Current Events > Started God of War 2018. Anything to keep in mind?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Going to the mountain now.

Is this going to be a linear experience? If so How do I know where to go? How to know which is the story path so that I can avoid it and go off the beaten paths to collect items/treasure/etc?

The game is so far shaping up to be really intriguing, I'm already invested. I can't believe this is the same series and same guy from the cheesy 2000s yelling and anger era, he's weirdly nuanced here where you feel the rage is just bubbling under the surface.

I like how media tends to give men a bushy beard when they become fathers so that we the audience know they've aged and matured and are now a parent.
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Don't want to ask in case it's a spoiler but is Atreus the biological son of Kratos? Or is it implied that Kratos was raising the boy with this unknown lady whom he loved? If spoiler don't answer I'm just posting my musings here to look back on after I beat the game.

And I know this was probably already talked about extensively 3 years ago but wow at the fact that they actually made a game where it's now Kratos vs Norse mythology gods. After GoW 3 people were joking that after Kratos defeats all the Greek gods he'll probably move on to Norse gods and then other culture gods but the developers went and made it real after all.
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Story progression is marked with an orange or yellow way mark, sidequests are blue

Artreus is his biological son

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When you get the boat you can start to do some extra stuff.

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Your playing the greatest ps4 exclusive out enjoy the ride and take your time in each area its semi open world.

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The individual regions are fairly linear, but you are free to move from place to place and each area feels just large enough to explore and find some neat stuff.

It's probably the best game I've played on the PS4.

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All other games will seem like trash, so there's that. It's literally perfect

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I have some issues with the game, but it's from a gameplay perspective (not the mechanics, but I don't want to say anything more because I don't wanna spoil you).

with that said, it's an amazing game all the way throughout.

and as others have said, the main story stuff is pretty linear, but you have this world with different areas that you can travel to with secret enemies, "side-missions", armor, runes, etc., so there's a lot of incentive to explore and travel outside of the beaten path.

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It's probably the best game released for the PS4. Also you always want to keep ur armor up to date especially when ur fighting hidden challenges. It gets pretty hard without having epic items

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One complaint, the text is absolutely tiny (typical of post gen 6 games) but there's a text slider type option in the accessibility menu but even when I put it at the max size, none of the font in the entire menus or game seem to have been affected at all, they don't increase or anything. Any fix?
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This game really is different than the old games. We stop to help a woman and her boar? The over-the-top 2000s era games would have Kratos just kill them all in a shower of blood while yelling the whole time. It's weirdly like the developers grew up and wanted something with a little more substance. I'm just pleasantly surprised.
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The game kind of falls halfway between open world and linear IMO. It's large enough that it probably could be open world, but it lacks most of the trappings of the genre.

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saspa posted...

This game really is different than the old games. We stop to help a woman and her boar? The over-the-top 2000s era games would have Kratos just kill them all in a shower of blood while yelling the whole time. It's weirdly like the developers grew up and wanted something with a little more substance. I'm just pleasantly surprised.

I HATED Kratos in the original trilogy.

he was this petty, selfish psycho, who'd hurt and kill anyone, including innocents, if it meant completing his goal.

but in God of War 2018, I feel that he's a legit good character (as in, he's well-written), and the game really does a good job, IMO, of evolving him while still keeping the original series in consideration.

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saspa posted...

This game really is different than the old games. We stop to help a woman and her boar? The over-the-top 2000s era games would have Kratos just kill them all in a shower of blood while yelling the whole time. It's weirdly like the developers grew up and wanted something with a little more substance. I'm just pleasantly surprised.

It's great. It's deliberate btw, not a retcon. Glimpses of his trauma and past appear frequently enough to remind you that old Kratos is still somewhere in there, just tempered. Great game, even better story, imo.

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saspa posted...

This game really is different than the old games. We stop to help a woman and her boar? The over-the-top 2000s era games would have Kratos just kill them all in a shower of blood while yelling the whole time. It's weirdly like the developers grew up and wanted something with a little more substance. I'm just pleasantly surprised.

agreed, i loved the original god of war games but i think it is really cool how they made kratos mature alongside the developers, audience, gaming industry in general, etc

as for shit to consider when playing the game, not really. just go along for the ride. GoW pretends like it's a big open world game but it's mostly pretty linear, with the occasional branching path you can go down to do a side mission or w/e

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saspa posted...

One complaint, the text is absolutely tiny (typical of post gen 6 games) but there's a text slider type option in the accessibility menu but even when I put it at the max size, none of the font in the entire menus or game seem to have been affected at all, they don't increase or anything. Any fix?

kotaku.com/god-of-war-patch-increases-the-text-
size-but-its-still-1825451101

Your playing "the fix" lol

Seriously it was worse before, I remember playing at launch and I couldn't see shit on my 40 inch TV then until this patch.

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SSJKirby posted...

