God of War II
About
The second installment in the God of War franchise and exclusive for the Sony PlayStation 2 console. The game uses basics from the hack-and-slash genre, like its predecessor, and was developed by Santa Monica studio, which is a subsidiary of Sony Entertainment. The game is recognized as one of the best for the console from Sony and the best game in action genre in 2007. The game was released on Sony Playstation 2 already at the moment when the third version of the console was already selling for four months. The developers explained their decision: one hundred million people already playing on PlayStation 2, whereas on the next-generation console gamers were just going to adopt the new hardware.
Key features
The player controls Kratos, who in the first part killed the god of war Ares and took his place. The game heavily relies on the ancient Greek mythology and uses it as inspiration and the main source for enemies and NPC design as well as locations design. However, the game is not a great source of accurate historical facts: Ancient Greece history was rewritten for the sake of the genre and the game universe, the rules of which were established in the first part.
The story
King of the gods Zeus betrays Kratos and kills him, but the Spartan is saved from the Underworld by another goddess Gaia, who invites Kratos to find the Sisters of Fate and go to the past and prevent his own murder. The gameplay remained the same: the player can use several attacks, which can be combined and improved with the help of the in-game currency collected from enemies. The game has a lot of Quick-Time-Events, mostly they are used in battles with bosses and in finishing combo-moves. Bosses in the game, in comparison with the first part, significantly increased.
System requirements for PlayStation 2
System requirements for PS Vita
System requirements for PlayStation 3
Where to buy
Top contributors
God of War II reviews and comments
Better bosses, better weapons and bigger setpieces.
I loved the OST and cutscenes. The story is kinda one-dimensional, but considering the purpose of the game, I like this way. Kratos is always pissed off and this reflects in gameplay. The number of boss fights was way much compared with the first game, and I approved this decision. They were memorable in some way and the atmosphere matched it.
The gameplay was better than the first game. Since the two were released on PS2, there was not an actual improvement if we are talking about graphics, sound design, and game-changing features. But yeah, they made the first game mechanic more solid. The weapons are funnier to use - the skills as well. Oh, I cannot forget to mention how good the cutscene was. Amazing.
Hyped for the third game. Let's go.
After I have finished the 1st God of War a year ago or so, I finally started the second one and damn, I couldn't stop playing. I rarely stumbled across a perfect game so far, but this definitely ist one. They not only took everything already perfect from the first game and somehow even improved it, no, they have put new mechanics and aspects into the gameplay, which make the game THE example for how you have to make a great sequal.
The story itself is not spectacularly complex, but the way they presented it is movie worthy. Not to mention the incredible smart and beautiful designs for everything, especially the gods and titans.
All in all I'm more than happy to finally have played this master piece and can only recommend it to everyone.
A true Playstation and video game classic!
(5/5) with <3
Rating: 5/5