Characters / God of War Series – Kratos (Greek Era)

God of War characters index
Major Characters: Kratos (Greek Era | Norse Era) | Kratos's Family | Major Supporting Characters | Main Antagonists (Odin)
Greek Era: Gods | Titans | Mythology's Heroes | Other Beings | Normal Humans | Characters from Comics
Norse Era: Gods | Jotnar | Other Characters | Monsters

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"By the gods, what have I become?"

"The hands of death could not defeat me, the Sisters of Fate could not hold me, and you will not see the end of this day! I will have my revenge!!"

After killing his wife and child, Kratos becomes a willing servant of the gods, dedicating himself to their every whim and performing every task they would demand of him. His efforts would eventually bear fruit when the city of Athens falls under siege from Ares himself; a petty move of jealousy from the God of War. With the knowledge that the gods are forbidden from waging war upon each other, Athena tasks Kratos to find Pandora's Box and empower himself with the evils laying within, ordering him to defeat Ares and save Athens.

And by defeating Ares, Kratos, the once mortal warrior, becomes the new God of War. However, Kratos soon finds himself alone on Olympus, shunned by his fellow gods; the feeling is mutual, as Kratos resents them deeply for their refusal to rid him of the memories of his past. For, in Athena's own words, no man nor god could ever forget his terrible deeds.

A spiteful Kratos proceeds to send out his Spartan armies all throughout Greece in a massive campaign of war, putting him in conflict with Zeus himself. When it then becomes clear that he's made an enemy out of every god on Olympus, Kratos then proclaims, "If all on Olympus will deny me my vengeance, then all on Olympus will die." Allying himself with the Titans, Kratos triggers the Second Titanomachy and sets the stage for Olympus' fall.

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A-L

• Anti-Hero: In Ascension, the first game, and the prequels, he's more or less a Byronic Hero, who eventually shifts into pure Villain Protagonist territory by the time of the second and third games, allowing the destruction of the world around him all for the sake of his petty vengeance.
• Anti-Villain: Kratos's more unsavory actions, especially throughout II and III, can be seen as reprehensible at best and irredeemable at worst, as at his lowest point he proves himself ready and willing to kill about any innocent on his path and while causing an Apocalypse Wow on all Greece solely for the sake of vengeance. That being said, Kratos's suffering, though largely self-inflicted, is equally perpetuated by the machinations of the gods and forces just plain beyond his control. Whether or not one can feel sympathy for the man is entirely up to the player to decide.
• Acquired Situational Narcissism: Becoming a marauding Spartan captain with an army numbering the thousands bolstered Kratos's ego to incredible heights, and his desire for glory only intensified after his declaration of servitude to Ares. He was taken down a peg the minute Ares forced him to kill Calliope and Lysandra, but didn't learn his lesson even then—after killing Ares and becoming the God of War, he becomes even more petty and arrogant than before. Though to be fair, by that point, he's lost his brother and his mother thanks to the trickery of the gods, so his unflappable anger is at least somewhat understandable if not sympathetic.
• Ax-Crazy: If he wants to kill something, don't expect that something's corpse to look pretty - and he will use any possible object as a weapon in battle, though axes were not exactly common yet.
• Back from the Dead: He's died twice, and escaped from the underworld. In fact, he is too damn angry to die, and he even says it best.
  "The hands of death could not defeat me".
• Badass Boast: He sends these out pretty often. The baritone helps. Just look at the quote for this section!
• Badass in a Nice Suit: One of Kratos' alternate costumes in the first game, Tycoonius, puts him in a black business suit and replaces his Blades of Chaos with giant suitcases. When worn, the suit grants Kratos extra red orbs and doubles his damage output, but heavily reduces his defense.
• Barred from the Afterlife: Or, in particular, Elysium. The reason Kratos doesn't just saunter over to the Underworld to meet Lysandra, Calliope, or anyone else he's lost, is because he once, though apparently forced to do so, massacred a vast majority of the Elysium Fields in order to kill Persephone, horrifying his daughter to the point of tears. He's barred from entering Elysium on principle, but it's heavily implied that even if he wasn't, he's far too guilt-ridden to even think of facing his daughter again after what he's done.
• Bash Brothers: With his younger brother, Deimos, in Ghost of Sparta.
• Benevolent Boss: He treats his fellow Spartans as his brothers, and shows the Spartan soldier gratitude for looking after his weapons in Ghost of Sparta, and when he realises he's killed the Last Spartan by accident, Kratos is horrified.
• Big Brother Instinct: When Ares and Athena showed up to kidnap his brother Deimos in Ghost of Sparta, he, despite being a little kid at the time, actually tried to attack Ares directly to save Deimos. And when he found out Deimos was still alive years after that, he immediately went on a quest to save him despite the warnings of Athena. It didn't end well at all.
• Blasphemous Boast: "A choice from the gods is as useless as the gods themselves!" He even says this straight to the face of Zeus, who was impaling him on the Blade of Olympus at the time.
• Break His Heart to Save Him: In Chains of Olympus, Kratos manages to reunite with his beloved daughter Calliope in the Elysium Fields. To do this, he had to forsake all of his weapons and powers, in turn rendering him completely mortal but pure. However, thanks to Persephone's plot to destroy the world (which would, in turn, destroy Elysium and Calliope), Kratos is forced to abandon his daughter and slaughter nearly every soul in Elysium in order to reclaim his powers. Leaving a horrified Calliope in tears, and stoking Kratos's hatred of the gods.
• Brought Down to Badass: After losing his godhood in II. He's still a One-Man Army capable of throwing down with creatures several times his size.
• Cain and Abel: With Ares and Hercules. Though it's justified, in that Ares made him kill his own family. Hercules wanted to kill him and actually attacked him first. His list of killing his other siblings is long, though: Hepheastus, Perseus, Persephone, Peirithous, Pollux, Athena (though Kratos regretted the first one and the last one was an accident). The one time where he was the Abel instead of the Cain was with his mortal brother Deimos, whom he genuinely loved, but he ended up blaming Kratos for being trapped in Thanatos' domain and tried to kill him (they make peace with each other before Deimos' death, however).
• Cerebus Retcon: Much of Kratos's actions throughout the main trilogy of the Greek series are contextualized and expanded upon further by the prequels and midquels. With these releases, Kratos Jumping Off the Slippery Slope in II is no longer him merely lashing out in petulant vengeance, but instead it becomes decades of pent-up anger and aggression at the gods and himself being unleashed completely.
