Well, Kratos kicked some serious butt in the first one, and God of War 2 only enhances and expands upon the mindless gratuitous violence encountered therein. It will leave you with the perplexing nature to shout at everybody, a disturbing distaste for lopsided nipples and will go over the general principles for using aggression to get your way. If you’re one of those that find a fine line between reality and the virtual, do everyone a favour and don’t pick up this title. If however you enjoy a good thronging, a flagon of mead, a hearty punch up and then do it all in to go back to your office job on Monday morning, get this game. It’s very, very cool!

God of War II happens some time after the first game when, after defeating Ares, Kratos becomes the new in-house resident Dude of War – err I mean, God – but none of the other Gods want to play with him due to his previous naughty actions. So, what do you do if you’re all on your own and no one wants to play with you? Get out your toy army set of course. In a God’s case these would be the Spartans which Kratos takes great pleasure in aiding conquer Greece. Athena tries to stop Kratos from going on a bloodfest, but he ignores her and goes to Rhodes where the battle rages on. Upon landing, Kratos’ strength is sapped by an Eagle that then revives the Colossus of Rhodes to against Kratos. He initially believes it to be the treachery of Athena as he sets about brining the Colossus down. Zeus appears to offer up the Blade of Olympus, a huge ruddy great sword that he says will help win in his battle against the Colossus at the cost of his Godly strength. Of course, you being the ever-greedy God of War that you are, agree to sell your soul for a better weapon – and then it all goes a bit pear-shaped.

Suffice to say, God of War 2 takes it that next step further in the sequel by not only reintroducing you to your favourite enemies from the previous game, but giving you a whole bunch more with a whole new set of ways to kill them. You’ll be strapped with the usual Blades of Athena which make up most of your basic attacks and throw animations, but additionally you’ll find Barbarian Hammer – a slow moving, ghost summoning weapon and the Spear of Destiny – an electrically charged spear which has a multitude of combos and nifty tricks up it’s sleeve. Although you’ll start the game with bugger all in the way of magic and realise from the story that the Gods don’t like you, you’ll probably be thinking, “hang on, how do I get magic this time then m’addo?” Answer: The Titans. They don’t particularly like the Gods either and so will bestow powerful magic on you, well; either that or you’ll take it by force.

As before you’ll obtain relics in the form of Gorgon eyes and phoenix feathers which will increase your health bar or magic bar respectively. Additionally, the red, green and blue orbs remain the same in principle; with the red orbs giving you the ability to level up your weapons and magic. However this time around you’ll get yellow orbs too; these orbs fuel your ‘button that makes me mad’ power called Rage of the Titans. With this power turned on all of your attacks do double damage and you’ll find although you take damage if not blocking, you can’t be knocked down which basically means you can mash up whichever enemy you happen to be facing at the time.

You’ll find that it’s really easy to get back in to the swing of things from the first one with only a slight variance on the previous moves, but if anything they just enhance the ‘cool’ factor, you wont feel like you’re missing anything. The whole game looks stunning, if anything it puts the PS3 titles to shame, which really helps draw you into the game and rooting for Kratos as he progresses through the game. From swinging slow motion, pillar-to-pillar, to slamming the door on the head of a gatekeeper, it’s truly brutal. But in a good, non-censorship way of course.

Speaking of Brutal, the cutscenes and death animations have got even more gory than before, it’s really not for the fainthearted or elderly. Or small children, dogs and primary school teachers.

Or your mum.

As I already said previous, the head smashing part was great, as was the time I shoved a bridge through a Kraken’s mouth or pulled the wings off a griffon-looking thing. Great. Although at times it can be difficult to pull off the moves, of which you can’t memorise as they change, you’ll still keep button mashing your way through the scenes as it’s always worth it.

To be honest, we don’t always get to play a game through as sometimes we just don’t have the time, or sometimes it’s crap and there’s nothing we can do about it. With God of War being in my fave list from the past 5 years, it was only right that I play the sequel…and play it…and play it. Until my eyes bleed and I dribbled my way over to type a successful review on an amazing, and welcomed addition to what I no doubt expect will turn into a trilogy or more.

It even has bonus play, which allows you to play through as different people or with different power-ups for added value. Once you’ve completed it you can also put yourself to the Titan challenges that allow you to push yourself further in the hopes of getting your hands on some great rewards.

You know, the only downside, the ONE downside in all this game for me is that the voiceovers are always bloody quiet. Ok so in some respects the storyline is a breather in-between the mayhem, but you know, when Gaia’s talking you’d think by the size of her that she’d have a pair of lungs. Instead I find myself turning up the volume for that bit only to jump out of my skin once the cutscene ends and the normal sound resumes. Odd, but nothing near to stopping me enjoy the game.

With 4 composers, and epic score, cinematic cutscenes, flying blood, insane violence, cool moves and titanic (yes it’s a word) magic, you’re in for one hell of an experience. I can’t wait for the next one!

I really can’t.

Is it done yet?

Aww..