Did God Of War Rip This Game Off?

Much ado has been made of games that rip off God Of War. some of you that God of War ripped off Devil May Cry, but I dispute that. However, there is perhaps a game that God of War did in fact rip off, a 2002 game called Rygar: The Legendary Adventure. let's dive in and take a brief, and somewhat tongue-in-cheek look at this game, while comparing and contrasting aspects with God Of War to see if this really is a skeleton and God Of War's closet. You know, to add to the pile.
Thanks to Maggie Mui Longplays for the DMC footage
• Devil May Cry HD Editi...
And World Of Longplays for the footage of Rygar NES
• NES Longplay [888] Rygar
Read My Words
realtbp

[@TBP]

Edit: BREAKING NEWS. In an unexpected turn of events, David Jaffe himself responded to this video. kzbin.info/www/bejne/fIaxhXSJfNuNnLM Back to your regularly scheduled pinned comment. Shoot me again, I ain't dead yet. Thanks for waiting, there are more videos coming out very soon. I had some personal things come up, but more is finished and waiting to release. Thanks to my boy Ryan for the cameo, you can find him here kzbin.info Thanks to Maggie Mui Longplays for the DMC footage kzbin.info/www/bejne/b3emf4WPoJiFotU And World Of Longplays for the footage of Rygar NES kzbin.info/www/bejne/lXXQkoCYf8t8l7M And don't forget to follow me on Twitter twitter.com/realTBP

[@bigmangoji]

st anger

[@NotOrdinaryInGames]

Some people spend months in-between uploads, some YEARS. You ain't been gone for long. Also, David pretty much unveiled every GoW inspiration.

[@TenebrisGladius]

Please, take alook at NANOBREAKER from PS2 and how Metal Gear Rise: Revengeance ripped off A LOT os it's ideas!

[@causewhynot6485]

no god of war came out five months after spartan total war i always thought it ripped of that game hard

[@whitenoise0065]

lol

[@XxXDrakonkillerXxX]

If you watch the "behind the scenes" in the extras section of the menu of God of War, they actually explain that Kratos was originally supposed to have a shield and spear weapon combination, but that weapon set limited his moveset and made the game extremely unbalanced due to an infinite ranged spear throw ability that would allow the player to bypass certain story points. Since they were going for a more difficult game with linear story, they decided to change his weapon to something that wouldn't have too much range, while turning the "spear throw" into the lightning throw that was limited by the magic bar. They later brought back the Spear and Shield weapon for God of War: Ghost of Sparta

[@ShatteredGlass916]

Wait, where is this mentioned? I thought they were only talking about how Kratos almost had a medieval knight design

[@hennyspiderman9974]

@@ShatteredGlass916 in the director cuts or extras of the games

[@skeetermagee2487]

You also have shield in God of War 2018 too

[@BenDover-vg9ep]

The spear and shield is one of the best weapons ive used in god of war

[@Tenshiro_Kurogane]

won't have to much range me: "spamming chaos of blade insternsifies"

[@casekocsk]

In one of the developer interview videos, Kratos was supposed to be dressed in full plate armor (like knight) wielding sword... but the developer felt something is lacking... And so they buffed Kratos with protein and huge muscles, ditched the armor, and gave him the iconic sword chain.

[@PeterDB90]

I believe it was part of the bonuses on the original game - you could watch a "making of" video of God of War and they when they were planning level design, they even had a little greek soldier guy as a placeholder for (eventually) Kratos to just jump around and traverse said level. You can actually find that footage on KZbin pretty easily.

[@ShatteredGlass916]

And Kratos almost had a blue tattoo. And in some other early concept, Kratos has a dreadlock as well lmao

[@Mandalore_ultimate]

@@ShatteredGlass916 Also with yellow eyes

[@GameDevAraz]

Muscle is 90% water dumbass

[@theredandblueyakuza]

@@ShatteredGlass916 sometimes he was also a samurai

[@Tempus0]

I find it highly unlikely that the GOW devs, designers and management was unaware of Rygar: a game that was in the same genre as the game they were making and had sold that many copies. That would have been a big failure on their part as far as research goes. Given that the whole gaming industry is built around researching and copying from other games, they probably did know of Rygar.

[@mixbydlo184]

Precisely, that's damn-near standard industry practice. To "draw inspiration" from lesser known/less successful projects

[@vahidebrahimi9750]

@@mixbydlo184 I don't think that's true. Imagine a Santa Monica crew member playing this game and going to the director like "hey, boss. you know this really obscure game that didn't do so well and was basically a commercial and critical failure? yeah, let's do what this game did."

[@vahidebrahimi9750]

@Josiah Ali What?

[@ThatM84Guy]

@@vahidebrahimi9750 More like, "Let's take what they did and make everything better."

[@cody11096]

They didn't know shit about this nothing game lol

[@DioBrandoWRYYYYYY]

It was actually kind of a trend in the PS2 era to sometimes try to re-imagine old 2D games in to 3D. Like Maximo was a reimagining of Ghosts and Goblins and there was even an attempt to revive Altered Beast.

[@jesseflores5635]

When I was a kid I played both at the same time, I'm just glad someone was able to put a spotlight on this pretty underated game!

[@TheOptimalmax]

both at the same time? That's MLG

[@HistoryandReviews]

Wrong! It’s impossible to play two games at once

[@andresgonzalez887]

@@HistoryandReviews LOL Ive actually seen people do it, its dumb as hell but it is posible

[@deathspatience3613]

How could I forget about shinobi those were like my holy Trinity at the time rygar devil may cry and shinobi and on the xbox Ninja giden.

