Kratos has left Greek mythology behind. The gods are defeated, he has taken his revenge and closed all the fuss. In this new God of War he is a lot older and he is in the north of Europe. Norse mythology is what occupies people here, and although he seems to have a fairly quiet life, the problems are quickly rising again. Luckily Kratos has not changed anything - apart from what has become older - and so he picks up the weapons to go to war again.
On the road with Atreus
A very important change from the previous parts is of course that Kratos now has a son. Atreus is his only relative, but he has not always been in the boy's life. The normal father-son bond is not immediately present, but he does take care of the young man. However, Atreus is not as trained as Kratos, but that is understandable given his young age. Kratos knows like no other how dangerous the world is and one of his first steps is to teach the boy some skills. That starts with the hunt for a reindeer, but soon more mysterious figures come around the corner.
Kratos can easily do this with his ax, but Atreus looks a little helpless. Yet Atreus will not just hang on the car like a fifth wheel, because Kratos is gradually transferring his knowledge and experience to the boy. That Kratos is not the everyday father is soon clear from the way he communicates with Atreus. He always calls the boy 'boy', gets angry when he does something wrong and is very short. Kratos may be a great fighter, education is not at first sight to him. Fortunately, Atreus is not a pathetic boy, because he has the urge to imitate and help his father as well as possible.
That makes for a fairly important aspect in the gameplay, because at a given moment Atreus will interfere in battles. Now he is not going directly to the monsters with the monsters, because he is simply without chance. However, he is becoming more and more agile with a bow and arrow, allowing him to attack enemies from a distance. During the game you also have a button for that, so that you can give Atreus a command to fire. At first it is a bit laborious, but as the adventure progresses, the young man will become more and more comfortable.
New way of playing
The fact that Atreus is now a secondary gameplay element is one thing. Another big change is of course that the camera is much closer to Kratos and that it no longer uses fixed camera angles in the levels. That makes for quite a change in the way you experience it, because you are now more free to move and the environments are also a bit more open and larger. Nevertheless, it is still a fairly linear adventure, but it feels very much like a fresh and new approach that we can call successful on the basis of three hours of play.
The world is now also of a different kind, because where you previously visited hardly known areas a second time, that will be different now. The world has a linear route, but it does have closed areas where you can eventually return to it. The reason for this is that the focus on action has to be scaled back to a focus on exploration, which in this game should be a fifty-fifty ratio. This was according to the developer also the case in the first part and in later parts it became more and more action. Not that that is necessarily bad, but Sony Santa Monica also finds exploration a very important part, which is now more visible and that is why the world is partly attuned to it.
Running through the game will also take a lot more time than before, because where you were usually ready with an hour or eight, the playing time is now about 30 hours. That is partly in course following the storyline, but also in exploring the environment. Afterwards, it is also the intention that you explore again previously visited areas to find new items that could help you. Whether the visit again and the opening of previously closed areas affects the gameplay, we do not know at the moment.
Titans?
One of the things that made God of War III - and Ascension - to a lesser extent - so brutal was the presence of titans, as well as the gods. It was large-scale, epic and incredibly cool to experience. In this new adventure it is all on a somewhat smaller scale, because the first boss who meets Kratos is even a little smaller than him. That fight was pretty cool, also because that guy was pretty provocative. Still, it feels a bit like a step back and we could not resist asking ourselves if there are any titans or gigantic enemies in the game at all.
Because the camera perspective has now changed, different things - including boss battles - will be on a different scale. The intention is that a fight always feels epic, whether it was the fight with Poseidon in part three or the fight against a small annoying Northman. Every fight has to be memorable and one certainly loves big moments, but it has to surprise players and therefore they have looked for other ways to keep the game interesting. The fight that we were able to experience was very cool, but to speak of epic now, things are going a long way. But hey, it was the first fight and giving something away at the start is seldom done.
Preliminary Conclusion
Kratos is back in an adventure that feels like a fresh new start in every respect. A new environment, an older Kratos, a different mythology, a son, a different way of playing and so we can continue for a while. In everything you notice that Sony Santa Monica really wanted to offer something new and although that initially takes some getting used to, it felt very good and nice during play. The developer has not forgotten the past of Kratos and despite the many changes for the franchise, they promised a grand and exciting adventure that Kratos is perfectly suited for. Now we are especially curious about how the adventure will unfold and what Kratos is going to find on his path. We'll know more in a month!
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