God of War: Chains of Olympus was sort of a miracle on the PlayStation Portable, delivering all of Kratos’ blood-soaked spectacle on the small screen. But it was only able to squeeze so much out of the humble handheld because a Jak and Daxter game was apparently also running in the background.
God of War stewards Sony Santa Monica revealed as much in celebration of the series’ 20th anniversary. “In God of war: Chains of Olympus, the PSP’s hardware limitations made seamless loading a challenge,” the studio wrote in a social media post. “The solution? A movie file running in the background to keep things smooth – true to God of War’s signature style.”
What was that movie? Well, it was none other than the intro cinematic for Daxter, a standalone PSP platformer based on Naughty Dog‘s series Jak and Daxter (duh). It might seem like a pretty random workaround, but The Order: 1886 developer Ready At Dawn actually cut its teeth by turning PlayStation’s console heavyhitters into small screen stars. It’s debut game was Daxter, and it eventually used the mascot platformer to go even bigger with Chains of Olympus. Ready At Dawn was eventually acquired and then closed by Facebook, though, so RIP.
I’m not nearly genius enough to figure out how Daxter’s intro cinematic would help God of War’s seamless loading – in my mind, two things running at once would just make everything slower – but that’s why we leave the game making to the wizards, eh?
