Sony God of War Ragnarök - Information Thread, update: initial OpenCritic reviews of Valhalla DLC posted

[Best]

4 minutes ago, Spork3245 said:

The other quest takes about 5 min too. Trust me, do it real quick.

 

Fuck me. I just turned on my XSX and have a Plagues Tale loaded. 

 

Let me check this out now. It better be worth it!!!

[Spork3245]

Just now, best3444 said:

 

Fuck me. I just turned on my XSX and have a Plagues Tale loaded. 

 

Let me check this out now. It better be worth it!!!

[Best]

@Spork3245 

 

Spoiler

I was all over Tyrs Temple and killed some raiders I believe.  Didn't see anything else and I explored all over the temple and a little outside of it. Where is this?

 

[Bacon]

6 hours ago, Spork3245 said:

 

Your weapons? I did.

Your combined gear score level. You can't get a level 9 axe knob as the materials only exist in post game. 

[Biggie]

I actually had to bump the difficulty up to balanced. Either this game is easier than 2018 or because I went straight from 2018 into Ragnarök that my skills are better. 

[Spork3245]

49 minutes ago, best3444 said:

@Spork3245 

 

  Hide contents

I was all over Tyrs Temple and killed some raiders I believe.  Didn't see anything else and I explored all over the temple and a little outside of it. Where is this?

 

 

Spoiler

Read my post again, you need to go to Nifilheim  

 

32 minutes ago, Bacon said:

Your combined gear score level. You can't get a level 9 axe knob as the materials only exist in post game. 

Ah, yea, Axe knobs are post game which is silly

[Best]

30 minutes ago, Spork3245 said:

 

  Hide contents

Read my post again, you need to go to Nifilheim  

 

Now I'm utterly confused.  😆 

 

I have to go for Thanksgiving now but wtf. Explain again!

[Best]

38 minutes ago, Biggie said:

I actually had to bump the difficulty up to balanced. Either this game is easier than 2018 or because I went straight from 2018 into Ragnarök that my skills are better. 

 

It's definitely easier by a long shot imo. I played on medium difficulty all the way through and had zero problems expect for one boss. I actually think it's a perfect difficulty for a game like this. For 2018, I had to play on the easiest difficulty all the way through just to beat it. 

[Biggie]

Just now, best3444 said:

 

It's definitely easier by a long shot imo. I played on medium difficulty all the way through and had zero problems expect for one boss. I actually think it's a perfect difficulty for a game like this. For 2018, I had to play on the easiest difficulty all the way through just to beat it. 

Exactly 

[Bacon]

5 minutes ago, best3444 said:

Now I'm utterly confused.  😆 

Spoiler

There really isn't a quest, but you get a lore drop from an enemy that is from the queen Valkyrie talking about an escaped prisoner. There is a quest about that I believe, but you don't get it from that lore drop.

 

[Best]

2 minutes ago, Bacon said:

  Reveal hidden contents

There really isn't a quest, but you get a lore drop from an enemy that is from the queen Valkyrie talking about an escaped prisoner. There is a quest about that I believe, but you don't get it from that lore drop.

 

 

I'll have to try later. Thanks. 

[Spork3245]

13 minutes ago, best3444 said:

 

Now I'm utterly confused.  😆 

 

I have to go for Thanksgiving now but wtf. Explain again!

Spoiler

Go to Nifilheim, use the portal you take to go to the Raven Tree, along the way to the tree you'll see a new path has opened up (there should be something to jump on to), follow it and you'll get to a prison that fell from Asgard. Work your way to the bottom of the prison via a simple puzzle.

You needed to kill the Asgardians in Midgard to get the lore drop which allows this path to appear, but you don't get a direct quest to go to it.

 

[Best]

25 minutes ago, Spork3245 said:

  Hide contents

Go to Nifilheim, use the portal you take to go to the Raven Tree, along the way to the tree you'll see a new path has opened up (there should be something to jump on to), follow it and you'll get to a prison that fell from Asgard. Work your way to the bottom of the prison via a simple puzzle.

You needed to kill the Asgardians in Midgard to get the lore drop which allows this path to appear, but you don't get a direct quest to go to it.

 

 

Ok. Will try, thanks. 

[Bacon]

Beat the hardest or second hardest fight in the game.

Spoiler

Gna Odin's Valkyrie Queen. She wasn't too hard, but she was hard. I made a whole new setup for the fight except for my blades' runic abilities. Fight would have been easier if I had thought to level up Freya's companion skill. I will talk more about it more when I post the video. Also, if you read Gna's Journal, I think she is kinda right when it comes to Freya. Not fully right, but there is truth in those words. What? That's Victim blaming? Pssh, nonsense! 

 

[Bacon]

Here's the video and my thoughts on that boss.

