Note: “This is Playstation’s announced date, not yet confirmed as shipped.”

God of War: Laufey — Faye’s Story Was Always Worth Telling

I have been a fan of the God of War franchise for a long time. Kratos is one of the most compelling characters in gaming — a Spartan warrior who tore through the entire Greek pantheon with his bare hands and his rage, and then somehow became even more interesting when Sony Santa Monica rebuilt him from the ground up in 2018 and gave him a son, a second chance, and a whole new mythology to destroy. I love Greek mythology, I love Norse mythology, and I love what this series did by moving between the two across the last two entries. So when God of War Laufey was announced at the PlayStation State of Play — a full 20-minute gameplay reveal, a new protagonist, a completely new setting — I was locked in from the first second. This franchise has earned every bit of my attention, and this announcement did nothing to change that.

The big headline is that Kratos is not the main character this time. His wife,e Faye, is. And before I get into what the game actually looks like and why I’m genuinely excited about it — I want to address something directly, because it needs to be said.

Some people online have been weird about this. Upset that Kratos is stepping back, framing it as some kind of betrayal of the franchise, being dismissive about a female lead in a way that has nothing to do with the game itself and everything to do with the kind of nonsense that follows any big gaming announcement like this. And I genuinely don’t understand that reaction. Faye is not a side character being handed the keys to a franchise she has nothing to do with. She is Kratos’ wife. She is Atreus’ mother. She is the reason the entire Norse saga happened in the first place — her death, her plan, her legacy is threaded through every moment of the last two games. This is not a spin-off. This is not a detour. This is a part of the main story that we never got to see, and frankly, it’s one of the most interesting parts of it.

Faye Has Always Been The Most Mysterious Part Of This Story

If you played God of War 2018 and Ragnarök,k you know that Faye’s presence haunts both games even though she never appears alive in either of them. Every major decision Kratos makes in the Norse saga is shaped by her. The path they take, the name they give Atreus, the journey to scatter her ashes — all of it is Faye’s design playing out exactly as she planned it. She knew more than she ever told anyone. She prepared for things nobody else could see coming. And we never got to understand why, or how, or what she was actually doing behind the scenes while Kratos was learning how to be a father and Atreus was learning how to be a god.

Laufey answers that question. The game picks up with Kratos and Atreus saying goodbye to Faye — and then we follow her into the afterlife, into a place called the Everywhen, where gods from across every mythology fight for power in a land full of dangerous magic. Faye wakes up dead and immediately finds out that the plans she put in place to protect her family are under threat. So she does what any Kratos-adjacent person would do — she starts fighting her way through it. The setup is genuinely brilliant, and it makes complete sense within the lore of the franchise. I’m surprised it took this long for Sony Santa Monica to go here.

The Combat Looks More Elegant — And That’s Exactly Right For Faye

I watched the full 20-minute gameplay trailer, and the thing that immediately stood out was how different the combat feels compared to what we’re used to. Kratos fights like a force of nature — brutal, heavy, relentless, the kind of combat that makes you feel the weight of every single hit. There’s blood, there’s rage, there’s an axe being buried into things that probably didn’t deserve it. That is Kratos. That is perfect for Kratos. Faye is something else entirely.

Faye’s combat is elegant. That’s the word that kept coming to me while watching her move. She fights with a sword and magic, and the way she moves through encounters feels precise and deliberate rather than overwhelming. There’s a mechanic where she strikes an enemy with her golden palm hard enough to detach their soul from their body — and then she can attack the soul directly, knock it into other enemies, use it to set up combos. It sounds wild on paper, and it looks absolutely stunning in motion. The ribbons on her sword are voiced and interactive, which is one of the stranger details in the reveal, but it works visually in a way I didn’t expect.

