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!
Trailer looks awesome… glad to see this coming along
cool
Oh yea! Can’t wait!
This will truly be EPIC…….
Nice ;)
OMG EPIC!!!!!!!!!!!!! Jeff thank you sooooooo much!
The lineup of games can’t get any awesomer =D
EPIC TRULY EPIC!!!!!
Thanks so much for posting this early Jeff. I like it when I can get the scoop straight from Sony.
Damn!!! Trailer was awesome and 3 mins long! This has to come out this year, fo sho!!!
FREAKING AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!
God of War is the cheese to my macaroni
Sorry to nag, but where the hell are those JRPG’s which the PS2 made so big?! I’m sorry but these type of games aren’t my cup of tea, exclusive or not.
Will Kratos ever see his daughter again?
That was a very sad ending in Chains of Olympus.
Speechless…
This is THE GAME!!!
We are looking at the new GOTY!!!
One of the best action game series ever.
Bring it on.
This is ten kinds of awesome. Can’t wait to see more.
I…I’m speechless. Goosebumps don’t adequately describe what I felt. Superb trailer.
Oh snap!
Wow thats one of the best gametrailers i have ever seen!
Beautiful! :)
[DELETED] EPIC!!!
this is my favorite series of all time. its what got me to switch from nintendo as my main platform to sony. cant wait for this game.
when i seen the teaser trailer i though the graphics looked sorta odd. sort of like a water painting but now it looks back to normal. hopefully the story stays as good as it started.
and better keep to tradition and release it in march lol.
All sorts of win! :)
What is thy bidding my Master?
Awesome stuff this! Kratos is King!
OOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMGGGGGGGG!
I want this NOWWWWWWW!!!!!
Thats what you call a trailer, and only god of war games can do it in epic style!
By the Gods!
This game will be EPIC. Don’t stry from the formulas of the earlier games and it will be fine.
*Fingers Crossed for this one*
Remember the time he ripped the bird apart? That was awesome.
It’s… beautiful. @_@
Looks STUNNING!
Santa Monica, don’t botch it!
Oh My God of War!!! Amazing, thats all I have to say about that
awesome now i hope it comes out first quarter next year so it can win GOTY
Superb gameplay trailer, loved every minute of it. Get this on PSN, stat!
Currently playing through GoWII, and am psyched for this game like no other. Can’t wait to hear about a release date.
Looking badass as always, my most anticipated game by far. Keep up the awesome work!
How smarmy was the guy from Playboy games? haha I just imagine him wearing a robe with some lucky guy smirk on his face. Even if it’s games, it’s pretty cool to tell people at a bar, “I work for Playboy”
OMG!!!
It looks super cool, I love the whole series, and also I agree with the guy that talk about the missing red orbs coming out of the enemies as you kill them…but I know the game still in development.
I can’t wait!!! :O
Holy…. Epic? Yes that’s a good word for God of War 3.
Still shocked…
UnBuhLeaveAble
Anticipation is growing….
Awesome!
Man, that was great. You guys should have waited until this video was ready to reveal it, because it will truly blow people away.
by the gods god of war 1 n 2 were awesome still are but 3 will b legendary cant wait for this masterpiece to b realesed
HOLY CRAP GOD 3 IS GOING TO BE SWEET
Amazing
Tell these guys not to rush the game… we can wait as long as it takes to make the game the best ever!
Epic!!!!
Please allocate more resources to /6, they need it.
I guess I’m not entirely sure what I’m seeing above. At this point, I have no trouble believing that that’s running on the in-game engine, but are we looking at something like a pre-rendered cutscene from that engine, or is that what the action in the game will look like, polygon for polygon. If it’s the latter, then that could be incredibly impressive, especially that last portion with the Titan.
Either way, I’m sure the game is going to look amazing, but I really don’t think that CG trailer that was originally released in conjunction with Jaffe’s raving, helped in terms of expectations- especially in terms of Kratos who looked frighteningly realistic in the original trailer.
WOW this is what i wanted to see , EPIC
I haven’t felt that excited since I saw the preview to 300. That’s the kind of stuff that grows hair on your sack.
@43
I really agree with you, We already know what rushed games look like…(cough,cough) “socom”
Wow…