I played the first 3 after the 2018 reboot, then Ragnorak on ps5 on release. All are great IMO.
GoW3 was pretty special. I played the remaster on PS4 and and it is a big graphical jump from the first two after my eyes had got used to ps2 graphics again.
The sex minigames in all 3 are so very early 2000s and I loved them.
The reboot is a pretty good continuation of the combat formula, but there does feel like there is more variety in the originals.
Ragnorak stretched on a little too far, and I was fatigued by just how amazing everything looked eventually, but it was still a fun time. Just a less tight package than the very enjoyable 2018 Gow.
I never beat the first one (I think it was the first one anyway...)
The ps2 disc had a scratch on it and the game would freeze/crash when I got to a certain part. It was the cutscene where Kratos hurls a gigantic column if anyone remembers.
I would like to eventually replay and beat that one game for some childhood redemption.
I started playing the new god of war 2018 at one point, but couldn't really get into it at the time. There was(is) an oversaturation of viking focused content at the time and I was kind of burnt out on it by that point.
I hear the new games are really good though, so I'd also like to give them an honest chance at some point.
It was the cutscene where Kratos hurls a gigantic column if anyone remembers.
I think Kratos does this in just about every game. I was playing Ragnarok 5 minutes ago and he was hurling pillars at enemies left, right and center :D.
As for 2018: it’s a game with a big focus on combat, exploration and character driven storytelling. I can understand feeling burnt out on the viking aesthetic, but the game feels way more fantastical than historical to me.
Ha, fair enough. I'm fairly sure it was the first game. I just looked up a video, I think it actually may have been the part where Aries throws a pillar at Kratos which impales him in the chest.
Combat peaked in GoW3 and it's definitely the best western action game, IMO. OG trilogy badly needs a remaster and PC port, which I read is in the works, so that's good.
I liked the freedom of expression GoW3 gave me. Like, you get one opening and you can fuck up the enemy in all sorts of ways in true action game spirit. Really good stuff and more western action games should've followed suit.
Frankly, I don't think any of the originals are particularly good, and I was done with the new one just before the first one was over. They aren't terrible, but I've always found the praise and hype for the series entirely disproportionate to the content.
I don't particularly love the floaty, sloppy "just put some damage in this 180 degree arc" basis of the combat system much. I am also not at all on board with most of the early teenage edgelord narrative stuff in there. Maybe I was a bit too old by the time these came out.
The Harryhausen references are neat and some of the boss fights are cool set pieces that did set some of the groundwork for later AAA action games, but I would much rather spend time in the more expressive, free-flowing Devil May Cry side of things if I'm going for snappy, precise combat... or all the way into Musou slop, I suppose, although I'm not much into that, either.
I don't particularly love the floaty, sloppy "just put some damage in this 180 degree arc" basis of the combat system much.
I'm not sure what this means, to be totally honest.
I am also not at all on board with most of the early teenage edgelord narrative stuff in there. Maybe I was a bit too old by the time these came out.
I don't care what anyone says, narratives in character action games are shit 😂 I'm never gonna defend it, and always find it odd that people cared about their stories. They're not good vehicles for storytelling, IMO.
There's a reason GoW (2018) had to change genre to shift focus to storytelling, for example.
I would much rather spend time in the more expressive, free-flowing Devil May Cry side of things if I'm going for snappy, precise combat
Hmm… this makes me wonder how much time you spent playing around with GoW3's combat system because it clearly takes a lot of inspiration from DMC.
They definitely moved towards... I'm gonna say better references later in the franchise.
Still, there's also a reason they moved to a whole different genre.
GoW's core combat premise is that you have absurd range and can deal damage in a wide arc. It was REALLY hard to tighten that all the way via iteration while keeping the way the game plays.
GoW 3 was a huge step above its predecessors in setting up big standout setpieces, and it played... I'm gonna say "better", but it was still limited by the core framework of the series so far, and my argument is that framework was fundamentally flawed.
Hmm… sure, yes. I wouldn't say it's flawed, but I'd say it's different, and I much prefer the Japanese way of doing things here where it feels I'm precisely choreographing a movie fight instead of doing as much damage as possible to anyone in my immediate vicinity.
I'd still say GoW3 is peak western action, and quite fun to play. I would not rank it on the same level as DMC5, Ninja Gaiden II, or Bayonetta, but I'd rank it fairly close—like a step or two behind.
