God of War Ragnarok

[AngryGazelle]

Coming out in less than two weeks now. I've been devouring the pre-release media and it looks really bloody good.

They seem to have addressed some of the criticisms of the first game - lack of enemy variety arguably being the biggest complaint - and the dev team seem excited and passionate about the game which I can only take as a good sign.

Anyone else looking forward to this? 

[Magnum Valentino]

Yeah, very much so. Is it on PS4 or just 5?

[AngryGazelle]

It's on both. I think everything they have shown is PS5 footage, but reviews are out next Thursday, and they will cover the PS4 version too.

[Mister Six]

Played the first God of War back in the day but hated the protagonist because he was such an arsehole. Is he less of an arsehole in these new ones?

[Magnum Valentino]

He's still an arsehole but now he's a realistic arsehole who can't connect with his kid.

[Mister Six]

He's not going around murdering civilians in a way that's cringey as fuck if you're over 16?

[Mobius]

Am really looking forward to it. I just replayed and 100%'d GoW 1 last week to get myself hyped.

I don't think they can go wrong really, just do the first game but bigger and better. Thank fuck there'll be more enemy variety though.

[madhair60]

He's not going around murdering civilians in a way that's cringey as fuck if you're over 16?

Kratos is the best. Fuck civilians

[oggyraiding]

I couldn't get super far into the 2018 one, as the camera was not well suited to the combat. Could also not get super far into the 2005 one, as it was shit.

[Magnum Valentino]

He's not going around murdering civilians in a way that's cringey as fuck if you're over 16?

Kratos' hilariously OTT rage is the best thing about the first 3 games.

But no, Corey Barlog saw The Last Of Us and, having had a son and confronted his wretched personality, went "I'm having that", which is where the latest Kratos takes a lot of his cues from tonally

[Kelvin]

A dear friend of mine once made me sit down and watch every cutscene in God of War 2 and 3 like a film.

[AngryGazelle]

For those who are interested:

[AngryGazelle]

He's still an arsehole but now he's a realistic arsehole who can't connect with his kid.

Exactly, he just connects his axe with people's heads instead!

Based on what I've seen of the sequel he seems to have mellowed somewhat and engages with 'boy' beyond giving crochety instructions.

[Thursday]

He's not a good Dad because he's a terrifyingly angry and violent man. Not who you want as your Dad really. Trying to turn it into last of us style melodrama doesn't really work. But people love it. Combat's alright, but not as good as the old one's. And I didn't love the old one's that much. Ah well people seem to really like it.

[AngryGazelle]

Combat's alright, but not as good as the old one's.

The combat in 2018 was far from perfect but it was a bloody good system overall. The axe was so satisfying to use; the recall mechanic being a highlight.

Ragnarok seems to have improved on the combat in many ways too - increasing enemy variety, adding more vertically to combat arenas, as well as new signature moves and a general speeding up of the combat.

[madhair60]

A dear friend of mine once made me sit down and watch every cutscene in God of War 2 and 3 like a film.

this is absolutely hilarious

---

yeah old GoW is edgy as fuck, you have to enjoy it, just accept that you're playing something aimed at 14 year-olds who are like YEAH BLOOD BOOBS and try to enjoy the silliness

[AngryGazelle]

YEAH BOOBS

God of Phwoar

[oggyraiding]

I bought a PS5 and beat GoW 2019 in 3 days of intensive playing. Really good game. Think it gets off to a slow start, and combat is not the most intuitive (coming from Souls and Bayonetta), but the story was pretty much perfect. Dark elves and revenants incredibly unfun to fight. Died several times to the dark elves when you're in that elevator going up through the different realms. They do loads of damage and are fast and flighty, they're very unfair. Don't think any of the bosses gave me as much trouble as the dark elves.

[Mobius]

Just under a week away now and the reviews have come out.

93 on Metacritic. Seems to be getting fantastic reviews everywhere, very little to criticize. IF you enjoyed the first game it seems you'll love this, as expected. Basically sounds like they've just delivered more of what everyone enjoyed and improved on the bits that weren't as good.

Can't wait!

[madhair60]

I liked the previous GoW and the reviews of this are nuts. Excited for it.

[AngryGazelle]

I was buying this anyway but it's nice that the reviews have been so overwhelmingly good.

Games of this scale and quality don't come around often; I haven't been this excited for a release since The Last of Us Part 2. I think this is going to be special.

[The Roofdog]

Looking forward to this coming out so I don't feel so bad about shitcanning Gotham Knights

[Magnum Valentino]

I was thinking I'd have to buy a 5 for this, which I was going to leave til closer Christmas, by which time things with the newborn will likely have settled (our first was younger the Christmas the Miles Morales game came out and I played that for a week straight with no daddying problems at all), but now that I know I can play it on my PS4 in less than a week with a LESS THAN SETTLED situation regarding the newborn (she's great craic, HATES sleeping), I imagine I'm going to do something stupid and try to play this during the limited time when I should be sleeping instead of being awake.

Fuck. Had to get good reviews didn't it?

[Thursday]

The reviews are looking so good, I'm thinking "Ok it might actually be alright then. Nothing amazing but a decent 3rd person action adventure." Although I've just remembered I don't actually have a playstation console plugged in anymore.

[Mobius]

Enjoying this so far. First few hours are quite linear / dialogue and cutscene heavy, looking forward to being able to explore

[Crenners]

It seems/sounds very PS4 (I know this isn't a novel comment, nor have I played it) which puts me off at full price. It's why I found the first game a bit of a drag. Some amazing setpieces but it's the corridor shooter of third-person action games. The walk and talk while stuff loads is a necessary part of the game design on PS4, which also makes it inherent to the PS5 version.

The Series X is of course bound by similar constraints with the S.

I would like more actual PS5 games.

[madhair60]

Cross-gen is a real bummer these days. With something like 100 million+ PS4s in peoples' homes they're not dropping that thing anytime soon. I wouldn't be surprised if the entire upcoming Sony slate were cross-gen

[Crenners]

Cross-gen is a real bummer these days. With something like 100 million+ PS4s in peoples' homes they're not dropping that thing anytime soon. I wouldn't be surprised if the entire upcoming Sony slate were cross-gen

Yeah, I expect the PS5 exclusives will be the more niche shit like Demon's and Returnal. That said, that's exactly my shit but point is I also occasionally enjoy one of those big dumb grotesque crunchfests. Can't see any of the marquee shit being PS5-only for a couple of years.

[TrenterPercenter]

Calisto Protocol

[madhair60]

That's on PS4