[@souljastation5463]

So, you did know game, just like me. It's wrong to assume that "nobody heard of it". I played it back in the days.

[@ClarenceDass]

I loved Rygar! I played it a lot on the Famicom. I played the PS2 remake, but it never stayed with me. God of War though, that became an obsession for me. It took me down a rabbit hole of Greek culture, Spartans and ancient gods that I'm a fan of till this day.

[@KixverzEditz]

Why

[@damianramirez5292]

Si

[@Neogears1312]

You know the funny thing is, God of Wars devs in interviews don't just admit they're inspired by DMC, they flat-out say DMC is a better game then what they made.

[@frankbasile3662]

Much prefer God of war over DMC,..found only DMC 3 was good but the first 3 God of wars are excellent

[@naved6095]

we all know gow sold way much more compare to dmc but they have to say that

[@alphaomega887654321]

God of war 2 and 3 are better than all dmc games that ever made.

[@billyboleson2830]

@@naved6095 They sold more cause they are easier and have better stories but DMC has better combat

[@billyboleson2830]

@@alphaomega887654321 gow has better story but DMC has better gameplay

[@photobygil]

I played both when they were new. My reaction then was that God of War was highly polished, but definitely just a different studio's spin on Rygar & Devil May Cry. This video is interesting (& not many reviewers talk about Rygar, these days). But the conclusion that GoW wouldn't be inspired by Rygar, because the latter is comparatively unknown, seems illogical. If you were going to revamp (or rip off) some other game, it makes more sense to choose one that isn't universally popular. Put your own mark on something most people didn't play, & then it sort of becomes your "original" property. I'd love to hear honest remarks from the GoW developers to see if they would give credit where credit is due, inspiration wise. There's no denying GoW is the one to do everything better, whereas Rygar could be goofy fun, but was often repetitive & even a little dull at times. (But I did enjoy both!).

[@mohamedabdelfatah7297]

No he is just so extremely stupid to think of that in the first place .

[@Thispersonsaysso]

Exactly, I couldn't understand why after going through this entire video showing all the potential evidence of how it may be a rip off, just to say "nah, it wasn't very popular" just doesn't make sense 🤷‍♂️

[@killyridols72826]

Exactly, God of War and Devil May Cry have no similarities in combat, but the combat of Rygar is suspiciously similar to God of War

[@SomeBlackGuy]

I think it's possible someone on the GoW dev team knew about this game and passed their ideas off as if they were original. Song writers for pop artists often take ideas (or straight steal) from obscure bands.

[@gamingenthusiast5450]

Gow's ideas are objectively their own They got inspired from some games and improved upon their inspired elements These games do not include this game

[@randomgod6371]

@@gamingenthusiast5450 lmao stop crying

[@SupermanNew52]

Led Zeppelin ripped off tons of songs from lesser known bands and people. This stuff happens all the time and this guy doesn't give any credit to Rygar or Shinobi because he's too much of a GoW fanboy lol.

[@lazyvoid7107]

@@randomgod6371 Xbox fanboy right here

[@TheMixedPlateFrequency]

Seeing the age of the GOW developers and creators. They most likely heard and played the original Rygar and the remake.

[@bern9642]

it being obscure even makes it more likely that they took inspiration from it. It's like taking something unpolished and rough and proving that it can be something amazing

[@nanashi4147]

Rygar was super popular back in the 90's that's probably where they caught wind of it.

[@overlordmao6062]

David jaffe has talked about what games influenced GOW, and he didn't mention this game, most likely didn't know about it, he has a youtube channel and he made videos about the games he "ripped off" aside from dmc he also mentions the ps2 shinobi (which was the game that inspired Kratos' main weapon)

[@slowmercy69]

We should ask that old so and so and see what he says lol

[@casualtalk6512]

Rygar is not very popular on ps2 but it's one of the most popular games in nes I'm pretty sure they heard of rygar or even have played it

[@frankbasile3662]

Loved ps2 Shinobi,was a great game

[@DevMode951]

This game sucks lol and God of war is better I had nes it was awful on that

[@Frozen_Potata]

@Ian Novak knew it, DMC and onimusha are like people got to back in the day when it comes to hack and slash games.

[@CasualGamerPlays]

I honestly can't believe no one remembers Rygar. I remember playing Rygar in college but it didn't leave a lasting impression. There are a lot of unknown or forgotten games out there that were released on the PS2 but no one remembers. Does anyone remember playing Sphinx and The Cursed Mummy?

[@kikineptune316]

I honestly had no idea about Sphinx til I found Nitro Rad's video about it; shame most of us missed out on some hidden gems

[@xtreme1211]

Lol bro that was so contradicting. " I can't believe nobody remembers a game that didn't leave a lasting impression." Just clowning but I caught a laugh from it haha

[@awesomereviews1561]

Rygar was an arcade game, relatively famous in the 80’s. The NES version is a port of it ( it was ported to a lot of systems). So for 80’s kids it wasn’t an obscure license. In 2002 when the remake came out, it wasn’t that obscure for the one who knew about the license. It was featured in magazine and websites. David Jaffe was a teen when Rygar came out, he sure as hell knew about the original, and likely knew about the remake. Also it’s not surprising that Temco tried to revive it, SEGA was trying the same with some of its old properties ( Shinobi, Altered Beast).

[@shun0825]

this comment needs to ne highlighted due to the fact that of most japanese midde schoolers sare a bunch of an arcade head then and now

[@lazarushernandez5827]

Yeah I played Rygar in the arcade, on the NES (which was similar but expanded the game to an action adventure) and the PS2 remake. Another game that tried to make the remake rounds was Bionic Commando this time for the PS3/360 and PC.

