God of War [PS4, PC]

Got the game from the PS collection finding it a bit of a bore., I'm half way through the game. Visuals and tech are just "OK" other Sony studios have done better like Uncharted 4, Last Of Us 2, Days Gone, Infamous 2nd Son, etc. Visuals are very gaudy like WTF was the art director smoking?

Yeah, I had a lot of fun with the game (on PS4 Pro), but the visuals were most of the time nothing particular imo. I liked the art, but from time to time I was thinking "I guess they allocated most of the ressources to the characters models...". But It has to run on PS4 non pro too, son they did a good job imo.

I realize I often finish my sentences by "boy" when I have to speak english with some friends, that's how you know a game left a mark on you.
 
I stopped playing after the first couple of levels.

It certainly is beautiful but I preferred the first GoW. You could advance with a lot of button mashing and learning a few combos. I don't recall any kind of QTE either. One of the final levels of the original GOW, you see this giant god in the background as Kratos fights through grunts before getting to that final boss battle.

The original felt much more response. This one on the PS4, you can still mash buttons but just not as responsive. Arguably more fluid, but you can't instantly attack monsters coming from different directions.

I had a bit of a similar experience at first but this patch brought me back ... I left off at a pretty tricky fight with four types of enemies really forcing you to use different strategies, and it was hard to come back right into that after well over two years of not playing, though great that my save was picked up automatically. I also don’t really remember the difficulty I picked, but probably normal, but the fact that you can switch difficulty at any time is interesting, not in the least because that makes me want to try harder not to use that option.

But that fight definitely shows how different the game is. The game is way more deliberate and slow, requiring more thinking and less button mashing. In this one fight, one monster was basically immune to my axe, one monster had locking range attacks and splash damage and impossible to hit, two monsters who could kill me with just three hits, and two ranged fireball shooting monsters.

I think I retried this one like 10 times before I got it right, having to figure out again what Kratos can do and when he should do it. The ice monster was a piece of cake throwing away the axe and killing it with shield and fists, then avoiding the wraith as much as possible (who is also fierce in close combat) killing the brutes with dodging by rolling away and hitting them with a heavy axe attack (holding R2 I think), and the last bit can be finished off with the fast axe attacks, or once I also managed to throw them off the cliff, then killing the fire throwing demons with quick hits using shield and fists (as they are good at dodging) and finally figuring out that with circle I could get my ‘boy’ to fire several arrows after one another which helped to pin the wraith down for a brief while allowing me to hit it. Then there is the shield that can reflect hits back at the thrower a bit when well timed, the axe you can throw by holding R1 and aiming and have to recall with triangle afterwards, the berserk mode area attacks, and then the upgrading of your equipment etc.

What this means though is that up to this point the fighting and story progresses much less aggressively than in previous god of war games, which compensated a relative lack of depth to the gameplay with one set-piece after another in very quick succession, and the overal fighting speed was also much higher.

The more open spaces in this game where you don’t quite know where to go relatively early in the game also took getting used to and perhaps could have been better timed a bit later.

But it is a very different game and doesn’t hook you quite like the amazing God of War 3 did, but now I am getting the hang of the mechanics I am starting to enjoy the fighting a lot, and the graphics are getting better as well. Will be interesting to see where this goes, as clearly I am still only just starting (from the fact that there are still bits of tutorial, first time in a shop, crafting, etc).

And yes, true, you are so close to Kratos a lot of the time that you don’t get the high cameras that make crowd control easier. You have to rely more on your son and arrow indicators to anticipate attacks from behind etc.
 
I got a lot further now, and the game is definitely a very differently paced game. A certain lady’s house you visit is very pretty though!
 
This game has a more strategic element to it than the previous GoW games. Timing and direction are more crucial. The element of predicting the delay of attacks and minimizing the gap between makes this much more interesting.
It also has a very distinct atmosphere. In many aspects this game could have been the perfect next gen version of Golden Axe.
This one is an adventure. The previous games were beat em ups mostly.
As for the graphics, I think it is one of the best.
 
In a sense, from looking at the videos at least, it seems a bit like Demon Souls in terms of the fights being more strategic?

I do sometimes have problems with how quickly I can get this ‘God’ to get killed ...
 
In a sense, from looking at the videos at least, it seems a bit like Demon Souls in terms of the fights being more strategic?

