There have been exciting questions on everyone’s mind since the conclusion of the Norse chapter in Santa Monica Studio’s God of War. Questions have come to mind, like, what will happen next? What will happen to Kratos and Atreus in the future? What does the future of God of War look like? There have been many theories running around on Reddit about the end of the game, and one of the biggest ones is whether Kratos has retired from his role as the god of war.
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Kratos’ Journey
Kratos has had a long and harrowing journey as the face of God of War, fraught with plenty of sorrow, loss, and, of course, wrath. Luckily, we have been able to follow along with a lot of his harrowing journey. Of course, Kratos has retired from being the god of war before, but is it for good this time?
God of War saw the beginning of Kratos’ journey through the Greek pantheon. He starts working for the Greek gods, and the past reveals that he was once a bloodthirsty but powerful captain in the Spartan army. When faced with death, he promised to serve the Greek gods if they would agree to spare his men and provide them with the power to destroy their enemies. Ares, the Greek god of war, agreed, bonding him with the Blades of Chaos.
Ares set up an attack in which Kratos killed his wife and daughter in a blind fury. When he realised what he had done, he vowed to renounce his servitude to the Greek gods and vowed to slay Ares. He eventually manages to do so, and Athena gifts him a new set of blades, which marks when Kratos officially becomes the new God of War. The rest of the Greek trilogy is competed in God of War II, God of War III and in the several series spinoffs, God of War: Betrayal, God of War: Chains of Olympus, God of War: Ghost of Sparta, and God of War: Ascension.
To everyone’s surprise and immense happiness, the series was rebooted with God of War in 2018. In this version, Kratos has settled down again with another family and has had a son. But unfortunately, his wife has passed away, and he and his son must journey to scatter her ashes in the realm of the Norse gods. During the journey, they discover that his wife wasn’t really who she said she was and was far more powerful than they once believed.
Kratos’ son Atreus discovers that he is prophesied to be the reincarnation of Loki and that his fate is intrinsically connected to the future of the Norse realm. In the events of the most recent game, Kratos and Atreus must work together to try and prevent the end of the world in Norse terms and prevent Ragnarök. To do so, they fight many Norse gods who won’t help them but are trying to get in their way.
Once they accomplish this and prevent the end of the Norse realm, Kratos is regarded by many of the mortals of the Norse realm as a hero and a god. Wouldn’t that be the perfect time for Kratos to finally retire from his long life of war and wrath and protect the Norse realm from part of the pantheon?
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What Will Happen In The Next Game?
There have been a lot of suggestions about what might happen in the next game and what the ending of God of War Ragnarök means for the rest of the franchise. Many players seem to think that Kratos has gotten a bit old for his role as the God of War and that Atreus will take up the mantle in his own adventures. What these adventures might be is entirely open to interpretation. Atreus, although definitely, the son of Kratos and has his fury in him, doesn’t seem like the kind to go out looking for trouble.
Instead, a lot about him still needs to be discovered. For example, he can read runes and speak to animals. This is possibly due to his connection to the trickster god Loki and an avenue that could be explored. Along that vein, there is also the possibility that his half-giant lineage could come into play. His mother, although passed, was a giantess, and according to the lore of the game, most giants sport the ability of prophecy. Being a character who is so connected to prophecy already, it would be interesting to see how some of his other skills could manifest in the future.
There have been a fair amount of theories about what the events of the next game might be, and there are still plenty of pantheons to be explored. One suggestion was that Atreus might be kidnapped by another Pantheon to understand Kratos’s weakness. Although this could go one of two ways.
Of course, Kratos would probably go after his son if he were to be kidnapped, bringing the last Spartan out of retirement and not fitting with everyone’s theory that he will no longer be the protagonist of the God of War series.
The other possibility is that if Atreus were to be kidnapped, he would have grown up quite a bit and could possibly defend himself perfectly fine. We would then have a game following Atreus fighting for his freedom, perhaps using the Spartan wrath he inherited from his great father. This will make sense if Kratos has retired, although it is difficult to believe that the stoic but doting father would leave him to look after himself.
Atreus has also been talking about breaking away from the protective wing of his father and going his own way. So this would be the perfect opening for us as players to follow him as the protagonist as he tries to figure out who he is and how he fits into the world as the son of the God of War, basically in two pantheons and a half-giant prophesied god himself.
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