Vengeance is born in the fires of betrayal in this prequel to the best-selling God of War franchise. Six months have passed since Kratos stood over the bodies of his wife and child, his hands stained with their blood – tricked by Ares into murdering the only people he ever loved. Swearing to avenge them, Kratos broke the blood oath that bound him to Ares, but oaths to Olympus are not so easily broken… Sentenced to an eternity chained within a prison for the living damned, Kratos battles insanity at the hands of the Furies. He will be tested as he seeks freedom, redemption for his sins, and the clarity to avenge his family.
Kratos, the former servant of the God of War, Ares, has been tricked into killing his wife and child. Kratos renounced Ares, breaking his blood oath to the god. For this act, Kratos was imprisoned by the three Furies.
| Minimum System Requirements | Recommended System Requirements | |
| CPU | 2.1 GHz Core 2 Duo | Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4g / AMD Athlon II X4 600e 2.2g |
| VRAM | 1 GB | 2 GB |
| RAM | 2GB RAM for Windows 7 | 6GB RAM for Windows Vista & Windows 7 |
| OS | Windows 7, Windows 8 or Windows 10 | Windows 8 or Windows 10 |
| Graphics Card | 3D accelerated 256 MB video card with support for Pixel Shader 3.0 | Nvidia 8800 GT / ATI Radeon HD 4650 |
| Direct X | Version 9.0c | Version 9.0c |
| SOUND CARD | DirectX 9.0c Compatible | DirectX 9.0c Compatible |
| HDD Space | 100 MB available space | 8 GB free |
| CD-ROM | DVD-ROM at 8x Speed | DVD-ROM at 8x Speed |
| Game Analysis | Vengeance is born in the fires of betrayal in this prequel to the best-selling God of War franchise. Six months have passed since Kratos stood over the bodies of his wife and child, his hands stained with their blood - tricked by Ares into murdering the only people he ever loved. Swearing to avenge them, Kratos broke the blood oath that bound him to Ares, but oaths to Olympus are not so easily broken… Sentenced to an eternity chained within a prison for the living damned, Kratos battles insanity at the hands of the Furies. He will be tested as he seeks freedom, redemption for his sins, and the clarity to avenge his family. | |
| Optimization Score | 10 | |
AMAZING visuals
great sound design (did have dropping audio though)
Not really innovative at all for GOW formula
story not impactful enough to replay
Kind of a mixed bag of feelings about this- I love the GOW series but this entry felt kind of… not as good. Felt like a lot of the assets from GOW III were reused, felt like the story was not quite as polished, also like the pacing especially at the beginning was REALLY slow. Granted, it also had stellar production otherwise so there’s no complaints there. Sometimes too easy and was able to plow through it with zero problems, and at rare occasions get stuck under an unnecessary difficulty spike. Just uneven across the board, but still better than most games out there.
Score Breakdown
“The Tale”
Story-
Pacing-
Characters-
Originality-
Linearity-
Length-
Epicness-
“The Presentation”
Visuals-
Display-
Music-
Sound FX-
“The Mechanics”
Ease of Use-
Innovation-
Replayability-
After a hiatus from God of War, I played Ascension. I felt like Ascension doesn’t stand up very well against the other trilogy and was left wanting a little more. At first I thought the game looked great, however by the end of the first major fight I realised that the opening shot was a trick. Kratos’ texture is far more detailed than any enemy or object in the game. Ascension has a couple of fun boss fights but there wasn’t enough in between to make me feel invested. The gameplay felt quite different from other entries with only Kratos’ primary blade and four elements to accompany them. A more balanced gameplay style forces you to dodge and guard more than in the rest of the franchise.
I feel like this wasn’t the game to end a franchise on, but as an introductory piece for those who have not played the games, this is a good choice.