God of War delivers an action packed experience like no other game before it.
The thing that impresses me the most about this game, is the sheer amount of care that David Jaffe and his crew have put into this game. They mad sure everything was perfect, and it really shows in the final product. Its shown how much effort was put into God of War in some of the extra's. Jaffe and his crew were determined to make this the best game they could, and as i said it shows in the final product.
One of the best things about God of War is Kratos, the main character. You play as him and he is really a perfect antihero. He is one badass Spartan. He will essentially kill anyone in his path. The character of Kratos even mixes in with the combat system really well too. For most of your enemies, after you weaken them enough, you can kill them in a special--more brutal way, e.g. you can rip off the head of Gorgons (Medusa's) instead of just killing them normally. There’s a tonne of attacks similar to that which suit the character of Kratos just perfectly.
The only thing worse than a merciless, brutal unforgiving Spartan, is a pissed of merciless, brutal unforgiving Spartan. Unfortunately for the god of war, Ares has managed to piss of Kratos. Kratos is on a quest to slay the god of war, aided by the gods, Kratos seeks the power of Pandora's Box, which he will need in order to kill Ares. Throughout the game you will slowly be fed information about Kratos, and by the time you know about Kratos's past, you will really want to slay Ares. God of War contains some of the most challenging puzzles in any game on PS2 that i have played. Although not impossible, you'll go through some very challenging puzzles in most of the levels, especially throughout the game. The great thing is though, that is there is a good amount of variety of puzzles. Some of the puzzles aren't too hard to figure out, but they will be a lot harder to execute than the puzzles where you will need a bit more time to figure out. So in a way, the puzzles have a good balance. The combat system in God of War is certainly one of its many strong points. The combat is essentially split up into two parts. Magic and Weapons. Throughout the game, you'll come into possession of two different weapons and 4 different magic spells. You can upgrade these weapons and spells by using the red orbs that you gain by battling enemies and found in chests. When the weapons and spells have been upgraded they will either become more powerful, or you will earn new abilities or often both. Another great feature in the combat system is the context sensitive combat. As previously mentioned, you'll be able to be killing most of your enemies in more than one way. You'll either be pressing a series of buttons, tapping one button (usually O) or moving around the left analog stick in certain directions.
If there is a weak point in God of War, it’s that it isn't exactly the longest game ever. It took me a good 8 hours and 17 minutes to beat the game on Hero mode (normal). After you beat the game you'll unlock God Mode, and there are some unlockables for beating God Modes, so at least there is some inspiration in going through the game again. Also, when you finish the game on any difficulty, you unlock "Challenge of the Gods" mode. You have to complete 10 challenges in order to unlock some useful things (i won't spoil what they are though). It'll only take out about 45 minutes to an hour to get through this mode, but its very hard, and often frustrating. God of War is also a very impressive looking game. Although Kratos's character model may not be as detailed as it could have been, the environments and backgrounds look simply, stunning. The visual effects such as magic look great as well. God of War's audio compliments its visuals and gameplay perfectly. The orchestral score is simply amazing, and it does a great job of complimenting the look of ancient Greece. Although there isn't much of it, the voice overs are done quite well, but they really only consist of Athena, Kratos and Ares occasionally.
Between the amazing gameplay, deep combat system and terrific audiovisual presentation, there really isn't much room for improvement in God of War. With that said though, the games length is probably its only legitimate weak point but overall, God of War is one of the best action adventure games on any current generation consoles, if you have a Playstation 2, and you don't have God Of War already, then as soon as you get the money for a new game, God of War should be your first choice.