  • Ascension features Kratos at his most vulnerable point in the whole series. Having killed Calliope and Lysandra just months prior to the events of this game, Kratos is faced with nightmares and illusions that plague him daily—partly because the Furies are trying to torture him with visions, partly because he's just so horrified by the things he's done. As if that weren't enough, it also shows Kratos being fully capable of interacting with others and even forming friendships, striking a bond with Orkos and regretting having to kill him in order to free himself from his oath to Ares. All this goes to show just how damaged Kratos ends up becoming while under the servitude of the other gods later in life, as well as how much empathy and compassion he lost from all the pain and suffering he's endured.
  • Chains of Olympus features Kratos reuniting with his daughter Calliope, only to be forced to abandon her thanks to the trickery of Persephone. Worse yet, Kratos has to re-traumatize his daughter by slaughtering every soul in Elysium right in front of her eyes, so as to regain enough power to kill Persephone. Cast out of Elysium for good, without a single chance to reunite with his daughter ever again, Kratos's hatred of the gods begins to fester right at this point.
  • Ghost of Sparta follows Kratos as he travels throughout all of Olympus in search of his brother Deimos, who had been kidnapped by the gods at a very young age, on the grounds that he was the Marked Warrior destined to destroy Olympus. However, along his journey, he loses his beloved mother, as well as Deimos himself, thanks again to the gods. Worse yet, his relationship with Athena gets strained, when he learns that she had directly aided Ares in the kidnapping of Deimos in the first place. This is where Kratos promises to make the gods pay for everything they've done to him, and sets the stage for God of War II. Ghost of Sparta also reveals that Kratos's red tattoo was in fact made as a reminder of his failure to protect Deimos when they were children.
• Chained by Fashion: The Blades of Chaos were attached to his skin by magic chains. The ending of the 2018 game shows that they left chain-shaped scars across his forearms after Ares ripped them out to kill the illusory Lysandra and Calliope. The Blades of Athena/Exile were attached to a pair of armlets Kratos wore to cover the scars.
• Character Development:
  • In a journey of conquest with his fellow Spartans, Kratos comes across a Barbarian King; assured of his victory, Kratos and the Spartans do battle against the King and his horde, only to find themselves epically outclassed. On the brink of death and in an uncharacteristic act of some cowardice, Kratos begs the God of War, Ares, to destroy his enemies in exchange for his allegiance. Ares does as promised, granting Kratos the power to slaughter the Barbarians — but Kratos would serve Ares's whims all his days, enabling his Blood Knight Glory Hound tendencies even more. While Kratos justifies the atrocities he later commits under Ares's name "for the glory of Sparta," Kratos's wife feels that his monstrous acts were all for his own glory, never Sparta's.
  • This all comes to a head when Ares sends Kratos to a village worshipping Athena, ordering him to slaughter all who lay within — naturally, Kratos obliges, but finds himself wracked with guilt and horror at having murdered his own wife and child in the haze of violence. Knowing this was all a manipulation by Ares to make Kratos a more efficient warrior, Kratos would be forever marked by his sin — with the ashes of his wife and child fused to his skin forever, Kratos transforms from a ruthless warrior devoted only to conquest and violence into a cold shell of a man endlessly tormented by his crimes against humanity. This would only get worse when he later encounters his daughter Calliope in the Elysium Fields—though their reunion brings out one of the few moments of genuine joy we'd see from Kratos himself, he's forced to abandon her yet again due to the machinations of Persephone. Leaving Calliope in horrified tears, Kratos abandons her and his rage at the gods begins to gnaw and exhaust him both physically and emotionally.
  • After defeating Ares and becoming the God of War himself, Kratos becomes bitter against the gods of Olympus, who refused to remove the PTSD-fuelled nightmares and visions he'd endure daily, despite having promised him they would do so with the defeat of Ares — in Athena's own words, no one could ever forget the many atrocities Kratos has committed. Though Kratos seethes with rage, he feels no immediate need to clash against the gods — that is, until he discovers that his brother Deimos, who had been kidnapped as a child by both Ares and Athena under the belief that he was the prophesied "Marked Warrior" who would destroy Olympus, is actually alive and kept tucked away in an Eldritch Location to be endlessly tortured by Thanatos. Though Kratos would defeat Thanatos, he would lose both Deimos and his mother along the journey — his grief for his loss eventually turning into rage against the gods themselves for stealing more family members away from him. In his rage, he sets the Spartans all across Greece in a mass slaughter campaign, earning him the ire of Olympus.
  • After being betrayed by Zeus in II and left to die, and discovering that Zeus later on destroyed Sparta just to spite him, AND being told by Athena that every god on Olympus would deny him his vengeance against Zeus due to Zeus's intrinsic ties to Olympus and reality itself, Kratos decides then and there that he's had enough of the gods and their manipulations, declaring that any god who would dare stand in his way would die. So consumed is Kratos by his vengeance and his refusal to take any responsibility for his own actions at this point that he deliberately ignores the rampant destruction he causes to the world from the deaths of the multiple gods he encounters throughout his quest. But even all this gets eclipsed thanks to the advent of Pandora, who forms a shaky bond with Kratos himself — as she resembles Kratos's daughter, though he knows that Pandora is not his daughter. Once Pandora decides to sacrifice herself in order to grant Kratos the power to defeat Zeus, Kratos's burgeoning emotional attachment to her clouds his senses, and when the time comes, he cannot bring himself to let her die. She manages to sacrifice herself anyway, only for her death to have meant virtually nothing, since the power to defeat Zeus had been inside Kratos all along. It is this that destroys Kratos's will, and propels him to make his first possibly heroic act, at least in a long time, by sacrificing himself to grant humanity the power of Hope, and let them live without need for the gods.
• Characterization Marches On: In the very first game, Kratos was basically a shell of his former self. Though vengeance against Ares was his top priority, much more emphasis was given to how he is basically edging closer and closer to the Despair Event Horizon. His hope in defeating Ares is less out of a desire for vengeance and more out of desperation to escape from his madness and guilt, to the point where when he's denied release from his past, he throws himself off a mountain. Later entries have him subsumed by his desire for vengeance against the gods, to the point where it's his primary motivation and defining character trait in both II and III. Multiple spin-offs and prequels were produced to add more nuance to Kratos's character, and better contextualize how he could jump so quickly off the slippery slope into crazed vengefulness.
• Deal with the Devil: As a young Spartan commander, he was nearly defeated by the Barbarian King until he promised to serve Ares in exchange for the strength to achieve victory. He turns on his master after Ares tricks him into killing his own family to remove his only "weakness".
• Death Seeker: Zig-zagged. Depending on the situation, Kratos may be attempting to take his own life to end his torment, or he may be literally clawing his way out of Hades to avoid death.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype:
  • Of the traditional heroes of Greek Mythology. Many of those heroes, such as Oedipus, Achilles, and even Hercules at some points, had a Might Makes Right mentality; their worth as heroes wasn't measured by their moral character, but through their strength and power. Kratos is essentially what these kinds of heroes would be in real life; sociopathic, selfish, bloodthirsty, and extremely entitled and largely indifferent.
