• Posted September 15th, 2012 at 08:21 EDT by Mike Harradence
• 4 Comments

Welcome back to PSU.com’s on-going badass bosses series, where we dedicate time to some of gaming’s most epic boss scraps. Last time around we scrutinized the PS2 classic Devil May Cry, specifically the clash between Dante and his nightmarish adversary, Nelo Angelo. In our latest endeavour, we bring things up to date with the titanic God of War III battle against the screen-filling Cronos.

Sony’s God of War series has provided some of the best boss battles on any format for the past decade or so, and Cronos continues to perpetuate this epic gameplay tradition. Standing hundreds of feet tall and absolutely dwarfing bald brute Kratos, the hulking titan is easily one of the biggest bosses of the entire series, or videogames in general for that matter. The again, as the Big Cheese in the titan army, we would expect no less. Having been banished to the Pits of Tartarus by a paranoid Zeus, Cronos, who has a bone to pick with Kratos after erroneously believing our hero killed Gaia, squares up against the Ghost of Sparta for a colossal ruck that ends up with Kratos being swallowed by his enemy – literally.

Still, you have to admire Kratos’ front, and sure enough players are tasked with bringing down this gargantuan foe despite the legendary warrior being small enough for Cronos to grip between his thumb and index finger. Your enemy will employ a variety of tactics to try and squash Kratos into a sticky paste, including slapping him with his almighty pimp hand of doom, and trying to crush him between his meaty fingers. Fortunately, players can easily dodge these attacks with some quick foot work, or by hammering away at the buttons prompted on-screen. Still, be prepared for a long slog of a fight.

Luckily, Kratos can blind his mammoth foe using Solar Flare, triggering a sequence where you soar through the air and land on Cronos’ hand. Here you’ll have to vanquish some basic sword-wielding grunts before focusing your attacks on your enemy’s hand wound, attacking yet more minor baddies. Cronos will attempt to squish you multiple times, though exposes his finger nail allowing Kratos to hack away at it to avoid a messy death. Eventually our bald hero will rip the nail right off in a move that looks just as excruciatingly painful as it undoubtedly feels to the hulking titan. Unperturbed however, Cronos continues the battle against his miniscule pain in the arse, forcing Kratos to blind him once again and eventually grapple his way to Cronos’ stomach.

The whole dynamic of the battle begins to shift here. After duffing up yet more minions and spotting the Onyx in an open wound, Kratos find himself sandwiched between Cronos’ mighty palms, forcing you to hammer away at the circle button to fend him off. After a spot of upside down combat, you’ll grapple your way to a platform where you have to slug it out with a Cyclops before finally being gobbled up by Cronos. Yes, Kratos is now inside his gargantuan foe, and after sliding down his throat, begins hacking up the titan’s vital innards. In one of the most viscerally, brutally satisfying sequences of the whole game, our bald-headed hero literally cuts his way out of Cronos’ body, before making his way up to the hulking beast’s forehead and finishing him off in stylistically bloody fashion.

Remember that old saying, ‘the bigger they are, the harder they fall’? Cronos found that out the hard way.