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Everything you've heard, and then some.

God of War takes my pick for best overall game of 2005. It's got the right mix of presentation, gameplay, and story so that any gamer will want to jump on for the ride. It also has great replay value with its unlockables and higher difficulty - God Mode - so that I'm going to keep coming back to it, trying to be all the god I can be.

The game basically never stopped getting played in the lounges of my college dorm in the Spring '05 semester. I seriously think the PS2 went at least a week straight without ever getting turned off when the first copy arrived on campus. Seeing things like Kratos wailing on a mythological beast just became commonplace (screenshot from the official game info site):

God of War screenshot

I was reluctant to participate in the frenzy though. I didn't really have much faith in action platformers nowadays. I considered it a dying genre. Prince of Persia might've been keeping it alive, but that was one hand clutching a cliff a mile up. The good things just didn't stop though. I kept hearing and seeing in passing how the game looked, and eventually, when I had the chance to grab it for free, I did. That was a good choice.

Upon finally playing it, the game ended up reminding me of the best parts of Onimusha and Devil May Cry: it's that engaging story and addictive gameplay combination. It also contains that cinematic quality that makes it really easy for hordes of people to get sucked in to just watching the world of ancient Greece unfold before them. End of the day, it's still no Ninja Gaiden, but it comes closer than anything else on the PS2 has.