POSTED 14/3/13


GOD OF WAR: ASCENSION

Sony
PS3

These bloody flies!

Those oft-repeated words of Dad each Perth summer echoed in our auditory canals as another batch of the little winged fuckers assailed us in the latest exploits of the bloke with the muscleboundiness and red GT stripe, Kratos. Dad only had to contend with little black ones craving his grub though – they didn’t have human on their menus.

Despite being the umpteenth God of War outing, this one’s prequelistic, as we discover what made Kratos the raging ball of fury that we know and love, as he seeks vengeance upon an Irish folk band. Yep, another Greek mythology-drenched, vaguely interactive, Harryhausenesque movie unfolds.

Hang on, “vaguely”? Well, yeah. We challenge anybody to adapt to an inability to swing the camera heartily with the right stick when desired. Instead, K rolls like a NASCAR driver on fire. The camera’s on a predetermined rail and will NOT deviate. Then there are infuriating invisible walls. We can hear the distant din of devs sneering “NYAHH!”...

So, we’ve issues beyond the obvious lack of player control. The camera often zooms so far out (man) that a certain vengeful protagonist will be so utterly infinitesimal that you can’t pick him amongst the melee of brawling bods he’s amidst. Oh, but it looks gloriously cinematic – that’s all that matters, right?

Meanwhile, that meleeingness tends to be rather stilted. Sure innumerable new and funktacular attacks unlock as you progress (we adore controlling beasties like a steroid-stuffed brain slug), but you can’t just let rip with gay (or straight) abandon. Stabbing repeatedly at R1 trying to emit a chain of doom and having it obey only when it can be arsed isn’t fun.

All the ingredients of past successes are here, and it’s not horrible, but GoW:A feels more “Oh god” than “Oh God!” Perhaps the time has come to give Kratos and his kronies the Aerogard treatment?

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