Spoiler

 

It took me 2 hours of inconsistent play. I took some breaks and then ate once. Plenty of attempts tho. I got pretty good at the fight but still made some foolish mistakes like blocking instead of dodging and vice versa. You can see them in the video.  I changed my Runic Abilities to ones that built up stun, and also stun-locked the boss. I also tried to pick ones that were shorter as the boss will sometimes hyperarmor through your abilities if you're unlucky. Then I changed some of the things that were in my amulet. When I noticed that Gna dropped a lot of healthstones I included an enchant that grants you leech after consuming a healthstone. I then added an enchant that grants you a saving grace shield and then a strength buff and health burst.

 

I focused a lot on trying to build up stun as filling up that meter does a lot of damage. My spear has the most stun modifiers on it and so I ended up using it a lot. I should have actually changed all of my modifiers to stun but I didn't think about it until I beat the fight. I almost never think about them until the game tells me I unlocked a modification slot. 

 

I don't really think my Relic was a great choice, or rather my use of it was subpar due to my muscle memory of the chakrams. I just go big on the opening burst so the boss can't do shit. I should have saved it for when I really needed a breather and to save my skin. Bifrost seems somewhat weak on this boss with stun being the top dog. I rarely think about my companion outside of building sonic and thus I didn't really prepare Freya correctly for this fight either with her primarily Bifrost loadout. 

 

I was surprisingly close to beating this boss without a rez stone. I almost feel ashamed for using it just because I was so darn close, but it also felt good to not die, again, with like 1.5 bars left on the boss's HP. I also have no clue what the fuck I am supposed to do when the boss uses her Sigil magic. Freya said to use her Sigil Arrows but when I did that nothing happened when only using the arrows. Or at least nothing happened when I did it. Maybe I needed to throw my axe as well, but there was no chance I was getting that off in time, especially seeing as I hardly use the axe. I only use the axe when I can consume permafrost for 2x the hits. That shit really fucks up the bosses. I also tend to get too aggressive when I do that tho and I'd probably be better off if I didn't. I mean, I ended up using my rez stone exactly because of that.

 

It was a fun boss. 10/10

 

[Bacon]

Beat the other super boss. Probably only took 30-ish minutes to an hour. Got lucky on one spot of RNG that was probably the reason I won that round. Hard to say if this super boss was harder than the other one as pretty much everything I mastered during that fight was used here and I corrected some of my mistakes like saving my relic for the right time. But I also didn't have to use my Rez stone either and fucked up the boss. 

 

Video is in the spoiler tag. Not much to say as this is a boss that uses every attack and magic you have encountered up to this point and you should know how to avoid it or survive it if you don't. A lot of this fight had me stunning the boss out of things I wasn't sure how to avoid the right way. The only thing I'll talk about in the spoiler is how I got lucky which will be pretty short.

Spoiler

 

So, the King Berserker has this thing where he buffs himself with an elemental shield. My other attempts had him do it twice. Not sure if I somehow knocked him out of the buff this time around, but I only had him do the buff once, and, where the real luck begins, he buffed himself with a Force Shield which means it was spear time and my spear fucks shit up and I hadn't spent my Spear's runic abilities. Boss had no choice but to get fucked up. I feel like having to switch to my spear at that moment won the fight for me. 

 

It was also a good fight. 10/10

 

[Bacon]

Also got Platinum  

[Bacon]

5 hours ago, Bacon said:

Beat the hardest or second hardest fight in the game

jesus fuck I suck balls compared to this guy who did it on GMGOW and no damage 

If you have beat the game, fuckin' watch this shit

Spoiler

 

 

[Best]

22 hours ago, best3444 said:

 

Ok. Will try, thanks. 

 

Ok. @Spork3245 I finally beat that quest. It was semi satisfying but kinda rushed lol. It was fine.

 

Then I decided to beat my remaining side quest. Holy shit, while doing that 5 other quests opened up! I've leveled up my gear twice and look badass, fought 3 bosses, one being enormous and very hidden, and opened up secret locations which are impressive. This game is pretty massive and I can understand how they can label it as "bloated". 

[stepee]

I’m in this cave area right now and it’s one of those types of areas that used to always look bleh in games but now there’s so much detail and better lighting that it actually looks great.  Really appreciating the ultra high res textures in this game, hope that becomes the norm now, I don’t see why it shouldn’t really. I think it helps with keeping the IQ still look so fantastic even in performance mode as well.

[Biggie]

Okay so I’m at the part where 

Spoiler

I’m playing as Atreus and it’s awesome. Damn I love his bow. 

 

[stepee]

I just beat

 

Basger The Feared, one of the bezerkers

First part I didn’t like, though to be fair I hate most bosses. It wanted way too many different button presses all over the controller for too long. It’s one of those fights where if you keep dying it’s just painful on the hands to keep playing because it wants you to hit so many different things so often. Not fun to me. Teleporty bosses in general are just the worst.

[Bacon]

47 minutes ago, stepee said:

It wanted way too many different button presses all over the controller for too long.

Go get Hel's touch for axe and Helios Flare for blades. Takes down fliers. 

