When we last left Kratos, Ares was defeated and Kratos had become the new God of War. While on Mt. Olympus Sparta thrived and conquered many lands in the name of Kratos. The other Gods grew angry with Kratos's disregard of them and devised a plot against him....GoW II picks up pretty much where the first ends, you begin with all the power and moves from the first game, but that doesn't last too long. Without giving out too many spoilers Kratos has got to be one of the dumbest gods around, if you had the power of a greek god would you transpose it into an inanimate object? The story is pretty straight forward, fight the power, kill the man (zeus), buck the system! In GoW II Kratos seeks out the sisters of fate to change the past and avenge his own death. Kratos allies himself with the Titan Cronos to defeat Zeus and destroy Mt. Olympus.The graphics are better than the original and also offer a HD setting for all thoseluck people with a 1080p television. The CG cutscenes are even more awe inspiring than the first, the voice acting was just as good as the original which was great!GoWII offers two new features, the pegasus and the ability to use your weapon ala Indiana Jones to swing across chasims. The pegasus level was a let down, the idea was good but the implementation was poor to be nice. It was like Afterburner with a flying horse >.>The game offers up plenty of replay value with unlockables, additional modes and there's a great making of featurette on a second disk.Before I watched the supplimental stuff on the second disk I finished the game. And it wasn't until after I saw what was cut out of GoW II did I feel the game was shorter than the first. The final fight against Zeus is a little better than the final battle in GoW but is still overshadowed by the awesome boss fights like the Hydra in the first game and the Argonaught fight in GoWII. Perhaps GoWIII will get that aspect right....oh there will definately be a third. The ending is so open ended but is satisfying and leaves the player craving the next game!GoWII is a worthwhile sequel, if you really got into the first one you'll love this one just as much. Fantastic graphics, better than anything on the PS3 at the time of launch, an interesting story, top notch voice acting, and one of gamings coolest characters up there with Solid Snake and Master Chief.8/10