[@thumbbusters2401]

Well said

[@jesuslejesus9051]

old heads know. great comment 👍

[@giornikitop5373]

black tiger/black dragon anyone?

[@internziko]

I can 100% believe that the creative team behind GOW all knew about Rygar and totally said to eachother "lets make a better version of that" especially since no one had heard of it. All the big geniuses started their careers ripping something off in one way or another.

[@josiahbicelis304]

Exactly I don’t understand how this guy could just dismiss the fact that this game not only looks, plays and resembles god of war in many ways but it also came out long before the first god of war and despite all that he genuinely thinks they didn’t take any inspiration from it or rip it off to some capacity. This kind of thing happens so often in the industry that there’s no point in even debating if they ripped this game off or not. Of course they did so many devs pull things like this all the time. Taking inspiration is good for all forms of art and in no way is it a bad thing but this a bit more than inspired in this case they obviously ripped this game off to a degree. I just don’t understand how he thinks that the “obscurity”of Rygar is enough to dismiss the GOW devs clearly ripping this game off to some capacity. Anybody that knows anything about Rygar knows that not only was it not obscure whatsoever in the NES days in fact it was very popular back then and the game mentioned in this video wasn’t that obscure when it came out plenty of people knew about and played it back when it came out and even drew comparisons to it while playing God of War for the first time when that came out. I want to make it clear though that even though they may have ripped it his game off to some capacity I don’t think it really is that big of a deal because they obviously had enough originality to separate it from Rygar in many ways and they did end up improving over what that game accomplished. the only thing that really bothered me about this video is the fact that this guy has such a complete lack of common sense in his reasoning.

[@rando843]

@@josiahbicelis304 I really feel like you're massively overestimating how popular Rygar in general, and especially this one game, are ngl

[@Silentguy_78]

Geniuses do not ripoff they get inspired or create original stuff

[@murta]

Exactly. It doesn't matter how popular the game was, it only takes one developer to be aware of it/bring it to the table. Embarrassingly dumb reasoning from the vid creator.

[@OYABUNxix]

I knew about Rygar and the Ps2 game before playing God of War when it came out. One of my first thoughts upon seeing Kratos' main weapons and the combat of the game was, "this looks like Rygar." God of War was primarily inspired by Onimusha before Dmc. The devs at Santa Monica wanted to make a game like it when they saw and played it. God of War's main inspiration, and why it is set in Ancient Greece and based on Greek Mythology, was the original Clash of the Titans film as well as Paul Verhoeven movies. The devs wanted to make a game that looks like Clash of the Titans but with the violence, nudity, gore and blood of a Paul Verhoeven movie. The devs considered many weapons for Kratos to use but from what I recall, they said they landed on the Blades of Chaos because of its visual identity and style especially during combat, it's easier to decipher what moves the player is doing even if the screen gets crowded with enemies; and the weapon has reach, able to keep enemies at bay while also minimizing the amount of time and distance the player has to cross to reach a far enemy; thus keeping the action going and being more offensive and aggressive. They still put in different types of weapons in the game as well as in the subsequent games, encouraging the players to try and use them as a driving goal in the later games, as a matter of fact. But, they admit that players primarily love and stick to using the main Blades. That's why they tried to design the alternate weapons in part 3 as sort of variants of it.

[@cenesm]

Cory Barlog actually speaks about being inspired by Rygar during the developement of the first God of War game in the Game Informer video "We Play God of War II With It's Director Cory Barlog" It sounds like he himself discovered the game during the making of the first GoW game but I don't know if the rest of the team was also inspired or knew about Rygar.

[@jonathanbell8887]

Nice, I’m glad he admitted it. This is so obviously a direct rip off - Rygar looks insanely nice as well. Much better than God of war which came out 3 years later.

[@contrabandresearch8409]

I've wondered this myself but because of the obscurity of Rygar, I could only imagine that if it did influence the team that made God of War that maybe someone caught a glimpse of it somewhere, maybe played it once, then forgot about it and then Rygar's ideas made their way into God of War without anyone realizing it. There is no evidence this happened but if it did somehow influence God of War, I think it was mostly by accident.

[@Mintcar923]

Apparently Rygar is obscure now for whatever reason.. But I don’t remember that being the case 2 decades ago.. People definitely knew of it from my recollection.. As of recently I’d been playing Castlevania Lords of Shadow which some say is a GOW clone.. But if you really think about it if you take OG Castlevania and put it in 3d you’re gonna find gameplay that’s really not all that dissimilar..

[@randomgod6371]

Lmao evidence? Gameplay Is almost The same kiddo

[@Mintcar923]

@@randomgod6371 The games themselves are your evidence

[@brownwallet942]

@@randomgod6371 you dont use your eyes!

[@TheMixedPlateFrequency]

Seeing the age of the GOW developers and creators. They most likely heard and played the original Rygar and the remake.

[@s.dreviews7208]

When the team who made Rygar for the PS2 were in early development, they studied the remains from Ancient Greece & the Roman Empire as references to help design the in-game world. At the start of production, in-house staff members had traveled to Greece to look at several different locations, structures & such. Photographs were taken to help create textures, and 3DS Max was used to develop the stages & character models as well. The character models were then converted into Tecmo's original format and imported into Softimage 3D to animate them while model textures were edited in Photoshop. The opening movie itself began production before the game sections. So as a whole, Rygar had just as much love poured into it's creation as GoW had. Both games have a lot of similar likenesses to them but are different enough to be their own things. It's a shame Rygar is such an obscure title, it'd be cool to see an even better version of it someday with added and refined mechanics. Thanks for sharing!

