God of War Needs More Hugs

God of War (2018) is doing something that a lot of people refuse to ever do: take stock of itself and its problematic past. The game never straight-up repudiates the old God of War series, but it definitely seems embarrassed by its previous entries. Kratos in 2018 is a quiet, depressed man, where the Spartan in 2005 was a screaming asshole. New God of War wants to be subtle, emotionally complex, and to push its character into being a fully dimensional human being. They even removed the sex minigames. I respect the goals here. Maybe we could try to fix Duke Nukem or Shadow the Hedgehog next?

The problem for me though is that Sony Santa Monica still wants Kratos to be "cool". This is the character's origins conflicting with the new game's goals. In 2005, all Kratos needed to be was an angry avatar of teenage boy id. You pressed Circle and Kratos made things dead in spectacular ways. Or he banged naked chicks with repulsive low-poly boobs. He wasn't a real person and didn't need to be one. In 2018, we expect more from our gaming protagonists, so Kratos can't "just be angry". He's got a son now, he has responsibilities. Kratos needs to get the kid dressed and off to school and maybe later, if he's still got energy, our war god can slay a mythological creature now or then. However no matter how much of a real person Kratos can become, he still has to be cool. And nothing is cooler, apparently, than emotional abuse.

In God of War I really enjoyed the gameplay. I appreciate the reasonably-sized world map. I liked the bosses, especially the Valkyrie superbosses which are the best part of an already good game. The whole style is like that bloodier Zelda that I always wanted the God of War games to be in the first place. (The loot and crafting systems however can go die in Ragnarok.) But I hated Kratos. Kratos starts this game sealed-up in his own edgelord bullshit, unable to even pat his son, Atreus (AKA: "BOY!") on the back. He can't apologize, he can't really open up, and he doesn't "do hugs". He's stuck as a bitter authoritarian, unable to crack a smile. Kratos continues to act out this stunted ultra-masculine fantasy, even as this behavior is clearly toxic.

God of War (2018) tries to make Kratos a good father, and it fails. Because it couldn't make him a good mother.

Playing a Bad Dad

I don't know where Kratos has been for most of BOY's life, but they don't seem to know each other very well. After BOY's mother passes away, Kratos is suddenly left raising the kid. And it's awful for everybody. The whole thing is like a bad weekend visit to your divorced dad. You have to sleep on your his futon with smelly crumbs in the middle. He doesn't have the cereal you like. His apartment is dirty and his fridge is empty except cheap beer and rotting Chinese leftovers. You're bored. Dad tries to make small-talk but every question is another reminder that he barely knows you anymore. He asks about kids you haven't been friends with since first grade. He rents the Mike Myers Cat in the Hat movie for you even though you're too old for it and the movie is unspeakably hideous. And you're stuck in his sad bachelor life for two days until finally you can go home and you both give a sigh of relief when its over. Then you know next month, you're doing it all over again.

...I may have Dad issues. All male critics seem to either come at God of War from the perspective of a father or the perspective of a son. I'm not a father, but I still think I'd do a better job than Kratos.

There's a moment relatively early in God of War where Kratos needs to go on a brief spirit quest away from BOY. To you, the vision is maybe a minute long. However, when you get back, it turns out you've been gone hours. BOY is surrounded by monsters that he's had to kill all on his own, and he's furious at you. "You left me alone for a long time!" That moment felt like a punch in the gut. Because it wasn't that I simply disappointed my imaginary video game son, I had let him down. It was entirely by accident yet still I failed as a father. That hurt.

I'm sure Kratos felt all those same emotions too. But where I would apologize and give Atreus a hug, Kratos boils it all down to a grunt. Then he carries on killing monsters as before. It's stupid pride holding him back, keeping up a male image that makes sense to nobody but himself and the fanbase.

There's something ambitious and even literary in choosing such an unlikable protagonist like Kratos.
But God of War doesn't pull that off.

At one point I was rowing a boat with BOY. (There's a lot of rowing in this game, the central lake acts as God of War's Hyrule Field.) I came up to a waterfall on the river we were going down. Just to see how Atreus would react, I dunked him under it. I was hoping he would giggle or splash or do something. I wanted to be teasing and fun. Instead BOY did not react at all. Because you can't have those kinds of moments in God of War. Kratos isn't that kind of father and nothing you do will ever help him get there.

The best you can do is complete some sidequests and that makes Atreus a bit happier sometimes. BOY wants to explore and wants to help people, and I know cynically this is the game manipulating me. But dammit it worked, because Kratos certainly isn't going to put in the work. I might as well. I can't hug BOY, but maybe freeing a dragon for him is close enough?

Be a Bad Father, Not a Good Mother

The thing with God of War is: what is the real moral here? Kratos eventually opens up slightly to BOY, so maybe the lesson is, "just be 10% less of an asshole". No open arms hugs, just a pat on the shoulder. No tears, just manly nods. No outright apologies, just a grunt. Kratos ends the game still closed-off and not terribly nurturing, but I guess that's progress? He does share some wine with BOY. It isn't reading Harry Potter before bedtime or kissing boo-boos, but take what you can.

