Ain’t No God Like God of War

The PlayStation 2 is one of the most important game consoles, because it’s where the current triple-A landscape was born. Third-party giants like Resident Evil and Monster Hunter took shape here, and the console’s first-party lineup made its creators into A-tier names. Look no further than the original God of War, which just turned 20 years old. Sony Santa Monica’s hack-and-slash title was pretty impressive back in the day, helped by an alluring demo that dropped players into the action right away and showed them what it was all about: slinging blades, killing everything in sight, and finishing off mythological creatures in increasingly gruesome ways. By that point in the PS2’s lifetime, the console’s big action game was Devil May Cry, and while there was some overlap in terms of style and ridiculousness, Kratos’ adventure appealed to a different (but maybe equally juvenile) audience. So players fell in love with God of War, and thus a franchise was born. Sony Santa Monica has led th ... Read full article.