Developer Diary: Become a Cosmic Guardian in ‘Asgard’s Wrath 2’
Prior to joining Oculus Studios where she’s now a Senior Producer working with Sanzaru Games on Asgard’s Wrath 2, Mari Kyle worked on our content review team and played through over 1,000 VR games—so needless to say, she’s seen some stuff and knows a thing or two about what goes into a compelling immersive title. We recently caught up with her to talk shop and learn more about the thrilling successor to Asgard’s Wrath.
The Road So Far
In Asgard’s Wrath, a Rift exclusive that launched in 2019, you play as a fledgling god, thrust into the middle of a white-knuckle battle with a giant kraken in the middle of the ocean. You meet Loki, who takes you under his wing and teaches you how to use your powers and navigate the world. In exchange, he asks you to collect a series of stones for him that will help him gain more power.
By the end of the game, you learn that Loki, the trickster god, has indeed tricked you—betraying you and leaving you to rot in an illusionary prison while he escapes to sow chaos across the universe. And that’s where Asgard’s Wrath 2 begins.
You find a mysterious Ankh and after picking it up, you summon a strange, otherworldly beast and do battle, only to be whisked away by the Weavers of Fate—three giant beings who control the fate of the universe and the balance of good and evil across all different realities. The Weavers of Fate reveal that you’ve evolved to become a Cosmic Guardian, a being more powerful than even the gods. And as a Cosmic Guardian, it’s your duty to right all the wrongs that came about as a result of your actions in Asgard’s Wrath. You must find Loki, stop him from upsetting the balance of the universe, and save not just the Norse realms, but all the realms beyond.
Of course, that’s easier said than done.
“In Asgard’s Wrath 2, you’re now a foreign god in this strange new realm that you have no experience in,” Kyle explains. “In Asgard’s Wrath, you were used to the Norse realm: You know all the characters, you know the creatures that were gonna come out and the heroes. In Asgard’s Wrath 2, it’s a whole new realm. In order to track down Loki, you’ll need allies who are familiar with the land, the tales, and the weapons of ancient Egypt, so you’ll gain ally gods in the form of ancient Egyptian gods that you may already be familiar with, and with their help as well as the help of the mortal heroes, you’ll be able to navigate ancient Egypt to find Loki and set things right.”
The (Mortal) Hero’s Journey
Your mission is an epic one, and along the way, you’ll also help to fulfill the destinies of the mortal heroes who have their own tales for redemption, balance, and hope.
“Abraxas is the first of our possessable mortal heroes,” says Kyle. “He is a cynical tomb robber, and as a Cosmic Guardian, you meet him right as he’s in the clutches of danger and death. You rescue him when he needs you most, and you two make an unlikely pair.”
As it turns out, Abraxas has sworn vengeance against the gods, believing they’ve wronged and abandoned him. “And then here you are as a god,” Kyle says, “and you need his help just as much as he needs yours.”
Together, you team up, and you can possess and empower him in order to navigate the mortal realm to pull levers, fight enemies, and progress through epic quests. You can also switch back to your God-scale perspective as a Cosmic Guardian to help Abraxas better navigate a space. Explains Kyle, “In a way, you have kind of a symbiotic relationship where you help him fulfill his destiny and he allows you to fulfill yours as well inside of the Egyptian realm.”
Leveling Up
Once possessed by the Cosmic Guardian, these mortal heroes are elevated and imbued with powers far beyond what they could have achieved on their own.
“As a tomb robber, Abraxas is used to using anything he can get his hands on to navigate through tombs and deadly traps and to fight enemies off so he can get some treasure,” says Kyle. “But with the power of the Cosmic Guardian coursing through him, he’s able to do so much more with his weapons.”
His ax, a stonecutter’s ax that belonged to his father, gains boomerang properties, so he can throw it and recall it back—a fun and satisfying mechanic that has a whole new level of physicality in VR. He also has a sword that can transform into a whip sword. “That is every bit as dangerous as it sounds,” Kyle laughs. “It’s a giant sword that turns into a whip that still has blades on it, so you can lash through enemies, grip onto them and grapple towards them, or also reach new areas by grappling onto a ledge and pulling yourself up.”
The Magic of Shifting Perspectives
It comes as little wonder that god-scale mode plays such an important role in Asgard’s Wrath 2, given the legacy of its predecessor. In fact, “The original prototype for what eventually became Asgard’s Wrath was a game where you played as a giant-sized god, facing off against a rival god by having hordes of mortal minions on a battlefield below you—like a MOBA,” explains Sanzaru Games Studio Creative Director Mat Kraemer. “At one point in development, the team tried out what it would be like to swap from god POV to mortal POV, and Asgard’s Wrath was born.”
That interplay between god-scale and mortal-scale gameplay proved to be a winning combination for the original Asgard’s Wrath, which received a 9.4 review score on IGN. Now, Sanzaru and Oculus Studios are leaning into that formula and combining it with lessons learned and player feedback from the first game to produce a truly breathtaking sequel.
“The Cosmic Guardian is incredibly unique as video game playable characters come,” Kyle notes. “The Cosmic Guardian embodies a lot of VR-specific mechanics, such as changing perspective—going from a smaller scale when you possess those mortal heroes to this omniscient god-scale mode where you can see entire landscapes and find parts of a puzzle that you couldn’t see previously or lift up items that you could never lift up as a mortal. There’s something magical about solving the puzzle and making a new way forward as the Cosmic Guardian and then going back into your mortal scale and experiencing those changes from a first-person perspective. It’s kind of like you’re experiencing that environment twice. And that magic is exactly what makes this Cosmic Guardian-scale something that’s very unique for VR. Being able to shift that perspective from first-person to third-person and really being able to grab and manipulate the space in a way that a god would is something that you can only find in VR games.”
And because the Cosmic Guardian can possess different heroes (once you’ve unlocked them as you move through the story), you don’t have to stick with just one playing style. You can bounce between a melee-first character, a ranger character, or more of a magic-wielding character and get familiar with a bunch of different loadouts for heroes without sacrificing progression.
God-scale mode also lets you go toe-to-toe with larger-than-life enemies in epic boss fights. “When you first meet Sekhmet as Abraxas, she’s towering over him and really terrorizing him with her massive fists and power,” says Kyle, “and you might think to yourself, ‘Wouldn’t it be interesting if she picked on someone her own size?’ Soon enough, when you’re in your god-scale mode, you’ll be able to do just that.”
Bragging Rights
In addition to its main narrative-driven quest, Asgard’s Wrath 2 features an asynchronously social dungeon-crawling mode where you as the Cosmic Guardian will take part in an ongoing battle that evolves over time.
We should note that Kyle currently holds the high score on the leaderboards, so even the most seasoned competitors will have their work cut out for them if they want to reign supreme.
“I’m in the game for hours and hours every single day, every day of the week,” she says. “It’s my favorite game—and I can say that without being biased. It genuinely is my favorite game.”
To learn more about this dungeon mode and all that it offers, tune in to our next deep dive where we explore The Uncharted Rifts.
Pre-order Asgard’s Wrath 2 now to secure the following benefits:
- An exclusive Asgard’s Wrath 2-themed character skin and the title of “Cosmic Guardian” able to be equipped immediately in POPULATION: ONE
- A free digital copy of the original Asgard’s Wrath for PC VR, which you can play with a VR-ready PC either on the Rift Platform or wirelessly on your Meta Quest headset via Air Link
- The Great Sand Sea environment for your Meta Horizon Home
- Epic in-game gear for Asgard’s Wrath 2: the Sword of Ra and the Sun God’s battle armor
Click here for details on how to claim your pre-order benefits.
