5 hours in, God Of War Ragnarök is a welcome, well-crafted return to a modern classic
Our spoiler-free first impressions of the first few hours of Sony's sequel to 2018's shockingly good God Of War revival
Games Features God Of War
Every Friday, A.V. Club staffers kick off our weekly open thread for the discussion of gaming plans and recent gaming glories, but of course, the real action is down in the comments, where we invite you to answer our eternal question: What Are You Playing This Weekend?
[Note: This is a pre-review, first impressions piece about the first few hours of God Of War Ragnarök; it contains a few light story spoilers about the opening hours of the game, but I’ve gone pretty sparing, even there; certainly, there’s not much here that Sony hasn’t revealed in the game’s trailers. Primarily, this is a piece for people who want to know, on a fairly basic level, what the game is like, without getting any story ruined for them. Our full review will run on November 3. Phew!]
At no point, during the first five hours of God Of War Ragnarök, does Kratos, the titular god of war, shout “Boy!”
That’s worth noting, I think, because it’s been four long years since the release of the last God Of War game, the franchise’s nigh-miraculous 2018 revival—i.e. more than enough time for it to decay from something alive in the head and hands into the base stuff of memories and memes. “Boy!”, delivered from Kratos at regular intervals to his son, Atreus, was a big part of the mental footprint of that game, a barked command more suited to a general’s treatment of his soldiers than any kind of filial address. God Of War 2018 contained many a hard-fought battle, but the un-“Boy!”-ing of Kratos—the steady loosening of two decades of nigh-comical rage and nu metal-scored angst into something resembling a relatable human being—was its fundamental, and most impressive, struggle, and Ragnarök honors it by not rolling back that clock.
We come back to Kratos and Atreus (still voiced, with exceptional skill, by Christopher Judge and Sonny Suljic) three years later, as they emerge from a period that’s not hard to view as their own very brutal, very chilly version of Pandemic Mode. Fimbulwinter has fallen across the land, see, a magical, apocalypse-signifying cold snap that has Atreus curious about the much-ballyhooed Ragnarök—and Kratos desperate to keep his son away from the machinations of the local gods, enforcing a rigid sort of cosmic quarantine on the bo—uh, teen. Unfortunately, said deities (led by Norse head honcho Odin, played very much in Toby-from-West-Wing-mode by Richard Schiff) have no problem making house calls—again—kicking off yet another father-son road trip through the Norse-derived Nine Realms to deal with the fallout.
If all of that sounds pretty familiar, it should: Ragnarök, for all the earth-shattering portents of its name, is very much a proud and measured sequel to God Of War 2018. Same road-trip structure, same father-son focus, same extensive lake-boating—once you ditch Midgard for some warmer climates, leastways—same compelling, but not overly complicated, combat. (Including sticking to its guns on the first game’s decision to keep the camera locked tight to Kratos’ back in fights; you’re still going to be relying on Atreus to call out attacks headed your way from off-screen, a nice bit of imposed team-building from the devs, that builds on all the work done to make the kid feel genuinely useful in the first game.) It looks quite a bit nicer, and the game is overall a bit chattier, since your allies (notably, the talking severed head Mimir) from the first game are now very much in play from the start. But this is a sequel that’s interested in continuation, not revolution; Santa Monica Studio isn’t out to reinvent a game that people very much enjoyed the first time around.
My one caveat is an admittedly obnoxious one: Like that first entry, I feel moved to note that what Santa Monica has made here is very much a video game in big-budget blockbuster mode. If, like me, you’re the kind of crank who enjoys a little friction in his games—maybe even a little outright obtuseness—then the steady, gentle forward motion toward the next objective, the next bit of story, the next series of Zelda-ish puzzles that come with a little reward that’s been exactly calibrated to deposit the exact right amount of dopamine into the player’s brain, might rankle a little. But this is, as noted, a crank’s complaint: Video game too smooth? Get better problems, self.
The fact is, if God Of War 2018 worked for you—and if you don’t mind keeping an early eye on DoesTheDogDie.com for reasons I’d probably get yelled at for disclosing in more detail—then there’s no reason that Ragnarök won’t, too. It’s a sort of platonic sequel, at least from what I’ve played so far: More story, more world, and, of course, way less “Boy!”
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Last What Are You Playing This Weekend, I mentioned that I was going through Telltale’s The Walking Dead: Season 1. Well, needless to say, I finished that game and it left me an utter mess. Here are my final choices in case anyone was wondering:This weekend, I decided that I’d go for something a little more light to balance with the heavy nature of the Walking Dead. I decided I’d dip my toes in the Spyro Reignited Trilogy and play through the first game. I heard about how the first three Spyro games were must have PS1 games and since I don’t have a PS1, I figured I’d get the Re-Ignited trilogy. So far, I am having a lot of fun just going through the worlds and collecting all the diamonds. I just finished Alpine Ridge, and the next world I intend to go through is the High Caves World. The only part of the game I’m not crazy about (and chalk this up to me just not being that good at them) is the flying levels. I’ve only done two of them so far, and they, especially the second one, has a strict time limit that makes it very difficult to actually pass the level. But I’ll keep trying and practicing and getting better at it.
