Why do people hate this game.

[MASTERSOTGr]

For me personally, these were the reasons that did not make me love the game.

1) Bad and short story, but mainly due to the fact that the events of this game do not offer anything of substance to the already existing story, for example in Chains of Olympus it was during the years when Kratos served the gods and gave some good foundations for God of War 2 and 3, in Ghost of Sparta after we learned more about Kratos' parentage the fact that the gods were responsible for his brother's suffering was the reason that triggered the events of God of War 2, while Ascension offered literally nothing.

2) Bad battle system for the sake of Online, in all the previous God of War I had mastered the ability of Counter so that I could deal with the Very Hard Difficulty, which I personally am very proud of, but in Ascension for the sake of Online many things changed for the worse and the Counter was one of them (too slow and too open to mistakes)

3) online, at least interesting but I got bored of it very too quickly

 

Αt least the graphics were awesome

[Clavietka]

Something I NEVER see brought up in the criticism about this game is the art direction.

 

It is horrid from the gameplay I have seen. I mean, all other previous games in the series can be gory as hell, but they still evoke that sense of wonder and awe and present some truly beautiful architecture and majestic creatures.

 

This game, on the other hand, went for a more "body horror", "parasitic" and "insect/arthropod-like" design.

 

Besides, there's an overabundance of sepia/ocre/brownish/yellowish tones.

 

I totally do not dig it.

Edited March 29, 2023 by Clavietka

[RainGamma]

Ima be honest I really don't like this game. I did plat it, but would I say it's worth your time? In my opinion, no. I don't like how laggy the game is on ps3, I feel like the weapons you can get from enemies are useless, some bosses were just annoying cuz of the zoom out. I didn't really enjoy the different elements for kratos blades of chaos, wish we had different weapons instead. Also the story really doesn't make sense and feels really rushed. I wish they didn't focus on multiplayer too much, honestly multiplayer doesn't belong in god of war. I've played all the god of war games, besides Ragnarok which I'm getting to soon. This is by far my least favorite.

On 3/28/2023 at 10:43 PM, Clavietka said:

Something I NEVER see brought up in the criticism about this game is the art direction.

 

It is horrid from the gameplay I have seen. I mean, all other previous games in the series can be gory as hell, but they still evoke that sense of wonder and awe and present some truly beautiful architecture and majestic creatures.

 

This game, on the other hand, went for a more "body horror", "parasitic" and "insect/arthropod-like" design.

 

Besides, there's an overabundance of sepia/ocre/brownish/yellowish tones.

 

I totally do not dig it.

I'd say the same.

[mega-tallica]

"Hate" is a strong word for this games criticism. 

 

I think most of the criticism stems from the fact Ascension is just ever so slightly different than the rest of the trilogy from how it plays to how it looks. The combat is just tweaked enough that it feels considerably different to play than the rest of the trilogy and not necessarily in a better way. It doesn't feel quite as good to play. That's my main criticism of the game, they fixed something that wasn't broken. Also, the constant panning out of the camera during critical boss fights is incredibly annoying. It's very easy to completely lose sight of where you are when this happens especially when the screen is littered with enemies that look a lot like Kratos when you pan out that far. 

 

It's not a bad game though and nor does it deserve hate, it's just different and separates itself from the rest of the series and because it's not exactly like the rest, people tend to shun it. 

 

I will say though, I do wholeheartedly disagree with the previous art direction complaints. I think Ascension is the prettiest GoW next to GoW3 (not counting the new Norse saga games obviously). All the lush greenery and brighter color palate really makes it pop to the eye in contrast to the trilogy which was a lot of neutral colors and greys predominately. 

[Fiercethetear]

This was probably the prettiest game I have played on PS3, but the gameplay, as @mega-tallicahas greatly summarized, did not feel as good as the previous entries in the series. I believe they changed so much to keep the core gameplay the same as the much unnecessary multiplayer, which tbh considerably diminished the single-player experience