A Genuine Improvement Upon 2018
There doesn't seem to be a way to start this, without comparing it to what came before. 2018 was a rather impressive game that was bogged down by slow progression, lack of character, and too much focus on the relationship between father and son + it's one shot arthouse push. While this game struggles with some of these things too, I do feel like this game builds upon the 2018 entry with a much more thrilling title.
God of War Ragnarok feels like a more fascinating and less maze like game, where it uses the past game's basis, and can actually do stuff to give you a more enjoyable experience. Combat is just better and has more varied enemies, the world is a lot more interesting, you have time to deal characters beyond the main 2, you ahve a better grasp of the world you're in, it's more embracing of it's mythology it's attached to, etc. Also this game can actually be enjoyed by people who aren't a father to a human boy.
While the shorter god of war 2018 felt drawn out and long, with tons of slow animations, meandering around doing boring tasks, and just going through the game felt tedious, this game had a mountain loads more worth of content, but still felt less bogged down. If you didn't like 2018 like me, I still think you'd enjoy this, heck, especially if you didn't enjoy 2018.
I do think this game was rushed, and it was 2 games in one, but I don't know how I'd have done that either. If this was divided into 2 separate games, it would feel just as slow and uneventful as 2018, but also the final battle definitely is hurt by it's rushed progression. Overall the whole saga is hurt by the fact that they didn't go into the reboot with full knowledge of the 2 game structure, because if the first game had more, and this game had more fleshing of what was there, I think both games would have been better for it.
The zoomed in camera is 100% a nuisance though, the reason we don't have another dimension of combat is purely because they wanted to force the one take aspect of it, which is used better in this (the one take aspect), but the lack of jumping + other aspects I do believe still hurts the game for very little gained.
Along with the weapons from 2018, you have a 3rd weapon, which is also very fun to use, and feels different in it's gameplay/application. Also the fact that you start with both weapons you get through 2018 means that you have a more entertaining early game.
While it lacks the original greek saga's scale, intensity, etc, and feels like a saturday morning cartoon version of said saga, this is a positive growth from god of war 2018, and it leaves the future of the series with some interesting paths forward. Oh and free dlc of actual quality, good on them for that.