IMHO, I’m not sure Telltale ever hit the emotional heights of S1 Walking Dead. Then again, I kinda soured on the series after playing S2, so they might get better after that for all I know. Without spoiling anything, S2 has Clementine as a protagonist, which means a lot of critical choices are left to her, which in turn resulted in the other characters constantly giving Clementine grief for the fallout of those decisions…which feels wrong.The Wolf Among Us is pretty much what you would expect from a Fables story (plus it’s kinda nice to see the Telltale engine used with a less drab color palette). Batman: The Telltale Series is an interesting reinvention of Batman mythos not tied to any other continuity. Troy Baker does a pretty good Bruce Wayne!After S1 Walking Dead took them from a niche developer of point-and-click adventure games (they had done liscened games before, but it was smaller franchises) to a developer of a top-selling, award-winning game for a hot liscenced property, they started to ramp up their development schedule, which left their writing staff spread a bit thin at times. I have a suspicion this might be what eventually led to their bankruptcy.
Tales from the borderlands was masterfully made. At times, I would be bold to say that’s better than walking dead season 1.
Tales from the Borderlands was truly excellent. It’s what got me into the rest of the Borderlands franchise. The new game is on my list.
Tales was a great gateway into the other borderlands games. I ended up loving borderlands 2 and the pre sequel. Tales is just masterfully done from start to end.
I’m still having great fun with Xenoblade Chronicles 3, unfogging more and more of each map and clearing out side content. I wish there were a bit more verticality to some of these maps — there’s nothing like Uraya or Tantal from XC2 — but there’s suitable complexity coming from the labyrinthine nature of some of these landforms. Plus, there’s some really strong art direction — again, nothing as striking as Uraya — but beautiful and memorable nonetheless. 128 hours in, I’m not tired of the game; I just want to keep doing sidequests and uncovering more narrative details.I think I might have been overly harsh in some of my thinking on Soul Hackers 2. I still think the game just doesn’t have the amount or depth of content it needs to support an entire JRPG. But the writing in the side content remains strong, and I like a lot of the core gameplay ideas. There’s a bit of prickliness and friction to the way people interact with you that sets this game as more “adult” than Persona or Tokyo Mirage Sessions. It sounds strange to say, but it’s actually refreshing when NPCs are dicks sometimes.
God of War is just one of those series I haven’t been able to follow for a very long time because I’ve only purchased two consoles in the past three generations: the Xbox 360 and the Switch. A friend insisted that I borrow the second one because it was amazing, and it did a fair job of roughly feeling like the first, but I barely remember anything from it. It’s interesting hearing that, after taking a break, they gave Kratos more personality than just “angry.” I hope the gameplay has evolved beyond “Devil May Cry, but with QTEs.”The past week involved clearing my third, most complete playthrough of Tales of Symphonia, finishing off the randomized optional dungeon and a couple of superbosses I wasn’t anywhere near strong enough for on my 2x EXP playthrough, completing my bestiary, and largely snapping up all the items I’d missed on my first two sweeps. Then I pored over the list of titles I still hadn’t earned, mapped out how much work they would take, realized that a single title would require a fifth playthrough, and stared into the abyss for a bit.And then started my 1/2 EXP playthrough. Because, at bottom, I’m still having fun, and it’s kinda cool relying on every other advantage I’ve earned to carry me through the game at what would otherwise be painfully low levels. Being able to cast endgame spells but having them deplete my entire TP bar, but also having extra capacity for restorative items and the carried-over money to fill up *and* buy every new weapon every time I reach a new shop? The game feels surprisingly well balanced for exactly this. My only complaint is that they didn’t think to make cut scenes skippable in NG+.Otherwise, I’m just checking my mailbox every day, waiting for my Kickstarter Everdell expansions to arrive. It’s my favorite board game, and the added mechanics feel like they should incorporate amazingly and change up the strategy significantly. Fulfillment was supposed to happen in early spring, but because of supply chain issues, pandemic restrictions at factories, and the campaign earning like 20x the goal, there have been plenty of perfectly justifiable delays. But I am very much Calvin waiting for his propeller beanie at this point.
I hope the gameplay has evolved beyond “Devil May Cry, but with QTEs.”It’s much different. Fewer enemies and the game is glued to Kratos’ shoulder for the whole duration – it never leaves his back in combat, even when you’re fighting giants, and the only time it breaks away from him period is a couple of cutscenes. And even then, the camera walks away literally a couple metres away from him just to focus on a different character in the scene.While there’s still comboing and even a little bit of juggling going on, the combat is much more duel-like and heavy rather, rather than the focus on breezing through fuckers of the original games. I’d best describe it as modern Assassin’s Creed combat by way of The Last of Us – it has a similar “Hollywood fencing” quality to how you dynamically yet methodically hack through your enemies’ defenses, but the fixed, limited perspective and fewer enemies give the combat a real “hefty” feel. It’s quick and dynamic, but there’s a punchiness and weight to your moveset.It’s a really good combat system overall. There’s a rhythm to it but it’s also relatively freeform and it keeps with the spirit of the original trilogy, despite the perspective and speed being much different. Your main weapon, the axe, is a good example: a big part of the combat is throwing it at enemies or objects and then summoning it back like a boomerang, and it lets you setup cool traps and layups on your enemies. A fluid combat encounter makes you a bit like a fantasy John Wick, efficiently mowing enemies in your path while pinning targets for later.