[Bacon]

I'll also somewhat take back about what I said about the chests to a point. At the beginning you do need every one to keep your armor updated, but that does stop. And then I abandoned my armor anyway for high vit armor that started at level 7 anyway. Still, the first third of the game was pretty bad with the amount of chests you were encountering, imo. It either got better or I got used to it or maybe I just ended up opening the majority early on so it felt like less later. 

[stepee]

oh man I did not want to fight

Garm

at all  

[Bacon]

I like Memer but like

Spoiler

can we get the fucker a new body or something already? With all the themes of imprisonment, Mimir has been stuck to Kratos' ass for two games now and had spent plenty of time being a solid dude. Kinda felt it was fucked up to have this head strapped to your ass for the whole game while you go around freeing a bunch of shit. 

 

[silentbob]

Haven’t had the time to play for a couple days but just found a bunch of great shit

Spoiler

by going into the stormy desert and freeing that giant Jellyfish creature. Plus just a ton of armour and chest to open and fight for. Some took me a bit to kill and then it becomes obvious.

Can’t wait to have a few days off to really give it my time

[Spork3245]

9 hours ago, Bacon said:

I like Memer but like

Spoiler

  Hide contents

can we get the fucker a new body or something already? With all the themes of imprisonment, Mimir has been stuck to Kratos' ass for two games now and had spent plenty of time being a solid dude. Kinda felt it was fucked up to have this head strapped to your ass for the whole game while you go around freeing a bunch of shit. 

 

 

Spoiler

Maybe Mimir enjoys the back of his skull slapping against Kratos’ ass. Who are we to deny Mimir what he enjoys?

 

[SaysWho?]

Late game, and oh my fuck did I love the 

Spoiler

Heimdall

boss fight.

 

SO good.

 

Played for nearly four hours straight yesterday and only stopped because I had to go to work this morning (plus I wanted to play a lot since I was out of town a few days). A whole new part of a world popped up and was really fun to explore. I'm just in awe that they did all this in four years. Sony Santa Monica is out of control.

[stepee]

One thing I wish they fixed from GOW that they did not was having no potions or auto healing in between fights or at the gateways or something. It’s just that the game auto checkpoints every three steps so it means the best strategy technically when entering a fight is to die first if you don’t have full health.

[Bacon]

6 minutes ago, stepee said:

One thing I wish they fixed from GOW that they did not was having no potions or auto healing in between fights or at the gateways or something. It’s just that the game auto checkpoints every three steps so it means the best strategy technically when entering a fight is to die first if you don’t have full health.

The gates restore hp and rage. You can even see a green effect if you aren't at full hp.

[stepee]

30 minutes ago, Bacon said:

The gates restore hp and rage. You can even see a green effect if you aren't at full hp.

 

hmm this is tough because it’s the internet so I kind of want to argue my point as if I’m right anyway 

[SaysWho?]

So many times, I'd be upset with "bloat" (Horizon Forbidden West probably has too much), but I'm with @Kal-El814: this game has fucking everything, and I'm actually interested in doing it all. And I can see because of the scope that I may not replay this as quickly as I did GOW 2018, but I'm also not complaining with all the stuff there is to do.

 

One area in 

Spoiler

Vanaheim

opened up out of nowhere, an area that you don't ever have to discover. And I legitimately love exploring it because there's so much in terms of optional bosses, runic attacks to acquire, and I still have a few places I've not figured out how to get to.

 

And this was AFTER a terrific boss fight with 

Spoiler

Heimdall.

 

Gee zuz, this game is great. At the beginning of the game, you might think you're getting GOW2018 but more, and in some ways you are, but the way exploration works in this game -- getting away from the Lake of Nine hub that changes with the World Serpent and opening up more world -- feels significantly different, and the number of mini-bosses and major bosses has increased a ton the further I get into the game.

 

I left that world and did the first six trials in Muspelheim and got a great item out of it. Now I'm thinking of going back to the main quest.

 

Oh, and I got all the 

Spoiler

Lindwyrms for the squirrel. Now I fed three of his stags and don't know where the fourth is, but I'm guessing it's probably in one of the areas I can't get to yet in Vanaheim.

 

And again, it's not like a bunch of games where I see all these icons and I feel overwhelmed and as if it's too much; I actually LIKE all this. I LIKE how it expanded the lore. I love all these new characters and building relationships. I think GOW being a "wide-linear" game helps it tremendously in that aspect because it's easy to do one side quest and bump into another one on the way, and sometimes you might find shit you missed on the way back!

 

Which reminds me, I also found 

Spoiler

the fucking wishing well in this fucking optional area that I could have never encountered because FUCK YOU you piece of shit.

 

[TheLeon]

I’ve slowed way down playing this. It doesn’t help that last week I was traveling, but getting back into it the last couple days, I dunno. I like the places where you can explore and churn through side quests, but every time it slows down to focus on story missions (especially with the boy), my interest level plummets. 

[SaysWho?]

HOLY FUCKING SHIT
 

LATE GAME SPOILER

 

Spoiler

TYR. BROK. ODIN. Wtffffff