  • Kratos also lacks a key component of the classic Greek heroes and his fellow Spartans: They should never commit hubris and think themselves above the gods, and if they did so, divine punishment would usually ensue to either humble them and provide a lesson that would temper their wisdom or just outright kill them. Kratos shows what happens when said hero doesn't give a crap and keeps pushing forward regardless of the consequences.
  • In a broader sense, he's also a deconstruction of the '90s Anti-Hero. Normally, someone who goes on a campaign of destruction across their homeland after being treated like stomped-on crap by the universe would be framed as not only morally justified but also heroic for mowing down anyone and everyone that stands in their way, regardless of how wrong it would be in any other context, consequences be damned. Not Kratos. Here, his actions have consequences that reverberate across the world and haunt him for hundreds, if not thousands of years with the actions that led to them being treated as deplorable and atrocious as you would expect them to be. He's basically everything you'd expect a '90s Anti-Hero to be in real life: a murderous sociopath with next to no redeeming qualities whatsoever looking everywhere but within to just make the pain stop.
• Despair Event Horizon: Crosses it when he accidentally kills his family, and remains past it from that point onward. But it gets real bad when he learns that the gods cannot (or will not) end his nightmares, even after the death of Ares that they apparently asked for. He attempts suicide soon afterward, only to be saved by Athena. Whether or not he actually recovers, or simply finds other channels to ease his suffering, is left ambiguous.
  Kratos: The gods of Olympus have abandoned me. Now, there is no hope...
  • In God of War II, when The Last Spartan passes away after their encounter in the Palace of the Fates (they were in a dark room and could not see each other clearly), Kratos loses all will to fight and is about to let the Kraken kill him, but then Gaia, taking on the appearance of Kratos's deceased wife, talks to him in a vision and brings him back into battle.
  • He nearly crosses it again at the end of Ghost of Sparta after the death of his brother Deimos. He briefly considers jumping off to his death at the Suicide Bluffs again, but pulls out of it at the last moment. He then decides to turn his despair into hatred for the gods.
• Detrimental Determination: His goal of getting revenge on Zeus and the Olympian Gods is ultimately this. While Kratos’s grievances and anger are justified, provided they played a hand in the deaths of his mother and brother, what isn’t excusable is his need of vengeance overriding his better judgement and even involving and killing bystanders for daring to be in his way. Even worse, Kratos’s mass deicide ends up causing natural disasters, killing untold numbers of people, but he doesn’t stop until he finally kills Zeus, whereupon he then realizes his need for vengeance only made him more miserable. Though he gets to live after an attempt at sacrificing himself, he survives with the guilt that vengeance could override and corrode your mind and hates himself for that.
• Dirty Coward: Generally, no. But a few rare moments of cowardice pop in and out. His greatest moment being the circumstances that led him to swear his life to the War God. More obsessed with his reputation than his Spartan traditions (which demanded soldiers to either win a battle or die honorably), Kratos called upon Ares to bail him out when he was threatened by the Barbarian King. This, of course, ruined his life. In Ghost of Sparta, the ghost of his child self actually calls him a coward as he tries to beat him up. He would eventually grow out of it.
• Disney Death: At the end of III, it was unclear if Kratos survived his self-inflicted wound, or simply cast himself off the cliff, as he tried to do at the end of the first game. God of War (PS4) reveals that he totally did.
• Driven to Suicide:
  • At the end of the first game, when he is told that the Gods can't end the horrific nightmares caused by Kratos's guilt over his family's deaths. He is saved by Athena, who had other plans for the Spartan. Such as giving him Ares's now empty throne, making Kratos the new God of War.
  • He seems to briefly consider suicide again after Deimos is killed, but ultimately decides against it.
  • He impales himself on the Blade of Olympus at the end of III, but that is more of a Heroic Suicide, and even then, it turns out he survived that.
• The Dragon: To Ares, during his time in the God of War's service. He is a Dragon to the gods of Olympus, Athena in particular, after the deaths of his family, acting at their behest to perform tasks that they either cannot or will not do themselves, such as killing Ares.
• Dual Wielding: The Blades of Chaos/Athena/Exile, the Claws of Hades, the Nemean Cestus, and the Nemesis Whip.
• Establishing Character Moment: Two, really, during the first chapter. The first is when Kratos finds a trapped slave/prisoner, who declares that even being locked up on a sinking vessel with monsters swarming over it won't persuade him to accept Kratos's help. The second is at the end of the boss fight, where Kratos retrieves the captain who was previously Swallowed Whole... then yanks away the key he was wearing around his neck before deliberately throwing him down into the dead hydra's stomach. For apparently no reason, though it may have been in disdain at the captain fleeing from the beast earlier and leaving his men to die.
• Et Tu, Brute?: Throughout Kratos's search for his brother, he is confronted repeatedly by Athena, who desperately attempts to turn him away from this path he's taken. Though Kratos is furious at the gods for their hand in kidnapping his brother, he actually seems to consider Athena's advice at one point, only to fall back on anger when he realizes that she helped Ares kidnap Deimos. Judging from the Tranquil Fury he displays towards her later on, it's clear that this betrayal stung Kratos pretty deep.
• Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: He did care for his mother Callisto, and was enraged and guilt-ridden when she turned into a monster and he had to kill her. He also did so in the most humane way he could.
• Even Evil Can Be Loved: Kratos is a callous and violent man, but even he has been loved. He and his wife were actually Happily Married, before Kratos let his Glory Hound tendencies get the better of him, and when Calliope reunited with him in Elysium, she happily ran over to him and embraced him tightly. When he first encounters his brother Deimos, Deimos rages against him for "leaving him behind" in their youth, yet after Kratos saves his life from Thanatos, the two brothers work side-by-side to defeat the God of Death. His mother Callisto also loved him dearly, to the point where even after Kratos kills her in Ghost of Sparta, he can find a note in the Underworld presumably written by her, begging the gods to punish her in his place. If we're gonna go real far with this, even Zeus is said to have cared for Kratos at the very least (before succumbing to his fear), having taken pity upon him at his birth. When Kratos falls into the Underworld thanks to Ares, Zeus even helps Kratos escape under the guise of a lowly Grave Digger, affectionately referring to him as "my son."
