Sony’s God of War Gamble is About to Pay Off
In other words, I can’t wait to play God of War
When Sony unveiled the new God of War roughly two years ago, I was intrigued. The game’s setting was beautiful, and the promise of a more thoughtful protagonist and story sounded appealing. I had never (and still have never) played any of the God of War games yet, but Sony’s strong track record with single-player, first-party games always demands at least attention for any title they announce.
Fast forward to April 19, the day before release, and God of War couldn’t look any better from a critical perspective. The game has racked up perfect score after perfect score, and currently sits at an elusive 95 on Metacritic. Last October, I wondered when (if ever) a game would launch to the same fanfare as Super Mario Odyssey. Sony’s newest offering falls just a few points shy on the critical scale, but for all intents and purposes has achieved nearly the same level of review-score success. I’m currently waiting for my Amazon pre order to arrive, and the bevy of positive reviews isn’t doing anything to help my impatience.
With the game currently just a few hours from release, here are a few reasons why I’m excited to play it and why it’s important for the video game world.
First of all, God of War is currently the highest-rated PS4 game that launched on this platform. Grand Theft Auto V sits at a 97, and The Last of Us: Remastered at a 95, but both of these games natively launched on the Playstation 3 console back in 2013. In terms of games that actually arrived during the PS4 generation, God of War sits alone at the top. Of course, I’m not advocating that Metacritic scores are the only barometer of a game’s quality. But in terms of how well games have achieved critical success on a platform, there are far worse methods to use. And by nearly every metric, God of War is either the best or very close to the best game to launch in years for Sony’s console.
Secondly, God of War is the product of Sony’s approach and success with game publishing in recent years. Kotaku’s Alex Walker wrote about how God of War shows the differences between Sony’s and Microsoft’s approach to gaming, and it’s an excellent read. Simply put though, Sony the publisher is willing to let its developers take risks and long development cycles in search of truly fantastic games. As titles like The Last of Us, Horizon Zero Dawn, Uncharted 4, and now God of War show, this strategy has resulted in some of the best-reviewed games of the last 10 years. In no small part, the promise of the best games has contributed to Sony’s success over Microsoft in terms of console sales this generation as well.
Finally, the promise of an elite game is enough to be excited about all on its own. The critical acclaim God of War just earned has been a big surprise, especially given how critical many observers have been of the last few games in the series. I wasn’t expecting perfect scores across the board, and to see this title do so well has me hoping for a truly phenomenal experience. Tomorrow, I’ll find out if the game lives up to its monumental expectations.
