Art Shift: The flashbacks in-game are done in a heavily stylized and trippy art style in the fashion of classic Greek pottery artwork.

She actually name drops this trope when Kratos demands to know why she's suddenly cool with him killing Zeus.

Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: Athena's Heroic Sacrifice to save Zeus has turned her into a transparent, angel-like figure.

In particular, Hades has several legitimate grievances with Kratos and Hephaestus only wants to protect his daughter.

Anti-Villain: For the most part, the gods, while definitely of the jerkass variety, are doing all they can to defend themselves from Kratos, who is the aggressor in the whole situation.

Kratos kills Hermes by chopping both of his legs off.

A Bolt of Divine Retribution from Zeus blasts Gaia's left hand almost clean off, leaving it hanging by a mass of root-like tendons.

And I Must Scream: The Head of Helios is implied to still be alive, as it screams when you activate it.

And then it turns out what he was looking for was inside him all along.

Kratos goes searching for Pandora, to undo the Olympus Flame, and in the process lays waste to all Olympus.

And then they get their asses kicked easily by the gods, to the extent that by the time Kratos catches up with them, all but two of them have died.

The previous game ended with Kratos freeing the Titans, with them storming Olympus.

It's revealed in the ending that he wasn't actually evil, he was just consumed by the evils of Pandora's Box, which came out when Kratos opened it.

if it wasn't for Envy from Pandora's Box cursing him. Though it was implied that he might still be the legendary hero. Adaptational Villainy: In this game, Hercules, rather than the legendary hero most fiction depicts him as, is shown as arrogant and jealous of Kratos' accomplishments, as well as Zeus' apparent Parental Favoritism for the Spartan.

Actor Allusion: Kevin Sorbo shows up, once again voicing Hercules.God of War III contains examples of the following tropes (Beware of unmarked spoilers): The game got an enhanced rerelease in Summer of 2015 for the PlayStation 4.

God of war 3 labyrinth