[@powderedwater67]

Where did you find all that info, was there a documentary or interview? I'd watch that.

[@GenericProtagonist118]

I think it's an interesting coincidence that Rygar and GoW have big similarities, but I'm not quite iffy on them taking some inspiration from it either. I mean it's not out of the question that at least one of the developers for God of War played this game for a while. Probably while they were brainstorming they brought this game up and said "What if we did something kinda like this?". I mean even there similarities are extremely surface level (the Sweeping chain weapon and the Greek mythological influence specifically). They probably only used those two things and after awhile it eventually became it's own thing.

[@azurablue9988]

it never became it's OWN thing man, i don't wanna be rude with you, but, if you compare it onimusha and devil may cry, what's original in god of war??? (besides the action time in videos, who is original to GoW) one small, almost usseless lilttle thing,soooo, outside of that, how it is original???? an don't tell me greek, don't tell me father killr, cuz, thats generic and cliche and, even if, God of War uses them...

[@InstiGator805]

You contradict yourself

[@mavvynne444]

@@azurablue9988 You rude af bro. I should smack you in the head. God of War is original. If you say that God of War is not original... I could say the same thing about Devil May Cry and Onimusha. 🤡🤡🤡🤡

[@truthcrusader360]

@@azurablue9988 You’re objectively wrong.

[@casualtalk6512]

Besides the story nothing much is original about god of war it was a successful attempt at bringing the hack n slash genre in the west which was mostly into fps and strategy games hack n slash genre was kind of an afterthought in western market until god of war came

[@straightjacket308]

I would love to see Dante and Kratos team up in something! Dante's "devil may care" attitude, yes pun intended, conflicting with Kratos's extreme."no bullshit" attitude would be amazing!

[@mersunarytigre]

Wasn't there and interview where the GoW devs literally admitted to having Devil May Cry as an inspiration? I wouldn't doubt that Rygar may have helped but they would've atleast mentioned it

[@DSan-kl2yc]

There could be other reasons. As in other things could have cobbled to make sometht similar. It could also be he forgot the game after it left an impression, or some other team members. He might have merged the game in his mind with Onimusha, since part 3 also had a long weapon.

[@gendoruwo6322]

If only Rygar had been a more successful franchise, we could have an epic God Of War - Rygar cross over.

[@TheGary108]

Funny enough, for the longest time I thought someone at Santa Monica must have played Rygar at some point and that influenced the original God of War. While the two games had similarities such as the chained weapon and Greek influences, they were fairly different considering that God of War went on to have multiple games and even crossed over into the Norse Pantheon not to mention I don’t recall Rygar being a half naked demigod full of rage with particular tattoos and fetish for ripping heads off.

[@Death_Vail666]

Don't forget having lots of sex! Like lots and lots of sex, whether it was with normal hot chicks or hot chick god's, Kratos was on top of it lol.

[@KABLAMMATS]

Because if you copy something you have to change it a little bit

[@nainmayoudavich7541]

Thats more basis for a lawsuit for many kind of properties eh

[@bern9642]

well rygar wasn't a huge success

[@khaled3433]

I played Rygar to the end back in the days then a few years after I played GOW but I didn't had the feeling that the two games were similar but with Devil may Cry I had that feeling, but I'm really happy that someone put a spotlight on this game, it reminds me of my childhood, thank you

[@MaxSonkaFlare]

I remember my father got this some time after it released, and he played it a good chunk, but felt very disappointed in it, because he played the original NES game, and the fixed camera annoyed him a lot. I don't know if he still owns the game, but I'd probably try to get him to play it again, or at least grab it for myself to play.

[@TheGingiGamer]

Ryger or God of War?

[@MaxSonkaFlare]

@@TheGingiGamer Rygar. My father had hoped it would live up to the NES game, and it disappointed him.

[@TheGingiGamer]

@@MaxSonkaFlare Oh. It doesn't look like a bad game from what's shown here. I never played the original or the remake before.

[@MaxSonkaFlare]

@@TheGingiGamer I think it's a pretty decent game from what I saw played.

[@Antonio_Ortiz]

I still have Rygar (PS2) to this day. Got it on sale used at GameStop. Played it quite a bit in the late 2000's-early 2010's. Lots of fun and totally thought of it as a PG-13 God of War.

[@Jburneyjr]

Someone would have had to play rygar to draw some inspiration. Too many of the chained hits from the shield look like some of the combos you would do in God of War. And probably why if you hit an armored character you can block midstring to prevent damage since they probably learned that from play testing Rygar.

[@behzadmirmozaffari2563]

I've played Rygar back then and I really enjoyed it and even thought of it when I first played GOW. Even if David J. did some ripping off, that's not a problem in my book. All art is copying at this point, important thing is how they do it. We know and love how it turned out. So let's just say thanks to the people who developed Rygar as they may or not have inspired a great franchise👏👏👏

[@steffdia7080]

To hell with God of War. Trash game.

[@ambidex5383]

@@steffdia7080 🤡

[@My6119]

By that logic, it's the architectural equivalent of Rome inventing the dome ceiling and the Byzantines per perfecting it.

[@Takemura76]

I had completely forgotten about this series and you unlocked a hidden box of memories stored somewhere in my brain. I loved this game. Thanks for bringing it back. I do think there was a more modern version of the game but that could just be my childhood memory playing tricks on me.

