This review contains spoilers
2018 God of War was a real special game to me, the poetic "get to the tallest peak to spread the ashes" framing, the incorporation of the original trilogy's narrative as a ghost haunting Kratos' relationship with his son, the terseness of their dynamic with each other evolving messily over the game's hours with curt, subtle writing and body language often weaved into the level design and combat. Having Kratos get tangled up in Freya and Baldur (with all their parallels to Zeus and himself in the original games) led to an ending that was climactic and moving and didn't overplay its hand.
And while I appreciate what a monumental task it was to develop Ragnarok as a follow-up with its elaborated combat system, greater realm count, oodles of subplots and characters... I can't help but feel disappointed in this one, the subtext and focus of 2018 is just not there, I pretty consistently felt like I was being shuffled around to the next area the devs had made with elaborate exposition trying a little too desperately to explain why, characters talk incessantly either because of AAA game design ethos demanding (more and more) a frictionless critical path, or because they're having to bear the weight of forcing more connective tissue between disparate plot sections than there really is. Odin and Sindri's arcs and dialogue, in particular, approach greatness but are dragged down by not having enough room to breathe with everything else the story is trying to achieve, along with the game dropping hours and hours of unrelated sidequests into the laps of characters who have much more urgent things to do. As much as I loved the depictions of the Aesir in a vacuum, the game just really didn't work for me on a story level or reach satisfying conclusions for many of the plots it set up, which is a bummer.
Combat-wise, it starts off a little overcomplicated but around the time I hit the mid-game and got THE SPEAR (hell yeah) it clicked into a higher gear which was a blast paired with a much more diverse set of enemy types than the first game. The optional bosses in the end game really force you to engage with all the equipment upgrade systems and enchantments you can find and thus, make finding those things feel more rewarding in retrospect. Was surprised to find myself enjoying the game a lot more AFTER the main story was over when I could just focus on kinetic combat hijinks.
And while I appreciate what a monumental task it was to develop Ragnarok as a follow-up with its elaborated combat system, greater realm count, oodles of subplots and characters... I can't help but feel disappointed in this one, the subtext and focus of 2018 is just not there, I pretty consistently felt like I was being shuffled around to the next area the devs had made with elaborate exposition trying a little too desperately to explain why, characters talk incessantly either because of AAA game design ethos demanding (more and more) a frictionless critical path, or because they're having to bear the weight of forcing more connective tissue between disparate plot sections than there really is. Odin and Sindri's arcs and dialogue, in particular, approach greatness but are dragged down by not having enough room to breathe with everything else the story is trying to achieve, along with the game dropping hours and hours of unrelated sidequests into the laps of characters who have much more urgent things to do. As much as I loved the depictions of the Aesir in a vacuum, the game just really didn't work for me on a story level or reach satisfying conclusions for many of the plots it set up, which is a bummer.
Combat-wise, it starts off a little overcomplicated but around the time I hit the mid-game and got THE SPEAR (hell yeah) it clicked into a higher gear which was a blast paired with a much more diverse set of enemy types than the first game. The optional bosses in the end game really force you to engage with all the equipment upgrade systems and enchantments you can find and thus, make finding those things feel more rewarding in retrospect. Was surprised to find myself enjoying the game a lot more AFTER the main story was over when I could just focus on kinetic combat hijinks.