If you’re a budget gamer who wants to play online, then good news comes in the form of God Mode. The story is simple, you’re a descendent of a god who was banished from Mt Olympus. Consequently, you’re a mortal who’s recently died. Now you need to fight your through the “Maze of Hades” in order to win your life back. To be entirely honest, that doesn’t really matter at all. The fun really starts once you join a game and start playing.
God Mode offers up some wholesome 3rd person shooting action which feels like a blend of Gears of War’s “Horde Mode” and Quake III Arena. The game can be played single player (although there is no campaign/story mode) or you can play online via LAN or PSN with 3 other players. Some smart design decisions were made, for example, there is no cover system, so no “sticking” to walls. As a result, gameplay is quick and frenetic with cover being offered in the form of objects on the stage, nearly all of which are destructible. Death matching isn’t offered, rather the entire game focuses on 4 players working their way through the mazes co-operatively. Enemies range from zombies and skeleton warriors to minotaurs and Atlas statues throwing giant globes at you. Stages are often finished off with a massive boss which requires the 4 players to work together. Weapons are pretty varied ranging from the SMG you start to other more exotic weapons like a vulcan cannon. Items and power ups are littered through out the stages which replenish your health, ammo and armor. Fighting my way to brightly colored power ups reminded me of my days playing Quake III (and similar arena FPS’s). To keep things interesting, there is also a minigame style stage in between the combat called “Gold Rush” which challenges you to collect the most gold coins inside of a quiet martyrium style building. Despite having a limited amount of maps/mazes (about 5), gameplay is kept fresh thanks to 45 different modifiers which greatly improves God Mode’s replay value. Modifiers randomly effect the gameplay in some way, for example all the enemies could become huge, or your weapon could change every 10 seconds. Some of the modifiers are also done just to throw you off including one that makes all the sounds high pitched and another that makes all the enemies smaller.
Visually, God Mode does surprisingly well, especially when considering it’s modest price tag. It looks about as good as any other contemporary action title out there. Backgrounds have enough variety to be interesting and characters have a familiar charm and style. The music and sound design won’t win any awards, but sufficiently fits the action in the game, which really takes the front seat here. I played the Playstation 3 version of God Mode which did suffer from some slow texture loading which was only noticeable in the beginning of a stage and did not effect the gameplay at all.
I have only 1 complaint with God Mode… It would’ve been nice if the console versions (PS3 and Xbox 360) had split screen. That is really a critical feature for console gamers and as a result made me play the game online with strangers rather than the friends I was sitting with.
Verdict: God Mode doesn’t do anything terribly original, but what it does do, it does with utmost enjoyable simplicity. If you’re looking to spend a good 20 to 30 mins playing a modern arcade style action game without any story to follow (and remember) then God Mode has the goods.
God Mode screenshots (photographed on flatscreen)…
On a side note, which doesn’t effect the game’s score, it would be nice to see Old School Games add more content to God Mode as time goes on, even in the form of DLC. Since it’s just a $10 game, compelling paid DLC would be appropriate if the added features offer good value.
God Mode was developed by Old School Games and published by Atlus. It is available for Playstation 3 (via PSN), Xbox 360 (via XBLA) and PC (via Steam) as a downloadable game.