Kratos: A complex user experience or a shallow cliche character?
Though I’m not quite yet finished, I have recently been playing the two current God of War games and I have to say I’m having a blast. Though the game can be incredibly frustrating at points it is just enough for me to feverishly keep trying and not give up, while also not giving me an aneurysm. But that’s not what this post is about. The gameplay to the story is fantastic. The use of old Greek mythology is also very creative and fun. What’s lacking from this otherwise stellar story is pathos, and pathos makes all the difference in a story.
Kratos is the character you play as in the story so lets go into a little backstory. Kratos is this bloodthirsty spartan army leader when he takes on some barbarians and his army is decimated. Right before the leader of the barbarian horde is going to enact the final blow on Kratos, Kratos calls out to Ares and says he’ll be his servant if he can deliver him from death. Ares kills everybody except Kratos and his Spartans.
Kratos is now the leader of Spartans under the command of Ares. He goes about killing pretty much anybody and everybody. Eventually this catches up with him and though an old oracle warns him, in his blind fury Kratos murders his wife and child. He then feels bad and swears not to be Ares servant anymore. Ares points out that he was just trying to get Kratos to be a better warrior but KRatos is pretty set on getting revenge. In fact unquenchable revenge is ultimately what powers the main character and the story.
Kratos then becomes a servant to the other gods and sets out on a quest to kill Ares. After you kill every monster and person (regardless of they’re innocence) Kratos eventually kills Ares and becomes the new god of war.
The second game opens with the rest of the gods pissed at Kratos because he’s being a complete douchebag like Ares before him, sending out armies to destroy everything. The gods take away his powers and Zeus delivers the kill blow, however the Titans intercede and blah blah blah.
Poor boat captain...*sigh*
Okay now lets get into what this is all about. Kratos is perhaps the weakest written character of the story. He is pretty much revenge in human form. While this makes for fun gameplay (I mean who doesn’t want to knock Zeus down a few pegs) it leaves a rather empty character. For characters to work (especially in video games when you play as them) you need to be able to connect with the character on some level. And unless you’re a homicidal maniac, there’s nothing to relate with Kratos about. So he killed his wife and daughter and though he blames Ares, it is Kratos blood thirst that really brings him to such a point. So how does he rectify this? By killing more people.
Several times throughout both games you meet up with other characters, some needing your help. Thing is if this person needing help doesn’t have large breasts and isn’t at least showing her tatas for the world to see than you can kiss this person goodbye. In fact Kratos often uses a person asking for help to either torture them or kill them so he can progress further through some puzzle. This ultimately leaves you feeling rather alone in the game and perhaps that’s what the creators wanted. Except I don’t feel bad for KRatos at all…not one bit. In fact I’m disappointed that you can’t actually save those characters you come across. You are forced to kill them, which I suppose leads the player into the mindset of this character who doesn’t care about anybody but himself. However it leaves me not caring about Kratos. In fact I in all honesty hope he fails in the third (and final) installment of the franchise on the playstation. At least with his failure it would give the player a taste of what all these ancient tales were about (moral fables and such).
Among the characters you mercilessly slaughter there is one in particular (a boat captain) you you kill a water serpent for, only to take his key and knock him down the creature’s throat to die. Later when you’re in the underworld you use his spirit as a lifting point to get yourself out of there, sending him down to the river Styx. In the second game he’s summoned by an undead man and the guy is freaking out that you’re there. Now this sort of character is funny even if it’s frustrating for the character. The problem is Kratos treats everyone like this.
Kratos has no friends, family, or apparent emotions other than unresolved hate. He’s either very cleverly written or an absolutely dreadful stereotype taken to the extreme. Only the third installment will let us know. I hope he loses. I hope he rots in Tartarus forever.
Of course how many game makers can create such a popular game with such a despicable protagonist (if you can call him that) and have people keep coming back for more. The obvious answer is a large part of the demographic are just people who like violence and don’t give much thought to story. But I think there’s something else there. It says something that I hate the character I play as so much. Perhaps I’ll have to retouch on this issue when the third game comes out. Till then Kratos remains a mystery to me.
