On the 22nd March 2005, Santa Monica Studios unleashed Kratos unto the masses in his first video game outing, God of War for the PlayStation 2.
A relatively baby-faced studio, Santa Monica had released just one other game before God of War, a racing title many may never have even heard of - Kinetica. Still despite their inexperience Sony offered the studio, though more specifically game designer David Jaffe, the freedom and funding to develop what would become the PlayStation 2's eleventh best-selling title of all time.
David Jaffe, who had worked on a designer and director on the Twisted Metal series, has stated the idea for God of War came to him after playing the Capcom title Onimusha, a Resident Evil-style game which sees the player take on the role of a ninja slaying demons from Japanese mythology. Upon spending some time on the title, and coupled with further inspiration from Clash of the Titans and Indiana Jones, Jaffe put forward his earliest concept for the game - Onimusha, but with Greek mythology, or Devil May Cry's combat but with the puzzle elements of Ico.
This early concept only begun to snowball from there as more ideas begun to be thrown around, some of which would go on to become some of the more iconic aspects of the game, whereas others were relegated to the cutting room floor, never to be seen again or at least until later franchise instalments.
Kratos for example went through numerous tweaks and changes, going from a fairly un-threatening looking eleven humanoid, to a long-haired fella carrying a baby, to the personification of rage itself, modelled after Edward Norton in American History X. The armour he is seen wearing in the CGI cutscenes was originally going to be worn at all times, however due to the team being unable to make it look any good in-game they begun to strip more and more of it away, until removing it completely upon realising that with each removal of armour Kratos actually looked more menacing, an absolute beast of power who is beyond the use of protection. This quest to make Kratos as brutal looking as possible also led to his tattoos to change from blue to red, though other aspects for this change include the fact the team realised his blue tattoos made him look a little bit like the barbarian from Diablo 2. Kratos' white skin was also a choice made well before the backstory of his family's ashes being fused to him had been written, as the team had been omitting a skin tone in the concept art and decided that it complimented the red tatts and thus kept it in.
A few other elements of the game were altered or simply cut due to the PlayStation 2 being unable to handle some of the team's more ambitious ideas, such as a magical elevator section of the game that took place during a roaring sandstorm, which despite being shown in test screenings to the press would have to be cut after the team were unable to properly pull off the sandstorm effects. The Gorgons were also intended to have legs rather than a serpent-like bottom half, however as with Kratos' armour and the sandstorm the team found it near impossible to implement properly, and thus the legs felt the cut. There were also plans for Kratos to harness the power of flight with Icarus' wings, but this element was cut though fondly remembered enough to be brought back in later instalments.
The story of God of War borrows heavily from Greek mythology obviously, though obviously huge liberties were taken. According to Jeffe the intention was always to cherry pick the best elements of those stories and use them for God of War's rather than feature faithful re-tellings of the tales, allowing Kratos more freedom as his own character. Kratos himself is partly based on the character Cratus (sometimes known as Cratos and Kratos), the offspring of the gods Pallus and Styx, and also a little on Hercules, especially in his backstory. See where Ares tricks Kratos into killing his family, Hercules was equally influenced by Hera into murdering his own family in a fit of rage, after she tormented him to get back at Zeus for his infertility.
The game had a whole lot of buzz surrounding it following the release of the Hydra demo in January 2005, and when it hit stores two months later in March (a significant date given the month of March is associated with Ares the god of war) it was a smash hit with gamers, who praised it for its simple yet satisfying combat mechanics, overly grotesque and sometimes comical violence, and the general feeling of power it gave players when controlling Kratos. I mean shit, with a single button press you could just grab a dude and rip him in two, as though it was no feat whatsoever, who doesn't want to harness that kind've power? Sure takes the stress of the day off your shoulders!
The game of course would go on to produce a fantastic franchise of sequels and prequels, each garnering fantastic reviews from critics, with the recent instalment in 2018 winning countless awards. Jeffe worked with Santa Monica on the franchise one more time with the 2007 sequel God of War II, however after this he left to form his own studios, both of which sadly didn't work out for him. He worked as a director on the PS3 Twisted Metal title, however following that his only other big project that came to fruition was the free-to-play title Drawn to Death in 2017, which didn't do amazingly. Santa Monica have continued to produce every God of War game to date, though there were concerns for the studio following some layoffs in 2014. With the immense success of 2018's God of War however, it is doubtful Sony will let them fall off the map just yet.
The God of War series has also been the subject of comic books and novelisations, and there have been talks for a few years now of a movie adaption, however much like a certain similarly cinematic Sony exclusive named Uncharted, the God of War movie has been sat in development hell for some while now, with nobody quite sure what to do with it.
Oh and one final thing, you can unlock the phone numbers 1-800-613-8840 (for beating the game on god mode) and 1-888-447-5594 (for destroying all the statues in the throne room) which when dialled will lead you to a voice message recorded by Kratos himself.
Well, recorded by Kratos' original voice actor Terrence C. Carson actually, the same dude who voices Mace Windu in the Clone Wars cartoons.
Comments