Changing a sacred franchise

When Sony rebooted God of War, they introduced new characters, a different plot and setting, and a new storyline. And with the game still in development and at least a year from launch, there wasn’t a lot to show yet to build excitement. Luckily the team were hard core gamers and up for a challenge. The resulting nine-month campaign stoked fans’ passion with content that illustrated this new God of War, step by step. The game went on to be the biggest launch in PS4 history.

The case film gives an overview of everythng we created, from podcasts to social contents, a chatbot and more.

One of the biggest changes was the switch from Greek to Norse Mythology. Challenging fans on social with Runic texts to unlock game art was a good way to step them into the new Norse world.

Kratos (the God of War) was a beloved as a “hack and slash” character. The new game would feature a sidekick, his teenage son Atraeus, and dramatic story arcs. We gave the son some street cred in a Messenger game with an entirely separate storyline that told his backstory and showed off his skills with a weapon.

Fans were introduced to new powers and weapons through the game, which had 5,000 possible open-ended commands.

Every level unlocked one of nince pieces of original art representing key themes of the character’s story.

The plot and backstory of this game wasn’t part of the original God of War, but was adapted into the game’s official canon once it was released.

We told the story of the first great war in Norse mythology in an enormous triptych displayed at the PAX convention.

With 70 hours of gameplay, there was a lot of story to cover in God of War. Each section of this illustration represented a different part of the history represented in the game.

With only artists’ renderings to work with, we teased new enemies with a series of animations that explained the creatures’ origins.

A bit of detail from a social video telling the origin story of one of the game’s epic characters. All told, we dropped content over the course of nine months leading up to launch. The result was a debut that set sales records for a PlayStation release.