The first thing I notice about this game is just how damn good it looks. It looks leaps and bounds better than Chains of Olympus and that game blew my mind when I first played it. It looks better than the PS2 titles. The environments in the demo are all appropriately rocky and wet looking. I loved the look and feel.
I’ll get combat out of the way now: It’s more of your traditional God of War fare (ha!) but that doesn’t detract from the game in any way. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it. There are some minor additions: A charge move similar to the one in God of War III has been added but instead of holding the enemy and running with them Kratos slams them to the ground MMA style and starts pounding on their face with some brutal looking punches.
The demo starts the player off on a ship much like the original God of War did. Kratos is once again battling a sea monster. This time it’s the Scylla instead of the Hydra. While the Scylla is decimating the fleet of ships, Kratos fights Triton soldiers. The Triton soldiers are armed with -what else- tritons. They lunge and stab at Kratos but he’s easily able to dispatch them with his now legendary chained blades. Square, square, triangle still works (on the lower difficulties at least). Once the deck is clear of enemies a door unlocks. Kratos, not having time for doors, violently kicks it open. Kratos fights through the interior of the ship and kicks open another door on the far side. It’s here that he encounters a barrier. The Scylla has wrapped it’s tentacles around the ship and has unleashed a number of smaller enemies called Scylla Brood onto it’s deck. These small, blade legged, crab-spider creatures are attacking soldiers. Kratos simultaneously hacks his way through the tentacled mass while fighting off the lesser enemies and makes it to the other side. Here Kratos (in form of classic God of War mini game) begins viciously stabbing at one of the Scylla’s many mouthed tentacles. This angers the beast which then tightens it’s grip on the ship and drives it into the nearby rocky alcoves.
This is where the demo’s main boss fight takes place and where you first get a good glimpse of the Scylla. My description won’t do it justice: The beast is large but not massive. It’s got a thick, layered shell atop it’s back and head. It has the nose of a pig and six eyes. Three on each side of it’s head. Strangely enough it’s tentacles come out of several large holes in it’s chest. It uses them to try and crush Kratos but he is able to avoid death simply by blocking. After damaging the Scylla enough it drops from sight and reappears on the other side of the arena. It attempts to devour Kratos and spits it’s brood out of it’s mouth. Kratos lays into it again and it spews forth even more brood before going back to it’s original point of attack. Just a bit more and it slams it’s head into the ground, indicating that Kratos can jump up on the platform next to him and begin turning a wheel that pulls a hook through the Scylla’s jaw. The Scylla cries out in pain and Kratos flies through the air (qte) and lands on the side of it’s face. He rips at it with his blades, cuts the rope holding the hook, jerks the hook out of it’s mouth and then finally lands back on the ground. With the Scylla gone Kratos is free to progress.
Here the demo shows off some very light platforming and has Kratos zip-lining down a rope and climbing walls. It’s very short and at the end of it Kratos pulls the Eye of Atlantis (what I’ll describe to you as a chain lightning canon) from a stone barrier and like most magic acquisition moments in previous GoW games, proceeds to use it to decimate a number of enemies. After the enemies are dead Kratos destroys the barrier that the Eye was pulled from and presses forward once again.
The game has you guide Kratos down a short hall and across a grapple point to face a minotaur. You don’t fight it long however because the Scylla appears out of no where and grabs you. Kratos breaks free, stabs the tentacle and then cuts it off. After clearing the area of enemies you push a crank which opens a gate and climb up the wall through it. You travel again down a rocky corridor and encounter some more of those triton soldiers fighting with men from the fleet. A short fight follows and once it ends you climb up a rock wall and then shimmy along a ledge a bit before reaching the top. Here you find yourself in the city and see several Athenians running from some enemies. These enemies are throwing weapons and killing the citizens. The demo’s tutorial tells you to switch over to your sub-weapon (spartan arms) at this point. Doing so will allow Kratos to use his shield to cover himself as he moves forward and stabs all manner of things with his spear. The shield and spear combo are my new favorite weapons in any God of War game. You can block while moving with the shield like I previously mentioned but you can also string together a number of combos with square and triangle. Holding R down and pressing square will result in Kratos throwing spears at his foes. As versatile as the chains? Maybe not. Awesome? Very.
After Kratos kills the enemies and drags a box onto a pressure plate he travels across yet another grapple point, fights some more enemies and then slides down a wall. Once he reaches the bottom he kicks open a door and gets on an elevator. Kratos fights yet more enemies on this elevator (it’s God of War, of course he’ll be killing things…) and once it reaches the top you see that it’s the center of a fountain. Blood from dead soldiers is running down a path that is littered with ranged enemies. Kratos makes quick work of them and then runs down the watery path towards another arena scenario. Geryon, a metallic statue creature wielding an electrified globe, is killing soldiers. After it’s defeated a cut scene plays: the Scylla is back and it destroys some pillars off in the distance. Kratos charges towards it and the screen fades to black before the Ghost of Sparta logo appears.
After my short time with this demo I’ve decided I might just like it more than God of War III. My reasoning lies solely with the weapons that developer Ready at Dawn has put in the game. Finally Kratos, a Spartan, can use Spartan weaponry. The spear and shield in this game (called Spartan Arms) are going to be my favorite God of War weapon(s) to date. That might not seem like reason enough for you to care but trust me. It’s far more awesome than just having several different kind of chain weapons ala God of War III.
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