I do sometimes have problems with how quickly I can get this ‘God’ to get killed ...
When it came out, the new GOW was very much compared to DS games, and for good reason. It's definitely more forgiving, but the combat sure went from mostly button mashing in previous generations, to a more strategic type of combat. Which is why so many people hated it, as they missed the 'old' GOW. I loved it *shrug*
 
Right, I get it and from the many videos I looked at for Demon’s Souls on PS5, there certainly seem a lot of similarities even in some parts of the structure. Heck even the design of a certain flying creature seems a homage. Though I would have preferred a more traditional design myself for that one.

I did a lot of stuff in the realm of the nine before I figured out how to move on (basically everything!), had to look it up as I missed something really simple. And all the different battle mechanics, there are so many options, really cool.

Just made it to A ... m. (Not spoiling anything)
 
Right, I get it and from the many videos I looked at for Demon’s Souls on PS5, there certainly seem a lot of similarities even in some parts of the structure. Heck even the design of a certain flying creature seems a homage. Though I would have preferred a more traditional design myself for that one.

I did a lot of stuff in the realm of the nine before I figured out how to move on (basically everything!), had to look it up as I missed something really simple. And all the different battle mechanics, there are so many options, really cool.

Just made it to A ... m. (Not spoiling anything)

I initially thought that as well but over the past 2 years, yes that long, the more I noticed how different it is to souls specially if you go into the actual hidden advanced combat that significantly increases your speed but I'm not that good at pulling off those advanced combat moves.

The amount of tps aiming just dawned on me on how different it feels to souls and how the ai is more nuanced in creating breathing rooms for the player.

I've been watching some older gow videos and notice that a lot of the combat feels like they still carried over but the major change is the loss of jump and perspective change.
 
One thing I must also say, God of War 3, when I played that, it was probably the only game ever where my wife sat down and watched, even though she hated Kratos.

She probably wouldn’t hate Kratos now, but purely artistically, this game is a huge downgrade, bar a few small exceptions. This is my biggest disappointment. Gameplay is actually very good, but the art ... not so much. GoW3 some scenes looked like they were hand painted.
 
but the art ... not so much. GoW3 some scenes looked like they were hand painted.
That I agree. It also had a much better and a continuous flow which kept you on your toes wanting to see what's gonna happen next.
 
One thing I must also say, God of War 3, when I played that, it was probably the only game ever where my wife sat down and watched, even though she hated Kratos.

She probably wouldn’t hate Kratos now, but purely artistically, this game is a huge downgrade, bar a few small exceptions. This is my biggest disappointment. Gameplay is actually very good, but the art ... not so much. GoW3 some scenes looked like they were hand painted.

I found some places almost ugly. Alfheim and the turtle house.

Maybe it's the shadows but gow3 looked to me like it had crushed blacks everywhere and looks a little cartoony and a lot of things look made out of clay. Many small, bombastic parts and scenes feel better and more varied than gow4 tho.
 
One thing I must also say, God of War 3, when I played that, it was probably the only game ever where my wife sat down and watched, even though she hated Kratos.

She probably wouldn’t hate Kratos now, but purely artistically, this game is a huge downgrade, bar a few small exceptions. This is my biggest disappointment. Gameplay is actually very good, but the art ... not so much. GoW3 some scenes looked like they were hand painted.
I think finding beauty in art is a personal thing.

I personally like greek mythology wayyyy more than nordic mythology, and therefore I find the older GOW games resonate more with me. Also the same reason I have no interest in playing AC:Valhalla, after loving Odyssey so much.

Still, GOW (2018) was and is still one of the best looking games I think I've ever played. I have very fond memories of GOW3 in particular, which I finished several times, but let's also not forget that GOW1/2/3 fixed camera angles had a lot to do with how certain scenes and set pieces were always perfectly shot and lit to achieve the desired effect. This is a luxury newer games with free cameras do not have.
 
GOW (2018) was and is still one of the best looking games I think I've ever played.
Just finished the game on PS5 @ 60 FPS and I love the art direction, assets and other stuff, but on a tech side, the game is very lackluster.
There are light leaks everywhere, many dynamic objects look out of place due to bad probes placement, SSAO and SSR are non existent, froxel fog is very aliased and unstable in motion and they even managed to fuck up checkerboarding resolve pass so that in static the game looks like if it was rendered at 1080p (except geometry edges, they look fine) instead of 4K.
It seems there is no camera jittering when it doesn't move, the same resolve filter works nice when camera is in motion, take a look at textures here for example - https://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/11421 , they clearly have 1080p appearance, which indicates that something is broken in checkerboard resolve.
@Dictator I wonder whether Digital Foundry have seen this issue?
I've not played the game a lot on PS4 Pro due to 30 FPS, so i don't remember whether the game had the same issue from the beginning or whether it was introduced in PS5 patch.
 
