On the other hand, Asura's rage is innate because of his demigod powers. There's little about it that serves him, other than being his one definable emotional trait. Further, his wife is killed and his daughter is kidnapped not because of anything he does, but because of the villain's overarching scheme.Īs for the nature of their ever-present rage, I've noted before that Kratos's anger, which is at first justifiable toward Ares, grows petulant over time. From the outset, he's a pawn in a coup enacted by his comrades, framed for the murder of the emperor, and branded a traitor. Whereas Kratos's thirst for revenge came from, in general, being a violent fool that pleaded to Ares for power and became a zealot, leading to his family's deaths, Asura is never under any such delusions. You know, because he's supposed to be a badass.Īsura, on the other hand, is a more sympathetic figure. He goes about murdering everything in his path with very few exceptions, and falls into the trap of being more or less defined by his thirst for slaughter above all else, with a side of sex minigames. He becomes less a tragic hero or antihero, and more just straight-up petulant, like an angry teenager. But then the sequels only serve to regress him. The first God of War is a tale of revenge and redemption as Kratos makes up for being tricked into murdering his own wife and child. If you care at all to experience the game for yourself, don't read any further!ĭespite that advantage, Kratos's characterization exists more or less on a downward slope. Warning! The rest of this article is scattered with spoilery references to things that happen in Asura's Wrath. Namely, that in terms of their characterizations and despite their similarities, Asura is the better, more realized of the two, even taking into account that Kratos has had more games in which to develop. But even with that being the case, I felt the urge to add my own views to the argument. I'm sure that, given their obvious similarities, comparisons have already been drawn between Asura, the rage-fueled protagonist of Asura's Wrath, and Kratos, the rage-fueled protagonist of the God of War series.