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: You'd be surprised at how many. His wife Lysandra and his daughter Calliope were Kratos’ last tethers to humanity, and his love for them was so strong that in accidentally killing them, he immediately renounced his service to Ares. He also was so distraught over losing his brother at such a young age that when Kratos discovered that Deimos was still alive, he immediately went off to go save him from wherever he'd been trapped. Ascension also shows that Orkos the rebel Fury was one of his only true friends and allies in Ancient Greece (Kratos referred to him as "brother" even before Mimir) and he was devastated when he was forced to perform a Mercy Kill on him. III also shows his genuine care for Pandora and his desire to protect her from Zeus' machinations.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • He expresses much disgust at the torture the victims of the Olympians get. Kratos is no saint, but there are levels that he will never stoop to — well, not willingly anymore. The first sign that there's more to Kratos than just mindless fury is when he has to burn an innocent man alive as an offering to the gods. He does it, but he makes it clear how much he hates having to.
    "The gods demand sacrifice. From all of us."
  • Despite almost being killed by Hephaestus, he understands why he did it and bears no animosity for it, Hephaestus wanted to save his child by any means necessary. As a father himself, Kratos truly values the importance of family and the duty of fatherhood. Kratos's face also changes to a sorrowful one, showing that he really didn't want to kill Hephaestus but he had no choice. To an extent, the expression also shows that Kratos sees Hephaestus as a better parent than him because Kratos accidentally killed his family and believes he failed as a father for doing so.
  • Kratos also has a strong sense of brotherhood, due to the fact that he lost his brother Deimos at a young age as well as Sparta instilling this in all Spartans. After discovering that Zeus is his father, Kratos tries and fails to reason with his half-brother Hercules. In Ascension, he was most likely disgusted as well by Pollux's cowardice, when the guy tried to pin the blame for his and Castor’s atrocities on the latter — while crawling away all the while.
  • It's noticeable that all of Kratos's many lovers all appeared to be fully consenting. That might not seem all that impressive; but compared to what the Olympians usually did when someone was unlucky to catch their eye, he's downright saintly by letting these women be once done with them.
  • While he's willing to do anything to accomplish his goals without remorse, Kratos doesn't target people unless they specifically get in his way or he has to defend himself. As Kratos says to a dying Athena in II he doesn't seek to destroy Olympus, only Zeus. Indeed, II and III shows Kratos is fine letting his opponents live, be they demigods, Olympians, or Titans, but they kept provoking him. His destruction of Olympus was largely done in self-defense.
  • Despite talking about letting Greece suffer for his revenge, Kratos looks genuinely remorseful when Zeus dies and Greece descends into chaos.
• Evil Costume Switch: He starts wearing a suit of God Armor which resembles Ares’s own armor when he fully becomes the God of War and spearheads his own conquest of Greece.
• Expy: Kratos' character and backstory in the Greek era are heavily inspired by Heracles', most noticeably in the first game; both are supernaturally strong warriors sons of Zeus with a mortal woman who murdered their own families in a fit of mad rage caused by a god and had to do several chores to be pardoned — Kratos with his servitude to Olympus and mission to defeat Ares, and Heracles with his twelve labors under the orders of Eurystheus —, receiving help and advice from the Olympians during their journey, adventuring in the Underworld as the final challenge to accomplish their goals, and eventually being turned into gods themselves around the moment of their death. Some of the main differences are that Kratos was tricked by Ares while Heracles was bewitched with madness by Hera, Kratos was saved from his attempt of killing himself while Heracles only became a deity after dying on a pyre, Heracles never resented the gods, and Kratos was much more brutal and feared than Heracles ever was. When Heracles/Hercules makes his debut in III, this becomes Expy Coexistence.
• Family-Values Villain: Kratos deeply loved his immediate family, to the point where when he discovered he'd killed them in a blood frenzy, he nearly went mad from the grief alone. In fact, the death of his brother Deimos is a large factor in what caused his rage against the gods to fester, culminating in his eventual declaration of war upon Olympus. Ironically, though he hates the gods and makes motions to destroy them in III, him being Zeus's son means that throughout the game, he's slaughtering all his family members.
• Fatal Flaw:
  • In his younger years as a Spartan captain, Kratos's Blood Knight and Glory Hound tendencies were so insatiable that when he dedicated his life to Ares, he grew drunk on the atrocities he committed daily under the God's name, justifying himself endlessly by proclaiming his intent to spread the "glory of Sparta" throughout the world...even though it was possible that he only sought personal glory. This mad dash for power and bloodshed cost him dearly when Ares tricked him into killing his wife and child in a blood frenzy, solely for the purpose of undoing more of Kratos's humanity.
  • Kratos's Unstoppable Rage is exactly that — unstoppable. He's perpetually in a state of grueling anger and self-loathing, and it's awfully easy for him to take his anger out on bystanders in the wrong place and time; when anybody wrongs him in any fashion, whether they be gods or men, Kratos is generally prone to going in for the kill and likely causing collateral demolition regardless of their reasons. After becoming the God of War and going on a massive campaign all over Greece just to anger the rest of the gods, Kratos is warned by Athena that Olympus won't take too kindly to his rampage. Shockingly, when Kratos refuses to listen to her and tries to destroy Rhodes by entering the battlefield himself, Zeus takes action and proceeds to end his life.
  • His unbelievably deep-seated self-loathing is one of the biggest contributors to why he is as screwed up as he is. Kratos is completely aware of what kind of man he is, and he bears a great many regrets about the numerous atrocities he's committed over the years, his greatest failure being his killing of his own family. Unable to bear the weight of his sins, furious at the gods for refusing to remove his memories of them, and driven to the brink of madness from the multiple travesties they committed against him and his loved ones throughout the years, Kratos unleashes all his self-hate in a projection against the gods and lashes out in II and III, to the point where he outright declares war on Olympus itself.
  • His shortsightedness and self-centeredness have cost him much throughout the series. Kratos spent his entire life doggedly focused on singular goals, and as such has a very difficult time seeing the big picture, so to speak. Throughout the original series, he's so blinded by his desire for revenge that he fails to notice or even care that in killing the gods, he's heralding the destruction of Greece.
• A Father to His Men:
  • The Spartans are loyal to him even in death itself. What we see of living Spartans has them treat Kratos with reverence and awe. In III and the most recent entry, it's their power he draws upon, not the Gods or the Titans as in previous games.
  • Two of the particular Spartans he's particular with is Atreus and the Last Spartan:
    • Atreus was a Spartan warrior who believes in having hope and often inspire his fellow Spartans in battle. After his death, Kratos decides to honor him by naming his son after him.
    • The Last Spartan had served Kratos even after Kratos's fall from grace as a god. Even after his accidental murder by Kratos's hands, he still puts faith into Kratos before he dies.
• Freak Out: Kratos was always a little unstable, what with the constant nightmares, the shame of killing his family weighing down on him, his short-sightedness and temper causing him to lose what few things held him in check and the gods playing a constant game of "kick the Spartan". But by the time of II, he's on the knife's edge of madness, and Zeus's betrayal shoves him right off said edge into full-blown insanity: by that point, nothing truly matters to him but killing Zeus, no matter who gets hurt, more or less. While his actions are reprehensible, they're potentially understandable to a point: Kratos has literally nothing left but revenge.