[@ricosanchez3432]

There was a wii remake but it was horrible

[@ddramos956]

I'm just glad we are all anticipating God of War Ragnarok and not Rygar Ragnarok. Whew!! We sure dodged that bullet!!

[@babafemiladipo2519]

Hahaha that was really funny....I laughed hard... Played Ryga on my PS2.. couldn't endure it at all

[@jimthar17]

Rygnarok

[@nicolausteslaus]

you are anticipating Sugar Bigblackcok

[@Christian_Ada1]

I'm anticipating my pregnancy Oh wait I don't have ovaries.....or a uterus. Nevermind

[@the__man1]

It will suck

[@Angel-fv4vg]

I remember playing this as a kid on my ps2. It was my first game I have ever played in my life. I loved so much and I was surprised by the fact that no one else talked about it. Such an underrated game.

[@brigurugi]

I have long felt GOW was a spiritual "improvement" to Rygar Ps2. The semi-metroidvania style, massive bosses, I even think it had some QTE's, the colors of the flames on vases. This needs a deeper dive. Pretty suspicious to me.

[@gamingenthusiast5450]

Gow is nothing like this generic and mediocre irrelevant garbage It is an original property inspired by some great games:dmc,ominusha and ico.

[@randomgod6371]

@@gamingenthusiast5450 shut up fanboy

[@stefanocarlocelsi1705]

maybe sony bought the original rygar and used it as a base.

[@godblow4934]

@@gamingenthusiast5450 yeah, sure

[@DSan-kl2yc]

@@gamingenthusiast5450 this game is in line with Onimusha and was considered a quality title at the time. Nothing generic(it's bananas) or mediocre. What reason is there to call it garbage?

[@GreenTeaGal01]

actually BECAUSE rygar's so obscure yet so similar to GOW i think it was ripped off. this reminds me of what happened with AVATAR. a huge chunk of the movie, aesthetic, and even blue cat people were lifted wholesale from an obscure sci-fi novel Cameron was probably hoping no one else read

[@stinkinthinkin1078]

You could say there's a similar scenario with rising zan and devil may cry, where zan came out first and had a few similarities (main character wears red and uses sword up close and guns for distance, also the stinger move input being the same and zan says "lets rock" at the start of some levels)

[@slowmercy69]

Yo Rising Zan had the sickest soundtrack!

[@stinkinthinkin1078]

@@slowmercy69 ya zan definitely has some good ones

[@Neostream]

This is a great example of how, development, marketing and management needs to work together to deliver the best game.

[@Larry]

Out of curiosirt, was Maximo before or after God of War?

[@megasoniczxx]

From a quick google search, it seems like Maximo came out about 4 years before GoW.

[@kaisarr7632]

maximo is part of ghost n goblins tho

[@OYABUNxix]

Maximo came out before. In fact, iirc there were a few Ghosts'n Goblins games for the Ps2, some in the vein of Maximo; which also had a sequel that came out before GoW. From what I recall learning from interviews, commentaries, behind-the-scenes developer diaries and documentaries all throughout the years: God of War was primarily inspired by Onimusha before Dmc. The devs at Santa Monica wanted to make a game like it when they saw and played it. God of War's main inspiration, and why it is set in Ancient Greece and based on Greek Mythology, was the original Clash of the Titans film as well as Paul Verhoeven movies. The devs wanted to make a game that looked like Clash of the Titans but with the violence, nudity, gore and blood of a Paul Verhoeven movie. The devs considered many weapons for Kratos to use and wield but from what I recall, they said they landed on the Blades of Chaos because of its visual identity and style especially during combat, it is easier to decipher what moves the player is doing even if the screen gets crowded with enemies; and the weapon has reach, able to keep enemies at bay while also minimizing the amount of time and distance the player has to cross to reach a far enemy; thus keeping the action going and being more offensive and aggressive. They still put in different types of weapons in the game as well as in the subsequent games, encouraging the players to try and use them as a driving goal in the later games, as a matter of fact. But, they admit that players primarily love and stick to using the main Blades. That's why they designed the alternate weapons in part 3 as sort of variants of it.

[@falconeshield]

You took the thought right out of my head

[@blazeblackk]

Why, hello you.

[@modyahmed3016]

Fun fact : David jaffe the developer of gow wanted the game to be like legend of Zelda ocarina of time and wanted the story to be involved in fairys however he came up with kratos a protagonist who isn't involved in fairys

[@charleschamp9826]

I remember a few gaming magazines making a big deal about Rygar being back for some reason. Still find that odd to look back on. What do you think about the Wii version?

[@crossy44]

Hold up, there's a Wii version?

[@DSan-kl2yc]

@@crossy44 battle for argus or something. It's basically the game but the hero is edited to be more anime. Some waggle. And the enemies were edited to have more humanoids.

[@dayveeman]

Great video! I think the Rygar series is cursed with fist pancake syndrome. The NES version is actually a similar story. It was a somewhat popular arcade game (the giant urns puzzles in the 2002 game are a callback to the arcade that ended each stage with a giant urn). If you look at NES history chronologically, you find a trend in arcade ports going from mostly faithful straight adaptations to complete remixes of the arcade games ingredients into something that plays better in your living room. NES Rygar is an early arcade remix game taking all the same elements and making a very different game, but it's a bit unfocused and jumbled together, it was successful in that the NES version is more popular than the arcade original, but was completely overshadowed by much better arcade remix ports like Bionic Commando or Ninja Gaiden. NES Rygar is also a proto-Metroidvania (I think the Japanese version of Metroid is technically first, but only by a few months, so it's unlikely Rygar was trying to copy it). It's usually not listed as a Metroidvania because it only has a few abilities needed to unlock areas, and it's more about grinding to buy abilities than about exploring to find them. But you can see the early DNA is in there. Again, it was completely overshadowed by Metroid which did it much better.