As of the franchise as a whole, yeah, it's not the best, but many franchises aren't, TBH. I love Bayonetta, for example, but that franchise is all over the place. It's almost GoW backwards… higher peak than GoW, for sure, but still messy overall.
I don't have much to disagree with there, frankly. I mean, I like GoW 3 less than you do. I'd genuinely play the Ninja Theory DMC, if I'm honest, but at that point we're splitting hairs.
To be clear, I don't hate these games, I just don't like them much and generally don't play them on purpose. We're coming at it from different angles but meeting pretty much halfway.
Again, a Let’s discuss post guided by what I am currently playing: God of War Ragnarok.
Let me start of by saying that I am a big fan of this series. I came late to the party, playing the original 2 games on my overclocked PS vita as part of the God of War Collection. I really liked the first, loved the second and actually absolutely adored the third game on my PS4 pro. Something about God of War 3 just going all the way on this mad destructive rampage really left me in awe. It has multiple incredible set pieces and Kratos truly becomes a vengeful monster in this game. The different weapons all felt amazing, it looked unreal at 60fps on PS4 pro and just was an all round epic experience.
I also played both psp games, which I thought were very impressive for the device, though a slight step down in all areas compared to the main trilogy. Still worthy entries though!
I did not play God of War Ascension yet, as this is the only one stuck on PS3.
I played God of War (2018) a few years later (a year or two ago), and while I did like it, I wasn’t as in love with it as many other people. I felt the combat was often sluggish and the storytelling slow and meandering at times. The design of the different areas was a bit hit and miss for me. There were moments of absolute brilliance (the opening scene, Kratos carrying his unconscious son to Freya, the ending and its impact on their relationship with Freya), but felt a bit too stretched out at times. Still, with respects to presentation, graphics, acting performances and music this was an all time classic.
I now started God of War Ragnarok, and I must say I am really liking it so far. The stakes seem higher, the characters are all interesting and even the combat feels better to me (I started on the hardest difficulty, just to see how long I would be able to hold out, but it actually makes me use the different systems more precisely). I am very hopeful for this one!
Fun to read your detailed thoughts on the series as whole. Literally the only GOW game I have played is the 2018 reboot, and honestly I found it to be really cool and fun! The story ended up being a bit thin by the end, but I thought that it was really engaging and fun the first time through, as you are experiencing it. There were just enough twists and turns that I felt like i never knew exactly what was going to happen next. Even though I never played the OT, the moment where
spoilerKratos goes home and takes the Blades of Chaos out of storage
was HYYYYYPE!!!
As a Dark Souls fan, I also found the slower pace of the combat to be pretty engaging. I played through all of the extra combat trials (idr what they are called) and beat all the Valkyries, so clearly I was enjoying myself. I liked all of the build options they give you with the loot and abilities. I remember beating my head against a few of the trials before realizing that a build overhaul made the trial trivial. Making builds is one of my favorite experiences in games, so I really appreciated this.
I don’t remember my exact feelings about the combat, but I remember my one major criticism was how slow Kratos turns around. They give you that input to do a fast 180, but when you are in a heated fight and you are getting surrounded by enemies, you can forget to tap it with all the other inputs you have to remember. The end result is it can feel like Kratos is resisting you as you try to spin around to hit some enemies behind you.
I had exactly this issue at times! Sometimes it felt like Kratos just wasn’t fast enough to react to my inputs, almost felt a bit over animated or something. I’ve dabbled in souls games (only finished Demon’s Souls though), but there the movement and reaction always felt instant and fair.
To be honest with you, I hate this fkin' game! I never had it. I like the OG Donkey Kong, and Donkey Kong Jr. My sibby loved this game, although he only played it via roms back in the day. I had a group of friends who loved this game like crazy. I can't even tell you much about it, because I suck at it so hard. I mean I am miserable at this game. I like the characters. The animations were out of this world. The soundtrack, super good. I still like that underwater song, and it's what I think about when I think about this game. (Well in this order a) Fuck that giant baby b) Trixie (?) has flying hair - whee! c) Hornet boss. Pheh! d) Barrel smashing e) Crocks, I always think I am lined up to smash them but then get smashed by them f) That song was a banger tho)
Guess it's called Bramble Blast . I just remembered the bramble part, this song is a banger =)!
I love that the whole reason he even became a video game composer is because his boss promised an extra day off to anyone who could learn enough about the music computer to demo it to customers. Just floating through life by happenstance, and then becoming the most revolutionary person in the field.
Donkey Kong Country was my favourite childhood game series.
