Hades (from Supergiant, maker of Pyre, Bastion, Transistor)

sorry, CNN, the $25 itself is not generous, i just mean that the game itself is very generous. like, given how much enjoyment i've already gotten out of it (even if i never play it again, starting...tomorrow), i think i would pay $140 for this game

Thanks Karl! That's definitely food for thought.

the downbeat atmosphere draws me in quite a bit, i love how much of the voice-acting is calm and quiet. details like that keep me interested even though i'm not great at the game, kinda like a difficult book with a really nice cover

had fun playing with dad in the front yard. i'm just gonna admit that i'm s spear guy. it's the only weapon that makes sense to me.

(ie, i haven't figured out how to get the same dps from anything else - the spear special is the only way i know to reliably backstab in chaotic situations.)

pierced butterfly is nice, wearing it when meeting the person who gives it to you is cool too.

i have a different take on what "there is no escape means" now, a much ... darker take

okay the fists can be cool. i shouldn't evaluate weapons after trying them only once or twice, because boons.

It's really annoying that bull rush can't clear the smallest barrier or gap. Am I missing something?

KM is chilling on Olympus

sorta! i have defeated it 3 times now. there is so much to say. suffice to say, the post-game is very excellent. like, i'm not sure i've ever been tempted to hang around long after beating a game, but i seriously feel like i'm just getting started. poopsocks left behind on olympus

only click this if you want to learn the secret name of the hydra

it rhymes with journey

had my first clear today but it was pretty cheesy - running in circles while my health regen'd, dropping crystals, waiting for athena's invulnerability call to charge so I could run in and do a bunch of damage.

the moment when I realized this might work (reached the final guy without any DD) was one of my favorite moments playing videogames ever.

I haven't finished the second stage of the final boss yet, but I made a similar discovery about Athena's deflecting boons being the best way to neutralise the ridiculous area attacks in the fight... I wonder if there's any other way to do it for someone like me who doesn't have fast enough reflexes to dodge the attacks?

I made the plunge! It's already more engaging than the other rogues I've played, definitely because of the dating sim elements, though the voice acting and writing both deserve praise as well.

I've gotten as far as Asphodel, and have beaten Meg once, using the shield, which makes me feel like Captain America.

you're well on your way!

there is sooooo much to discover in the game. i read a review about being 40 hours and huge, interesting, gamechanging (potentially) systems unlocking, and that's very true. and also, the path to 40 hours is also filled with all sorts of things to find along the way.

this is a very, VERY polished game. it's obvious that they put a lot of thought into what is interesting and compelling at each stage of the game - absolute beginner, working your way up to the boss, and also what happens afterward. if anything, i am MORE compelled after beating the game than i was at the beginning, which is kind of disturbing and has seriously ruined my life the last couple weeks!

the music in this game is really awesome and there's the correct amount of it.

the game this reminds me of most is disgaea 1 on the ps2. in the sense that you go out and do your mission then come back to the underworld hub and chat with all your dudes. like karl said the loop is really satisfying and the characterization is done well (and there's the correct amount of it).

SHIT

DON'T READ THAT!

messed up the spoiler tag, getting mod assistance now, sorry

The difficulty hasn't bothered me so far, either! I'm not sure if it's genuinely not as hard as I feared or if it has so many other objectives that are within my grasp and thus distracting me from the difficulty.

that's good!

like so many other things in this game, i think the difficulty curve is perfectly tuned. it's well-tuned for single runs because no matter how good you are, you're going to be able to clear the first few rooms (probably - i mean the one time my mom played a videogame was SMB1, and she stood perfectly still on the left side of the screen for almost the entirety of the time limit, and then when the hurry the fuck up! music started and i told her she was going to die, she ran to the right and immediately hit the very first goomba. then she got mad and said she would never play a game again, and then hasn't for the last 32+ years). most likely, you'll get a little bit further each time through, and when you die it rarely* feels like you got totally screwed, and you'll probably feel like if you tried again you'd do better.

the difficulty curve is also well-tuned on a macro scale. hard to explain without spoilers but very true, i think

* except for those fucking poisonous rats godDAMMIT

a few tips for the final boss:

i posted this earlier but then had to have a mod delete it because i fucked up the new spoiler formatting tags. but in short:

