While it might annoy some PlayStation diehards, I love Sony’s new approach to bringing its first-party games to PC. Yes, these games have outdated their relevance at a time when they may well have exhausted potential sales of PlayStation hardware.
But it’s clearly a smart business strategy, and beyond that, it’s good for video game fans everywhere. So here we are, another PlayStation exclusive coming to PC.After Horizon Zero Dawn and Days Gone, Sony thought it would be appropriate to follow up on these god of warThe sort of reboot of 2018 is not.
Overall, I’m a huge fan of God of War, especially the new version. I’ve played it extensively on PS4, but like I play most exclusive games, I’ve always wondered how much better it would run on PC. Nearly four years later, I finally got my wish.
The PC version of God of War – which launches on Steam and EGS this Friday, January 14th – is a basic port that offers a slightly polished experience, but isn’t too different from the PS4.
For starters, it’s in a better technical state than Horizon Zero Dawn at launch, and about the same as Days Gone. We’ve had access to the God of War code since late December, so I had to time stamp various parts of it to see what we could do. The build is very stable and offers mostly consistent frame rates. To help keep this performance on target, Ares on PC is equipped with DLSS, AMD’s FSR, and its own internal upconverter. But even running it natively, it’s easy to get frame rates far beyond consoles with everything at its limit.
That’s great news for gamers looking to go beyond 60fps, as games can go as high as 120fps. However, with the i7 9700K and the RTX 3080 Ti at 4K, I couldn’t get it to run at that frame rate consistently. Usually, it hovers between 70 and 80fps. Some quiet places can get you into the 90s, but it’s rare. Turning on Nvidia’s RTX card-specific DLSS settings (with four quality settings) provides the advantage needed to push frame rates toward these targets. DLSS manages to boost frame rates by rendering the game at a lower native resolution before upscaling it with AI tools – in the best cases it’s often barely different from the native resolution.
God of War will actually display the rendering resolution for each selected DLSS quality setting, which is rare but still welcome. The most performant setting for me is Ultra Performance with DLSS, which renders the game at 720p. It looked noticeably blurry compared to native 4K, but it got me the closest to my 120fps goal. While I did see the frame rate counter hit 120fps here and there, it was mostly between 90-110fps.
However, for some reason I can’t find a way to run the game in exclusive fullscreen mode. Your options are either windowed or borderless. It’s annoying, but far from a major issue in this case, especially since God of War isn’t a power-hungry game and it won’t run in exclusive fullscreen mode, but I do wonder if fullscreen is the It’s closer to what’s needed to 120 fps.
The port offers a decent set of graphics options, some of which take you beyond what’s possible on the PS4. The two most notable changes are ambient occlusion and screen space reflections. Compared to the PS4 original, reflections are much sharper, especially in rooms with marble floors and various sources of reflection – such as the Realm Travel Room. The update to ambient occlusion is even more noticeable, as many of the areas you visit allow some light in through ceiling shafts and cracks in the walls.
However, none of these upgrades are dramatic enough to really matter. For example, reflections, while improved, still omit Kratos and most of the screen. They show – certainly less blurry – reflections of lights and colors, but not characters, weapons or other objects in the scene. It’s a bit disappointing, but predictable, given the hardware of the original game.
While the image is generally clearer, I can still spot some of the same issues I’m having on the console. There is no dedicated AA solution, so aliasing is more or less the same as on PS4, even at native resolution. I’d love to see if some community-made tool can successfully inject AA into it, as the Nvidia control panel solution has been inconsistent when I use it.
Sadly, one special option I wish I could adjust in the PC version is FOV. The third-person camera in God of War is one of the tightest in any game I’ve seen. Sony Santa Monica knows this, as evidenced by UI indicators alerting you to off-screen attacks, flashing almost every time you fight more than two enemies, not to mention the constant calls of Mimir and Atreus.
I’ve always felt this was an inelegant functional solution. Unfortunately, this problem still exists in the PC version. The camera is as close to the Kratos’ back as it is on consoles, but now I’m more annoying playing games on PC for a few reasons, not least the higher resolution effects make it harder to see these metrics.
However, again, I’m not entirely surprised to see this omission. Unlocking the FOV after the development team has relocated for many years requires a lot of work to re-tune asset flows, animations, etc; it’s not entirely realistic to expect to arrive in port so late after release.
Hopefully SSM has taken this into account in Ragnarok, but given the studio’s combination with the idea of an intimate clipless camera, I have my doubts. This is obviously the most frustrating aspect of my PC version of God of War. While the overall visuals are sharper, the presentation is sharper, and the frame rate is significantly improved, you still have to contend with an incredibly narrow FOV.
Another issue with the original also appeared on PC, which was the most surprising. Stutters when loading into a new area or transitioning to the outdoors are somewhat common on PS4, but they’re often subtly hidden in cutscenes.
With the PC port installed on the 3rd generation NVMe SSD, games barely take advantage of this speed. Those parts of traveling with elevators and realms were about as long as they were on PS4, but there were also noticeable stuttering issues as new zones loaded behind closed doors.
You can also see exactly when it happens because it’s fairly obvious. The vast majority of them happen in non-combat areas and last a second or so – but they’re noticeable. If you’re unlucky enough to fight an enemy in a zone with two distinct zones, some of the most dramatic can happen in combat. Loading and loading games is faster, but that’s about it.
The rest of the God of War demo on PC is fairly straightforward. After enabling HDR for your monitor in Windows, you can turn it on. It offers the same level of customization here as it does on the PS4, with separate settings for brightness and white.
Unfortunately, while you can remap keyboard and mouse controls, you can’t do the same with controllers – another odd omission. In fact, once a controller is detected, the game greys out the keybindings customization menu. I don’t think that’s a major issue as the same option returns for PS4, which lets you switch dodges from A to B, and brings back the classic X/Y attack buttons instead of Soul-style bumpers/triggers.
I can imagine this is a bigger problem for players who need accessibility options for certain controllers, and I honestly don’t see why that feature could be provided for the keyboard but not the controller.
God of War’s PC port is enough to warrant a second playthrough, especially if the only time you’re using it is on PS4. For those who missed it, this is a better chance to experience a beautiful action game with an engaging, exciting narrative without having to battle the port to make it work.