• Glory Hound: Used to be a big one. During his tenure as the captain of the Spartan army, he led his men throughout the lands in an endless pursuit of conquest. This only got worse when he dedicated his life to Ares, as from then on Kratos began slaughtering more people and became infamous all throughout the world. And of all the ways he could've had a Humble Pie moment, it had to be him killing his family during one of his many random slaughters.
• God Is Evil: As the God of War, he leads a brutal and ruthless conquest of all of Greece in the name of Sparta (as far as non-Spartans can see, though he has good reasons), mainly to spite the gods for everything they've put him through.
• Gone Horribly Right: Ares wanted to make Kratos the perfect warrior in his bid to conquer Olympus. First he gained his loyalty through a Deal with the Devil. Then he gave him the powerful Blades of Chaos. Then he tricked Kratos into killing his wife and child because they were all that was holding him back from being the perfect murder machine. Kratos even acknowledges this at the end of the first game.
  Ares: That night... I was trying to make you a great warrior!
  Kratos: ...You succeeded. (runs Ares through with the Sword of the Gods, killing him)
• Good Scars, Evil Scars: Has a scar near his eye given to him by Ares himself, when Kratos attempted to attack him for kidnapping his brother. He also has one on his stomach where he was impaled with the Blade of Olympus, as well as marks along his arms from the chains he’d wear during his time in Greece.
• Hated by All: Not entirely, as he had his army and a few on his side... but he was feared by so many. As the series goes on, it becomes increasingly clear that Kratos's hatred of the gods is mutual, and in II he's explicitly described from the beginning of the game as being shunned by the rest of Olympus. By the time of III, when Kratos has declared war upon the pantheon, the vast majority of the gods immediately take up arms and fight him without hesitation.
• He Who Fights Monsters: By the opening of II, he's become as bad as Ares, doing all of the horrible things Ares himself had done, which led to the gods assigning Kratos the job of killing him in the first place.
• Heart Is an Awesome Power: The only reason Kratos managed to kill any of the gods after opening Pandora's Box is because he's been powered by the light of Hope itself.
• Heel Realization: After causing the apocalypse, Kratos realizes that he's made a bad call.
• A Hero to His Hometown: Kratos's birthplace, Sparta, is the only place in all Greece where anybody accepts him with open arms. After the death of Ares, the Spartans immediately welcomed Kratos as their new God of War, to the point where Ares worship quickly dwindled from that point on.
• Hero with Bad Publicity: While "hero" is stretching it, notice how the Olympians constantly throw flak on Kratos for supposedly trying to Take Over the World, without remembering that maybe they shouldn't have transformed his mother into a grotesque creature that he had to Mercy Kill. The Spartans' rampage through Greece was more of a giant "Screw you" than it was out of boredom or conquest as Zeus feared. Granted, Kratos wasn't really forthcoming about it, but he never actually tried attacking the Olympians until after Zeus destroyed Sparta. Not only that, but during his ten years of servitude to the gods, it's shown that several mortals who are aware of his past deeds are more scared of him than they are of the monsters attacking him and would rather be killed than be saved by him. It only gets worse after he becomes the God of War, though it's largely because he begins abusing his power upon the whole of Greece. This is averted when it comes to Sparta, though; seeing as how the city-state is founded upon a Proud Warrior Race Guy mentality, it only makes sense that they would be rather pleased with their fellow Spartan Kratos becoming the new God of War.
• Heroic Sacrifice: After all is said and done in III, Kratos runs himself through with the Blade of Olympus, releasing the power of hope to mankind.
• Heroes' Frontier Step: He did heroic deeds in the past, like fighting off a Persian invasion and saving Athens from Ares, but they were more purely done for his own interests rather than any altruism. However, by the end of III, he reaches something of a Heel Realization, having finally discovered just what kind of colossal damage his quest for vengeance had done to himself, the world, and those close to him. His response to this is to impale himself on the Blade of Olympus in a Heroic Sacrifice, bestowing Hope upon the rest of mankind in the process.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Kratos has, in addition to removing enemies' weapons and turning their own sharp objects against them. repeatedly used godly weapons to kill other deities. In Chains of Olympus, Kratos defeats Persephone through use of Helios' Sun Shield and the Gauntlet of Zeus (the latter of which he used to deliver the final blow); this is important because Kratos hadn't even opened Pandora's Box yet, so he didn't even have any innate power to kill a god at this point. When Kratos and Zeus do battle at the end of II, Kratos manages to put Zeus on the ropes because he's wielding the Blade of Olympus (which contained Kratos's godly power at that time) throughout the whole fight. It's implied even that Kratos might have actually managed to pull off killing Zeus had Athena not intervened at just the right time.
• Hope Springs Eternal: Of all the characters to associate with this trope... It's complicated. In the original series, Kratos obtained the power of Hope when opening Pandora's Box to defeat Ares, while all the evils contained within the Box spread out amongst the gods of Olympus. Fast forward several years later, Kratos comes in conflict with Zeus and the other gods, and, driven by vengeance, utterly demolishes all of Greece in the ensuing Roaring Rampage of Revenge. But, upon realizing the full weight of his actions and how utterly empty his quest for vengeance has been, Kratos unleashes the power of Hope unto mankind by stabbing himself in the gut with a giant sword.
• Idiot Ball: Throughout the original Greek entries, the guy gets manipulated left and right by gods and titans, repeatedly makes foolish decisions because he constantly chooses immediate satisfaction over long-term benefits, and end up collaterally causing suffering to innocent people (as well as himself) all in the name of his petty refusal to take responsibility for his own actions.
• Insane Troll Logic: When Zeus confronts Kratos at the beginning of II, after the latter was drained of his godly powers, Kratos vocally demands an answer as to why Zeus would "betray" him. Note that at this point, Kratos has been ransacking the whole of Greece with his Spartan armies and has expressed nothing but disdain towards Zeus and the other gods after their refusal to remove the nightmares of his past, as well as their involvement in the deaths of Callisto and Deimos. Zeus even lampshades it:
  Kratos: Why? Why would you betray me?
  Zeus: It is you who would betray me! Am I to stand idly by while Olympus is threatened?
• Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: He was always a Sociopathic Hero on his very best of days, but he was perfectly capable of compassion and feelings of camaraderie. But then his mistakes start to add up, he spends every waking second being pushed and prodded and tormented by the gods, he loses half the things he cared about to his own failings and the other half is taken away. As of the second game, he's devolved into a straight-up Villain Protagonist. The game opens up with him waging war alongside the Spartans in Rhodes, and after Zeus betrays him, the man just snaps. It's all downhill from there.
