The New God Of War Received Inspiration From An 8-Bit NES Classic

While the new God of War looks to go way beyond where previous releases in the series have, its roots are still pretty well inspired by the likes of the old-school.

We saw how great the new game looked this past Monday during Sony's pre-E3 press conference, with its complex battle system and its unhinged carnage, but it turns out that game director Cory Barlog felt inspired by a long-lost classic from the NES era when it came to putting the game's world together.

Talking with GamesRadar, Barlog explained that the game's explorative spirit was actually inspired by the Nintendo classic The Legend of Zelda. This includes one particular situation when you had to drop a bomb in front of a wall with a crack in it, which, when blown up, would open up a new path for Kratos to go down – nice little nod to the old-school, indeed.

While the game won't be completely open-world (despite hints saying it would be), there will be multiple paths that the player can take when it comes to reaching a certain objective, and they can be opened up simply by doing a little digging around. For that matter, by taking these alternative paths within the game, you could very well open up additional narrative as well, getting more of the back story in regards to Kratos and his son, as well as the world the two of you are venturing through.

Barlog did indicate that you'll have to do some digging to find these cues, as they won't always be in the wide open. That said, when you find them, they're sure to be a pleasant surprise, especially if you grew up with games like The Legend of Zelda, or other adventure games of those types. Hmmmm…it makes us wonder if the game will have any sort of nod to Star Tropics, for that matter.

We'll have to wait a little bit longer to find out just how many old-school surprises God of War is harboring, as the game won't be coming our way until sometime next year on PlayStation 4. Still, it should be worth the wait.