Shelved titles for God of War, Twisted Metal; Kratos’ original name revealed

[Cue opening cinematic from God of War] “The gods of Olympus have abandoned me… Now, there is no hope.” “And Dominus cast himself from the highest mountain in all of Gree-” Wait, what? Domi-who? David Jaffe has revealed a list of working titles for God of War, Twisted Metal, and Calling All Cars that never saw the light of day, including, of course, a bit of history on Kratos‘ original name – complete with pizza delivery jokes! More in the full article.

Apparently, even Kratos had a childhood nickname. Well, not so much canonically in the story, but in terms of video game creation, he had a different name than Kratos during the early stages of God of War development. In fact, it turns out that “God of War” might not have been called “God of War” to begin with!

In a blog post from David Jaffe yesterday, a list of abandoned working titles for God of War, Twisted Metal, and Calling All Cars was revealed. Some of the titles here are pretty easy to see why they didn’t make the light of day, but the other titles are still also made of win:

TWISTED METAL could have been named:

URBAN ASSAULT
CARS AND ROCKETS…I STILL love this…no one else does tho 🙁
HIGH OCTANE
FIRESTORM

GOD OF WAR could have been called:

AT THE HANDS OF THE GODS
DARK ODYSSEY
OMEGA
Just the OMEGA SIGN and no name….

CALLING ALL CARS was gonna be:

CRIMINAL CRACKDOWN
DAMAGE!

Well, the Omega symbol (i.e. Ω) is still somewhat recognized by the public as an icon to refer to the GoW franchise, as seen in this kickass PSP mod. But as for Kratos’ name, it was actually originally Dominus – with Jaffe making a side note that he had the team running on some pizza delivery jokes along the lines of “Get the door, it’s Dominus!” for a full year!

Now some little trivia here… I did some digging to confirm what my Latin Basic 101 lessons dictate, and yes, the term “Dominus” is used to call someone a “Master” or “Sire/sir”, or maybe “Lord”, as in someone who owns a manor. But stranger still, “Dominus” is a title that was once used to apply to clergymen. Yes. Clergymen. Imagine that. Kratos, the holy man of Sparta!