God of War, the series that up unto this point was about creating liquid viscera in over the top ways. The lead-up to 2018’s God of War was not a happy one. The first appearance of Cory Barlog holding the PS4 controller in three small screens while the game played on a larger 4th at E3 2017 led to questions. The main question was why are they doing it? Of course, the conclusion hastily jumped to was a reboot. That was not what we got, and instead it was a fresh start to the character running away from his past.

I think it is reasonable to say that while some hold up the PS2-PS3 era God of War series as something exceptional, they were somewhat churlish. Tapping X to have sex with a goddess of Olympus and ripping gods in two would do that. It was hardly trying to be high art and that’s ok. Piecing together what little I remember of the games and from conversations that I’ve had recently about them, they were cathartic fun. However, no one mentions the story as being the selling point. The main selling point of the older games was the gameplay.

God of War (2018), or as I am just going to call it from here on out, God of War, is playing grown-up. Once again, Kratos has a kid, this time not ripping him to bits with his bare hands in blind anger, and his wife has just died. No need to see her dying for 5-minutes, the first thing we’re doing from that opening menu is picking the tree to burn her on and collecting her ashes from it for her final wish. This is where I get to start talking about one of my favorite things in all of the cinematography, “the oner.”

I touched upon it a little back when I was reviewing Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, which features some of Hideo Kojima’s best direction of all his games. The oner is something you’ll have noticed more recently in some films, such as Birdman or 1917. These films do what Barlog did very well, the edited oner. From that first menu, as you see Kratos standing over you, to the final moments of the game, you wouldn’t be able to see an obvious cut. That is unless you know where to look. With video games, it is hard to say it is an oner because there isn’t a physical camera being directed by a single vision throughout, but it is the single shot.

While it limits the pacing of a scene to however it may be choreographed, it puts you further into the scene as a spectator. I’d argue it takes you from what is often a passive viewing to something that makes you feel like you are in that scene, in that moment with the characters themselves. That was an important choice because this is such a more personal and emotional story than any previous game in the God of War franchise. Instead of vengeance, it is a story of a distant dad and his son, having to overcome the loss of the one thing that bonded them, the person they both loved unconditionally.

You are brought into that relationship while you play as Kratos, voiced by the (indeed) wonderful Christopher Judge having a renaissance of his career following Stargate SG-1. Though you don’t see it literally through his eyes, you are brought into the world with him. Throughout the game you see his relationship grow, change, and unsurprisingly sometimes bend and eventually break with Atreus. Atreus is a kid that is literally too naive to understand what is going on around him, who his parents are, and eventually who he is. Meanwhile, Kratos is on the other end of the spectrum, a man that’s grown up from his time playing with Zaggy Stardust and the hounds of hell.

Not that any of this means the gameplay is lacking. Instead of the Chains of Chaos being wrapped around Kratos’ wrists, it is the bandages from those wounds he tightens up in that very first scene. Of course, the scene with the tree that you need to chop down, which brings me to the ax of some specific Nordic powers. I beat this into every conversation I have on game mechanics: Whatever it is, whatever your core happens to be, it has to be satisfying. You can throw the ax, and when it impales an enemy they’ll freeze in place. You can recall it like a blonde bloke that hangs out with Iron Man, and every time it returns to your hand, it lands with a thud as if it has perceivable weight to you as a person.

Combat is significantly different in some regards, partially due to the ax and how powerful you feel lodging it into someone or something. However, the change to the camera also provides a noticeable change. No longer are you in large grand halls killing Zeus’ imps; Instead, you are in forests and on much more minor occasions, smaller halls of imp murder in fewer numbers. I can’t say I’m always happy with the camera placed so far up Kratos’ crack, as it can make fighting sometimes feel too confined by continuing the generically named Action-Adventure trope of placing the camera so close to the character. Of course, that is done more so for the story than the combat itself.

