God of War in all its PC glory looks downright amazing

As one of PlayStation’s biggest exclusives, God of War’s arrival on PC has been eagerly awaited. After all, it boasts an excellent story with incredible visual fidelity, and its combat is easily the pinnacle of the series. The migration to PC meant that new features could be added to the game, such as improved DLSS and ultra-wide support, and as PC Gamer reported, the latter represented a unique problem for God of War, praised for its gapless camera.

This meant making sure that players not only see everything they need to see in ultra-wide format, such as the action but also that UI elements are presented correctly. With all the “huge vistas, big moments and cinematics playing into that”, lead UX designer Mila Pavlin shared that the team was definitely “looking at how to present the game in the best way possible”.

“It’s not just put resolution and that’s it. I wish it was that easy, now there’s all this stuff that was on the edge and cut off in 16:9 that’s now in the scene, like ‘Oh no, Atreus is warping in the scene because he’s getting into position,” Matt DeWald, senior technical producer, explained.

To overcome any potential issues, the team at Santa Monica Studio, along with Jetpack Interactive, set to work playing the PC version of God of War repeatedly in ultra-wide. Once visual errors were discovered, only then could the animators step in to fix things.

“So you had to go back and animate all that stuff. It required playing the whole game. And not just cinematics because we’re an uncut camera, it’s one shot all the way through,” DeWald added, “So you really play through the whole game… all these controlled camera moments, like when Kratos is trying to kill something, and he goes into a locked animation, the camera is controlled for that scene, or there’s some moment in the game where something like the Draugr appears, and Kratos pulls out the axe and freezes.”

Working with an extended field of view on PC was always going to be a sticking point, especially for a cinematic game like God of War. However, as we’ve seen, the development team has done an excellent job without losing the immersion and majesty of the game’s presentation.

The PlayStation Access YouTube account has uploaded the first 15 minutes of gameplay from the title, demonstrating the noticeable visual improvements the title has received, as we see the iconic scene of Kratos and Atreus going hunting.

The game will be coming to PC with support for ultra-wide monitors, as well as giving the ability to unlock framerate or enable NVIDIA DLSS; giving a more personalised and customisable experience according to the player’s preferences. You can read our review about the game here.

Source: playtrucos