This game is very well done, especially for a Triple-A reboot, but it has two major problems that hold it back from true greatness:

1) The "one take", no cutaways, unbroken perspective thing. This might work for something like HALF-LIFE, which only seeks to tell a tiny sliver of a much larger story, content to hint contextually at the rest, but using it to try to do this multiverse-spanning historical epic is a serious mistake. We're dropped right into the middle of this incredibly complex world of Norse mythology, and since we're shackled to the perspective of Kratos and his son for what amounts to one long day^, that means a whole hell of a lot of telling and not showing. Mountains and mountains of lore about gods, monsters, weapons, realms, artifacts, wars, and history are just barfed out at us in conversation ONLY, and even the main antagonists are only (incessantly) described to us, and never actually seen. They did probably the best they could within this framework, but I think it was a bad choice to begin with, despite the benefits to our relationship with the characters.

2) The entire game ends up feeling like sequel setup. I just KNEW from the moment they started talking about Thor and Odin THAT way, that we were absolutely not going to be seeing them in any meaningful way in this game. Heading towards the finale I was praying that they would find some way to deliver a satisfying and real ending beyond some stupid teaser but I knew from pretty much the first five hours that that was exactly how it was going to go. Through essentially every minute of the game, we are constantly being told of Bigger Things On The Horizon but it's crystal clear that they mean in the next one. That sucks!

The rest is pretty great though. Good combat, great small open world, respectable writing. This is clearly the best of the series and an impressive reclamation of a story and a character for whom a revival definitely needed some justification.

^this, by the way, makes absolutely no sense in context

A million weapons and none of them are good. A million enemies and all of them are spongey. Longggggg, dull, nearly aesthetically identical levels that take ages to sprint across. You're expected to explore but enemies constantly respawn, making you rush.

But it's perfectly playable. You run really fast and there are cool secrets. Some of it is goofy in a fun way.

Inessential, but inoffensive. It's certainly got nothing on GOLDENEYE.

A "DOOM clone" in the truest sense, but a very, very good one. The all-new art and assets are quite polished and the feel is fresh enough despite being on its progenitor's engine. It's more than just a reskin, too -- they got pretty ambitious with an inventory system full of items that transform the gameplay. The implementation is shaky and the items themselves are hit-and-miss, but a couple of them (like the one that powers up all of your weapons into totally different forms for a limited time) are quite fun and useful.

Most impressive of all, to me, was the level design, which does a great job of suggesting larger structures and organic areas with DOOM's limited tools, but also deftly avoids falling into that series' trap of abstract mazes and annoying switch puzzles. The flow of each area is very well designed and signposted in a way to guide the player organically without being too obvious about it. Top-tier work for this period.

I was very surprised by how good this is. I can see myself coming back to it.