Meanwhile BOY actually has more of an arc, and I fear it's in the wrong directions. God of War is spiritually Atreus's game with Kratos as a POV. However, the lesson Atreus learns is how to kill and arbitrarily dispense a weird kind of justice. Briefly Atreus goes on a tangent of being a murdering jerk, imitating his father, only to pull himself back thanks to no real actions by Kratos or the playerr. You can see the negative influence the god of war is on his son. Kratos and BOY ultimately leave things with the Norse pantheon far worse than how they found it. They set up the seeds for destroying this mythology just like Kratos destroyed the Hellenistic one. Still they go home proud.

Meanwhile, the other example of parenting in God of War is a mother-son relationship between the god Baldr and his mother Freya. We unfortunately do not get enough of this interplay. Freya, as Frigg does in the myths, made the entire world promise not to harm Baldr, so Baldr is left unable to feel anything. Exactly what led up to that is never shown. It is a huge hole in major characters. So you're left with a game that seems to say "be more like Kratos, than this loving mother". If you hug your kids too hard, they turn into douchy Jared Leto-types. If you keep them at a manly distance, they grow up strong and proper. Mothers fail, fathers succeed. This all feels very under-cooked and not very well thought out.

Those aren't great character arcs, and it harms the game. I would love a game that could really explore what being a man is and what being a father is, especially when all that is so very confusing in 2018. Kratos represents old martial virtues that haven't been relevant to Western Civilization since World War I, which might be why he's an incomplete person. Especially when today people seem to be looking for easy answers like "strength" and "power" as definitions of manhood. (If your idea of a man is the president, you have never met a man in your life.)

I wish God of War could come up with a different answer than "to be a good father, kinda don't be a dick and kinda be a bit more honest". Kratos can't teach BOY justice or kindness or fairness or empathy cause he doesn't have those things and he doesn't want to learn them. Kratos is never overtly sexist (again, no sluts to bang this time), but he tacitly rejects everything feminine. His nature is pure testosterone which is why he sucks.

Moms Can't be "Cool"

More over it isn't even the greater points of "fatherhood" or "masculinity" toxic or otherwise that God of War fails to touch on that annoys me. It's that Kratos is fucking boring in this game. This quiet, sullen Kratos has lost all the charisma his anger used to bring. Now he reminds me of Lightning from Final Fantasy XIII. (And if you've read any of this blog, you'd know that is not a compliment.) Kratos is best in God of War when he can be a straight man to sillier characters like the dwarves or a talking British head. But without those things, he's bland and unpleasant. His total inability to open up or be vulnerable really limits him as a character. Kratos is too cool to be afraid, too cool to laugh, and way too cool to ever cry.

See? This is already an improvement.

I know Kratos is feeling a lot of deep emotions in God of War. He is afraid that he is failing BOY. He is full of guilt. He does want to open up. But this game can't ever let him do that. Cause letting Kratos' armor break, even a little bit, breaks Kratos. He can't be mothering because the god of war's entire existence is a macho fantasy. A better game can imagine what lies below that fantasy and even cleverly subvert it, God of War cannot. It simply lacks the imagination.

There were other dynamics that Santa Monica Studios could have chosen to go with. I can imagine a version of Kratos where instead of being a distant jack-off, he is instead the exact opposite. Imagine an over-protective Kratos, a Marlin to BOY's Nemo. After like a dozen games of constant tragedy, Kratos could easily have seen Atreus as the only thing left in the world for him, and been a protector parent instead of a neglectful one. Or maybe BOY really looks up to Kratos and sees him as a hero, while Kratos carries all his sins, knowing he is not the good guy his son believes in.

Instead, God of War picks the dynamic that keeps Kratos as close as possible to that "cool" character we had before. Hugs and tears don't sell enough. Mothering isn't cool enough, I suppose. Which may be why God of War is like the five-hundredth "Dad Game" and the only Mom Game I can think of is the heinously bad Metroid: Other M.

If God of War's goal was to expand Kratos as a character and show he could be flexible enough to grow with gaming, it really only showed how limited the god of war is. There's nothing necessarily wrong with a limited game protagonist. Mario will never lie awake at night wondering how to pay off his bills and make ends meet. Bayonetta doesn't need to have painful calls with her mother to explain why she can't keep a boyfriend. However, those characters are being used in simple stories where they fit. Kratos is an emotionally constipated square peg in a round hole of a game.

If you just want a fun game, God of War is that in spades. This will easily make my Top 5 of 2018. But if you're looking for actual emotional stakes and a fatherhood arc that brings something out of its protagonist, play The Witcher 3. Geralt can cry, Geralt can give Ciri a hug, and he can be emotionally open to her. His masculinity is not broken by simple humanity.

Also Geralt of Rivia is a way cooler character than that poser Kratos will ever be.