Great!! ... while it lasted

Reviewed by fr1zzank on March 07, 2008  |  report this review

Let me start by saying that I'm sort of a middle-of-the-road fan when it comes to the God of War series. See, I've played, and beat, them all so far, and enjoyed them while doing so. However, I'm not one of those people who beat it on every difficulty, complete every little challenge, unlock every little doodad.

First off, wow this game is gorgeous! It really displays what the PSP can do technically, and it gets you excited to see how games will look on this console near the end of its life. The detail in the cutscenes is really PS2-quality, and even the graphics non-cutscene are really quite impressive. There's not much else to say about the graphics without gushing like a fool.

As for the gameplay, well, it's just more of the same, really. I know it sounds like I'm saying it's a bad thing, but if you enjoyed the gameplay in previous GoW games, then you'll easily find yourself at home with Chains of Olympus. It doesn't really try and do anything it hasn't done before (unfortunately), but what it DOES do, it does excellently.

Now, here's where I ran into problems: the content/story area. See, the game's short... frighteningly so. I beat it in a little over 5 hours, and this includes getting lost/stuck 3 or 4 times. Now, I know people will say that they'd rather have 5 hours of a great game than 20 hours of a so-so game, and, for the most part, I'd agree with you. However, 5 hours is too short regardless of how good the game is. In fact, I feel that because it IS such a good game, being only 5 hours long makes it hurt EVEN MORE. It was only when I was at the end of the game that I was truly getting into it, and to have it end right as I was becoming interested was a huge disappointment to me. I didn't want to stop playing, I was enjoying it too much, I wanted to keep going!

I also found the content a bit lacking. There are only 2 weapons to use, and 3 types of magic. ... that's it? I was easily able to fully upgrade every weapon, and every magic on my first play. This provides you with no strategy as to which weapon to upgrade over another, since you can just upgrade EVERYthing before you're even at the end of the game. So, you get no sense of pride in your fully upgraded weapon, or feeling that it's better then your other, non-upgraded weapons since everything is the same! Maybe this is just a personal gripe, but it annoyed me.

The story in Chains of Olympus is also pretty common GoW fare. There's the same groups discussed (gods, and titans), with just different specific persons now taking centre stage. Oh, and what's with the final boss?! This person is hardly mentioned throughout the game, but ends up being the final boss?! And, the person who is arguably the most fitting of being the final boss just ups and leaves?! However, the story does further develop the character of Kratos, and provides us with some good scenes which tug at the heartstrings.

It just fell "short" for me.

4/5

wow!!

Really superb..Lots of fun to play the game...

Great fun!!

try this game..