Story progression is marked with an orange or yellow way mark, sidequests are blue

Oh ok now I see what you mean, got the compass from the witch in the woods and I now have actual markers for which is the story path direction.
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Don't bother upgrading equipment too much until later in the game. Like, upgrade some early game gear once if it will get you a socket slot, but don't bother maxing everything out just yet. Unless it raises your overall level, level means more than stats until you start getting into endgame builds. Hoard hacksilver and xp like a greedy stooge, you'll need everything you can get when you do a new game + playthrough, the gear exclusive to second playthrough is crazy expensive. And yes, new game + is worth it, you can do some fun builds that you'll never be able to do on your first playthrough. Made the entire playthrough feel fresh all over again.
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Just another small complaint/thing I noticed: Manual save doesn't do anything? I saved manually at a part in the game and exited the game but when I came back the next day I had to redo that entire portion again despite saving after finally getting all the chests and ruins? What gives? Makes me paranoid that I don't know what will or won't save now.
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Yeah, shortly after the point you're at, it really opens up. It's not a sandbox or nonlinear with the main quest by any means, but there is a massive hub with a lot of exploratory elements.

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Definitely can see it now. This game really is beautiful though. Like my goodness the colors, the environment, being in the woods almost felt like a fairy tale at times.
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Makeveli_lives posted...

kotaku.com/god-of-war-patch-increases-the-text-
size-but-its-still-1825451101

Your playing "the fix" lol

Seriously it was worse before, I remember playing at launch and I couldn't see shit on my 40 inch TV then until this patch.

Ugh.

On the one hand, I feel vindicated in knowing that other people agree and share my very real concern about tiny video game text of most western games (usually) in the HD era rather than the constant trollish "durr you need to get your eyes checked"

On the other, it really sucks that developers don't seem to notice this when they're checking and testing their own game. Are they exclusively playing on a pc monitor 2 inches away from the screen or something?
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Does anyone else think it's weird to use the shoulder buttons to attack? I've noticed this happen more than once this gen, and I think it's weird not to use the traditional square/triangle/circle trio. I'm glad that shoulder buttons no longer get stuck like the ps2 era controller but still.
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It did take some getting used to, but I think it does work for this game in particular, and tbh I actually think it should be standard kind of. Like, keeping all the main attacking buttons right at your fingertips just feels nice compared to the old days where you did mostly everything with the face buttons. Like, Devil May Cry games and Mega Man X games are basically unplayable to me without remapping the controls so that my thumb isn't trying to do everything.
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Didn't like it personally. It just wasn't my cup of tea. I prefer the old style of combat, plus the fights seemed really repetitive after a while. It's a beautiful game though.

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Mediocre combat, too much walking and talking
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saspa posted...

Does anyone else think it's weird to use the shoulder buttons to attack? I've noticed this happen more than once this gen, and I think it's weird not to use the traditional square/triangle/circle trio. I'm glad that shoulder buttons no longer get stuck like the ps2 era controller but still.

After playing Dark Souls for years, shoulder button for attacks feels very natural for this type of gameplay.

As for your comment about Kratos seeming to mature, the director mentioned that in an interview. I believe it was something about becoming a father himself and how his own personal focus changed. It kind of makes sense. IIRC, even in 3, he was willing to stop in order to keep Pandora safe. The seeds were always there, but he needed a reason to believe in. You could even see it with the first encounter with the stranger. He didn't want to fight, just to be left to grieve.

I will say some of my favorite scenes in this game are the little ones of Kratos trying to be more of a father to his son. Little motions like about to pat him on the back or whatever, but he holds back. You can see he wants to change, but doesn't quite know how. Remember, he is a spartan, and they were known for having rough, militaristic upbringings.

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awesome999 posted...

Mediocre combat, too much walking and talking

What? The talking is the best part. All the little stories you get when meeting up with that NPC. Stories being put on hold when you dock your boat. I often found myself just sitting on the lake wondering what was going to be said next.

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loafy013 posted...

I will say some of my favorite scenes in this game are the little ones of Kratos trying to be more of a father to his son. Little motions like about to pat him on the back or whatever, but he holds back. You can see he wants to change, but doesn't quite know how. Remember, he is a spartan, and they were known for having rough, militaristic upbringings.

There are no words to describe how blown away I am for these little moments in this game.

This game is like... prince of persia sands of time in terms of playing a game with 2 people and you see their relationship unfolding. The little bits of dialogue and their interaction with each other and the rest of the world they're in... it really is amazing.

I was not expecting this from a gow game. I was not expecting it at all. I think like most guys I particularly connect to this kind of story of father and son and see the relationship between my own father in Kratos and Atreus. I love these kinds of stories.
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Ok so I got lost items in the dwarf shop after I finished an area? What does that mean, that if I don't get a treasure chest the game will simply just give me its contents free of charge just like that?
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I'm pretty sure the way lost items work is that if there's some kind of loot that drops from an enemy or a boss and you forget to pick it up, that item will wind up getting picked up by the dwarves. So it shouldn't affect chests at all, just actual dropped loot.
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it's usually dropped loot from areas you can't go back to

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GoW 2018 was one of those games I remember starting when it just released, loved it, but slowly drifted away from it. I think ill go back to it after I finish Yakuza 5 platinum, even if I know a general feel for the "story"

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Ah so it's dropped loot, okay that's nice of the game. I'll still make a point to go after treasure chests I missed or ones that stumped me.