• Kick the Dog:
  • Kratos does this a lot, more by accident, but sometimes the player must slash at or otherwise harm bystanders to get through an area - though an In-Universe one that counts as well as a Moral Event Horizon to all who know him is the killing of his wife and child in a blood frenzy. Literally in the case of the ever-annoying Cerberus Pups.
  • The Valhalla DLC for Ragnarok in particular has Kratos musing over the time he took the Boat Captain's key and kicked him down the Hydra's throat since unlike a lot of his other kills there was no point to it other than needless cruelty. As such, he's since come to consider it one of his biggest personal shames.
• Kill the Gods: By the end of the series, the only gods he didn't kill are Artemis, Apollo, Aphrodite and Morpheus, and that's because the first and the latter sort of suffered a case of What Happened to the Mouse? while Apollo was only mentioned by others...though then again, one could assume that all three of them died due to the events of III.
• Kill the Ones You Love: Mind you, it was by complete accident. Kratos left Calliope and Lysandra back in Sparta, but Ares transported them over to his position as he was slaughtering dozens of people in the same room.
• Large Ham: What do you expect from an Axe-Crazy, Psychopathic Manchild demigod that's been poked one too many times by Jerkass Gods like Ares and Zeus?
• Light Is Good: Post God of War I, Kratos is powered by the Light of Hope. Almost entirely his sole redeeming trait, for a given value of "redeeming", is his stubborn refusal to give up hope (of revenge, of closure, etc.) and die. Ultimately, the realization of the kind of power that gives him leads him to try to atone by killing himself and releasing hope to the world to help make up for the destruction he's caused.

M-Y

• Mike Nelson, Destroyer of Worlds: In III, he spends the entire game plotting to kill Zeus, killing multiple Physical Gods who get in his way in the process, which each cause a progressive Apocalypse Wow. Although he can survey the destruction at some points, and in-game text at these spots do indicate what is happening, it's rather evident that, past killing Zeus in a state of Revenge Before Reason, Kratos doesn't actually have any plans for what he's going to do afterwards. Ultimately, in the finale, he sees what he has wrought, and is Driven to Suicide mostly to spite Athena and keep her from getting Hope, but does seem to comprehend that he left the world in a horrible state, and while the gods won't rule over man any longer, there's not much left to rule over anyway.
• Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Eventually turns on the entire Greek Pantheon of gods for all the times they've shafted him and his loved ones.
• Moral Event Horizon: His frenzied rampage in a settlement and the subsequent murder of his wife and daughter is treated as this In-Universe. Kratos was punished by having his skin grafted by the ashes of his wife and child to forever remind Greece and its gods of the heinous acts the Ghost of Sparta committed and then chained within Aegaeon by the Three Furies. Kratos spends the first three games chronologically in earning the god’s forgiveness and to erase the memories. He succeeds in being forgiven, but his memories and the reminder of his family’s death was kept, which furthered Kratos’s disdain for the gods.
• Moment of Weakness: Begging for Ares's help after being defeated by the Barbarian King. That one moment of cowardice ultimately proved to be the bane of Kratos's existence.
• My God, What Have I Done?: At the end of God of War III, Kratos looks out at the complete and utter devastation his vendetta against the gods has wrought on the world, with each death at his hands causing a new disaster, and with him having cleared the way for Athena as the last surviving god to rule over humanity with them as slaves to her whim, Kratos, aside from the incidents with pandora, finally feels remorse after such a long while, (supposedly) kills himself, and leaves Greece forever after giving hope to humanity.
• Never My Fault: While he definitely was screwed over by the gods, Kratos doesn't take any responsibility for the countless people who have died because of him or his actions, often blaming the gods for his misfortune.
• "No More Holding Back" Speech:
  If all on Olympus will deny me my vengeance, then all on Olympus will die. I have lived in the shadow of the gods for long enough. The time of the gods has come to an end!
• Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: In the past, Kratos was a warmongering, bloodthirsty Spartan who led his soldiers on conquest after conquest. When his wife Lysandra called him out on it, Kratos declared that he was going it for the glory of Sparta; Lysandra was not convinced and sensed that he only did it for his own personal glory.
• The Oathbreaker: He broke his Blood Oath to forever serve Ares. Ascension reveals that The Furies captured and punished him for it, but he managed to escape and kill them.
• Offing the Offspring: Kratos accidentally killed his daughter Calliope in a blood frenzy.
• Paradox Person: If II has any implications on the timeline, Kratos has either created an endless time loop of his own death and resurrection in his pursuit of vengeance, or, he has moulded with his past self, undoing the events of the game.
• Pet the Dog: He, on some level, does this. The Last Spartan and Pandora stand out. The former, who is a loyal follower, and the latter whom he feels fatherly affection to (despite killing her father in self-defense, he understand why he did it).
• The Pornomancer: Aphrodite, two of her daughters, two random slave girls, two random matrons, and eight prostitutes simultaneously, each get a Hot Coffee Minigame. It's possible that Alecto wants in on that too, and so do Aphrodite's handmaidens.
• Power Copying: Has a habit of taking weapons, items, and powers from defeated enemies. In certain cases, he even uses decapitated heads as weapons.
• Properly Paranoid: In III. When the ghostly Athena confronts him in the Underworld and states her intent to help him kill Zeus, Kratos is suspicious, since Athena had previously sacrificed her life to save Zeus from Kratos's wrath. Athena claims she sees truths she didn't before, but during the ending, it turns out Kratos was right to be suspicious; Athena was just using him to take Zeus out so she could become the sole god of Greece and rule over mankind for herself.
• Protagonist Journey to Villain: While he was never a particularly good man in the first place, it can be argued that the events that occur in Ghost of Sparta is what kickstarts Kratos's transformation into the infamously unapologetic, psychotic, and selfish brute that eventually destroys much of the surrounding world out of revenge.
• Proud Warrior Race Guy: He was born in Sparta, where war was a way, if not THE way of life.
• Psychological Projection: Kratos has a tendency to blame pretty much all of his problems on the gods or on others, when it's perfectly clear to everyone and especially himself that his own actions are largely to blame for why his life has been as awful as it is. Naturally, he can't forgive himself for the things he's done, because that would actually mean facing his failures head-on, so he ends up causing way more trouble to others than he's worth. And while some of his problems really are entirely the Olympians' fault (the events of Ghost of Sparta are a good example; Deimos was kidnapped when Kratos was still a child and Kratos tries to save him when he learns he's still alive), Kratos uses these legitimate grievances as justification to also blame the gods for things that are very clearly the consequences of his own actions.
