings (honestly, can we just take a second to observe how stupid it was to turn Icarus of all people into a boss fight? This is a guy whose wings were famously burned to a crisp and died, yet here he’s somehow alive and actually able to hold his own against Kratos? There are so many discourses throughout the game which indicate the writers studied past Greek myths, so why they outright sabotaged them with worse retellings is beyond me).

-There is a challenge mode for you completionists out there.

-No subtitles (again), but at least they sped-up the orb procession.

-Thank the lord they moved the door opening button to O instead of the right bumper! It alleviated my fingers tremendously.

-There’s an awful sex minigame early-on that’s both narratively-intrusive and built on QTEs (worst part is you don’t even get to see any of the action).

-Hated how slow Kratos became whenever he carried bodies. I get this was done to make some of the boss fights artificially-hard, but the man is literally capable of moving giant cinder blocks yet somehow gets encumbered by a mere corpse?

-There’s a track from the OST that literally sounds like a Diet Coke version of the famous trailer song Preliator by Globus.