God of War Ragnarok developer Sony Santa Monica has shown off a number of character designs, with some familiar faces and some imposing new arrivals.
This article discusses some narrative details of God of War, so consider this a spoiler warning.
In an instagram post following the game’s first official trailer during last night’s PlayStation Showcase, we got an entire gallery of characters. Several characters are making their return from the original game, including Kratos, a slightly lankier Atreus, Mimir, and dwarves Brok and Sindri. There’s also Freya, although her design is somewhat different – she looks somewhat disheveled, wracked by grief after the events of God of War.
The gallery also offers a closer look at a handful of new characters. First up is Angrboda, last of the Jotunn. In Norse mythology, she’s the mother of giant wolf Fenrir and apocalyptic snake Jormungandr, but Sony Santa Monica might have found a way around that here. In that same mythology, however, Angrboda is also the wife of Loki, a name you may remember is applied to Atreus in the first game.
Next up is Durlin, the scholarly-looking dwarf with the small squid on his shoulder. At a quick glance, the mythology doesn’t seem to provide an exact match for that name, but it could be Dvalinn, who was said to have introduced writing to the dwarves.
Finally, there are two seriously-imposing figures. Tyr is the Norse god of war, and much of the trailer focuses on Kratos and Atreus locating him, finding that he towers above his southern counterpart. Finally, there’s Thor, who’ll be voiced by Ryan Hurst, best known for his roles in Sons of Anarchy and The Walking Dead. Until now, we’ve only been able to identify Thor by his iconic hammer-and-lightning combo, but Ragnarok veers pretty far away from the MCU hunk we’ve come to know – this version of Thor is boasting some impressive heft, with an imposing beard to match.
While his character isn’t included in the trailer, we also learned of the return of another character. Ratatoskr, the rodent messenger god, features as a runic animal in God of War, where he’s voiced by Troy Baker. In Ragnarok, Ratatoskr will return, but Baker won’t – instead, the character will be voiced by SungWon Cho, best known for his roles in Borderlands 3 and his extremely good YouTube channel.
God of War Ragnarok is coming to PS4 and PS5 some time in 2022.
