Jaffe explains his reaction to the GoW footage.

[Cyorg]

Apparently, the footage he was so excited about was not what we got to see on Spike... But I'm sure you guys already knew this.

PSXE: Dave, after seeing a little of God of War III, do you regret in any way leaving; do you wish you could've been part of that project?

Jaffe: "Actually, here was my response to GoWIII- I had gone to Santa Monica studios and I saw the trailer they were going to show on the SpikeTV [Video Game Awards]. But they didn't show it all; I was watching it on TV and I was like, "I don't know if they're going to dole this out over time, like break the trailer up into chunks throughout the night and we'll eventually see the whole thing." But they didn't do that. Anyway, when I saw that trailer, to me, it looked like a next-gen God of War. You know, I'm not blown away; I expect the level design and codes and stuff to be as good as it has always been, and yeah, it looks just like a next-gen God of War.

But they showed me this [other] sequence - that's all I can say about it - and they must've put it together only two or three days prior to me showing up. And that's the stuff that absolutely blew me away; it looked better than Gears 2; it looked like a Renaissance canvas-style painting come to life. Stunningly beautiful. I actually found myself getting nervous and sweaty and I was like, "why am I getting like this?" But it was because I was wondering, "how the fu** are we going to compete? The bar has just been raised again." Our game just doesn't look that good and it never will, and there are reasons for that. But no, I don't say I want to be part of the project and I wish those guys the best."

Full interview:
http://www.psxextreme.com/feature/356-2.html