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[existensmaximum]

I finally completed this game.

Not the sequel I had hoped for if I'm totally honest. The game moved at a meandering pace. Some sections were downright awful, such as Ironwood. There were also far too many 'forced walking' sections, and the dialogue felt like it belonged in modern day America. One of my biggest gripes was also the HORRIBLE field of view. It was so frustrating to fight enemies when the 3rd person camera was right up Kratos' ass.

GOW:R felt like a bloated experience, a reminder to devs that bigger games are not always better. I did not have the will to attempt any of the side quests; I adhered to the main campaign only and it took more 20+ hours according to the in game timer. The final level was the highlight of the game. IF I were to replay this game, I'd probably reload my save from the final level.

Thor (both at the beginning and at the end), Heimdall, Odin boss battles were awesome. The other 'boss battles' were forgettable; they felt like fighting 'bullet sponges' and were not fun at all.

To this date, I still think God of War II is the peak of the series. It had the best 'adventure' out of all the games. God of War III probably had the most exciting boss battles however, and each of these felt unique.

On the plus side, the Valhalla DLC seems to be incredible. I'm enjoying it considerably more than the base game.

I'm curious to see where the series will take us next. Hopefully Egypt.

I agree with you, word for word. It had so much potential to improve on every aspect of the precious game but instead, did the opposite.

 

[Kenneth Haight]

I haven’t played it and have no real desire to. I did like GOW 2018, platinumed it a few years back on a cleanup run.


I am just not invested in the continuation of the story, I thought it set it up well for a sequel and the gameplay is great, there is just something that hasn’t made me NEED to play this game. It’s the same way I will feel about Horizon 3 when it releases. I was there day on for Forbidden West and felt I didn’t really need to be, the need to pay £70 to play these games at release has been lost on me completely, in quite happy to wait for a deep sale. Some IP’s like TLOU I think I will buy day one as I got Part 2 spoiled for me and wish o hadn’t.

 

[BbMajor7th]

I've not finished it. I enjoyed 2018 - it felt fresh and interesting, but stretching those same characters and format over another 50-hour saga was a mistake. Add in a bunch of extraneous padding and meandering story and it's hard to stay invested.

 

[Dafegamer]

Some of the side quests are better than the main campaign, I feel like you're missing out out on not doing them

 

[Dafegamer]

Game gets a lot of unwarranted hate for only a few sections that have really poor pacing.

Rest of the game is absolute with much better combat encounters, set pieces, and side content than in GoW 2018.

I thought the story was particularly strong too, with some real gut wrenching moments and a very cool cast of characters. Yeah, the kid gets annoying at times, he did in 2018 as well and I could have done without his combat.

I do agree though that God of War 2 is the pinnacle of the series just from a pacing standpoint. GoW Ragnarok is excellent however, I would rather re-play it than 2018 which is barebones in retrospect especially the combat encounters/enemies.

I agree that GOW R gets unwarranted hate based on some sections(sorry Atreus but the sections are mostly containing you) but 2018 is still very great imo. The level design feels even more interconnected than GOW R, I like metroidvania games so maybe that's the reason. Still GOW R has that too, but the realms feel more semi open world, compared to GOW 2018

 

[CompleteGlobalSaturation]

I haven’t played it and have no real desire to. I did like GOW 2018, platinumed it a few years back on a cleanup run.


I am just not invested in the continuation of the story, I thought it set it up well for a sequel and the gameplay is great, there is just something that hasn’t made me NEED to play this game. It’s the same way I will feel about Horizon 3 when it releases. I was there day on for Forbidden West and felt I didn’t really need to be, the need to pay £70 to play these games at release has been lost on me completely, in quite happy to wait for a deep sale. Some IP’s like TLOU I think I will buy day one as I got Part 2 spoiled for me and wish o hadn’t.

The only driving factor for me to complete the game was the story - unfortunately it feels like a contradicatory mess.

Kratos:
"We must not do X at any circumstances."
5 mins later
"We must proceed with plan X"
5 mins later
"We must stop plan X!"