• In early attempts, aim for specific Calls. Get one of the Athena (invulnerable, deflect) or Ares (invulnerable, spinning rift) calls, and if you can, try to pair it with a boon or two that helps build up the God Gauge faster, too. then, you can use the call to counter Hades most powerful attack - that huge-ass spin move that does massive damage. he has a tell, before he does it: a small thin white circle appears around him, and then about a second later he kicks your ass. if you have a good Call, though, you can activate it when he does the spin move, so you're invulnerable while also kicking HIS ass. very satisfying.
• level up your Keepsakes, specifically the
• In later attempts, adjust your build to fight Hades, rather than normal encounters. i say "adjust" because in the earlier stages you definitely need to be thinking of how to defeat lots of different kinds of encounters. but toward the end, start thinking about what you'll need to fight Hades, specifically. there are a lot of ways that plays out, but i struggled for long to just REACH Hades that it took a while longer before i realized i could tailor my build toward that final fight.

WTF IS WRONG WITH ME

whatever, no more spoiler tags for me. this is a spoiler zone. i am sorry

I finally did manage to beat the final boss! As I suspected, I needed Athena for that, having the deflecting dash and putting the deflecting boon on the shield's special attack. If you put some speed effect to it (from Hermes and/or from Daedalus hammer), you can just keep throwing it and it'll deflect a lot of the attacks on the way. This is especially useful against the dragon boss, as you can just stand in front of its heads and keep spamming it with the shield again and again with most of its attacks being deflected.

Karl's tip on how to use Athena's call seems very useful, but I didn't get it and instead finished off the final boss with Aphrodite's call. It seems to be the one call that does the most damage instantaneously, so if you other ways of deflecting the boss's damage and building up the god gauge, it works as an awesome finisher, doing hundreds of points of damage.

Specifically the WHAT!?

I can get to Dad Boss almost every time but can't beat him. Thanks though KM for saying that you can level up the Keepsakes, didn't know that. Boney's keepsake seems like the best, as far as i can tell.

Skelly, not boney, sorry

Yeah, Skelly's keepsake seems to be the best one to have, especially on the final two levels, where the bosses feel like they're almost impossible to beat without taking massive damage.

So my strategy has been to chose the one god's keepsake who's basic boon I really want to have for the first level, as the Furies are pretty easy to beat without dying once you've levelled up, then change for Skelly's keepsake for the other levels.

Thanatos keepsake is my favorite as I've mentioned - maxed it gives +2% damage for every encounter your clear without taking damage. gives an incentive to stay on your toes in otherwise relaxed encounters. I've gotten as high as +26%.

I guess if I ever start planning builds in advance I'll have to switch to a god's keepsake yeah. ugh.

seriously it's real fun to complete an insane Asphodel or Elysium encounter and unexpectedly get the +2% notification.

Specifically the WHAT!?

― Dan I., Monday, September 28, 2020 2:22 PM (seven minutes ago)

lol, in the chaos of trying to post that post, i also forgot to complete that thought! lol, what a fucking disaster

some of the more useful keepsakes for hades (the boss), SPECIFICALLY, are:

• Lucky Tooth (grants you a one-time revive when you die, up to 100 HP depending on how leveled it is)
• Distant Memory (up to 30% ranged damage, only useful for certain builds of course)
• Bone Hourglass (this one is more out of the box and might not even work very well (sorry), but every once in a while you might have a run where you can give it a shot. it extends the number of encounters that you can use items purchased from Charon (either in person or at one of blue shops). the idea is to use it during Elysium (or maybe even for the Cerberus/Hades section as well), buying a bunch of buffs near the end (just before Theseus and the Minotaur), and then rushing through Cerberus so that buffs still apply when you fight Hades.
• honestly one of the best things (the best thing?) about this game is that almost all of the keepsakes can be useful for the final boss, in certain ways, depending on your own preferences, aiming toward certain builds, trying to accomplish some of the bounties/heat conditions, and the luck of the draw. i'm at 55 attempts now, and almost every single one has felt different, and i feel very encouraged to try out ridiculous strategies (like the bone hourglass one above)
• now i'm just using bullet points for no reason, but another weird/fun thing you all should try is spending NO money! there are various boons and mirror options to help increase the amount of money you get, but you need a little luck to really take advantage. if you use the first weapon, Stygian Blade, one of the Daedalus upgrades you can get is called Hoarding Slash: "Your Attack deals bonus damage equal to 5% of your current gold". that might not sound like much, until you think about having 2000+ gold while you fight Hades - very useful to be dealing an extra 100 damage on the final boss!

