God of War creator David Jaffe has slammed the series’ new side-scrolling spinoff Sons of Sparta for being “boring” and “an insult” both to fans of the series and its original creative team.
God of War Sons of Sparta was announced and then shadow-dropped on PlayStation 5 last week at the end of Sony’s big State of Play broadcast. A Metroidvania-inspired action platformer from indie retro developer Mega Cat Studios, Sons of Sparta is designed as a prequel to the original God of War trilogy, featuring a young version of Kratos and his brother as they train together.
In an initial YouTube video posted after playing an hour of the game, Jaffe made his frustrations with the project’s concept clear: essentially, that it was too different in tone from the original trilogy, despite his initial excitment to see a side-scrolling take on the series.
“This is the kind of game I’ve always wanted in terms of 2.5D God of War, super into it — but this, to me, is not what I was talking about. I bought this game, it’s a $30 game, I don’t like it, I don’t recommend it,” Jaffe began, before turning his attention to the executives at Sony who decided to greenlight the project.
“I wanted to make a video more about what are they thinking, like what the f*** were they thinking? It’s not a bad game by any means, it’s fine, it controls decently… but to me the more fascinating part of this is, why is this in existence? I don’t understand.”
After an hour’s worth of play, Jaffe said he couldn’t continue with the game as its characters kept “stopping over and over [to] talk and talk.” He added: “This is not God of War.”
“Let’s just make him some generic f***ing kid, like we’re watching a Kids WB TV show or something,” Jaffe continued on. “It’s probably some bulls*** writer going, ‘Oh people want to know why, how did people become this way?’ No one cares. It’s a dumb idea… [Fans] wanted something like Blasphemous, in terms of it’s violent, it’s bloody, it’s serious, it has the tone of the early God of the War games.
“If you pulled God of War out of it, and you just said, ‘hey, we’re making a game about this kid,’ most people would say ‘that doesn’t sound like a very compelling idea for a video game character,’ because it’s not.”
David Jaffe. Image credit: David Jaffe.
“Maybe it gets better, I’m sure it does,” he further continued. “There’s nothing offensive about it. The only thing offensive about it is its genericism. The only thing offensive about it is its inability to reflect the license, the brand. It’s like you get the John Wick license and you make a movie where he’s just sitting in a coffee shop talking. Now that might work when you have Keanu Reeves as he’s so compelling, and the character’s interesting.”
Jaffe said he had been keen to see a 2.5D God of War game more similar to titles such as Ninja Gaiden Ragebound, Neon Inferno, or Shinobi. “Why would you even put this out? All it does is leave a bad taste in God of War fans’ mouths, in my assumption,” he concluded.
“Every time you make a new game, you don’t have to go, ‘You know what? Let’s not go back to the great character that people love that built this franchise. Let’s see him as a little kid, some generic boring little f***ing kid.’ It’s just insulting to the fans. It’s insulting to people who worked on the games that they would think this character right here is what people want. It’s crap. It’s dumb. It’s stupid. I would say avoid this f***ing thing.”
God of War Games in Chronological Order
While Jaffe had said he wouldn’t return to Sons of Sparta, he then went back and played a further three hours, at which point he posted an even more in-depth video that critiques the game on a more granular level for more than 30 minutes.
Specifically, Jaffe addressed points around “confusing visual noise during combat,” “gameplay breaking visual inconsistencies,” a “buggy and confusing user interface,” the suggestion that “level design and character motion feels off,” and “kiddie level dialogue and poor voice actor performances.” Ultimately, he branded the game as “not ready for release.”
Late on Friday last week, God of War franchise developer Sony Santa Monica was forced to clarify God of War Sons of Sparta’s two-player offering following widespread fan confusion. After numerous fans assumed the game’s “1-2 player” listing on the PlayStation Store referred to full co-op, the company clarified that multiplayer functionality was limited to a challenge mode unlocked after completing the game.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social