Just finished the game on PS5 @ 60 FPS and I love the art direction, assets and other stuff, but on a tech side, the game is very lackluster.
There are light leaks everywhere, many dynamic objects look out of place due to bad probes placement, SSAO and SSR are non existent, froxel fog is very aliased and unstable in motion and they even managed to fuck up checkerboarding resolve pass so that in static the game looks like if it was rendered at 1080p (except geometry edges, they look fine) instead of 4K.
It seems there is no camera jittering when it doesn't move, the same resolve filter works nice when camera is in motion, take a look at textures here for example - https://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/11421 , they clearly have 1080p appearance, which indicates that something is broken in checkerboard resolve.
@Dictator I wonder whether Digital Foundry have seen this issue?
I've not played the game a lot on PS4 Pro due to 30 FPS, so i don't remember whether the game had the same issue from the beginning or whether it was introduced in PS5 patch.
Well... It was a PS4 game built for 1080p after all. Pro and PS5 just checkerboard that same game, with PS5 running it faster. But it's still a PS4 game.
 
Just finished the game on PS5 @ 60 FPS and I love the art direction, assets and other stuff, but on a tech side, the game is very lackluster.
There are light leaks everywhere, many dynamic objects look out of place due to bad probes placement, SSAO and SSR are non existent, froxel fog is very aliased and unstable in motion and they even managed to fuck up checkerboarding resolve pass so that in static the game looks like if it was rendered at 1080p (except geometry edges, they look fine) instead of 4K.
It seems there is no camera jittering when it doesn't move, the same resolve filter works nice when camera is in motion, take a look at textures here for example - https://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/11421 , they clearly have 1080p appearance, which indicates that something is broken in checkerboard resolve.
@Dictator I wonder whether Digital Foundry have seen this issue?
I've not played the game a lot on PS4 Pro due to 30 FPS, so i don't remember whether the game had the same issue from the beginning or whether it was introduced in PS5 patch.

I remember playing the game without film grain on the ps4 and a lot of the textures look really ugly up close, not even zoomed it.

I only found 2 standout models. That's Kratos and Mimir. The other faces in cutscenes almost look half a gen back when compared to the last of us 2 cutscene models.

I love the game btw. The hybrid souls/tps combat feels great and I still think the game overall looks good.

Having no AO is interesting. It's like the opposite of demons where dark areas in gow4 have a lot of cascade shadows against krato's light in dark areas while demons almost rarely have em but the gi is better and have ao (ssdo?).
 
Played < 10 hours but gave up. Pointlessy complicated game (why does Kratos have five different types of armour?) and not really fun. GoW3Remastered was way better!
 
Just finished the game on PS5 @ 60 FPS and I love the art direction, assets and other stuff, but on a tech side, the game is very lackluster.
There are light leaks everywhere, many dynamic objects look out of place due to bad probes placement, SSAO and SSR are non existent, froxel fog is very aliased and unstable in motion and they even managed to fuck up checkerboarding resolve pass so that in static the game looks like if it was rendered at 1080p (except geometry edges, they look fine) instead of 4K.
It seems there is no camera jittering when it doesn't move, the same resolve filter works nice when camera is in motion, take a look at textures here for example - https://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/11421 , they clearly have 1080p appearance, which indicates that something is broken in checkerboard resolve.
@Dictator I wonder whether Digital Foundry have seen this issue?
I've not played the game a lot on PS4 Pro due to 30 FPS, so i don't remember whether the game had the same issue from the beginning or whether it was introduced in PS5 patch.
Looks like some of the sample position fixes doesn't work properly. (Takes sample between the MSAA samples for both subsamples.)
 
Played < 10 hours but gave up. Pointlessy complicated game (why does Kratos have five different types of armour?) and not really fun. GoW3Remastered was way better!
God of War 2018 is definitely not the game you'd like to play if all you want is more God of War 2005-2015.
You're better off playing Nier Automata or Devil May Cry if you want a fast paced action game.
 
God of War 2018 is definitely not the game you'd like to play if all you want is more God of War 2005-2015.
You're better off playing Nier Automata or Devil May Cry if you want a fast paced action game.

I try to be open for new experiences and I liked the combat system in GOW2018. Everything around it was just pointlessly complicated like all the collectibles, currencies and upgrades. I find those things incredibly boring most of the time.
 
Back
Top