Genre: Action
Developer: Santa Monica Studio
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment

Like the previous game, Ragnarok uses screen space reflections, volumetric fog, and superb art direction to convey its variety of environments, among them snowy, desert, and swamp areas. Tessellated snow and sand deform as the characters move about those areas. The texture resolution in this title is absurd, and at times it looks as good as "Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart", despite not having any ray-traced effects. Character models are even more detailed than in the first title, and the special effect-laden menu system is as polished as they come.

Just like in the prior release, the music in this game is borderline non-existent. It's there, but so utterly forgettable that the title may just as well be musically mute. The various voice actors retain their roles from the 2018 title, and do just as good of a job here. Kratos's son is a teenager in this title, and though the voice talent is solid, the character whines quite often and is a bit of a low-T cuck.

Ragnarok has the exact same combat engine as the previous game, but with the addition of a third, spear weapon. Spears can be used to traverse various environmental puzzles, can be stuck to enemies, and can be exploded at any time. The level design is as good as the previous game, and in a way the "linear hallway" sensibilities are refreshing in today's era of open world bloat.

If the first game took a long time to take off, then this title's pacing is even worse: it's like they said, "We interrupted the player with dialog every thirty seconds in the 2018 game, let's make it every fifteen seconds now!" The core combat and level design is still well done, but the tempo is absolutely plodding due to the incessant story exposition. It's also disappointing but par-the-course in this woke age to see yet another bad-ass, masculine role model protagonist slowly written out of his own game series in lieu of a soy boy and his black girlfriend.