here is my ULTIMATE QUESTION for you all, the one i really wanted to know:

do you use the "you have multiple casts but you have to go pick them up after you throw them" mirror option, or the "you have 1 cast, but it autoreplenishes so you don't have to go pick it up" option?

i have to admit that once i switched to autoreplenish, i never went back. i think it probably makes sense to go chase it for other playstyles, though - for example, there's a spear Aspect that changes the special so that after you throw the spear you can sprint forward to retrieve it, rather than pulling it back to you (as default). if you were already doing that, it might make a lot of sense to aim your special in the same area as your cast, so that when you sprint toward it you also pick up your cast at the same time

i really need to get back to work, but one final thing i've recently realized is that there is a balancing point between the damage you deal and your HP. it's natural to be focused on conserving/regaining your HP when you're purchasing things or picking a boon. but if you're about to face dad and you can only pick one thing (or door, in the Cerberus labyrinth thing, (or item, at Charon's last shop)), it often makes more sense to pick something that gives you a boost to damage, rather than your health, because when you hit him harder, you're also taking less overall damage by the end because you can defeat him more quickly.

finally beat theseus and the minotaur this morning with a high-damage doom fists/athena call build that left me with 1 hit point and 0 death defiances going into the next area. lasted a little while but still lots to figure out.

the fists aspect with the scorpion get over here special is awesome

Dear Bone Hydra,
You are a butthead.

Yours,
Zag

How have you been making out so far, Leee?

just beat the game for the first time. adamant rail with the MIRV mod and a shitload of doom, chill on the attack, heroic athena dash, ares call. got to the last boss with 4 death defiances and just kited while spamming AOE damage. good shit. love this game.

I just made it to Bone Hydra, and I have one last weapon to unlock. I'm also stockpiling darkness till either I have a surplus of keys to unlock more abilities or I can level up my death defiance.

Otherwise, I'm trying to collect nectar.

Is there any way to tell which boons/upgrades I haven't used yet while I'm escaping? Maybe I'm still a little too underleveled to worry about min-maxing my fated list, though.

There is a way! When you have an option for a boon that’s on the fated list, a little scroll icon will appear next to the name of it.

But I’d say don’t worry too much about completing all those, because you’ll end up using them all eventually just by playing. a boon that seems really bad on one run may be essential with a different weapon

got to the bull of minos for the first time on my first run with the adamant rail. seems like a much easier weapon than the others, but the fists are so fun

i thought adamant was overpowered the first time i used it, too, but in returning to it i've sometimes struggled!

also, the bow is by far the hardest for me! it seems really strong at the beginning but underpowered by the end. every time i make it work, it's by pairing it with a dash-strike boon and just spamming the crap out of it. granting, i do that sometimes too with other weapons, but i don't feel as forced into it as i do with the bow

the aspect where the special flurry arrows all target the last-attacked enemy allows for a little more tactical thinking imo

i only tried that aspect once, and did very poorly with it! i don't think i was being very tactful with it, though. i remember being frustrated that the arrows kept targeting enemies that were already dead, so i think i was changing targets too quickly

Bow is my least favorite weapon. Feels like it takes forever to clear a room with that thing.

That's my feeling too. It requires more finesse and less running around like a cat on fire.

I beat the Bone Hydra! And unlocked my first set of additional abilities! An he played around with weapon aspects! I.e. all the little unlockables are what make this game approachable.

How does Stubborn Defiance work? It sez once per chamber, but does that mean level (e.g. Tartarus) or once per room/encounter? Because functionally it seems like the latter.

stubborn defiance works once per encounter, and there's no limit to the number of times it works.

death defiance is limited (starts with 1, but you can level it up to 3 using the mirror), but heals more.

i always tend to die on the bosses, not the encounters, so i almost always go with death defiance (if you have that plus the leveled up keepsake that gives you another life, you have up to 4 revives against the final boss).

Stubborn doesn't work against bosses, either?

I've bought most of the renovations from the House Contractor, an he the only things left are upgrading troves and urn drops, which don't seem that useful. Am I underestimating them or can I just trade them in for keys?

