Combat Developers Reflect on God of War Excellence

God of War: Ragnarok is one of the most anticipated games of 2022, so much so that other games were rumored to be moving out of the titan’s way for its release date. Launch day is so close, now on November 9, 2022! The PlayStation blog has been ramping up to the event for the whole year essentially, including releasing a beautiful new controller, a Rick & Morty ad, and a collaboration with five artists to celebrate the relationships in the game. Today, the PlayStation blog released a collection of quotes from game developers discussing what made God of War‘s combat so unique and powerful.

The developers had all worked on popular games that involved great combat themselves, so there’s an element of experts appreciating experts. Quotes came from Naughty Dog, Capcom, Team Ninja, Sucker Punch, Insomniac, and more. It turns out that many popular combat heavy games were directly inspired by the 2018 God of War. For example, Ted Fishman, the lead combat designer at Sucker Punch, described how the red and yellow rings that let players know that action was required influenced the creation of “the blue and red ‘glints’ in Ghost of Tsushima for unblockable/parryable attacks” in Ghost of Tsushima.

Mostly though, other developers admired the attention to detail.

Of course, the Leviathan Axe got all the credit it was due. Morimasa Sato from Capcom specifically mentioned that the combination of melee and ranged attacks that the axe makes possible was really innovative and enjoyable. And Leif Walter from Torn Banner Studios compared the game to Chivalry 2 in the sense that both games let the player “do the awesome thing.”

Tyman Smektala from Techland believes that the great secret of why God of War turned out so great was because of the “relentless iteration” and hard work. He said, “Creating a good combat system is always a long bout against time and resources, but you’ll never land the triumphant final blow unless you invest all of your focus and attention to the feedback loop of hitting your enemy and him reacting to that powerful hit.” He wasn’t the only dev to comment on the power of the hits either. Christian Wohlwend from Naughty Dog also spelled out how the game used that brief impact pause to really show off the power of Kratos’s blows.

God of War: Ragnarok brings back the story of Krotos and Atreus as the father and son duo travels across the Nine Realms in search of answers. The monsters and gods they will face are inspired by Norse mythology, and the prophesized Ragnarock is on its way. Get ready for the gorgeous visuals, moving story, and epic combat. The game will be released on November 9, 2022 for PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5.

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