God of War Ragnarok was everything I wanted out of a sequel. The 2018 game is one of my favorite games of all time, and ragnarok expands on what made it great. If you had major problems with that game this won’t change anything, but if you already liked it, you’ll probably like it even more now.

Puzzles and Traversal: I’ve seen people complain about the puzzles in this game and how they’re handholding. They should definitely make an option to turn off puzzle hints but when I was playing a game I had two things happen. Either I already knew what to do immediately and it as simple/I didn’t need a hint (which is bad unless the “puzzle” is locked behind a combat encounter), or the hint was no help at all (this is also bad since it can be annoying if repeated). The puzzles on the main path were usually eh but the optional puzzles were usually satisfying to complete. In Alfheim they combine a new puzzle mechanic with one from the previous game, and it’s really well done. Unfortunately that’s the only time it happens. I’m generally fine with “uncharted climbing”- but I wish they just let us use the blades of chaos grappling hook most of the times. Also there’s a section where you just need to climb a massive wall, the climbing isn't that fun, it just serves to show the world and break up the pace in the game. I think the best part of the game (and god of war) is that I like hearing the characters speak during gameplay, Kratos isn’t talking to himself fortunately. Mimir always has something interesting to say.

Combat: There’s a ton more enemy and boss variety, and the new verticality added to combat makes these arenas more fun. You’ll get a lot of mini boss encounters to bolster the difficulty too. There’s a ton of unique encounters to find across the world. The blades of chaos were my personal favorite weapon. The runic attacks are satisfying, although I wish there were more. There’s a ton of new skills for Atreus as well.

Presentation: Not a massive jump over god of war 2018, but the visuals looked even better than I expected honestly. But all this is expected from god of war, the music and sound design remain fantastic too.

Combat spoilers: To be honest I was kinda disappointed they didn’t have you use mjolnir lol, the spear is pretty cool though. I like the three elements- if they wanna keep on going with norse mythology I wouldn’t mind a game about thrud. Freya is an awesome addition, when I saw “Freya xp” show up on screen I was so hyped. She’s a great companion in combat and I really enjoy her side quests. This isn’t really combat but I also really loved how there’s a massive quest where Kratos opens up to her, it’s a great way to make her redemption actually make sense. Also it must’ve been annoying to design every side quest to have dialogue for both Atreus and Freya depending on when the player completes them. I also like how they added new forms of spartan rage- but the original is so fun that I don’t get why you wouldn’t use that one, especially since you can use it to regenerate health too.

Combat Spoilers (Atreus): Atreus is such a welcome addition man, it makes perfect sense- and it’s great for pacing imo. Even tho he’s less entertaining than Kratos this is much better for gameplay variety than like a water level or something. The thing is the game focuses on Kratos. Atreus isn’t like an equivalent character who can explore the world, he just has sections where you play as him. I wish they made combat with him more complex and added the option to have some combat challenges in jotunheim with him post game- that would’ve been cool. Why not bring in more arrows that you can use in combat? There’s no side quests with Atreus or exploring the world with him, it’s not like the Ellie sections in the last of us 1, but since there’s more of them I have to wonder why they didn’t go all the way and make him as prominent as Kratos. Also it was really awesome that they kept this secret.

World Design and Side Quests: The levels are more expansive this time but the main missions aren’t that evolved from the first game’s, I think they’re still better due to other factors (the minor improvements in the game/the scope), but the side quests are where this game’s improvements really shine. I was really impressed by the side quests in the first game, I completed them on my second play through and I liked how they tied into the main themes. Some were like full on levels you could find, others were just “explore the lake”. The progression of the lake of nine was satisfying but led to repeated visits of islands and it taking a while to get the full view of everything. This was the only “open world” stuff in the game. This made a lot of sense, but I think that progression of making the player go back places might just cause people to leave things behind. You can tell when there’s stuff hidden that you need a new item for, sometimes they just naturally bring you back to it, but in this game I felt less incentivized because of how massive everything is, I’m not gonna take note of everything. Some realms are basically just god of war 2018 levels, but others have really awesome open world stuff. I honestly think this is my favorite type of game structure lol. In Horizon, they separate side quests based on how expansive they are, I think this game could’ve used that since there’s a couple that I feel are imperative to “getting” the story. Anyway I enjoyed exploring svartalfheim, alfheim, and midgard. Midgard’s great since it made me miss the old lake of nine which is now icy due to fimbulwinter. Anyway do the side quests they’re great, even the basic combat ones- speaking of which. It’s also incredibly easy to go from realm to realm now, but I wish they cut out the two way fast travel system and just allowed me to go places. My favorite realm in the game was vanaheim, the story missions were fantastic and the open world sections were brilliant as well.

