This week I got a chance to see Kratos in all his glory. With breakfast and lunch in hand, Sony gave a peek at the third chapter in the God of War series. The presentation was headed by game director, Stig Asmussen, starting off with the answer to the question on everyone's mind. "When will it be released?" Unfortunately, Sony has no announcement at this time, but plans to during this year's E3.
Asmussen went on to explain that they've set the bar high and want to redefine the generation with their vision of God of War 3. The size and scope of this game will be huge. The first two games pushed the PS2 to its limit. Now, with the power of the PS3 the team is building Titan levels. Levels that live and breathe, moving environments and land that is so large, these titans are the equivalent size to the Sears tower. Asmussen also stated that the entire Medusa level from the first God of War would be able to fit in a titan's hand. In fact, this model of Kratos won't even fit on the PS2. Wowza!
Now, if you didn't already know, Kratos is one pissed off dude. He will stop at nothing to get to Zeus and is bringing the fight to Olympus. He's also reigniting the war between titans and gods. We don't know much about what's happening with the story, but we will get to see more of the internal struggles Kratos faces. One thing the team wanted to do was make sure all fans could follow the storyline. The game will take place exactly where the second left off and will be reminiscent for current fans and more of a "history lesson" for newcomers.
With that being said, it was time for the demo. The goal was to find and reveal the door of Eos that would eventually lead to the back entrance of Olympus. To do so, Kratos must first chase Helios. Asmussen stated that in all of their research, fans always went back to the blades. As an answer to this, they have introduced the lion-headed cestuses. The weapons will match the moves of the blades in power, but alter slightly. For example, you can still press the same button combo as you would the blades, but it will of course look different and the cestus allows for quicker evades. There's also the real-time weapon changes making it easier and faster to defend against different types of enemies. Another addition is the ridable enemies. Yes, just jump on the back of a Cyclops and after your action mini-game, you'll be controlling where he runs and how he attacks what's in front of him. This works great with large groups of enemies that surround you. Don't have a bridge? That's fine, just jump from harpy to harpy while stabbing them so they don't come back around to bother you. It was also stated that A.I. improves once a mini-boss comes into play.
One of these mini bosses is a Centaur that you end up gutting, while the other is the Chimera, a figure with the face of a lion, head of a goat and tail of a snake. I won't even go into what Kratos does to that thing. I'll give you a hint, it's bloody. We finally find Helios and after fighting off a few of his minions, we attack an already wounded Helios. How do we attack? By pressing the right and left triggers back and forth to rip Helios' head clean off his body. I would have to say there were a few surprised groans from the room because it really did look and sound painful. Did I mention this game was gory? Well, it is. I would say even more so and in even greater detail do you see ligaments, tissue and chunks of flesh. Or as I like to call it, pure awesomeness.
My only complaint? No boobies. Well, there were harpy boobies but they were ugly. I was hoping for godess boobies personally. I'm sure the game will hold true to it's boobie factor amongst many other things we love about the series, but we'll have to wait till E3 for more. This is one of my most favorite series in games and this just makes me even more anxious to own. Can. Not. Wait.