The spectacle of this game is unmatched by any freaking game in this genre. The music, the views, the feeling of taking on a God at the final act, and seeing these GIGANTIC ancient buildings that all tell a story just from their designs. It is incredible this game was a PS2 title. The story is surprisingly interesting?? With like actual emotional writing, character arcs, and revelations?? Coming from DMC, and Ninja Gaiden, it shocked me how invested I was in Kratos's story of manipulation, sadness, and his descent into anger. And what a fantastic finale!

Oh yeah...the combat. Ummm, you mash. You block, and you spam magic. If you don't have magic, sometimes you just lose, and sometimes RNG is on your side. There's some complexity with aerial combat and how enemies bounce, but it will not help succeed in this game. Square, square, and triangle is your only optimal combo for 75% of this game. QTE's are fun, but they become exhausting after the 30th QTE. Enemies are varied, but fighting them becomes exhausting when they keep on respawning, or their health seems to be infinite. It all gets very exhausting after hour 3. To make things worse, some gauntlets are miserable to get through (Zeus Mountain, I am looking at you!). But thankfully, there are some puzzles and platforming to break up the combat, which ranged from serviceable to pretty neat. The Bosses are cool, but there's so little of them. Why? Not sure. But nonetheless, this game was pretty enjoyable for the most part. Nothing really grabs me mechanically to ever revisit this game, but the story has gotten me hyped to see where Santa Monica took their series next.

6/10

Reviewed on Nov 19, 2022


Comments