After beating and enjoying Rift Apart. I’m now playing DQXI and Vice City. DQ has been very slow and kinda boring so far. Still waiting to see why it’s so highly rated. With P5R and FF7R you could immediately see excellent games. Vice City has been very fun now that I can actually beat the missions that made me quit when I was 11. R* really improved on their narrative skills after this game. The story in this one is pretty dull but Tommy Vercetti is a fun protagonist
Gotham Knights is ass. It’s not bad, but it’s so non-commital to every single of its ideas, barren and soulless that it’s a game I just don’t want to play.It’s a shame, because they’ve actually managed to create a cool superhero game loop for it. You go out at night, solve crimes and beat up goons for info. You literally collect “clues”, a currency that unlocks more crimes on the next night. You basically have to return to your HQ to progress through the game because of that. It’s very gamey, but it’s actually a good portrayal of the street superhero routine and it allows you to progress through the story at a speed that ultimately feels a lot more natural. It’s certainly better than Spider-Man’s “solve alerts until they stop popping up” approach.The problem is that nothing lands because everything is half-baked. Combat feels shitty and samey. It lacks the Arkham snappiness, it’s governed by numbers so you rarely feel like a superhero because they need to balance your ass and there’s just no imagination to it. I hate bringing up the Arkham trilogy because it’s not some sacred cow, but the way those games introduced your various skills and tools into the combat was awesome and gave the games a very nice rhythm: with a clear set of rules, but free enough not to feel like a mechanical chore. Here, you punch fools enough to use a fucking power. Most of them fill some general purpose – crowd control, big fuckin’ hit, elemental damage – regardless of character, so a lot of them feel extra soulless. It’s also the “press for light, hold for heavy” system, so the literal feel of the combat is incredibly samey throughout.The loot is ass. The costumes you get are very nicely designed – sans the default ones, which are terrible – but there’s not that much customization going on with them because you can’t switch parts around if you apply them to a piece with a different skin. Yes, the transmog system is that much ass. The loot is entirely inconsequential beyond your numbers increasing so you can tackle higher level challenges. I fucking hate the Destiny/RPG Assassin’s Creed power system and this is one of its worst implementations – the feel of the various weapons you craft is entirely the same, and the exciting variation comes in different critical percentages or shit like a mild splash on your projectiles.There’s a lot of variety to the side activities but unless it’s in the main storyline, it’s half-baked. Crime scene investigations are a fantastic example – the one’s in story are cool little atmospheric puzzles that have you at least think about the clues you gather for a teensy bit. The procedural ones are braindead “read the description” match puzzles because they can’t generate anything more cerebral, so it ends up being a really boring adventure game “I spy” hunt.The characters are undercooked and the game shows zero willingness to tackle what makes them tick. Largely because they are meant to be entirely interchangeable in cutscenes, so everyone behaves with the same morals and often even voicelines. Red Hood is a fucking stone cold killer, but the fact that he has less regards for violence than the rest of the family is never brought up. They write a bullshit excuse that he’s given up killing to honor Batman’s memory, but it never comes up – it’s not a story arc where you gradually shed lethality as you play him, it’s just a shitty thing they say so you stop thinking about it.All of it is incredibly homogenous. It feels like a live service game, but it’s not a live service game. Give me a 10 hour game about ANY of those characters solo and I’d enjoy it a lot more than this.Played a bunch of Asterigos: Curse of the Stars. It’s a soulslike by way of Fallen Order: you don’t lose currency when you die, the stamina only governs special attacks and there’s a lot more punchiness and speed to the combat. It’s cool, though it’s very much “baby’s first Souls” – a lot of the level design is uninspired and the cannon fodder enemies get a bit too breezy, too quickly. There’s a lot of interesting lore but too much of it is told through really clumsy and long exposition dumps – none of the dialogue is particularly inspiring, so it’s easy to lose yourself in all the info despite a certain moral heft to the things you do. But it’s fun: it’s perhaps the best 3D indie soulslike on the market, with a clear reverence and understanding of what makes those games click, even if they obviously didn’t have the budget to fully implement that understanding.
Continuing to sink hours into my favorite genre of 2022, strategic role playing games. The HD 2D Game of Thrones energy of Triangle Strategy is quickly filling the hole that The House of the Dragon has left behind. The party based combat system is a joy to play, I especially enjoy Anna’s dual turns, with the story of the Prince being a classic tale that’s got immense replay Additionally, I have made a lot of progress into the grid based combat meet school management within Fire Emblem: Three Houses as I’m over 100 hours across two playthroughs so far. Given all the hype surrounding the game, it truly delivers, and is getting me super hyped for the soon to be released Fire Emblem: Engage in January.