Am I worried that this game will kind of sink and blend in with the rest of the modern-day action games by adopting influences from other titles? Somewhat.

Am I mad that I'm not getting a game that plays exactly in the style of its predecessors? Not in the slightest. I think the age of gratuitous nudity, coitus minigames, wanton gory violence for the sake of it and mad berserker protagonists has run its course for this series. But that's just me.

I kinda just wished they went with a different protagonist. Turn it into a sorta anthology series where every 2-3 games follows an entirely new character with an entirely new playstyle and tone. I like Kratos, but his story was done in my eyes. Trotting him back out, regardless of what they decide to do with the story, doesn't really do much for me.

That's my only complaint really. Otherwise, it looks perfectly fine. I mean I hope the game is awesome because awesome games are always awesome, but just more Kratos isn't a plus as far as I'm concerned. I could be wrong though. We'll see.

"It's different and I don't like that" is always an argument I think is fair but a little judgmental, as though a series is irreversibly tied to the mechanics/tropes which popularized it in the first place. Granted, I agree that I would have preferred a new character, but not because I like Kratos, because I think he's boring and serves only as a vector for the story. This Kratos seems less boring.

As for everything else, it's very subjective, see above paraphrasing.

Would it have made more sense to have a new character or even a new IP in the same universe? Maybe. Do I prefer this over the theoretical concept of a new, really good "Kratos is angry... AGAIN!" button masher action game (I'm assuming you're correct and this will feel more Dark Souls-y in its gameplay)? Absolutely. Different - even after all these years - is usually more interesting. I don't know, I guess I just never liked God of War enough to really care if they "betrayed" its legacy by trying a different take on the series' universe or its gameplay.

I would have liked a new character, yes. But I also don't find what they've shown that appealing. It could be an original IP and I'd still be fairly unimpressed.

I haven't really seen much explanation for why this is better, aside from it being mature now and focusing more on narrative. What about the gameplay? The over-the-shoulder view and AI partner so far don't appear to do it any favors. It's good that dodge is assigned to a button now, at least. I'm also skeptical that this is mature. How many big budget action games have mature stories and writing? It could be as hackneyed, immature and dull as any one of them.

Its needed. Three main line games with how many mobile games that are more or less the same? Have faith in the developers.

God of War with Kratos in a norse mythology setting and different gameplay feels like the equivalent of The Last Of Us being called just Uncharted with Nathan Drake as protagonist instead of Joel. Point being this would make more sense as a different IP.

Is that to insinuate that the previous God of War games didn't suffer from hackneyed, immature and dull narratives?

OP, my dude, you're feeling betrayed by an upcoming game that we don't know much about, on a console you don't own and resent due to its online multiplayer subscription, for a series that you've played less than half of the games. Is this really a hill to die on?

No. You missed or ignored my point. I was asking why this is better and pointing out that the narrative could be hit or miss. The three writers don't have impressive backgrounds. I can't even find info on one of them.

I just beat the Barbarian King for the third time in like eight years. Frustrating, but satisfying. I'm gonna see if I can make it through Hard mode this time.

I resent PlayStation for more than that. But I have a list of games I may begrudgingly buy a PS4 (or perhaps a backwards compatible PS5) for.

• Bloodborne (The only Souls game I haven't played. I would be playing it offline.)
• The Last Guardian
• Uncharted 4 (I liked the previous three to varying degrees. They're better than the new Tomb Raiders.)
• The Last of Us (Never played the PS3 version.)
• The Last of Us Part II
• God of War III
• Nioh
• Ratchet & Clank (2016)
• Until Dawn
• Horizon: Zero Dawn
• Death Stranding (Because it's Kojima. The trailers tell me nothing at all. I skipped through the latest ones because I don't care. I wanna see gameplay.)
• Journey (This is a big maybe. I didn't like the demo. It's on my list mostly because I need to justify the 400 dollar price tag.)
• Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy (Also a big maybe.)

@ezekiel: I think you missed my point, but it's cool that you like PS4 games I guess?

The point was obvious. I'm just communicating that I have some personal investment in PlayStation and that I'd like to play more God of War games.

@ezekiel: So which God of Wars have you actually played and finished? You might have said so in the thread but I'm not looking through multiple pages just to see that.

I played about an hour of CoD: MW mulyiplayer with friends, and the first level of CoD 3.

I absolutely cannot believe that more recent CoD games are betraying the series by taking place in space!

Maybe it's best you don't play it then. I didn't play andromeda after watching a couple videos on it, and I played me 1&2 at least twice each.

Games need to change to stay fresh, they will gain and lose people as they reform and change. If it's truly not what you want, and the response to the game is a huge demand for an "old style" gow, I suspect someone will develop it to meet the need.

It's sad to see a game that you won't enjoy, especially when you've enjoyed the previous ones, but you are free to ignore it, and play stuff you do enjoy.

@ezekiel: Growing up does not mean "super serious time" It means changing for the better. God of War 1-3 were decent games, but always sub-par to Devil May Cry's action and difficulty anyway, trying something different (but hey its still a 3rd person action game) is healthy. This is a good thing for the series, and the action in the new trailer does not look slow at all, just different. As well, it looks deeper than GoW ever has as a game (deep mechanically and structurally) instead of the poor man's DMC that GoW always was. Also God of War was never that fast, it is like...barely faster than Arkham City if that as an action game.

The story and characters were pretty two-dimensional and atrocious (almost everyone was just a horrible, angry asshole except the women who were sinister assholes but hey look at their tits.) So the fact that they are making Kratos a stranger in a strange land, and taking the concept of the ever-raging homicidal maniac and trying to build him out into a human being of some kind is interesting to me. I mean, nothing about the game is totally exciting or amazing-looking, but I want to wait and see. I really like GoW2 and 3 was good as well, but none since have made me think twice about playing them.