Ok so I decided to finally use XP to power some Kratos and Atreus moves, but I'm very hesitant to waste any XP on equipment runes. I don't know which is the best ruin and just kind of switch them out with each other every little bit to see which move works best for mobs and/or bosses.
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I ended up using Hel's Touch a lot if that helps any. It might be literally the first one you get, but it's quick, reliable, and it can open up some enemies for quick and easy stun kills. Hel's Touch, switch to unarmed, and that enemy is basically already dead.

Have you been remembering to socket your armor with enchantments? This can sometimes be the difference between leveling up right away and not leveling up right away. I usually upgrade all my early armor at least once just to squeeze an extra socket slot out of it.
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Kircheis posted...

I ended up using Hel's Touch a lot if that helps any. It might be literally the first one you get, but it's quick, reliable, and it can open up some enemies for quick and easy stun kills. Hel's Touch, switch to unarmed, and that enemy is basically already dead.

Have you been remembering to socket your armor with enchantments? This can sometimes be the difference between leveling up right away and not leveling up right away. I usually upgrade all my early armor at least once just to squeeze an extra socket slot out of it.

I switched out hel's touch for the axe throwing attack thinking it might help more... maybe I'll switch it back if it can stun those witches that laugh in my face and keep teleporting around the area every time I try to attack them.

Also... armor can have more than one socket slot at a time??? I didn't know that. It would help immensely to be able to put in as many enchantments as possible.
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Part of what makes Hel's Touch so good for stunning is that enemies will often have their backs turned to you after using it, which increases stun damage, and if you back attack an enemy while unarmed their stun damage shoots through the roof. One of my favorite ways to take out revenants and wulvers.

And it's mainly later in the game when armor gets more than one socket slot, most of the early gear only gets a socket slot after upgrading at least once.
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It's a pretty good game. I definitely don't like it as much as the general consensus, though. It's in the 7-8/10 range for me. But it feels like a game that's a preview of an amazing sequel.

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Jabodie posted...

It's a pretty good game. I definitely don't like it as much as the general consensus, though. It's in the 7-8/10 range for me. But it feels like a game that's a preview of an amazing sequel.

As much as I like it, I don't disagree with you. While it's very good, it does have kind of a bare bones feeling.

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Just came back from alfheim, a fairy elf world. Damn this is awesome, the idea of actually exploring the 9 realms of norse mythology is too good.
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How'd you feel about the dark elf boss? I'll always remember that guy as being a real shitter on my first playthrough (which was on Give me a Challenge).
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Oh man let me tell you I am simply terrible at these games. I almost feel guilty that Atreus is near invincible because I use him a lot
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I really liked the game. That, Spiderman and HZD are probably my favourites of the PS4.
Very smooth. Great world design and aesthetic. Some of the best sound in any game I've ever played.
I thought the combat was fine, but not excellent. The depth probably isn't there compared to the previous entries, but as someone who is more superficial about these games it worked better for me overall.
The story was good except for the later few hours and "final boss", which I thought dragged out and were disappointing. The ending itself and epilogue part was good though.

Kircheis posted...

How'd you feel about the dark elf boss? I'll always remember that guy as being a real shitter on my first playthrough (which was on Give me a Challenge).

Yeah I remember that realm being the hardest part of the game for me, with the exception of one or two of the Valkyrie fights, because I was still getting the hang of things.

EDIT: Also, I agree with upgrading Atreus as much as possible when available. His arrows are just great and make a lot of fights easier.

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pegusus123456 posted...

As much as I like it, I don't disagree with you. While it's very good, it does have kind of a bare bones feeling.

It really does, most of the bosses were reskins and the enemies start to feel samey after awhile. With that said, it was my 2018 GOTY. It definately feels like the game is setting up for something bigger in the sequels, which most definately will happen considering this game sold incredibly well.

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Also that boss fight got overshadowed by the fact that I fight a freaking dragon! HOOLY crap!

This better not be the same dragon I rescued from being chained up! Because that will seriously tick me off at the betrayal.
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Sonic Cannon posted...

I thought the combat was fine, but not excellent. The depth probably isn't there compared to the previous entries, but as someone who is more superficial about these games it worked better for me overall.

Look up GAME BREAKER GOD's channel on Youtube, he makes this game's combat look smooth and stylish. It's always a joy watching him play this game.

saspa posted...

This better not be the same dragon I rescued from being chained up! Because that will seriously tick me off at the betrayal.

Nah bro, that was a completely different dragon that you killed. The three that you rescue are chill. Hope they show up in the sequel, that'd be pretty tight.
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And another thing. Do dragons in Norse mythology breathe... lightning, instead of fire? Just wondering
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saspa posted...

And another thing. Do dragons in Norse mythology breathe... lightning, instead of fire? Just wondering

They don't really breathe anything.

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