Why play through God of War: Chains of Olympus in 2017, when I have a big backlog of highly praised current generation games and not nearly enough time to play them? I’m not 100% sure. But last night the urge to finally get to the PS3 port of this 2008 PSP title struck me, and here I sit about 24 hours later, having rolled credits on the second of Kratos’ adventures I have played through. It’s hard to think of too much interesting to say about the game itself; it’s God of War and if you don’t know whether you like that at this point it’s because you’re not interested enough to find out. I enjoyed the game more than I thought I would, and I also like the fact that I was able to play through it in essentially one day. Having a play time under 6 hours is frustrating for a $60 day one purchase (see another Ready at Dawn joint, The Order 1886, for details on this) but for a digital download that cost me $8 and came with another game, 6 hours is about the perfect length. Even then the game felt padded at points, especially towards the end where it tosses lengthy arena sections in cramped quarters back to back to back, obviously re-using assets in order to ship a game that was more than 5 hours long.
What is notable about GoW:CoO is how irrelevant it feels in the culture. This was once a huge release, intended to drive the PSP to even greater heights in the West. It was heavily advertised and it’s one of the few games I’ve seen people play on their PSPs in public. 9 years later it feels like a footnote in a franchise that wants to break from its past, and there was grumbling recently when it was tossed in as a free PS+ game last year, since it’s not actually a VITA title.
9 years is not that long ago. The first Iron Man movie launched in 2008 and while it’s an older film it’s hardly forgotten. Breaking Bad first aired 9 years ago and it’s still talked about all the time. But video games age differently than most media, and playing Chains of Olympus feels like excavating an artifact of the past. Not the game experience itself, which remains competent, but its place in gaming history and culture.
It's been awhile since I spent significant time with a PS3 game, let alone a PS3 game that’s an up-rezzed version of a PSP game, and it took me a little bit of time to adjust. The first parts of the game felt very low-poly and ugly, and while I appreciated the big set-pieces they were going for and was impressed by some of the animation, I was definitely feeling some generation shock in the first hour or so.
However, in an effect not unlike eyes adjusting to a dark room and making it seem brighter, the game looked better and better as I played it, to the point where I barely noticed the blurry textures and simplified architecture in the later parts of the game. I’ve long said that PS2 era games have aged much better than PS1, and GoW:CoO definitely proved that point to me. I was able to accept the game on its own merits and even find it impressive in places, while PS1 games mostly just look like a mess. I know this was a PSP showcase at the time, and they cleaned it up for the PS3 release, but I was still surprised at how little the dated graphics bothered me just a few hours in. I also started the game over after completing it (there’s a gold trophy for starting over in a costume, and I’m enough of a trophy-whore to grab a trivial one like that) and I was shocked at how much better the beginning looked the second time. What had looked low poly and ugly 24 hours before now just looked like video game graphics to me, nothing particularly wrong with them. My expectations had adjusted to fit what I was playing and I was able to take it on its own terms. I don’t know if someone who wasn’t playing games in the PS2 era could make the same adjustment but I’m glad I can still go back.
While the graphics held up okay for me, and the gameplay was fine, there are some choices that must have felt questionable in 2008 and 9 years later are flat out cringe inducing. For example about half way through the first level you encounter some women you free from a cell, complete with low-poly digital nudity, and you go through one of God of War’s infamous QTE sex games with them. It’s weird and uncomfortable and not sexy, and even more so for a portable game presumably meant to be played in public. I would have shut my system off immediately if I had gotten to that part while playing on the train or bus. There is additional female nudity later in the game, and all of it feels gratuitous and skeezy. I have no problem with sexiness in games, but this doesn’t feel sexy, it feels cheap and obligatory. Also, I had to try the sequence like five times to get it right, and only did it for the trophy, which I guess makes that literal trophy-whoring. In addition to the silly sex and nudity, it’s worth noting that the game features basically no context for its story. It’s just like “Hey, you’re Kratos, the Ghost of Sparta, and a great general, now go fight hand to hand in this city, where everyone seems to know you!” You’d think that the game might contain a little bit of “on-boarding” for players who never played the PS2 original (maybe the PSP is their only PlayStation system) and a little bit of character building/scene setting. Stories have never been the best part of God of War games, but the beginning of this game is almost at SNES levels of simplicity and suddenness.
The story does improve later, but it curiously seems to assume the whole time that the player is a God of War fan and already knows why Kratos is in servitude to the Gods and what his sins were. It’s a strange choice and I have to wonder whether it’s because Ready at Dawn was using someone else’s IP and was restricted in what they could do with it. In addition, despite the threadbare nature of the storytelling, there are times where the game overexplains itself, like when the narrator tells the player they are standing on the chariot of Helios and then Athena manifests to explain…that you are standing on the chariot of Helios. Perhaps the game is worried that PSP players might be playing in short bursts and forget what they’re supposed to do, but having objectives repeated constantly made me feel like the game thought I was an idiot.
That’s not to say it’s a terrible game. The combat is okay, with enough magic abilities, combos, dodges, and parries to be engaging. Despite the low poly count there’s still the visceral thrill of violence that is, perhaps, the true secret to God of War’s success. The way Kratos kills the Persian king; smashing him in the head with the very chest of treasure he offered as a bribe, is both poetic and visceral. I winced at it, even though it’s far lower fidelity than the brutal killings in modern Doom or Mortal Kombat. There’s also still satisfaction to be had climbing on top of mythical beasts and mutilating them by ripping their jaws off or sinking a dagger into their eyes. Playing as Kratos has always been heavy on the power fantasy; where size or magical power can be overcome and conquered through sheer force of will and rage. That comes through in GoW:CoO, even today. And while the environments don’t feel as vast as in the main console games, that’s not to say that they don’t have anything going for them. A lot of work went into the game’s art and it shows, and there are times when the game achieves a meaningful sense of place, which is something a lot of games never do.
One thing the game is light on is true spectacle. The first boss is a giant basilisk, but most of the rest of them are about Kratos’ size and don’t really fit in with the God of War multi-stage huge boss archtype. I am guessing this was a function of budget and PSP limitations.
I can’t recommend God of War: Chains of Olympus. It’s…fine…but feels inessential. If you want to learn Kratos’ story prior to God of War 4 this doesn’t really tell you much about the character. He loves his daughter and he’s really angry and yells a lot even when it’s not appropriate to the scene. There. You have now gotten everything you need from this game story-wise.
On the other hand I won’t warn anyone away from this game either. I had fun. There were some boring parts, the puzzles are too simple and there aren’t enough enemy types, but it’s still a serviceable action game and it has its moments.
Perhaps what’s most interesting about GoW:CoO today is how it shows the disposability of certain kinds of games. This thing came out less than ten years ago and was a big blockbuster with a lot of push, and now it’s a forgotten trifle, given away for free on a dead console, its franchise looking to reboot and go in a new direction and its style hopelessly outdated. 9 years is a long time in videogame land. It’s a medium that lets its past burn away more than an other, and God of War: Chains of Olympus feels like just a little more ash on the wind. In a way that’s appropriate, but it’s also kind of sad.
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