Going to play this with God mode switched on tonight, have only ever managed to beat the first boss once, died instantly in the next chamber.

I really needed God mode. It helps but isn't a panacea. Just makes things a tad easier over time

OK, this game is insanely fun and addictive, and while I'm still struggling to figure out all the mechanics and approaches, all while trying to enjoy the writing and voice acting, I have been making steady progress, or at least what counts for progress in a game that keeps booting you back to the beginning. My own general impatience has started to become an impediment, though. I've beat Meg a few times, but usually I'm so kind of latently annoyed with the run back that I get sloppy.

Beat the Bone Hydra and made it a bit into Elysium, but I think I may switch to God Mode.

Playing on God Mode has been a lot of fun, since it makes it gradually easier but not always easy. Regardless, it's been a great way to grind, should I ever choose to increase the difficulty again (which I guess you can toggle on and off on the fly).

It kinda lost its hold on me, I got sick of doing the mostly-same thing over and over (although I know I'm partially to blame for sticking to the same weapon). Maybe I should try god mode.

Here's something I just started doing that's kept me interested. Rather than focus on level/enemy progression, focus on all of the other little meta progression things you can achieve. For example, just work on accumulating keys, to unlock certain things. Or try for purple crystals to unlock mirror boosts. Or grind for gems to complete chores and whatnot. A lot of these things will ultimately help you in the end, afaict, and they're kind of fast and fun things to focus on, making each run productive even if you don't make it that far.

Yes! That's much closer to the way I played it. Honestly, while I did think about using God Mode when I got a bit frustrated I would have never actually done it. Trying and failing and making small bits of progress is the thing, not just winning as fast as possible.

Finished my first run. Obviously God Mode gave me a big boost, though I think it was also because I (literally) lucked out with a great Chaos boon that gave me special up to 300% more damage. I was loaded out with the machine gun/rocket launcher, so I would typically just run around firing off bombs that, as I progressed, would just get more and more powerful. Plus, I had leveled up the mirror to give me health back based on a percentage of Darkness, and since I just kept accumulating Darkness, it kept me nice and healthy. Of course, one thing I can try to gauge God Mode vs. boon combination is doing another run with the current setup, but turning God Mode off, to see how far I get. Maybe I'll try that.

Nicely done! I think my first completion was with the gun yet that would eventually not be the weapon I found most succuss with overall.

Hades..... 2

it's pretty fun

Also just in case anyone was thinking of trying it: don't save scum. It doesn't work. It'll make you sad (heard this from a friend, wouldn't try it myself obviously)

Apparently no date for a switch release? I really enjoyed playing 1 on that platform, wondering if I'll have to borrow another of my bf's consoles to be able to play.

Assuming the format is the same as the first game, I'm not sure why you'd save scum??? The whole thing is a loop, right? And I'm saying this as someone who absolutely does save scum games like Baldur's Gate.

Game is amazing so far. They've done a great job of reworking the gameplay into something fresh while still maintaining the feel of the original. I'm so excited for the full release.

Saving does work the same as the first game; you can "quit" if you've reached an autosave point (e.g. clearing a chamber), otherwise you can only "give up" and start the run over. Though I only played the original on Switch so maybe alt+F4 was an option if you played it on PC.

I took an item I thought was going to raise my max health from a certain person in the second area, but turns out it just refilled your health which was already full. Immediately alt-f4'd and it cancelled my whole run out (and I really liked that run lol)

It was a good thing. I need to learn to stop doing these things and I only learn stuff the hard way.

Hades launched early access in December 2018, then released in September 2020. So all you Switch users (myself included) who are hoping to get your hands on this, you might want to be patient. My guess is the game officially launches late 2025 at the earliest.

That said, who knows how far they are into this one vs the OG. I recall the early access for Hades being pretty raw, and only Tartarus was playable

To clarify - this drop of Hades 2 is early access, not the full launch. Switch was a day 1 supported system for the official launch of Hades in 2020, before PS4/PS5 and Xbox, so I'm hopeful that's coming sooner than later.

Decided to wrap up Hades before trying Hades II, so I created a new game and had a week of button mashing to kill Hades a dozen times... now on to Hades II, which has really good music so far (and everything else)!