"God of War: Chains of Olympus is about Cory Barlog," opens God of War: Chains of Olympus creative director and God of War II director Cory Barlog. "It's a Cory Barlog story about Cory Barlog taking down Cory Barlog. But Barbie Horse Adventure somehow factors in. There is Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen--"

"Shhhh," interjects the game's director and co-founder of developer Ready at Dawn, Ru Weerasuriya. "Don't talk about that project."

"It's supposed to be our secret," Barlog continues. "And My Little Pony. All secret."

With Barlog once again highlighting underappreciated licensed games, thus begins my impromptu chat with two of the leading men behind Ready at Dawn's upcoming God of War: Chains of Olympus for the PSP.

A prequel set ten years before SCE Santa Monica's original God of War, the PSP version looks virtually identical to its PS2 brethren and retains all the chaos and brutal on-screen action the series is known for. While Kratos swings his chains overhead and tears apart a number of Persian invaders, the Persian fleet and the defending army exchange mortars in the background. Later on in the demo, a large cyclops is about to crush Kratos with a pillar, but just then a giant fire-breathing basilisk unexpectedly crashes through the wall and devours the beast, forcing players to face off against an even larger and more formidable foe. Of course, this being God of War and all, it should come as no surprise that Kratos eventually jabs his blades through one of the basilisk's eyes.

In fact, the only noteworthy difference Olympus presents over the past console editions is that of control--instead of using the right analog stick to dodge, players now hold the L and R shoulder buttons in conjunction with directional input. Special attacks are a little different as well, now activated by combined presses of L with either Square or Triangle, but are still easily accessible.

To find out more about how all of this was accomplished, I caught up with Barlog and Weerasuriya to discuss how Chains of Olympus fits into the overall series, the power of the PSP hardware, and the challenges of moving a series from PS2 to PSP.

Cory Barlog: Chains of Olympus is basically the ten years that Kratos was in service to the gods. If you played God of War I, he's complaining about that all the time--"I was in service to you ten years, you've not taken these visions away." This is kinda fleshing that aspect out, giving a little bit more of the human side of Kratos and hopefully closing a little bit of a chapter in his life. It is a prequel, but it's not a prequel in the sense that I think a lot of other games treat prequels because it's really just another part of the story, and when all the games are finished, it's like one big story, you know, and it all connects. We're not gonna make some random thing that has nothing to do with the story.

Shack: There's obviously going to be a lot of tie-in with God of War and God of War II, but are there going to be some hints or maybe some hooks for a hypothetical God of War III?

Cory Barlog: There's definitely the enthusiasm of us wanting to do that, to make the God of War III, but there's obviously no commitment to that right now.

Shack: Is there anything that's being preplanned that may tie back into this game?

Cory Barlog: Put it this way. If we ever do get to make God of War III, it'll have connections to all the games, just like this game has direct links to [God of War] II. So if you go and you play this game, if you remember in II or you go back and play II, you'll see situations that are directly explained because of the PSP [version] and [this game] helps flesh out [the mythology] even more. All these games have a connection to each other.

Ru Weerasuriya: As far as the game goes, one thing we've tried to do is really again tie into that experience. God of War as an experience is just a multitude of different things that are just done well and put together. What we're trying to do really with this is just do the exact same thing as God of War I and especially II has done, which is with this thing, with this experience that is so well balanced, of things that are happening to you when you're least expecting something to happen to you. It's always like, you know, a crescendo of gameplay happening throughout the whole game.

On the PSP, we're trying to really, really attach to that and do that properly in the combat sequences or bosses. You're gonna get the experience that you got in God of War in very different ways with new environments, new places that Kratos has never been, that no mortal has ever walked into. [We] really give you more of what you've already seen in the combat, in the weapons, in the magic, and also, like Cory said, a story that really will give you depth into how big God of War is as a franchise. People play the game and you know the stories that are there but there is so much behind all of this that is gonna deal with the mythology of God of War and what is hidden behind all these games. You're gonna find a lot more out.

Cory Barlog: What he said.

Turn the page for more on the PSP's remaining untapped power, control differences, sacrificial goats, and the Cory Barlog / David Jaffe tag team.