In this review of the PC port of God of War, we mainly judge how successful the game’s transition to PC was. For a comprehensive review of the game itself, we welcome you to the original Gamer.nl website God of War review.

God of War is a game that is ported to the PC quite prominently, albeit almost four years later. It’s not just that the PlayStation-exclusive title until recently still looks pretty cool; The PC scene sometimes lacks an action adventure of such epic proportions. Kratos’ comeback is undoubtedly more than welcome on many video cards.

The PC port of God of War is nothing more than a direct carry over from the 2018 version. Aside from some cosmetic packs, God of War has hardly received any additional content, let alone the full expansion packs. Unlike the PC adaptation of Horizon Zero Dawn, this is the only core game from God of War. Don’t expect a “final version” or another gimmick of all.

Of course, the game God of War on PC offers more possibilities to customize the graphic performance, but other than that it is a one-for-one copy of the original PlayStation 4 version, operated by the Canadian company Jetpack Interactive. The PC version is priced at €49.99 at launch.

What you get for five bucks in 2022 is a relatively smooth PC version of God of War. PC gamers can still pick up the game with average three-generation GPUs – and the port can be graphically tweaked as seamlessly as desired. Already sharp and smooth gameplay can be upscaled to native 4k, screen ratios of up to 21:9 and locked frame rates of up to 120fps.

Players with modern and high-end cards can play God of War at a relatively fast 4k resolution, with good frame rates as well. Direct support for Nvidia’s DLSS upgrade certainly helps, although you can also turn to AMD’s open source alternative, FidelityFX Super Resolution. Aside from the clever sharpening of the image, God of War offers a medium package of effects and levels of detail that must be balanced.

In terms of load times, God of War also appears to benefit from faster SSDs. Only the latest high-end PCIe Gen 4.0 models can keep up with the PlayStation 5, but the computer also easily outperforms the PlayStation 4 (Pro) on an older or somewhat slower SSD. The nvme mini tweak takes out the game world in about fifteen seconds. Pop-ups for textures or game items are not noticeable while playing.

God of War is also technically more compact in gameplay than, for example, the open world of Horizon Zero Dawn. For example, Aloy’s Adventure picked up quite a few bugs while migrating to PC, but Kratos appears to be stable on the new platform right away. In all the time playing the game, there was no bug, glitch or major graphic flaw. This stability seems to be in place, given that the God of War story should appear as a cinematic “one-shot.” This view also remains the same on PC.

This does not mean that the game is free of visual bugs. God of War could look nicer on PC than it ever did on PlayStation 4, but the port has its limitations. Despite promises of fancy additional lighting effects, like Ground Truth Ambient Occlusion (GTAO) and Screen Space Direction Occlusion (SSDO), God of War still has some rough edges at times.

In terms of shadow formation and reflections, God of War is not up to par. The worlds look beautiful and the textures are sharp, but even at the highest settings, the water surfaces look almost like a Nintendo 3DS. This contrasts with how amazingly beautiful the game is at other times. The same can sometimes be said of the play of light: in the chosen environments, shadows look like a kind of memory in a mosaic.

So it was a pity that the God of War did not go deep into the sea with new technologies. For example, the port supports Nvidia’s Reflex input acceleration and upscaling technologies, but unfortunately it’s not a common ray tracing tool. By printing in real time the sources of light and rays, the game could undoubtedly have looked a lot nicer, but this was apparently not possible.

In terms of resolution and graphics performance, God of War runs smoothly on PC, but in the nitty-gritty, you notice that the game comes “from another time” on a different platform. On the other hand, from a PlayStation perspective, it makes sense that no mountains would be moved to decorate the loaned game better than they would on the home front.

This dedication to the main console also resonates with how God of War’s controls are handled on PC. Mouse and keyboard are free to arrange the controls differently, but a controller? It must be DualShock 4 or DualSense.

It doesn’t matter if you connect something from Xbox, Steam, Google, or Guitar Hero, God of War pretends it doesn’t exist. Even officially licensed third-party PlayStation consoles are banned, making the controller ban strict and unsuitable for the PC market.

The same limitation is also reflected in the accessibility options. Here and there it is (partially) possible to automate common actions, but it is difficult to modify the game in terms of input or display elements. A slightly more open-ended mini PC game for those in 2022 – especially aimed at less physically able players – but God of War doesn’t want to go with that trend.

God of War will be available on Steam and the Epic Games Store from January 14, 2022. For this review, Gamer.nl received a pre-release Steam version, which ran on a high-end platform.