• Psychopathic Manchild: Kratos can act like a mature adult, particularly to his daughter and the Last Spartan, but more often than not, he acts like a selfish, entitled, irresponsible brat who acts without thinking. The second and third games are stand out examples, where his rampages throughout Greece and Olympus are little more than him reaching emotional overflow and throwing deranged tantrums.
• Pyrrhic Victory: He succeeds in destroying the Gods and the Titans,and as well as getting over the guilt of killing his loved ones... at the cost of Greece's destruction and being forced to walk the earth forever for his crimes.
• The Quiet One: In Ascension, he has considerably fewer lines.
• Rage Against the Heavens: The perfect poster child for it. In fact, he currently is in this trope's page.
• Redemption Equals Death: Played with, at the end of III, he kills himself with the Blade of Olympus to release the power of Hope. It is up to the viewer to decide if this was to humanity and try to make up for destroying the world in his quest for revenge or just to spite Athena. Either way, it didn't stick.
• Reforged Blade: After the Blades of Athena are damaged in the River Styx, Athena's spirit remakes them into the Blades of Exile.
• Regret Eating Me: In III, Cronos tries to finish him off by eating him alive. Kratos just cuts his way out with the Blade of Olympus.
• Revenge: It's the fuel that runs Kratos's Character Development throughout the Greek entries.
• Revenge Before Reason: If the fact that he singlehandedly destroys much of the surrounding world in his crusade against Olympus in God of War III is anything to go by. At the end of III, he has to choose between saving Pandora who he has come to see as a surrogate daughter or sacrificing her to complete his revenge against Zeus. Though he’s initially ravaged by the choice, as Pandora reminds him of Calliope, he, though distracted by his own rage, chooses revenge over her due to Zeus’s taunts.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Basically his entire objective, throughout almost ‘’every single game’’ taking place in Greece.
• Satanic Archetype: Kratos is widely feared and reviled for the horrible things he's done, and once he becomes a god he ends up abusing his power out of sheer spite towards Olympus. In II and III, Kratos becomes so fed up with the gods that he outright wages war against them, disregarding the consequences completely. By the time his vengeance is complete, he's ended what seems to be all of reality and plunged the world into Chaos. The only "positive" aspect here is his association with light; by the time of III, Kratos is revealed to have been imbued with the power of Hope, when he first opened Pandora's Box all the way back when he fought Ares. So when Kratos discovers the weight of his actions in triggering an Apocalypse How upon all Greece, he performs a Heroic Sacrifice by impaling himself on the Blade of Olympus, releasing Hope to the whole world.
• Scarred Equipment: Kratos' Spartan garb gradually gets shorter and more tattered as the series progresses. By the time of God of War III, his greaves and Golden Fleece are also covered in scratches, with the latter even having a large blood stain on it.
• Scars Are Forever: Long after leaving Greece, he still has the scar over his eye that he's always had, as well as scar on his stomach from when he was stabbed with the Blade of Olympus in God of War II. The ending of the 2018 game also shows his forearms are still scarred from having the Blades of Chaos attached to his arms.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: Kratos usually displays an Undying Loyalty towards Sparta and its values. In the comics, however, when the authorities decided Calliope had to be sacrificed because of her skin disease that made her be deemed weak by Spartans, Kratos was willing to defy the laws of his land and fight the soldiers tasked with seizing her. He eventually would take the quest to find the Ambrosia to heal his daughter.
• Semi-Divine: As revealed at the end of II, he's one of Zeus's demigod sons.
• Shell-Shocked Veteran: He's constantly attacked by the memories of his campaigns through Greece and the only way he can cope with them is through battle. The reason why he allied with the Olympians in the first place was the hope that they would take them away. Their promising to forgive him but not take the memories away if he killed Ares was what pissed him off. In the third game, Zeus attempted to use his memories to break Kratos's will through a Mind Rape and almost succeeded.
• Sociopathic Hero: Extremely concerned with self-interests, morally near-bankrupt, finds a temporary gratification in the deaths of his enemies, extremely prone to emotional outbursts, violently reacts to things like betrayal, and severely lacking most empathy for his fellow man.
• Start of Darkness:
  • Regarding his Villain Protagonist mention below, he seems to start down this path in earnest by the end of Ghost of Sparta, owing to the deaths and divine manipulations of his mother and brother, followed by Athena essentially congratulating him for losing his mortal binds and becoming ready to become a god.
  • He reveals in Valhalla that he views his killing of the boat captain in the first game to be this. There was no reason at all to kill the man; he had never wronged Kratos, Kratos was not taking anyone's orders, and it served no purpose at all. Kratos literally just murdered him for the hell of it.
• Then Let Me Be Evil: After accidentally mortally wounding Athena, he is horrified and tries to assure her that he doesn't mean to harm Olympus, just to kill Zeus. When Athena tells him that the survival of Zeus and Olympus are co-dependent, he angrily declares that Olympus will fall. Though that declaration alone is not a straight example, his lack of worry over the disastrous consequences lingers.
• This Means War!: "ZEUS! Your son has returned! I BRING THE DESTRUCTION OF OLYMPUS!"
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Make no mistake, Kratos was never a properly nice person. But, as seen in Ascension, there was a time in which he still had detectable empathy for others. However, he gradually loses more and more of whatever standards he had left until, by the time, at least apparently, when not brooding by III, he has cast almost all of his moral concerns aside. In a Game Informer interview hyping Ascension, one of the developers was quoted as describing Kratos as "unlikable" and "an asshole" by the time of III.
• Undying Loyalty: Regarding Sparta. Kratos has shown dedication to their cause and almost fatherly concern for his fellow soldiers, particularly the Last Spartan. Unlike his predecessor, Kratos doesn't backstab his fellow Spartans or manipulate them like pawns. If anything, Kratos was lending Sparta a helping hand to their cause - it just so happened that the Spartans are very much a Blood Knight society, which (intentionally or otherwise) played into his hand of flipping the essential bird to the Olympians over what happened to his mother. Furthermore, Kratos only swears revenge on Zeus after he destroys all of the soldiers (from both sides of the conflict, no doubt) before his eyes. Ironically, the destruction he causes by killing the gods in III is all but stated to have destroyed Sparta as well. By then he is too far gone to give any thought to his actions.
• The Unfettered: Ares purposely made him into someone who would be capable of anything by removing the only things grounding him in morality, his family.
• Unstoppable Rage: His default emotion, when not in a smouldering, foul mood.
• Villain Has a Point: His rampage against the gods has done way more harm than good, but he wasn't entirely wrong to bring up how, back when he served them, they've either tricked or manipulated him, changed what his objective should be, or found other ways to screw him over or weasel out of honoring their end of a deal, which has made his previous service a waste of time at best or slavery at worst. No wonder he refused to pledge himself to Zeus in II and tried to convince Hercules in III his own service to the gods is not gonna get him very far.
