God of War

**HaiImNate** · 10-27-10

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
Developer: SCE Studio Santa Monica
Platform(s): Playstation 2
Players: 1
ESRB Rating: M17+
Release: March 22, 2005 (NA) June 21, 2005 (EU)

Played your Playstation 2 lately? Looking for an action packed adventure where you are a character that wants to redeem himself and show the gods that he’s not one to be toiled with? An adventure where you will kill some mythological creatures, and learn more about yourself than ever before? Then check this game out!

Storyline
You start out as the main character, Kratos, trying to commit suicide by jumping off of a cliff into the Aegean Sea. As you plummet to the rocks below, you go through a series of flashbacks. The flashbacks consist of you as a former Spartan captain with your loving family. That loving memory is replaced hatred caused by the defeat of your army. Now you are the only survivor, and here you are!

You are forced to live with these nightmares until you can defeat Ares, the current god of war. If you can defeat the current god of war, then the goddess of wisdom Athena will strip you of your nightmares so that your conscience can be cleared.

You must now go through the game defeating multiple enemies and ordeals while acquiring the many items and skills to defeat Ares. Will you defeat Ares and be stripped of these nightmares? Only time and hard work will tell.

Gameplay

Kratos, the protagonist of God of War is armed with two sword-like weapons known as Blades of Chaos. These are just one of many of the powerful weapons you can use to slash enemies too and fro! There are also a variety of mythical enemies such as minotaurs, satyrs, sirens, harpies, and more! Powers consist of leveling up your sword and leveling up your other skills given to you by other gods. Throughout the game, you gain more powers as get stronger, but will it be enough for you to defeat Ares? That is for you to decide.

God of War is a fairly easy game no matter what level you play on. The levels from easiest to hardest are: Mortal mode, Hero mode, Spartan mode, and God mode. You spend much of the game completing tasks, such as saving an oracle, killing a Hydra, getting through paths, mazes, etc. Throughout these tasks, Ares sends out enemies and monsters to try to stop you. But does it stop you? No! You do all of these tasks because your sole purpose is to defeat Ares!

The controls are fairly simple in too. To jump you just click ‘x’. To attack enemies you smash on the square and triangle buttons (triangle is for a heavy sword attack, square is for a light). The ‘o’ button is for other various attacks that varies depending on what enemy you’re fighting. Each time you level up, there are more combinations of sword techniques you can perform. Combos consist of you tapping the square and triangle buttons a certain amount of time, such as ‘square’, ‘square’, ‘triangle’, to perform a big kick butt combo which send enemies flying every which way. It’s also easy to memorize the buttons too. Throughout the game, you will see onscreen instructions about how to perform special maneuvers such as how to jump, dodge roll, etc. As you become accustom to the controls, they will become easier to perform.

Graphics

The graphics for God of War are classic PS2 graphics. You start to see an effect of 3D on some things like buildings and monuments, but on other things it’s more of a 2D effect. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with this, but it does tend to not look as good as the graphics on some games we see today.

The character design is very, very good! Kratos looks just liked a full-blown Spartan soldier that has been into battle. His white moon skin and his red scar are really well designed, and they fits the storyline quite nicely. Even the side characters are well-designed. The veil of the oracle with her green cloth is very life-like and matches those similar to the ones in Ancient Greece; even the citizens appear realistic. The design artists overall did a mighty fine job with this!

Sound

Audio and music for God of War is pretty limited. The clashing of Kratos’s Blades of Chaos with other enemies makes a pretty cool noise, but besides that, there is not much noise in the background.While going through most levels you hear the same type f Germanic music. The music is very monotonomous. Sony Computer Entertainment's Santa Monica division should have had more songs prepared for God of War.

On the upside, the voice acting is great! Each character talks very clearly, and it matches the story well. Kratos looks like a big strong guy, so he talks in a deep voice. The gods even talk like they’re gods. There is really no complication in understanding anyone that’s talking.

Longetivity
Despite all the events that you may have to do, God of War is a fairly short game. You could easily complete it in about 6-8 hours. Unfortunately, after you complete the game, there is not much to do after. Not really many more problems, side quests, or anything of that sort. Really, the only thing you can do after you beat the game once is to try to beat the game again on God Mode. God Mode is only unlocked after you beat the game once on Hard Mode, and really I don’t think there is much difference between God Mode and Hard Mode, except harder enemies and bosses.

Conclusion
Being the first game in its series, God of War packs quite a punch! You get to play as a unique character, Kratos and learn about his life. You get to play as him across an amazing, mythical adventure and verse many unique things. The game is short, but it also is really fun as well.

God of War gets an 8- a solid game with good gameplay, a good story, and overall is worth trying out!