By the Books Polished Beauty
If God of War (GoW) III could be summed up in one sentence it would be the ones titling this review, but it probably can't, so here goes:
GoW III is like a dim friend who makes you feel good about yourself and takes you to exciting places you don't go to alone, but when you do hang out you can't help thinking you should be more mature and stop hanging out with them lest you brain become as poorly nourished as their own.
In other words this is a God of War game that plays just like a PS2 game but looks like a very pretty PS3 title.
There is still much fun to be had with GoW III if you go in with appropriate expectations.
For example you should expect to turn off all logical functions in your brain and let your whole being be enthralled by unending (well about 8 hours of) gore and cruelty.You should also expect to feel as manly as is probably possible to feel sitting alone in a dark room with a controller. And finally expect puzzles that either stump you by their surprising simplicity or by their annoying lack of sense makeiness (darn my poor vocabularity).
In all seriousness the most important thing to consider when thinking of playing GoW III is your experience with GoW 1, 2 and Chains of Olympus. If you have played any of those titles you need to ask yourself if you feel like repeating many of those same gameplay beats but with a wholly superior presentation.
If you haven't played them and GoW III's themes at all interest you I'd definitely suggest playing the game, at least a rental will tell you more than enough to judge the game for your personal taste.
I personally bought this game on a whim since it had such a long time coming that I just got over excited when it actually went on sale. So for me as a player of all the previous games in the series I think I've had enough of Kratos in his current iteration for now, but I still think his brand of action gameplay is worth everyone with even a slight interest giving it a whirl.
Quick note on the score:
I consider 3.5 to be a very good score and it would have scored much higher if I only considered presentation as the audio visual overload offered is breathtaking.