Also I mean, I think Mario 64 is just not a very great game and SMW (and basically all other 3D Marios to varying degrees) is like 20x better, so we all have our unpopular opinions.

Nothing was more boring by the end (no probably the middle when it became a slog to finish) of GoW 3 than those swinging attacks you do with the chains that mostly lead to mindless mashing that works in many contexts. It's not fun or interesting and basically leads to one way to play the game. I was done with many other things the games were doing by then, including the story and tone.

Everything about this showing has been an improvement. Dialing it back from 11 all the time (every GoW game had to open with basically a city being wiped out or more), giving Kratos room to do anything but be an angry asshole by letting him interact with one person who he doesn't fight or use for a minute and then murder, creating a camera and combat system that makes spacing and movement very relevant in a way that most action games have gone because that's what people like and has depth.

The over the shoulder camera actually reminds me a bit of God Hand, just one of the best action games ever. It can work.

GoW's combat especially was never near what other games were even doing at the time. I'm not even so much of a DMC series fan because I find everything around the combat to usually be pretty bad, but the combat is way better in all those games. DMC 3 blows any GoW game out of the water in that area. GoW 1 and 2 were great games because of their visuals, the setpieces, and the take on the setting.

It's really easy to know what you like, harder to know what you don't like, and even harder to know why.

Then you're in luck! Buy a PlayStation 3 and you will have access to not one, not two, not three, but four (!) God of War games done in the style you like. Many of the rest of us, though, welcome a reboot of a series that has become stale.

Having years of experience doing design work for various clients and big companies I can with certainty say that it's actually the very opposite: people very often know what they don't like but find it difficult to articulate what they actually want. I would design things and have people come down and tell me to change it or make it "different" or my personal favorite, make it "nicer looking" without any sort of idea what this new direction should be - they just knew they didn't like what they were seeing right then and there.

Like I'm not sure if I'm 100% down with what they've done here for this reboot, but I can't exactly say what direction the series should take. I've spoken in the past how that initial demo last E3 didn't feel like a God of War game and to me it seemed like they were just too scared to release a brand new IP so they slapped this whole new theme on an existing series and branded it a "reboot." This year they showed a little more combat and I think it actually looks pretty interesting. The action definitely seemed a lot tighter and fast paced like a character action game rather than the weighty and lumbering RPG type thing they showcased before. Kratos was executing what looked like combos and I'm down with that sort of change - adding depth to the combat is something that God of War really needed, just not at the cost of speed.

Either way it's kind of early to place any sort of judgement on the game. If it comes out and plays like Dark Souls then hey maybe it will be an awesome game, it just won't be a very awesome God of War game - time will tell.

Very much agreed.

You see it in people critiquing games a lot. I find with modern games sometimes they don't like this or that in the games but I don't really see any ideas for alternatives.

Changing things now doesn't stop the old games from existing. We've got franchises running into fourth installments regularly now and, if you've can't express a little creativity, it'll go stale fast. It might be the thing you didn't know you wanted.

The game looks cool, OP is wrong

also GOW games are shitty

I'd much rather they try something different and fail than do the same old shit and it be mediocre.

We get it, you don't like Tomb Raider, and everything that reminds you of it is automatically trash.

Personally, I welcome the change. I started as a pretty big fan of the series, but after 6 God of War games, every bit of good will they got from me was lost. I ended up dropping the last game left than an hour before reaching the end, as sick of it I was. It wasn't even that they deviated from the formula I loved in the first game, it was that it was the exact same formula applied to different assets. If the new game were somewhat similar to the previous games, it would not garner any hype, it would get negative hype.

So, no. Having played all of them, some even several times, I don't think it is a "betrayal", but a much needed reinvention. If that still counts as betrayal, then we would be better if the franchise was well and buried... forever.

I can't believe this dumbass thread is still open

"I don't own a PS4 and I barely like the God of War series and I've only played two out of the six previous games but the new direction for the seventh God of War game is violence against me and I'm going to reply to everyone telling them why they're wrong unless they're pointing out why this is a bad take in ways that I can't troll my way out of" is hardly compelling

How can you tell the combat is deeper?

I thought God of War set itself apart from other action games with its adventure elements, like puzzling and platforming, which make the journey... feel more like a journey. It doesn't have scored levels because combat isn't the sole focus and because the adventure becomes harder as you progress and increase your health bar, magic and abilities, making going back with a level selector and getting better scores counterproductive. I also appreciate the production value. It gives me an experience I can't get from Devil May Cry.

I highly disagree with pretty much everything you said. Plus, you're clearly basing your opinion on the FOV, over-the-shoulder, etc issues on tutorial sections and narrative sections. It looks fine, even great, in real combat.

The last thing I would want (yet again) is God of War: Dynasty Warriors 5 - thank god they moved on, from what I've seen!

Also, Tomb Raider pretty much sucked, even for it's time on PS1, until they change it to be like the last couple releases. Those were great. TR1 on PS1 and the others in that era were neat to look at and terrible to play. I remember myself, and everyone I knew, were really impressed until they played it, and not one of us actually slogged through the BS and actually finished it. It was a poorly designed game in many ways, and just had the neat appeal of Lara Croft and the freshness of a 3D console game with guns... unlike Mario 64, which was great, but more focused on the younger market.

And you can't judge the story yet at all, you have no idea how good or bad it'll be... except for companion hate in the tutorial, I guess? Clearly the son will either die or whatever and he won't be with you for most of the game. Or he'll grow up and you'll play as him, passing the torch from Kratos to a new character for a new series in the GoW "universe".

I understand there's a deeper discussion to have here, but this is just a lot of arguing back and forth with no one really discussing anything.