Updated 14 Feb, 2012, 2:33 pm IST

Hands On: God of War III

02 Nov, 2009, 9:00 am IST | Avinash Bali

Kratos is back and he's about to tear Greek Mythology a new one.

As I woke up this weekend, little did I know that the E3 demo of God of War III lay waiting for me on the PlayStation Network. Now the God of War series is pretty much my favorite – EVER so you can imagine my excitement as I booted up the demo for the first time.

For once I really don’t care how fanboyish I sound so I’m just going to come out and say it – God of War III is f*****g phenomenal� and there’s no two ways about that. All doubts I had harbored initially were blown away in the first ten minutes or so.

Core gameplay in GoW III has remained the same which means the Square button dishes out faster attacks while Triangle delivers a bit slower but a more powerful attack. The Circle key grabs a nearby opponent and pressing Triangle after that makes Kratos rip his body into two. Hitting the Square key this time round will allow you to use your opponent as a battering ram and if you’re close to a wall Kratos will slam his head against it until it’s pulverized. Mixing all these attacks will unleash some truly devastating combos upon your enemies.

I never got to go up against a boss but I did come across a few mini bosses and killing them was nothing short of sublime. You see God of War has always been a violent game but GoW II will actually have you cringing at the insane carnage on-screen. Thanks to the marvels of technology you can now watch Kratos rip the eyeball off a Cyclops or gut a minotaur in glorious HD. The first time I saw these acts being performed I actually sat back for a minute just to soak it all in. What followed next was more maiming, head ripping, violent throat stabbing, and lots more that you really have to experience first hand.

Visually the game looks phenomenal and even though it doesn’t reach Uncharted 2 levels of “WHOA! Awesome” visuals, it’s still an excellent looking game. Kratos looks insanely detailed and so do the rest of the characters in the game. Level design as always is epic and even though there was a slight dip in frame rates from time to time, it was nothing to be alarmed about. Also keep in mind this was the E3 2009 code so the game will a lot better by the time it hits stores.

God of War III provided me with more excitement and awesomeness in 20 minutes than entire games have in their 10+ hour lifespan. I’m actually a bit sad as of now because I just realized I’m going to have to wait around three months to get my hands on the full version.

Images source: Neo Gaf forums

Tags: God of War III , PS3