[@jesh7174]

I absolutely loved this game growing up and i'm so glad it's getting the attention it deserves. The story isn't much but the gameplay is great.

[@jmssun]

The game was much bigger in Japanese publications.. and was on the cover of many famous magazines.. and because of that, I do have a version because of that exposure.. the Japanese magazines were much more important back then, so don’t rule out the influence yet

[@Manjawline]

This gave good insight into what the old GOW took influence from. All this time we thought it took influence only from DMC and Ninja Gaiden

[@LegendStormcrow]

I hated the era when everything called everything a "GoW Clone." DMC all the way

[@alaacharaf_]

Same

[@mavvynne444]

@@LegendStormcrow God of War all the way bucko

[@LegendStormcrow]

@@mavvynne444 Who's cooler, a guy who fights demons and plays a guitar or some pasty guy who murdered his wife and suddenly feels bad about it, yet murders everyone else?

[@mavvynne444]

@@LegendStormcrow You can have the best of both worlds bro

[@absolutedynamite4979]

Rygar was fun as hell back in the day...but make NO MISTAKE...GoW is no rip off!

[@bambammartin1556]

I’ve heard Jaffe say GOW was in development nearly 5 years so I imagine any likeness is likely a coincidence.

[@nerflv3428]

I wanted to look that up too

[@TheGingiGamer]

They still could've used this game as inspiration

[@nerflv3428]

@@TheGingiGamer barely and not by mechanics

[@DSan-kl2yc]

That would still give it 3 years of possibly affect gow. Unless you think they had the full game developed in year 1. According to what I just looked up, development started in 2002, the year rygar came out. There's nothing wrong with this. Even rygar is building on what Onimusha started.

[@CRONNOS95]

ive been trying to figure out what this game was called for years, all i could remember was fighting the caterpillars and thats not much to go on.

[@Najstefaniji]

I see only the same combat system. Nice finding though. Aesthetics and storyline seems quite differenr

[@DSan-kl2yc]

3 points Rygar was not that obscure. Rygar was a known character, especially around the time the game came out. Like how Ico inspired prince of Persia sands of time somewhat, which moved the genre forward itself. It was a triple A flop. It was reviewed by everyone, then it was considered an underrated game, and then hidden gem ECT. It's far from impossible for them to be aware of the game since they were alive around the time it came out(as part of the industry). The fish is easy. You have a shield you can leave in place. It would hit the fish constantly while he's away. Rygar isn't a spectacle fighter. Its inspired by Onimusha, with Rygar on top, evolving the genre forward.

[@PlasticCogLiquid]

Did GoW rip off that fish boss too? I think they had practically the same boss fight in one of them.

[@emilyalucard]

I've actually been meaning to pick this game up from my local retro store had no idea it actually came out before God of war

[@rayderavakian]

I know Rygar. Everyone my generation that owned an NES knows it. We never thought it was that great but he remember it like we remember Castlevania. If you want obscure games, try Rastan. Also, yes, they did rip it off.

[@mbh9566]

I knew about this game and actually purchased it back in the day when it first released. But that was because I was a big fan of the NES Rygar game, and wanted to play the sequel. I actually thought it was a pretty decent game back then too.

[@aw000091]

This game was obscure for the general gaming public, but the games industry knows whats out there.

[@suburbansamurai3560]

I don’t remember how I came into possession of it, but I had a copy of Rygar on PS2 back in the day. I really enjoyed it! I think the soundtrack is worth mentioning, which, if I recall correctly, was fully orchestrated and sounded incredible for a PS2 game. I never beat Rygar, though. I got stuck on a late game flying boss and eventually gave up!

[@biohazarduncovered]

1st off I love the channel name and second I'm just getting round to playing Rygar on PS2 and the G.O.W similarities are surprising I think Jaffe definitely borrowed a from Rygar even if it was a little bit.

[@asinaso335]

Hi buddy i want to ask your opinion about jaffe saying that even he played rygar and finished it but he never gets inspiration from rygar to developed GoW i mean the idea of weapon that have a chaine and boss's camera angel's how rygar and kratos moves and fights and climb using there's wapons and ground explode attack looks similar what do you think?

[@biohazarduncovered]

@@asinaso335 @asinaso335 I agree they are very similar, a similar thing was said about a over the shoulder Horror game could have been Cold Fear or a game like that, and the developer said the game was in development at the same time as RE4 but games can get changed at the start of development so my guess is Jaffe was working on GOW and played a bit of Rygar or had played it and maybe sub consiensly or not he made GOW in the same vein, I always use Elysium directed by Bloomkamp where he literally used ideas from Vanquish but never gave credit to Mikami or at least I don't think he has.

[@AskDrannik]

I played Rygar back when it came out in 2002-2003, and I've been saying that GoW, at bare minimum, took inspiration from it since the day I first played GoW way back in 2005. That's not to take away from GoW itself: story and character wise, they are very different games (GoW is a lot more violent), but the setting and gameplay had so many similarities to each other that the comparison was unavoidable.

[@doncornetto]

6:53 they absolutely got that guy from soul reaver

[@dantederi5062]

It's important to remember that originality is impossible, but authenticity is what makes something truly unique. We can't expect anyone make anything without taking inspiration from something else.

[@BodieB]

Tbf the media that gets ripped off a lot of times is media that flies completely under the radar. I mean Drake made hundreds of millions of dollars following that blueprint. You have to be good at your craft regardless but if you can get a jump start by getting concepts and ideas from unseen products then you have an advantage.