• Villainous Cheekbones: His cheekbones jut very prominently out of his face, which combined with his hairless scalp and bone-white flesh, makes his head look more skull-like and sinister.
• Villain Protagonist: In the second numbered game, Kratos cares little about anyone but himself, and leaves countless innocents to die in his wake. This is added to by the fact that he ended up trying to do the exact same thing he was told to kill Ares for attempting, and spent the remainder of the game and most of the third in a Roaring Rampage of Revenge that led into a Suicidal Cosmic Temper Tantrum as a result. Even though he had his reasons as shown in Ghost of Sparta, it's still enough to make him rather unsympathetic.
• Villain Respect: Kratos seems to have a respect towards famed heroes. In God of War 2 & 3 he spoke civilly to both Theseus and Hercules and offered to spare them if they stood aside or joined him. Theseus blinded himself with his ego and Hercules was driven by his envy of Kratos and loyalty to Zeus.
• War Is Glorious: Definitely believed in this, having been raised as a Spartan. After the killing of his wife and child, though, Kratos began to suffer from visions of his past atrocities in Ares's name, which he could only quell through...more violence, in service to the other gods.
• Was It Really Worth It?: By the end of III, he's succeeded in obtaining his revenge, having killed everyone who ever wronged him... but by that point, he's realized that most of his misery was his own damn fault. He also finally notices the devastation he wrought upon the world during his campaign for vengeance and he's been changed enough to actually give a damn about it.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: The past Kratos is left unaccounted for due to the current Kratos's ability to time travel in II, and he is last shown lying on the ground. However, Icarus' death still happened, so either past Kratos still escaped from the Underworld and still killed him, or he made time fix itself (somehow).
• "Well Done, Son" Guy: Averted. In spite of the games implying that Zeus considered Kratos his favorite child, Kratos has no intentions of pleasing or gaining Zeus's approval. Even after discovering the truth about his parentage, Kratos is further driven to spite Zeus and destroy everything he built.
• What Have I Become?:
  • At one point in the first game, Kratos has a rare moment of self-awareness and, horrified by the carnage around him, asks himself this question.
    Kratos: By the gods... what have I become?
  • Asks himself this again at the end of Ghost of Sparta. Zeus/The Grave Digger answers with ''Death, The Destroyer of Worlds.'’
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: This is a man that was completely broken by the gods and, in his rage for vengeance, turned the world to complete chaos.
  • While it doesn't excuse the countless combatants or even civilians he directly slaughtered, Kratos essentially lost his family twice over because of the Olympians. In II, he's described right from the beginning narration as having "no need for the love of petty gods," and expressly tells Athena he "owes her nothing," after she brings up concerns that his warmongering throughout Greece is causing unrest among the Olympians. This is after she literally made him the God of War. Ghost of Sparta actually contextualizes this: his hatred of the gods intensified once Kratos discovered that his long-lost brother Deimos was still alive, trapped in the Domain of Death under the suspicion that he would one day fulfill a prophecy in which he would bring Olympus' destruction. Realizing that Athena herself had aided the gods in kidnapping Deimos, Kratos ventured forth to free his brother, refusing to heed any of Athena's warnings; sadly, Kratos lost both his brother and his mother in the process, and blamed the gods for it. It was actually one of the few instances where he lost a loved one through no fault of his own. Not to mention the whole 'making him the God of War' is, in context, just one more kick to the ribs for Kratos: forget being denied death, which he had hoped for when he learned he would always be haunted by his nightmares and guilt. He's now condemned to live forever, in the throne of the god who had destroyed his life.
• Worf Had the Flu: The only demigod to ever defeat Kratos in single combat is Kratos's own brother, Deimos. Deimos had been kidnapped by the gods at a very young age because they believed he was fated to destroy Olympus thanks to his bizarre birthmarks, and throughout his torture by Thanatos in the Domain of Death always blamed Kratos for being unable to protect him. Kratos easily could wipe the floor with Deimos, especially since at this point he's become the God of War. The only possible explanations for the ensuing beatdown Kratos endures by the end of the fight is that he either loves his brother too much to try to seriously fight back, or that he completely agrees with Deimos' assessment of him and lets him beat him down.
• Worthy Opponent: Cronos calls him a "skilled warrior".
• Would Hurt a Child: Though his killing of Calliope was done so unintentionally and he in general avoids hurting children, Kratos does get into a violent fight with a ghost of his teenage self in Ghost of Sparta. He avoids the gory finishers typical of the series' boss battles, but he tosses the teen at a wall multiple times and bashes his head into it to kill him. An atypical example in that the child Kratos hurts is himself.
• Wound That Will Not Heal: By the time of the Norse series Kratos' awareness of his divine nature has allowed him to develop the ability to heal his wounds through focus. Despite this however, there are two scars that appear permanently etched into his body. The wounds from the chains of the Blades of Chaos burning Kratos's arms, which even still bleed years later judging by the bloodstained bandages on his arms, and the scar on his midsection from when he impaled himself on the Blade of Olympus.
• You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: When Kratos encounters Gaia again after killing Hades, she is in a similar situation he was in when Zeus knocked them out; namely that Gaia refused Kratos's aid and told him that he was nothing but a pawn to the Titans. She asks Kratos to help her, only for him to get annoyed and call Gaia out for being hypocritical over now demanding aid despite her literally casting Kratos aside the last time when he needed it. While Kratos doesn't say the trope, his choice of words and reaction evoke the spirit of it.
  Gaia: You live Spartan? The blood of Cronos serves you well. Quickly! You must help me!
  Kratos: Help you?!
  Gaia: Yes, child! Quickly! I suffer greatly! tried to return to battle but...
  Kratos: Without me!
  Gaia: You know I had no choice! You must help me!
• You Kill It, You Bought It: Kratos became the God of War after killing Ares, and in later killing Thanatos, is implied to have also become the personification of Death itself.
• You Killed My Father: Kratos rages against the gods because of the many terrible things they've done unto himself and his loved ones. Of the latter, these include: tricking him into killing his wife and child, casting a curse upon his mother so she'd never be able to reveal the name of Kratos's father (on pain of Body Horror), and kidnapping his brother on the suspicion that he was the Chosen One of a prophecy detailing the downfall of Olympus. Ironically enough, with the reveal that Kratos is Zeus's son, his attack on Olympus is him taking out his extended family. He ends up killing his own father.
• You Monster!: Typical reaction people get when seeing him. One instance of note takes place in the first game: while on a ship currently being attacked by a Hydra, Kratos approaches a terrified fisherman, who proceeds to lock himself in a cage immediately afterward.
  Fisherman: I know who you are, Spartan! I know what you've done! I would rather die than be saved by you!

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