Making changes to 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 everything we created, from podcasts to social content, 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 for the first time – his teenage son Atraeus – as well as dramatic story arcs. The son was introduced in a Messenger game with an entirely separate storyline that told his backstory and showed off his skills with a weapon, gaining some crucial street cred with loyalists.
Fans were introduced to new powers and weapons through the game, which had 5,000 possible open-ended commands.
Every level unlocked one of nine 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.
The story of the first great war in Norse mythology was presented in an enormous triptych displayed at the PAX convention.
With only artists’ renderings to work with, new enemies were teased though a series of animations explaining 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, content was released at regular intervals over the course of nine months leading up to launch. The result was a debut that set sales records for a PlayStation release.