2018's God of War was a surprise and a breath of fresh air for a series, and more importantly a character, who's story I thought really didn't need to be continued. Santa Monica proved me wrong, and they created a fascinating adventure exploring the bond between an old warrior and his adolescent son. Ragnarok picks up a few years afterwards and I would say does an alright job following it up.

Ultimately, the game feels like more of 2018. Larger realms to explore, a larger scale plot with more significant characters in norse mythology, and more development. This ends up being both a good and bad thing. You get to explore some of the other realms that were untouched in the first game or get more depth to others, but it also feels like the pacing of the game is significantly slower. Certain segments feel like they drag on forever, and while some fun new characters get introduced, a not-insignificant portion feel half-baked, under-utilized, bizarrely written, or just plain overstay their welcome (both allies and enemies alike). It was a stark contrast to the exceptional cast of the first game which was small and focused. Overall the story still concludes in a fairly satisfying way, and I have some interest to see if they continue from here.

The gameplay is also quite similar to 2018. Without getting into spoilers you do end up having some new tools and abilities to your disposal, but it doesn't feel that much of an evolution. I played on the second hardest difficulty and it provided a fun experience slicing through enemies and a reasonable challenge. However, it was disappointing that my gripes about the camera being far too close to you during combat from the first game is still true here. On paper it's great to have the indicator arrows and ally call-outs (when they aren't too frequent or repetitive, Mimir), but NOT when they exist as a solution to a problem the developers intentionally created in the first place. It's frustrating, and those same call-outs which annoyingly apply during puzzles and even the occasional exploration feel patronizing. It's genuinely bizarre that a game that provided such a challenging experience also doesn't seem to think very highly of the player's skill or intuition. Many of the so-called puzzles too feel more like 'I Spy' where you are looking for the interactable more than trying to figure out the solution, making those time-sensitive call-outs all the more annoying. Still, it is a fun set of worlds to explore and your companions narrating it with stories as you run around does break up the silence between combat rather nicely. They really do pay respect to the mythos and a lot of the sidequests are fantastic.

As I said previously, Ragnarok serves as a solid wrap-up for the 2018 game and Kratos steals the show of every scene he speaks in. Fans of the previous game would be foolish not to play this, but I hope they take some of the popular criticisms to heart if they plan to continue this series.

I'm not sure that here even should be a separate page for this game cause technically, it's an update and rebranding rather than a new game. So we can call overwatch 1.5

I'm a big fan of O1 cause it's a perfect example of how blizzard nails the game-making philosophy - easy to learn, hard to master.

I like characters, attention to detail, design, variety, complexity-accessibility, and overall fun.

Even after 6 years of release, I've been playing overwatch from time to time when I didn't have time for another run in Bloodborne or DS or a lengthy Sony story-driven game.

Main changes - now we have 5 heroes instead of 6.
Minus one tank. Fewer shields, more DPS.
Bloodborne vs DS3.

I'm not sure that I'm into this change. What I liked in O1 was strategy, team play and tactics. Here the game is leaning into a more individual approach and less reliance on the team.
Not my cup of tea.

Second - who the fuck decided to put some heroes behind the paywall? WTF?

And third - from a pure art history perspective, I don't feel like replacing O1 with O2 is a good idea. What about preserving the games as an art form? Or it's not an object of art anymore but just a service?






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It's a shame that my first experience with this fan favourite spin-off was with this recently re-released PS5 port. The personality of the game thankfully still manages to shine through. With its frequent self-referential and borderline fourth wall breaking humour, coupled with the excellent retro-stylistic art style. However, even though it isn't completely unplayable, the fast paced gunplay is nearly tarnished, due to the incredibly clunky movement speed, input lag and choppy framerate, that is outright unacceptable in this generation.