Not that combat is unwieldy because of the story itself or that it is entirely forgotten about, it is still your bread, butter, and everything in between. You spend more time chucking that ax about the place and punching everything that even slightly moves with the frequency of methhead in the forest. It is fun, chaotic, and feels about as satisfying as listening to Barry White tell you a bedtime story. I’ve not forgotten about the kid either, as he’s your support firing arrows into monsters the size of the room he’s in. Oddly enough, he’s nonplused about that one, I’d have at least swore once if I was dragged into a fight with Igor The Blue Nordic Hunchback.

Though you fight one of the trolls early on, and it could be characterized as a mini-boss fight if anything, the first proper boss rivals that of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. A bloke named Baldr comes knocking on the door and you go hell for leather, knocking each other about the place and possibly shifting the tectonic plates a few inches further. Between the ax, some set pieces with a tree and some pebbles, and the pure weight of every action, it is one of the best fights to open a game in a long time. There may be one too many set pieces in there, though with the camera following in tow with every action as if it is actually there, I think it might deserve to show off. If not for the story then at least for the camera shots.

Maybe it is because I am a squishy soft-thing with a beard that I’m told is a man, or maybe it is just a well-crafted story built on what it means to have a frayed relationship with a parent/be a parent. Barlog and his team, Judge, Suljic, and the rest of the cast brought everything together to create majesty. Considering this runs on a PS4 (though not perfectly), it is a technical marvel of a world so open while having almost no load times. There are portal sections later on, which (if I remember correctly) took a tiny bit of loading, but that’s it. Other than death, of course, where you see a proper load time.

There is a sneaky load time when you travel into one section of the landscape later on, I’ll avoid the light spoiler here, but you are plunged into darkness. There is a quick load time there, and unless you know about it already, you’d never know that was a sneaky camera cut. Without there being an actual camera or there being a need to cut, it might be shaky to call that one segment a deceitful edit hidden well. Nonetheless, it is one of the more obvious points of what the game is doing to trick the eye/mind into believing the world is seamless, and it is beautiful. Every trick is pulled off with masterful sleight-of-hand.

I don’t think there is another game out there that is simply this grown-up, and I’m no longer just talking about Kratos. The storytelling, the themes, and the overall performance are quite literally about being an adult. The reason Kratos has such a contentious relationship with Atreus early on is that he sees himself in that little murderer. The entire point of the game, as I said in the video review, is Kratos, the man that tore half of Olympus a new hole to defecate from for simply giving him the wrong breakfast, teaching a kid to stay calm. A man who in his younger self had so much pent-up anger he tore apart his previous wife and child with his bare hands, is teaching emotional maturity.

I feel like I’ve practically hit the crescendo with that, but I have more to say, as Bear McCreary crafted something from perfection itself. The soundtrack of God of War and the main theme itself, has so much power and raw emotion put into it that every time I hear it, I’m pulled back into that world. From loud and bombastic moments to quiet and sweet ones, it plucks every bit of emotion out of the scene and adds to it. I didn’t think I’d have to say this after Battlestar Galactica, but he simply knows how to strike the tone of a setting so perfectly that it alone is great. However, as an addition to the world, it makes it all the more special as was the case with Kow Otani’s Shadow of the Colossus score.

God of War (2018) is what games can be, though it is a little flawed in places. If I ever get past those Valkyries without snapping a controller in two, I’ll be surprised, but it is as close as you get to perfection. Of course, I am saying this. I ended up getting a cat soon after the game’s release and because of the lines across her face, and possibly because the game made that much impact, I ended up calling her Freya. I don’t have to think about the game daily, I have a reminder sitting on my lap or pouncing on my genitals at 3 AM. Barlog and his team did what so many games ignore doing, it moved the needle and progressed us to whatever is next in storytelling in games, whatever it might be.

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God of War

$16.58

10

Score

10.0/10

Pros

• A grown-up story.
• An (almost) seemless world.
• That gorgeous single-shot "oner" use.
• Beautiful casting.

Cons

• The camera between Kratos' shoulder blades.
• Base PS4 performance is a tiny bit questionable.