God of War: Ragnarök has just been released for PC and was almost immediately review-bombed on Steam. This is seemingly mainly in protest of Sony’s controversial requirement that a PSN account is required to play it on Steam, despite the game having no online features, where in several regions/countries it is not possible to create an account and a lot of extra work is required (such as submitting photo proof of who you are).
For example, one user writes:
“The fact that this game, a SINGLEPLAYER game, forces you to sign in to a network which is notorious for data breaches is absolutely ridiculous.”
Another commenter explains their dissatisfaction this way:
“The PSN account requirement (for a solely singleplayer game) however, is absolute Sony bullcrap garbage. Learned the hard way during a 4hr car ride that even if you perform your first launch on steamdeck, it will just crash if if fails to sign in to PSN on launch while you are offline. Absolutely horrible design on Sony’s part. 100% do not buy if that will ruin your experience.”
At the time of writing, God of War: Ragnarök has over 6000 user reviews on Steam and an overall Mixed rating from users. In addition to the PSN account requirement, several PC players seem to be struggling with the game’s performance a bit in, where it seems that the game “slows down” and the performance slowly gets worse and worse the more you play it. In addition, several seem to complain about support for hand controllers of various brands (including Sony’s own). In one review we can read:
“Fix the f***ing controller controls. Controller doesnt work unless using steam input which will randomly stop working. Trying to change the buttons in game directs you to steam input, but changing it there doesnt change the in game prompt.”
God of War: Ragnarök has got off to a slow start on Steam and after the opening weekend has not managed to reach even half of the maximum number of concurrent players that the original had. We guess the Mixed rating and all the complaints won’t exactly boost sales any further.