[@theunholinesswithin70]

So, GOW is an absolute improvement, not a rip-off.

[@PresidentOfTheUSA]

It can be both.

[@CanonRulesSaysGod]

Rygar was dope. Very enjoyable title, I liked it more than the original GOW to be honest. Still have it lying around somewhere, the ps2 version

[@WichardDuvenage]

I've noticed this back when the first God of War came out, it just so happened that I played Rygar just before GoW. Glad to see someone eventually made a video about this 👏🏻

[@SupremeGrandmasterAzrael1]

This video helped me realize that no matter where you go people are blind and bias. From the first second I looked at this game I knew it was older than God of war.

[@scrubzone4367]

Nah really. For dude to list all of those similarities and just chalk it up to a big coincidence is crazy. Definitely a GOW Fanboy.

[@SupremeGrandmasterAzrael1]

@@scrubzone4367 are you seriously stupid enough to not understand that I said the opposite of what you think. My point is that the other game look older than God of war. Meaning it came before it .

[@donovanbradford8231]

A funny video. I picked up Rygar very recently and honestly other than a styld of weapon and setting choice these games don't have anything in common. Rygar is a noble hero trying to recuse a captured prince from a monstrous foe if this sounds like Super Mario Bros or Zelda points to you. Kratos on the other is a tough badass who by the end of the first boss battle we are given the impression is either an asshole or possibly a murdering psychopath sense not everyone wants his help. But also the tone of these games are very different God of War is heavily steeped in Greek Mythology, hell by the 30 minute mark we had talked to 3 Greek gods and battle 3 different well know Greek monsters. Vs Rygar 30 minutes in I have killed more bugs than I can count and one mutant that was called a Hecatoncerues/ hundred hander that well was three things slammed into one but says it's set in Greek Mythology but I have my doubts. Point is 30 minutes in ti the Original God of War I was sucked into the game play, brutal ton, and story. Vs Rygar 30 minutes in I took a break and realized I'm not going to ever pick this game up because calling it vanilla is an insult to vanilla, Rygar is more like a Saltine Cracker it's so plain and there isn't anything special about it. Heck even when another game with similar ideas came out a few years later no said hey this like that one game Rygar. If you like this game god bless you but having played both games any similarities are a one in a million coincidence.

[@DSan-kl2yc]

If you watched the vid you'd know the game isn't vanilla. And people did say that. People have said that for years. You not being aware of it isn't the same as people not saying it. The one in a million coincidence of being alike in similar setting within 3 years of each other in the same industry. Also both the weapon, and the destructible environments were considered unique. As well as the general quality.

[@regs7487]

Units sold doesn't really mean that one game didn't inspire another. Game devs buy other company's games all the time for both research and inspiration. Even if Rygar only sold 100 copies, 20 of them are possibly bought by game devs. So GoW could still very much ne inspired by Rygar. I actually felt that GoW was a Rygar rip off when I first played it, so you were on the right track.

[@davidcervantes7961]

It’s possible that on of the dev’s played Rygar and knew it was a bad game but saw the potential in it if done right.

[@mad-dash6448]

I mean, Kill.Switch has been cited as a big influence for shaping the modern third person cover shooter for many games…but who’s really heard of it? So I’m inclined to believe the initial theory that Rygar was the inspiration.

[@derumasforlos4285]

This honestly sounds like another weird gaming coincidence case akin to Infamous and Prototype, or the time jump levels from Titanfall 2 and Dishonored 2.

[@guitarrilho502]

Bro this sounded much more Devil May Cry than God of War to me

[@Nishimiya_Bojji]

I played the Wii version of this game, and yes, I had a good time playing it. I got Rygar for NES when I was a kid and even today I still play it every now and then. This game indeed is more inspired by the metroidvania elements on the NES version of Rygar. The first Rygar was an arcade side scroller and the rocks you mentioned came from there, they were like milestones that indicate the end of a level.

[@brettperry3737]

How would you rip off a game when the game was a ripoff of Greek and Roman mythology? I mean there have been hundreds if not thousands of books that have told a similar story with a similar protagonist as well, and again... they were just taking liberties with mythology. There are only so many armaments and character archetypes, and settings that fit the mold here. Kinda seems to me like the only people who'd have a legitimate complaint have been dead for over 2,000 years

[@McGatts]

Rygar influenced God of war definitely but could rygar do what god of war did commercially?

[@asneakylawngnome5792]

Taking inspiration and ideas isn’t a bad thing. What makes it bad is not crediting and passing it as your own.

[@epsilonxvi5675]

and then sue the orignal creator look at king of the jungle created in 1963 rip off by disney they want to sue the second season of it called Leo the white lion.

[@maxfieldstanton5005]

I think you’re forgetting another influence. Castlevania Lament of Innocence, which was Sony’s first offering of a fixed camera 3D outing of the traditional 2D Castlevania series. Incidentally, NES Rygar shares an aesthetic similar with the first and third installments of Castlevania on the NES, so in a way, Rygar seems like Tecmo’s offering of a 2D franchise going 3D around that time frame, alongside Castlevania Lament of Innocence, which uses a whip to do most of the combos and a bracer as a blocking mechanism, both resembling what would be seen in God of War. It just feels to me like different companies experiencing parallel development towards games with similar gameplay, with God of War coming out on top as the next new thing after Devil May Cry. Thanks for bringing this up. At the time, I’d thought God of War’s main competition was Ubisoft’s 3D reimagining of Prince of Persia, particularly Warrior Within.