Boss Fights: The problem with god of war’s boss fights wasn’t the amount of trolls you fight, trolls are really enjoyable combat encounters. The issue was they were disproportionate. Now there’s a much larger variety of bosses and minibosses. I think the dreki might appear just as much as the trolls but I didn’t care about that since if I needed a break from a certain type of boss I could just look at my side quest list and go around. Valkyrie-type boss fights return except now there are three of them. The story boss fights are incredibly creative and fun.

RPG Mechanics: I love stupid rpg mechanics, it keeps me engaged with the game even if it’s dumb. The UI has been made fun of a ton (deservingly), and the stats and leveling systems are weird. I was able to understand better in this game, but god of war doesn’t need this. Just give me a skill tree and basic upgrades.

Story and Characters: God of War’s story is one of the best in gaming, it’s incredibly personal and very well integrated, every character and side quest you do connects. God of War Ragnarok is more expansive, it has very clear themes but it’s not as personal, there’s a larger variety of things it explores. The scope of the plot and world are imitated by the scope of what the game explores story wise. Side quests are well written, particularly the ones involving main characters. I love what the game does with prophecy and the back and forth with that. I have a few issues with the story though. They never explained how Kratos entered the norse realm, it’s honestly weird that god of war 2018 makes more references to the original god of war trilogy than this. I think the series also has a major problem now, there’s a path to keep on going- but they’ll need to end soon. They can’t keep on doing this shit where kratos and atreus don’t want to kill but are forced to. I loved ragnarok’s story and you get all these cool boss fights throughout, it wouldn’t have worked story wise to make this as insane as god of war 3, but from a gameplay perspective it would’ve been so awesome- it’s ragnarok. That all being said this is definitely the better way to go about it. Heimdall, thor, and odin are awesome to fight. I think it’s interesting how they kinda recontextualized ragnarok to be more a war against asgard rather than the apocalypse. The arcs of every character are great, I don’t wanna get into everything specifically but what matters to me is that the ending is incredibly satisfying. It all connects back to the main theme of letting go. When they advertised that I was looking forward to exploring what the apocalypse means, but I’m fine they didn’t go that route. My one thing with this world is that it was kinda dead in the last game- I know that was the point but I feel like they needed to have more likeable living characters you meet during side quests to really enhance ragnarok. There’s so many good moments throughout, story lived up to the first game.

Future/Meta: Can they end it here? God of War as a series is so good- sony santa monica seems to be splitting into two teams, my question is if they plan to go to egypt or whatever. I have so many ideas for what to do next, I’m sure they do as well. But they left kratos off on such a perfect note. This absolutely should’ve been a duology, but it would be weird to leave off the series again after just two games since god of war 2018 was “a new beginning.” The world is so well done, I want to keep on exploring what these talented developers create, but it might be time to let go. The thing that makes this worse is that if they want to continue this is the time to do it- they have the actors.

Conclusion: God of War is one of the most consistent video game series ever, and this is everything I want out of a game. Awesome melee combat and boss fights, insane scope, amazing story and characters, awesome exploration and side quests. I know some will dislike that it’s a “sony third person cinematic action adventure game”, and won’t connect to it as much as I do, which is fine obviously. These games are incredibly popular for a reason though, and it legitimately defines everything I love about video games.