Of the new series introduced during the Ps2 era, God of War stood out on top for its combat, story and graphics at the time. With Gow 3 the storyline is wrapping up for everyone’s favorite sociopath, Kratos. However having followed Kratos through his journey, I can say that I’m sick and tired of God of War both from the story and the game play.
For those that did not play any of the Gow series I want to give a brief explanation into its combat. Kratos’ main weapon is swords with chains attached to them that are wrapped around his arms. His attacks are most often wide to hit multiple enemies or have an area effecting explosion to attack a localized area. Kratos can also grab enemies and either use them against other enemies as a battering a ram or finish them off, however stronger enemies need to be whittled down first. The last pieces of equipment in Kratos’ arsenal are magic attacks and items, both have a limit to how much you can use at once while magic needs to be recharged with orbs, items recharge quickly. Magic is akin to a panic button and allows Kratos to clear rooms easily. The problem that I have with Gow 3 and with the series in general is that Kratos’ ability is detrimental to combat based on the threats he faces.
As I mentioned in the last paragraph Kratos’ attacks are designed to hit multiple enemies, however there are set number of enemies for fighting to be optimum. If Kratos is fighting one or two enemies, his attack are so wide and slow that it can be hard to hit something specifically. Also being slow leaves him very open to counter attacks or being hit before the bulk of his combo connects with the enemy. This is painfully made area when fighting bigger enemies who shrug off basic hits or can block his attacks.
Then we have huge fights, with enemy groups at least six and more at a time. While Kratos’ attacks are wide enough to deal with enemies in front of him, it doesn’t help when there are enough to surround him. A lot of his combo chains ends with a powerful area effecting attack which can usually hit everyone within close proximity. However to reach that point you need to let the rest of the combo play out and Kratos can be knocked out of his combo by any attack, which leads to the weird solution of starting a combo when there is no one nearby and letting it finish as they run at you.
There is a very minimum window of how many enemies nearby that Kratos is effective at fighting. Unfortunately this window does not occur often as you’ll mostly face large groups of weak enemies or one or two strong enemies. Fighting strong enemies especially bosses is a pain, as basic attacks won’t stun them and they can easily hit you while Kratos is in mid combo. What’s worse is how little defensive options Kratos has.
The game touts that there are three ways to defend, a generic block, counter attacks and finally an evasive roll but it isn’t that simple. Defending works ok at the start but when you start running into heavier enemies who have unblock able attacks you lose your basic form of defense. The counter attack system is based on hitting the block button on contact however it’s hard to suggest to the player to use that when the enemy can break your blocks. Finally the evasive roll not only feels less responsive this time around but doesn’t go as far as I remembered. In past Gows one roll was usually enough to get clear of an attack, in Gow3 I’m doing two or three rolls to avoid a boss’s attack and sometimes that isn’t enough.
Moving down my list of complaints is Krato’s arsenal. Like in previous Gow titles Kratos will unlock new equipment as the game progresses but other than the items everything still feels the same. In fact three of the four weapons Kratos has are blades attached to chains with the last one being the supposed “heavy weapon”. Still every weapon controls the same way, with wide unfocused attacks and a big area affecting one. The only stand out between each weapon is the magic attack which you’ll be saving for an emergency. This drags Gow3’s combat further into derivative territory.
Going back to last gen, Devil May Cry 3 and Ninja Gaiden Black nailed it with weapon diversity. Each weapon had a different feel to it and this also made the weapon switching ability in DMC 3 all the more useful. Going from the strong but slow gauntlets to the shock guitar provided unique combos. In NGB wielding the bow staff vs the heavy sword required different strategies to be useful.
The more I play Gow 3 the more I see where the main problem with the combat stems from. Because Kratos is only effective against small groups of enemies and not in one on one fights it limits his ability to fight. In an action title the player should be able to manage one on one fight and have all the tools needed to help them. Looking at other action titles such as Batman, Bayonetta, and of course Devil May Cry 3, each one of these titles has the main character being very effective in one on one fight. They either gained the ability to fight groups of enemies with better gear or abilities, or advanced moves at the start allowed them to fight multiple enemies.
Gow 3 however has none of this; Kratos starts out with his limited attack range and never grows from there. Not at one point does Kratos’ move set evolve allowing him to take down different enemies. Even Kratos’ gauntlets while the closest you have to a focused attack still is swung wide making it hard to keep attacking a single enemy. For someone who was the God of War and a mighty warrior, Kratos really isn’t all that useful in a fight and his greatest nemesis is someone who knows how to block.
My last complaint I swear is about the story, it feels at this point that the writers aren’t even trying to humanize Kratos. Instead of being a man on a mission in Gow3 Kratos just feels like a spoiled brat with a tantrum. There’s one bit of story that is so absurd that I want to go into detail about how bad it was but I want to keep this as spoil free as possible. So I’m just going to say two words to tell you what scene I’m talking about:
Minor spoiler warning
Hera’s death.
End spoiler
At this point I’m no longer playing Gow3 for excellent game play but to see how insane the story is going to get.
To be fair I don’t think Gow3 is horrible in the sense that the designers couldn’t keep the magic from the first two, instead I think it’s because I’ve seen better action titles. When I put the Gow series next to other action titles the faults become more apparent. In the past I actually finished both Gow and Gow 2 on the hardest difficulty setting, with 3 after I’m finished I’m just going to shelve it. I think next I’m going to go back to finishing Darksiders and if it goes on sale I might pick up Dante’s Inferno to see where it took Gow’s style.
Lastly just because I don’t want to be completely damning to Gow 3 I do have to compliment the graphics, the game looks amazing even on my SD TV.
Now that I have the Gow series under my belt I feel that the first one was still the best in the series hitting all the right points. The boss fights were few but epic and it felt that it had the most coherent story of the three. A lot of the events of the 2nd and third game could have been easily avoided if anyone stopped and talk things out, but then again “God of rational discussion” doesn’t sound as good on the box.
Josh.
