Well I am a God of War fan and I know I would have liked a few more changes to make the game feel like it was designed for the current gen. They changed the combat quite a bit with the new weapons and the items. The puzzles were also pretty neat but I found them to be too far apart.

I agree that there weren't enough puzzles as the previous games. But for me, the advancements in combat made it OK to me. 

The weakest thing for me (as it was in prior games) was the platforming. Unless you were using a direct item meant for that specific case, jumping from platform to platform and things like that still felt incredibly clunky and inaccurate. The invisible walls and fixed camera were also things I was annoyed with.

Inaccurate ? I don't get it. God of War was never about "accurate" platforming. You just jump in the general direction of where you need to go and thats it. Speaking of platforming, God of War III was so much better than God of War 1 & 2 in terms of annoying rope swinging/climbing, moving along ropes, climbing walls with your blade stuck into them. There were so much less of them.

The game is absolutely beautiful. I would have loved to spin the camera around Kratos and appreciate the great work Santa Monica Studios put into the game. Another thing I was kind of annoyed with was the lack of health bar during boss battles. I understand that this was meant to make the game more immersive and cinematic and it did help. But I personally like boss health bars. I played it on the hardest difficulty available on my first play through and having a health bar would've helped me concentrate a lot better. But that's a personal thing. I respect their decision to make the game more cinematic.

The problem with clearing up the right analog stick for camera movement is that they'd have to remap the dodging. And I liked the fact that you don't have to press a button to dodge in God of War. So much easier and responsive, imo. And the lack of health bar thing is again your opinion. I don't see where you are coming from about the boss health bar thing either cause that was never in God of War II.

Plus, I think the camera did an extremely good job in keeping you at the action....especially with the zooming ins and outs in the first boss battle, etc. I thought it was fantastic, and I definitely don't want to struggle with controlling a camera in the middle of all that frantic action.

For some reason the game just didn't feel like a fully cohesive package to me and I felt disconnected from the experience. It annoyed me that the production values and what was going on in the game and on my screen was absolutely maniacal but at the same time I just couldn't get into it all. I still haven't figured out what it is. Maybe the lack of physical feedback? Maybe the slippery-ness of handling Kratos? I have no idea.

Slippery-ness ? Kratos, I thought, handled much tighter than he was in God of War II (and most definitely GoW 1). He was also better than some other "GOTY" main characters like say, Nathan Drake in Uncharted who is a bit awkward to me. 

Nonetheless it's a great game (and my highest rated PS3 exclusive for the year - but Heavy Rain is my personal fav.). It just isn't GOTY material to me. I agree with your blurb about opinions. It doesn't matter what the publications say GOTY is or what game is best at w/e. I walk to my own beat and appreciate all the great gaming that has come my way this year. And I fully respect gamers who do the same and not buy into the hype of media. If GOW3 is your game of the year it's all fine by me. I'm glad you found something great about it and enjoyed it so much.

My GOTY is actually Halo Reach but that's a whole other essay I'll write when the thread comes by. Darksiders is just the underdog game I'm rooting for this year.  And agreed. Hack and Slashers were a gold-mine of a genre this year.

for fuk sake it hasn't even been nominated.it's such a disgrace to gaming.The game is gaming at its finest.

Hopefully VGC will give it an award or something.games this good need recongnition.

all the games i loved this year alll receieved an award .like GOWIII or heavy rain or vanquish.but not bayonetta.Instead that broing RDR gets all the awards :(

what do you think?do you think platinum games deserves an award for this outstanding game??

if they have a award for " worst ps3 port " , i think is for this they don´t put this game to a higher level...

I only played the ps3 version and to be honest? I have no idea what people complained about.

It's in my shortlist, what do I win?