The first game was a blast: fun gameplay, full of secrets and things to collect, good music, gorgeous graphics even for 2025 standards, the difficulty was just right. (A bit too hard for me back then, too easy nowadays.)
I remember when DKC3 was released in '98, I’d go to the cartridge rental shop once a week to ask the guy if they had it already. (He was extremely patient with me. That guy was a bro.) Once I finally got to play it, it didn’t disappoint me at all, I loved those puzzles and it was amazing to explore the map freely. Kiddy was a bit odd, but really fun to play with, and I loved how Dixie throwing Kiddy had different mechanics than Kiddy throwing Dixie.
But by far my favourite was DKC2. Everything was perfect - they picked the formula from DKC1 and expanded it: more collectibles! Better music! Better looks! The bonuses now aren’t just “find all bonuses in the level for +1%”, now you got something to find in them! I can literally play the first level of that game with a blindfold, it’s itched in my brain. (Fuck Bramble Blast, though. I had a hard time finding one bonus and the DK coin there. And by then my English was a bit too awful to get what Cranky said.)
Then… well, DK64. It killed the series for me. I didn’t get why it wasn’t fun, but nowadays I see what happened - early 3D games had clunky controls and camera, plus the whole “gotta remake the whole thing five times to get to 100%” was meh.
Wow, the analysis is great - thanks for sharing it! For me Stickerbush Symphony always evoked some sort of loneliness or melancholy…
And yes, the whole series has great music. I agree DKC2 is the best in this regard; not just because the tracks are great on their own, but because they fit really well the mood of each level. Disco Train is on its own a rollercoaster, Mining Melancholy’s “mmhmm mmhmm” evoking winds and machinery, Bayou Boogie making the level sound m… mois… swampy. From other games of the series DKC1 Forest Frenzy and DKC3 Nuts and Bolts are also great. (Now thinking, the DKC3 soundtrack as a whole is a bit more industrial.)
DK64 has a certain charm to it. I think there’s a really good game in there, but it also tries to do WAYYY too much, and having to memorise all those Street Fighter button combos to pull off basic moves is hard work.
I distinctly remember Donkey Kong Country as my first gaming experience. When my parents needed a babysit, they would often let me sleep at my aunts place. My older niece and nephew also lived their, but the age gap was quite big making it not ideal for us to play with toys together. One day however, my nephew had a SNES from his friend there and he was playing Donkey Kong Country on their TV. I remember being completely entranced by it and being unable to put it down (even though it was very difficult for me at the time). From then on I was always hoping that the “Gaming Machine” would be present if I stayed over, which was often the case as they figured out that this was a very easy way to keep me occupied. I later got a green Game Boy Color, and of course this was my first game for the system. I played it countless of hours, and even though I later got a Game Boy Advance SP, this game would remain in my rotation until I got a DS many years later.
I’ve barely played any of the later installments. I got Donkey Kong Country 2 for the Game Boy Advance when I was young, but found it to difficult and didn’t really like the new protagonist as much. After my DS I became a playstation fanboy for the rest of my childhood and teens.
Now that I have bought a 3DS I’ve started playing Donkey Kong Country Returns. It’s really nice, but I found it a bit overwhelming and haven’t really touched it since.
Also a shout out to the Game Boy game called Donkey Kong, in which you actually play Mario with some incredibly varied platforming for the time. An all time classic!
I played games on the PC before, but DKC was the first SNES game I played, maybe the first game with a controller. I still remember, after the console was set up, my sister played for a bit, then I wanted a turn, and just ran straight into the first enemy. Then I just watched my sister play for a bit, lol.
We didn’t have a lot of SNES games, but the game became probably my favorite on the console, along with the sequel. I played through both of them a bunch of times, and found every secret, without looking up guides.
A year or two ago, I casually played through it again, in like an hour, which was fun, I’ll have to do it again, along with the second game.
Hearing the music nowadays is also nostalgic, but it’s also just so good.
I only ever played GTA2 during the 2D era. I remember loving it then though. Maybe I ought to emulate the classics on my Steam Deck.
Of course I was obsessed with 3 when it came out. And Vice City and San Andreas were master pieces. I never played the PSP/DS games (those might also be good Steam Deck games for the future.)
I did beat 4 and its stand alone expansions. They were all pretty great, I even kind of liked the driving when everyone else was hating on it.
I have had GTA5 sitting in my Steam Library for a very long time with effectively 0 hours played. I’ll get around to eventually. It looks like I’ll enjoy it, though I hear its single player isn’t as good as 4’s.
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