God of War III is “D-Day + Cloverfield with Kratos smack dab in the middle of it” – Stig Asmussen, Game Director.
Earlier this week, over 50 media outlets from North America and Europe saw God of War III, the “epic finale” to Kratos’ tale of revenge, played before their very eyes for the first time. The game’s director, Stig Asmussen, led off the session by sharing some key features of the game: Titan gameplay, Ride-able enemy characters, a new weapon system, large-scale battle. All of these were demonstrated in this extended trailer, which was shown next:
To further drive home that this trailer was produced in the game’s engine, the audience was treated to nearly 20 minutes of gameplay (which you’ll be reading about all over the internet today, no doubt). After the gameplay demonstration, Stig took questions from the press. Here they are (paraphrased – I can only type so fast!):
Gamespot: How will you catch people up to the story?
- Stig: One of the criteria of the game is to “bridge the series.” Some recent games were confusing if you missed certain chapters in the story. I don’t want that to happen with God of War III.
Game Revolution: Has the ESRB gone too far?
- Stig: People have to stop looking at games like they’re a toy. There are a lot of mature games and a lot of mature gamers. We look at these like movies. I’m a husband with 2 baby twins, and we’re not making this game for them, we’re making it for people like you. Everything we do is in the character of Kratos. We’re not doing gore just to do gore.
Gamepro: I didn’t see red experience orbs coming off enemies, is it just too early to show?
- Stig: It’s just too early to show, expect all that to come back.
UGO: You mentioned this will be the “epic finale.” Is this the final God of War?
- Stig: I don’t know about the future of God of War, I’m just focused on God of War III.
Playboy: Gamers don’t want long load times or storylines, do you plan to recap everything?
- Stig: For the most part in God of War games, we’ve never made people watch very long movies. Don’t expect God of War III to change that. As far as loading, it’s something we take pride in. We’re a streaming game, we don’t have load times.
G4: Are you going to strip down Kratos’ abilities in the beginning of the game again?
- Stig: As a gamer, I’d like to start with everything Kratos has. But as a game designer, it’s not good for gamers who have never played before. We’re still deciding.
IGN: Large-scale puzzle sequences could get people lost because of the scale of the game. How do you keep people focused?
- Stig: I’ve never seen anyone else work on this kind of scale. Because of that, we don’t have anything to refer to. We don’t plan on something where you go to a marker and get a hint. We want to design it so that it has a flow, and we won’t have to drop hints. We also do extensive playtesting. Working on these Titans is tough. When we first started we realized we’re doing something we’ve never done before. When you’re on these titans, it doesn’t change how Kratos handles –he can still pull cranks and ride Cyclopes and fight bosses.
G4: When you’re on the titan, how does his movement affect gameplay. Will that affect gameplay?
- Stig: Perhaps. [laughter]
Now I know you readers had plenty of questions for the God of War team. I spoke with a number of the dev team, and am currently editing those together for you to see on the Blog next week!
Totally awesome. As I wipe away a tear of joy, the two questions that need to be answered (and perhaps will be in next weeks blog)are:
Tentative release date?
DEMO? How soon?
Thanks!
This new trailer looks amazing, if I ever saw amazing lol. I’m defiantly buying it the day it comes out!
Playboy ……. ??
were not going to see Kratos in Playboy are we? lol
OMG OMG OMG….. OMG…. OMG!!!!
Oh MY GOD OF WAR!!!!
*teardrop
Please come out in 2009 we all need it!!!!
i cant wait!!!!
Hey Playboy, I’m a gamer and I DO like plenty of story in my games. Load times, sure, not so much, but story and (well-done) in-game cutscenes, hell yes.
cant wait!! i better start with the first god of war games
i came …
No wussies allowed. This game is for real men. Amazing stuff.
Can’t wait for GOW III, it will definitely raise the bar for videogames and put our PS3’s above any other console… Take that xbox!!!
gamers dont like long story lines. r u crazy i hope dis is aleast a 20 hr game. they sed it will b epic 20 hrs is epic 4 me. i loved how long the second one was. i jus wanted to kno more if god of war 3 is short ill b greatly dissapointed.
OMG….OMG….did i mention OMG…..oh my…god…oh…..oh…..cant wait :)
GOD OF WAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
OMG that trailer just made my day. I really can’t wait 4 this game to come out. the ps3 is really taking this series to another level.
I cannot wait for this game to come out!!!!!!
If the gameplay is anything like what they are showing in the trailer then this game is going to rock.
EPIC EPIC EPIC EPIC
There are so many quality exclusives dropping this year that I can’t even remember them all.
2 quick questions:
1) Is it 60 FPS like GoW1/GoW2?
2) Can we expect it in 2009?
The game looks phenomenal. I’m officially pumped for it
Sony… I love you guys lol Honestly this is one reason why Sony dominates in games. Awesome story, great graphics, and well orchestrated music. I just hope that the series won’t end here.
Some say he can decapitate a God with his bare hands faster than Kratos, others say he takes pride in streaming (I said streaming!)…
…all we know is, he’s called The Stig!
Couldn’t resist :P
EPIC just EPIC…
to echo everyone else…EPIC.
That is one of the best trailers I’ve ever seen.
No words really.
This looks so epic! Really looking forward to this.
im glad to see GoW turning out so well.
ive folowed this game for so long.
to bad i never finshed number 2 cause i had to format my ps3 and i completely forgot that i had ps2 saves on it and didnt have the heart to go play it again al the way from the beginning.
i love the storyline behind it only a few other games had storylines better that this one MGS comes to mind anyway hope to see more details
omg i cant w8 for this game! ahh!
The lighting/rendering looks really bad so does the blood, I hope that improves.
insane….left me speechless. cant wait till t comes out….
This is exactly what I expected. Un-freakin’-believably good.
As soon as this gets a release date I’m gonna fire up GOW2 and finish beating it. I got to the end and stopped coz I didn’t want to finish it.
Tears of joy. :) Was that gameplay?!!
iight this caught my eye. i didnt play GOW 2 but i think i may be picking this up
Dang that looks tight!
absolutely amazing
WHERE IS THE GAMEPLAY FOR US!!!!!!!!!! Is it only exclusive for the press event? I haven’t checked online yet
I think Cliffy B is crying right now because his little game looks like an Atari 2600 compared to God of War 3.
incredible! this looks amazing..
i can’t wait! =)
That was a great trailer. Keep up the fantastic work. :-)
Wow, looks awesome. I can’t wait! :D
This game looks to be able to set a new standard in the game play and visual departments, at least that is what I got from the trailer.
“You dare defy the God of War”
http://www.us.playstation.com/GodofWarIII/ official website is live guys
Looks awesome
HAHA YES! I knew it would be amazing.
And people, I’m pretty sure they won’t rush. No previous God of Wars were rushed. No way they would screw up the most important one yet. I expect to get this amazingly polished game of the year in March 2010.
wow truly looking like a game that will blow away the players
the trailer looks awesome.
God of war is awesome.
No words can descripe how bad i want this game. Kratos will rule them all.
I have faith that the developers will make this the most rewarding game ever
oh…my…jesus!
one more thing, we need a edit button for the blog. Anyway I wanted to one of the best things in that trailer was “Only on Playstation 3”
Seriously IF GOW EVER and I say EVER gets ported Stig keep one eye open when you sleep…………
JK or am I
MGS4… LittleBigPlanet, Killzone 2 and GOD OF WAR III!!! Keep up the awesome work Sony. Never doubted you in XBox v PS2 v Gamecube, and I think you have the power to come out on top again and again!
Looks amazing.