 

[keefged4]

I'm going through it again on Steam now and honestly don't know if I can be arsed with it a second time, at the Angrboða bit just now and my god I forgot how boring it is. The whole game feels like you have an autistic parrot yapping in your ear the entire time who wont shut the fuck up. I have to agree with others, GOW II & III are peak and the best the series have to offer.

 

[Bloobs]

Spidey 2. HFW and Ragnarok are some of the worst sequels ever created.

 

[JimmyRustler]

The game was bloated in one of the worst ways I have ever experienced. I used to be OCD about side quests and stuff. This game cured me of it in a sense.

 

[Kupfer]

This is how I felt about GoW 2018. Why am I doing so many slow walk and chats while characters rapid fire Marvel quips at me in a God of War game. Original trilogy is great. I have no desire to play Ragnarok after the last game which I never bothered to finish.

I already criticized that back then and it's due to the old generation. Instead of loading times, there are slow walk / climbing / crawling sequences that completely destroy the pacing. After GoW 2018, which was okay but retrospectively rather mediocre, I had absolutely no interest in the sequel and even less when I read that it would also be a PS4 game with the same weaknesses.
On top of that, it's just not 'my' Kratos anymore, I know progression this trauma, responsibility and mental maturity that, but I'm just not up for spending hours dealing with a sad old man who used to badass while beating the crap out of cool bosses in a rage in his prime.
Also boy can fuck off.

 

[The artful mincer]

Combat is best in Ragnarok than at any point in the series.

So by default it automatically becomes the best in the series!

 

[TheRedRiders]

2018 was a masterpiece, one of my all time favourites. GOWR the developers got too pretentious and I felt like I was watching some cringy coming of age bratty kid embrace his "dEsTinY" or whatever.

 

[Alebrije]

Easy, if You play GOW games from Ragnarok to previous ones You Will feel an evolution

Ragnarok is a good Game I had fun playing it but is different from firsth 5 games...te tone is more Soft and not just because the father - son theme, Even the enemies feel more "human".

If Good of war were movies lets Say the first games are like Terrifier and the recent ones like Scream.

Still like the IP and surely Will get next Game but is moving to a different setup.

 

[Games of Today]

The ending was horrible. The rest of the game was decent. I actually thought the whole Giant grandma was pretty cool. They should have done more with that as well as more with the World Serpent. It also needed more God of War boss fights.

 

[Randall365]

It will be interesting to see what happens to the third games of these disappointing sequels (though no doubt high-selling), that Sony keep sharting out - GOW R, TLOU2, Spidey 2 etc.

 

[DenchDeckard]

Spidey 2. HFW and Ragnarok are some of the worst sequels ever created.

 

[Madserb2023]

2016 was better. More concise with less filler. Games like this actually benefit from being shorter. This is a mistake that Sony keeps making. Uncharted 4 was too long with slower pacing. Same goes for Forbidden West, Ragnarok. Last of Us 2 was probably the worst offender. I could have pulled my head out by the third time I walked around that aquarium. Resident Evil 4 Remake is about half the length of the these games.

 

[sainraja]

I totally get that Atreus’ character development could’ve been more polished, but I personally didn’t mind switching to him. It wasn’t because I preferred playing as him over Kratos, but it was a nice breather between chapters. I can see how they could’ve trimmed down some of Atreus’ sections, but overall, I had a great time with the game.

 

[Pandawan]

GoW Ragnarok is a pile of shit. Combat is still unbearable, no improvements over 2018 (still awfull camera, damage spungy enemies), pacing is much worse than 2018 (a lot of grindy, boring walks and easy tasks), story is much much worse than 2018 (Atreus is completely unbearable in Ragnarok, Kratos completeley lost any agency and became just a toughguy in service of Atreus). The worst thing is that the setting felt like i am playing a Disney game, not brutal God of War. It is freaking ragnarok on the horizon, the world is dying, and people speak and behave like they live in California, not in this brutal dying world. A complete lack of any dread in the story's vibe.

 

[Pandawan]

WTF this story even is. It is like the devs are so detached from reality. A game set in the dying world is centered around pacifism, forgiveness and themes like that.