@thefncrow: The problem is that if you call it fridging any time a woman's death affects a male character or incites the plot, you get to the point where the term loses it's weight and meaning. With God of War specifically, the fact that it occurs before the story begins, is natural and nonviolent, is not caused by an antagonist, and is not played for shock value in order to produce anger in the male protagonist, all that makes it lean away from being a case of fridging for me. Similarly, the main influence on Atreus and Kratos' character arcs is having to interact with each other as father and son, rather than anger at the death of Faye.
Then again, the fact that Faye is never allowed to be a character in her own right, and exists purely as a plot catalyst does really rub me the wrong way, so I can understand why people would call it that, but I think fridging is a tad more specific than simply the death of a woman as a catalyst.
Really this is a problem with discussing tropes in general, too narrow a definition and they aren't tropes, they're a few examples, but too broad a definition and they they're pointless for discussion. Everyone will have their own limits, and that's where the confusion sets in for people, since many people have a much more specific definition of fridging. The focus should be on the fact that Faye isn't a fleshed out character and how that leaves a big hole in the narrative, not that she died as a catalyst for the plot.
@humanity: It's definitely a tricky situation with regards to Freya, there's room to debate on either side of this, I think. The crazy overprotective mother as villain is certainly a trope, so for that to be the primary, almost only, female representation in a series that's trying to recover from it's past, it's a bit disappointing.
So as Abby said, the game needed someone else in addition to balance it out. They had the perfect character to do that, Faye. Why would someone fall in love with Kratos, what kind of person could change him? How could GoW 3 Kratos become modern Kratos? All worth exploring, I think, since personally, I still don't believe Kratos' transformation. He feels like a completely different person now and the only explanation is "he got married and his wife calmed him down" which is in and of itself a common trope. Even something as simple as flashbacks, as overused as they are, would have helped flesh things out really nicely. But ultimately Faye is a fairly abstract wife/mother and a mechanism of the plot, not much more, and that sucks.
The valkyries are fine, I think. It's still God of War, it's still primarily about brutally killing recognizable mythical figures, so you have to assume anything recognizable from Norse myth is going to be something you kill. Again, it's unfortunate in the context of God of War lacking any other female representation, especially given it's history, but it's a problem caused by a lack of female characters overall rather than a poor execution of those represented.
I think Abby maybe wasn't as clear as she'd like to be, as she said they started getting deep into it before she was really prepared for it. Also, I don't think the trope of fridging really applies in this instance, and that confused matters.
But the thrust of the argument still rings true, God of War has a long way to go with regards to how it treats it's female characters, and it had a golden opportunity to have a fascinating female character with Atreus' mother, but really she ended up being more of an abstract motivation/concept of wifehood and motherhood than real character. I get that it's about Kratos learning to be a father, but showing nothing of her at all really leaves a huge gap in the game's narrative, I think.
I'm sure later parts of the discussions will be clearer as they start to narrow things down and really have to focus in on the details, rather than these sort of preliminary summaries where there's someone of an urge to rush through them.
Yes, I played the game. The music was excellent, and I love the game, but the music felt generic, influenced by all the different kinds of soundtracks we've heard in westerns, without really inventing a sound of it's own. You could levy the same criticism for the game as a whole, even though it was all clearly intentional.
With Red Dead 2, at least in this opening section, the music sounds VERY Ennio Morricone, it has a very specific influence. In other words Red Dead 1 sounded like an amalgamation of western soundtracks. It doesn't really have a unique sound within the genre, but it didn't feel like it was aping anything specific. Red Dead 2 feels like it intentionally wants to sound like Ennio Morricone, at least at times. I'd sooner have original but generic than pastiche of a specific artist.
Man, the music in this section at least is very Ennio Morricone. The music in Red Dead 1 was definitely somewhat generic, but it felt more original than this. Some parts of this sounded like straight up For a Few Dollars More.
Just want to say, @alex, keep up the great work. While I like the new format a lot, I was worried that your excellent written reviews would be scaled back as a result. This particular mix of written review and discussion seems just right to me.
Man, Anarchy Reigns is so great. If he's up to it, Jason should totally play some multiplayer with bots to get an idea of how to make the game really shine. It sucks it never got split screen.
Brackstone's comments