In 2013, Sony released God of War: Ascension for the PS3, which is widely regarded to be the black sheep of the franchise. Of course, looking deeper into background of the 2018 title’s release makes its accomplishments even more impressive, because for a few years until it came out, the God of War franchise wasn’t doing too well. And yet, even with all of that in its rearview mirror, in 2018, the series managed to surpass any of its achievements with the soft reboot-slash-sequel titled simply God of War, which is the series’ biggest critical and commercial hit to date by far. Since its debut on the PS2 nearly two decades ago, the action-adventure series has delivered a steady stream of games that have seen great critical and commercial success, including the likes of the first three numbered God of War games, which all have Metacritic scores of 90 or above.

God of War as a franchise is in the best shape of its life right now.