GOD OF WAR, GOD OF STINKY STINKY WAR
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Like most boys who grew up with Atari, Commodore 64, Amiga, and of course Nintendo I am one who from time to time enjoys a good romp through the pixelated digital world. Lately I've been enjoying Animal Crossing (God why), Castlevania Portrait of Ruin, Guitar Hero II and God of War.

God of War was one of those games that came out on the PS2 about a year ago and took the gaming world by storm. There was much Kratos have my first born child to do as you please, Kratos please let me bear your Children, and Kratos please go talk to my mother-in-law with your bloody swords. After playing the first level and beating the irritating and ever cheap hydra all I kept thinking is Kratos needs to lick deeze nuts because the first level of God of War stinks in a way that only a lactose intollerent person can stink up a bathroom after some good pizza. The closest thing that I can compare God of War to is that it's sort of like Devil May Cry with it's over the top button mashing combo sequences put to a Greek mythology theme.

Let me preface, well I guess it's a little late for a preface but I was never a fan of the hack and slash game style that is Devil May Cry, Rygar, and 3d versions of Castlevania. So the fact that I hated God of War really isn't a surprise I just thought that for a game with so much critical acclaim it would have been better. I will say that graphically the game is very pretty and that yes soundtrack is fantastic but the mechanics were terrible. The game in many places felt like it was just taunting me with terrible game play aspects. The concept seems to be that you are supposed to mash as many buttons as possible while continuously hitting various undead enemies that just happen to get back up no less than 10 times before you finally kill them. I guess the idea is that you raise your BRUTAL counter or something but all I kept thinking is WHY WON'T YOU DIE. Things I hated in the first level:

1.) Game mechanics: When I think of great 3d platformers I think of the Prince of Persia series. The control system for that game was so fluid and natural that you rarely thought about what you were doing you just did it. God of War had sadly none of these things. The controls work as follows the left control stick moves you, the right control stick to allows you to dodge, the triangle does fierce attacks, the square button does lite attacks, the circle button does grab attacks, the 'x' button jumps, R2 opens things but sometimes you have to press R2 and then hit X, and last but not least L1 allows you to block. WTF, I need to be Dr. Fucking Octagaon to be able navigate a level.

2.) Walking and balancing: You have to go from one ship to another ship while walking on a log. Doing balancing acts like this have never been a great thing in 3d platforming games mainly because the camera angle is always fights you to make it harder than it needs to be. What almost always ends up happening is that you find yourself trying to balance your character while the camera is aiming from underneath you. The saving grace of many games is that you can move that porn star angle to something that might help you instead of just irritate you. God of War while not having the crotch angle did have a irritating tendency to place the camera at semi inconvenient angles and did not give you the option to switch the camera angle.

3.) Irritating action sequence: To kill some undead archers you have to grab a box and periodically kick it across the deck of a ship while keeping the box from getting hit by arrows. One hit too many and the box breaks and you have to go back and get the another box. Huzzah.

4.) Save points: There was one part where I had to listen to Poseidon yammer on about how the Hydra had troubled his kingdom for far too long and that I Kratos should kill it. Right after that a bunch of bad guys appeared which if you are one who is low on life have a tendency to kill you. The game then starts you from right before that cut scene to let you do it all over again. What made it all that more irritating was right after the cut and fight scene was a save point. Come on how hard would it have been to have the game automatically save right after that whole ordeal.

5.) Boss Battle

• Hydra Head Betsy: She was just a head in a lonely dark ships hull, I was God slayer new to the battlefield. We saw each other from opposite sides of the ship, drawn together by fate and fatal attraction we started our silent and deadly waltz where sadly one of us had two left feet. The scene went like this: 1) Run up and slash the hydra as many times as you can. 2) Block and let the Hydra gnash away at you which would of course push you all the be back. 3) Repeat until the game prompts you press the mythical circle button which like a Mortal Kombat fatality kills the Hydra head in a fantastic display of violence. It's not that I mind the violence it was more that I had to do all that highly repetitive button mashing to finally kill the Hydra head with a single button that then kicked off a choreographed display of athleticism that I as the gamer had nothing to do with.

• Hydra head Bertha: was a little bit better since this time Bertha unlike her sister Betsy choose to get it's head stuck up through the top most deck of a ship. Standard operating procedure was however the same with me running over and slashing at the head and then retreating a safe distance as the head then tried to suck me up Hoover fashion to then bash me to tiny little bits.

• Hydra head Nancy, Shella and their mother head Roberta. The game had some sort of bug where you could stand at the edge of the level on top of some boxes and take pot shots at Nancy and Shella until you weakened them to the point where you could jump on some platform that just happened to be right over where their exhausted heads would land and just happened to have Hydra sized meat hooks attached to them. Fighting Roberta while not hard was one of those video game experiences that brings back my prepubescent video game rages. You know back in the days when you believed the world was fair and that the computer didn't cheat. The game has you fighting Roberta in the crows nest of a ship where you have very little room to move. Right off the bat we are dealing with two things that I don't like in games a small platform that just so happens to be way off the ground. Mix in some clumsy game mechanics and you nearly have a recipe for carrot cake agitation. The only thing that saved the game was that falls from forty feet didn't hurt you and that you REALLY have to try to fall. Once you get the pattern Roberta gets weakened and finally goes down in an orgy of blood all activated by the ye old circle button.

Did I keep playing after the first level? Yes. Why? Because my father always taught me to finish what I started and I still remember wanting to quit playing kiddie football that one summer. So I beat the game and though it was fun in some parts it still wasn't the 5 stars that everyone made it out to be. One of my favorite reviews had to have been on IGN where the reviewer made the comment of how Kratos wasn't so good at platforming but how that wasn't much a big part of the game. Right-0, not just most of the Temple of Pandora's box and almost all of the level which will not be mentioned do to the rage that it causes me. So wee to God of War and wee to Sony of America.