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God of War (PS2) Review

Like gore? Like nudity? Good, God Of War has it all. In God Of War you play a very arrogant Spartan warrior, Kratos, who since a vicious battle against the Barbarians prayed to the God of War, Ares, to be helped in a failing battle, after winning the battle Kratos had to stay true to his word and have chain weapons embedded into his wrists and to be Ares' servant. After years of proving himself to be a great warrior, Kratos was ordered to burn down a village as it was the only thing stopping the Spartans from ruling. In blind rage Kratos kills his wife and child as planned by Ares and since then, Kratos has been on a mission to take out Ares, the God of War.
Game play is visionary, with the introductory of the Context Sensitive actions in which during a cinematic or cut scene a button will appear on-screen and you will have to repeat the action to finish the usually awesome and gory finish to a fight or grapple... or annoying reversal.

It almost always a kill that'll make your face melt and go "what the hell?" but we all know it's just a badass game. As for the platforming aspect, the jumping seems a tad off, bad even. I'm not a fan of the jumping but it usually gets me from A to B. Even it is like 50cm away from my current location.
Puzzles are very simple once you know how to do them. After staring at it for a few moments you can almost figure it out and just do it. Most puzzles don't have fiends launched at you every minute so you do get to relax and just do them with little hassle. Most puzzles consist of hauling fat ass blacks around the place and not a lot of it is like Tomb Raider where you assemble pictures or even blow things up. It's just simply putting the block or object in the right position and it will just click in.

Throughout the game you'll unlock all sorts of weapons and magic abilities, although never entirely making much sense, the game is awesome. Throughout your path you'll run into giant heads of the gods blocking your ways, you'll then have to prove your worth to them as a mortal. If you succeed they will grant you their gifts. Such as Zeus' lightning bolt or Hades' Army of the Dead. These are all great abilities but none can really surpass the awesomeness and just plain strength of the area of effect lightning bolt which is the very first magic you learn.
My only real complain with this game is the ending. Game play in the ending suddenly shifts to a Tekken style fight. It's kinda annoying. Instead of health and magic bars you'll switch to something that resembles a momentum bar in which whoever has the upper side will have more of the opponents bar, whenever the bar is full for you, it will start a Context Sensitive combo but if it gets to Ares side you will die instantly and have to restart the whole fight. On God Mode it has to be the hardest thing on the PS2.

After you complete the game you will be rewarded with a lot of extras showing you original concepts for the game and the development of the game. Along with David Jaffes opinions on the “over the top” animations. You'll also be treated to hints, teasers and alternate costumes. If you complete the game in different ways and on different difficulties you will be rewarded with different things. This is genius because it makes you want to replay the game to see what else you can get. Simply a revolutionary game.

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