[@thedarkone6706]

Back in the 90's, In local arcades Rygar challenges were held who can finish the game with 1 coin only.

[@streetside2833]

Ain't about who did it first it's bout who did it right

[@Dakota.Arnold]

I remember seeing Rygar in an issue of game informer when I was like 8. I’d always sit and ask myself what game it was, I could never remember the name of it. Crazy.

[@AnotherGameNerd5]

They definitely got a ton of ideas from Rygar… There’s no HUGE coincidence here.

[@captainspaulding2693]

Rygar on ps2 was actually awesome all the different abilities and disc armor variations made the combo system a lot of fun.

[@marlonrodriguez9623]

Okay hold up. Yes it’s a small title. However, when you make games for a living. If it was me anyway. I would pick a genere and looks at all competitors on that genre. I was to learn from successes and failures. Very plausible god of war ripped off the concept but vastly improved on it .

Castlevania lament of innocense was first than DmC and God of war.

[@cntipede1000]

Rygar was one of my favorite games growing up

[@0001captainawesome]

The actual combat is much more reminiscent of Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones. Other than that the only thing that strongly rwminds me of G.o.W. 1 is the camera angles, which also were present in the Prince of Persia games.

[@averyzaliasylvia4026]

I still remember when I saw Rygar disc box collecting dust at gamestop, bought it for a cheap and it surprised me how good the game actually is, and back then nothing was like it.

[@deronlouis88louis52]

I remember Rygar with the disc shield. Early two thousands when it came out. But yeah I think GOW was probably inspired by or ripped off of Rygar. Kratos bald head was probably thrown in to throw things off.

[@Mœrningstar]

If there’s one thing a rather popular video about that whole “Lion King ripped off Kimba the White Lion” debacle is that even when two properties bear a lot of similarities, it is entirely within reason that they can very well exist independent of one another due to their similarities simply being built on many very popular and well established tropes.

[@ThaNarc]

I always thought god of war was a greek version of Onimusha.

[@tf2redpie]

that amount of hit stun i saw during 6:00 was giving me dead rising 1 flashbacks

[@boycottactivision]

The thing that separates GOW From both it's predecessors is Scale. We didn't really see Games with Enemies, or Level Set pieces like that until GOW.

[@melxvee6850]

Wouldn't call it a Rip off, God of War really embarrasses Greek mythology and has quite the in depth story and I'm glad there's no princess to save or acting like a Hero like in Rygar or else God of war really would be a rip off🙃 Kratos is just amazing for what he is and the Gameplay is a lot more smoother even if the mechanic's are inspired by Rygar

[@christiankettlewell]

yooooo! i'm so glad someone highlighted this! i've always collected older games and i remember back in 2017/2018, i had bought this because i remembered ads in magazines for it and i knew about the NES game, and i was immediately blown away by the similarities to GoW!

[@GTDDR]

Back then my brother got Rygar when it launch and we enjoyed it so much, then when we got God of war we where always saying ''this is so much like Rygar''. we loved this game even if by today standards feels clunky and unpolished. Glad you mentioned this game!

[@Mk_Otaid]

There's still the possibility of somebody in the art team (or any team) coming across this game, as underrated as it was while they were still at early stages of GoW's development. They probably cycled through anything even remotely resembling Devil May Cry and looking into which "ingredients" they could gather and throw into their soup. This happens a lot in the music industry, in fine arts, it damn well could happen back then in the entertainment industry as it surely (and sometimes quite shamelessly) happens today. It is an important part of researching before commiting towards creating something unique or at least something that pretty much works when put onto the market. Seeing what previous and similar ideas from other people worked or didn't and choosing what you can avoid or incorporate into your own work, albeit trying to refine it as it's own unique thing. This has been happening forever and again, it's entirely possible that Rygar was not even mentioned when the brainstorming was still happening even though someone from the team possibly drew from it. In the end God of War sold better and became more renowned because it prevailed on virtually all fundamental aspects of a game. Even if (in an alternate universe) the creator of Rygar had proof that GoW "ripped them off", the world wouldn't give a crap because it's not just about having ideas and having them first. It's about how you present them and ultimately "sell" them to your audience.

[@CesarIsaacPerez]

Back in college I remember reading about Rygar in a magazine that was recommending games similar to God of War.

[@salamqadoori4951]

In the video there was a clip of a movie,. Does anyone know it’s name?

[@GOGOAKUMAN]

Rygar was a big Arcade hit before an NES game. Plus it was really good on NES, so it's normal that it was revived.

[@saurophaganax_0]

I mean if anything, what I could possibly imagine (before going to watch Jaffe's response) In a crazy scenario, perhaps Play Station anticipated Rygar to be a huge iconic success but seeing that it didn't, they allowed to borrow or sold the gameplay idea to Sta Monica, who then proceeded to absolutely upgrade it (because there's way more to explore on the combo section of GoW 2005). And that's about it. Because despite the helenistic inspiration, there's absolutely no way you can compare whatever kinda plot Rygar has with the masterpiece legendary writer Marianne Krawczyk intended Kratos to have. It's not impossible but idk, I'd say DMC is even more similar even without the chain weapon

[@SkeletalRavenArts2]

Nah, we played that back in the day!it was fun

[@hebanker3372]

I'm surprised nobody mentioned Prince of Persia,perhaps the most influental game for God of War.Especially the second game,Warrior Within,came a year before God of War and there are so many similarities,especially in the tone and the puzzles.The second God of War has even a time travel plot.

[@dragon92ize]

it's more Castelvania than God of War same chaind weapon and Metroid style.