The shift in combat style isn’t just a cosmetic difference — it reflects who Faye is as a character. Kratos overwhelms. Faye outmanoeuvres. Kratos hits harder than anything in the room. Faye finds the weakness in everything in the room and exploits it with precision. Watching the trailer,r I kept thinking this is what her fighting style should feel like, and the fact that Sony Santa Monica built something mechanically distinct rather than just reskinning the Kratos combat system tells you they understood that completely.

Everywhen Is The Most Interesting Setting This Franchise Has Used

The setting deserves its own conversation. The Everywhen — the afterlife of the gods, where mythologies from across history collide — is a genuinely inspired choice for this story. God of War has always been about mythology, but it has always been about one mythology at a time. Greek. Then Norse. Laufey throws open the doors and brings in gods from everywhere, all competing for power in the same space. That premise alone opens up storytelling possibilities that neither of the previous games had access to.

The visual identity of Everywhen, from what was shown in the trailer,r looks rich and strange in a way that feels distinct from both the Greek and Norse settings that came before it. It’s not gritty and grounded the way Midgard was. It’s not ancient and sun-bleached the way Greece was. It has its own character — dangerous and beautiful and slightly wrong in a way that makes sense for a place where dead gods go to fight each other for eternity. I’m very curious to see how much of it is explorable and how the different mythologies are represented within it.

A Talking Sword and a Gelatinous Cube Walk Into The Afterlife

One of the more unexpected details in the reveal is Faye’s companions. A talking sword — specifically the enchanted ribbons on the sword, voiced by Perlina Lau — and a gelatinous cube, voiced by Jack Quai,d come to her aid in the Everywhen. On paper, er, that sounds bizarre. Watching it in the trailer, it actually works in the same way Atreus worked as a companion in 2018 — there’s personality there, there’s clearly going to be a relationship that develops over the course of the game, and the contrast between Faye’s serious warrior energy and whatever the gelatinous cube brings to the dynamic has genuine comedic potential. Sony Santa Monica has always been good at companion writing. I’m willing to trust them with this one.

And There’s A God of War TV Series Coming Too

Separate from the game announcement — Amazon is building a live-action God of War TV series, and the cast is coming together, seriously. Ryan Hurst is playing Kratos, Callum Vinson is Atreus, and Sonya Walger is joining as Freya. Behind the camera, they have Ronald D. Moore — the person behind Battlestar Galactica — as showrunner, and Frederick E.O. Toy,e who directed Shōgun, as a director on the project. That is a genuinely impressive team for an adaptation of this scale. The first image of Ryan Hurst as Kratos that was shared looked the part — the framing was deliberately reminiscent of the opening to the 2018 game, and it landed correctly.

Between Laufey and the TV series, God of War is having a moment right now. The franchise that started as a pure Greek mythology action game and reinvented itself completely in 2018 is now expanding in two completely different directions at the same time. Both of them look promising. Both of them have the right people involved. As a fan of this series since Kratos first picked up the Blades of Chao, this is a good time to be paying attention.

Final Thoughts — This Is The God of War Story I Didn’t Know I Needed

God of War Laufey is currently in development for PlayStation 5 with no release date confirmed yet. That’s the only disappointing part of this announcement — we have to wait without knowing how long. Everything else about the reveal was exactly what I wanted from this franchise’s next step. A protagonist who has been one of the most compelling off-screen presences in modern gaming is getting her own story. A combat system built specifically around who she is, rather than just adapting what already existed. A setting that opens up the mythology of this universe in ways the previous games never could. And a studio that has already proven twice over that they know exactly what they’re doing with this franchise.

Faye deserves this. The story deserves this. And anyone still complaining that Kratos isn’t the lead needs to go back and play both games again and pay attention to how much of everything that happened was her plan all along. She was always the most important person in this story. We’re finally getting to see why.

We’ll be covering every new update on God of War Laufey as it drops — release date, new trailers, gameplay details. Bookmark this page and check back.

Mr. Sano

Hello! I am Mr. Sano Ethan, a content creator, variety gamer, and the driving force behind Kick Of Draft. With over 6 years of hands-on experience across PC, console, and indie gaming,