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

now out of Early Access, this game has kind of ruined my life since i purchased it a few days ago. there's so much to say about it, from how polished and good it is to build ideas, to making fun of Eurydice for being into acoustic Staind songs.

anyone else in hell with me?

RIYL: dead cells, rogue legacy, binding of isaac, good writing and voice acting, being perpetually one 25-minute run away from unlocking something you really want

what is most amazing to me is how they manage to keep things fresh. it is pretty amazing that none of the characters ever repeats themselves, dozens of times in, even though you're interacting with them repeatedly. as all the reviews indicated, it is the kind of game where you're always unlocking something that is interesting, even things that substantially change the way you can play the game, dozens of hours into the game.

I got an hour with this last night, it's very, very slick

Is there any kind of shortcut mechanic? It has all the signs of being a really addictive times ink, but also can see myself repeatedly failing several runs to that first boss and then bouncing off it because I suck at roguelikes

i haven't run across one yet, but i am pretty sure there will be one. i've been _this_ close to beating it (i think).

it's one of those roguelites where you'll be able to gradually improve your base stats (using the mirror in your bedroom) between runs, so i wouldn't feel too bad about losing the first couple times. also, the 6 weapons are very different and encourage different modes of style, so it might help just to try another one out.

i didn't like the shield, in particular, at first, but it can be incredibly powerful and fun with just a few boons

I loved the shield straight away, I had a lightning shield run early on that felt like it was better at being marvel ultimate alliance than marvel ultimate alliance 3 was

yeah the shield is my favorite so far but i've had the greatest success with the spear + wild backstab damage + speed up, throwing it and recalling it (+ backstab each time), dash across the room, repeat.

i was wondering at what point the NPCs would start resorting to stock phrases but it seems like there's a Lot of Writing here.

the first person i gave nectar to was my skeleton punching bag bro, he brings a lot of good vibes and energy to what is probably a crappy job

i've accidentally given nectar to cerberus like 5 times now. it's easy to do on a gamepad (using PS4 controller with my mac) because Pet is L2 and gift is R2

i find myself using the Chaos trapdoor more often, too, especially when it's the one near the beginning. some of those early-game rewards can be really powerful later

I stopped playing Dead Cells after a weekend, but this seems a little more forgiving?

i dunno, it gets pretty hard. i mean, with both games (and the genre, by design you're supposed to hit a point where it's too hard and die, at least a few dozen times, so you definitely read THERE IS NO ESCAPE a bunch

but counteract with Kith's Short, Dirty, and Spoiler-Free Hades Starter Guide, "for people who want to know the basics of how to fight good and plan ahead without getting spoiled on characters, locations, or the story"

one simple thing i was confused about was the Call gauge - I kept on saving it up for a big boss fight, but smartly, it depletes to 0 after every room, so if you have a Call equipped it definitely makes sense to use it!

This will definitely be too hard for me but it's cool, and hey you can pet Cerberus

two things i really like:

- "One must imagine Sisyphus happy", and they did! took me a while to make the connection but it's lovely
- i love the freedom of movement in this game, from the very beginning. the dash takes you right through walls, and except for the flames in Asphodel, it's setup so you can't "mess up" or take fall damage. very godlike controls, overall.

I got this yesterday afternoon and somehow played it for like 6 hours. Not much to say that hasn’t been said, but yeah, it’s good. This is kinda how I wished the too-unchallenging Diablo 3 played.

I still don’t quite understand how the Calls work.

shit, i meant to respond to that a couple days ago! you probably already figured it out, but once you get a Call (via a boon), your God Gauge fills up every time to you take a hit, and when it passes a threshold you can trigger the Call. what i didn't realize for an embarrassing amount of time was that the God Gauge drains at the end of each battle, so there's no point in "saving" the gauge for the next fight, you should definitely use them as much as possible

this game is so great that i kind of assume no one's posting here because you're all poopsocking hades

i think my favorite call is Ares? the one that turns you into a giant human spinning Rift for a few seconds? that one can be lethal on bosses. i feel like the Aphrodite call, the one that charms the enemy for a few seconds, could also potentially be very powerful.

also, i am on the verge of tears because i've died to (what i think is) the final boss like 4 times in a row when they were down to a sliver of health. sometimes it's because my build is weak, but other times it's total manual user error, flipping out with nerves. i feel like i'm on the edge of beating it, though. 37 hours in so far.

it's amazing to me how fresh each new run feels, and how the daedalus hammers combined with the boons can lead to totally different experiences with the same 6 weapons. i'm torn because the gun has gotten me to the end boss every single time i've used it, but it's also my least favorite weapon to use in terms of fun.

surprisingly, i think the melee/dual fists are my current favorite (again in terms of fun, not effectiveness) it has a cool alternate version you can unlock with titan blood, too, that makes your special pull in enemies from afar to right next to your character there is a boon for it that makes the dash-strike "combine" into the regular attack combo, which basically means you can pull off a nearly infinite punching and dash-striking combo that is nearly unstoppable if you also have deflect built into it.

i think the melee and gun are powerful (for me at least) because they're both rapid fire attacks so it's really easy to add boon effects that trigger with every individual strike (like lightning, or effects you can stack like chill or poison). and same deal with the shield, which has a special that can easily be modified to strike multiple times, triggering side-effects with each hit.

so those are mainstays that are almost always possible, if you make a point of building that direction. but i love running into unexpected playstyles, being forced to try them out essentially, that are like mini-games in their own. for example, my last heartbreaking run was with that one laser beam cast (forget which god), but later on i added another effect which made the lasers target ME instead of the direction i initially placed them. the lasers didn't hurt me, but they did follow me, which meant i had to place the lasers on the edge of the playing area, then run into the middle, so that the enemy was caught in the laser crossfire as it swept across to the center. hard to explain, and i'm not sure i'd try to get that build again, but also delightful and occasionally really powerful when i was taking advantage of it properly.

i love that the underlying system of hades upgrades makes that kind of run possible almost 40 hours in, it's great

18 escapes attempted. 0 times getting past Theseus and the bull. I really want to stop playing but I also just unlocked the gun ...

For me, the short-range weapons like the gloves or the sword are great for other enemies, but I have a hard time fighting the bosses with them, as the bosses have many ways of hurting you if you get too close... So the only way I've been able to consistently get past the third boss and into the endgame is to use the bow, whose special attack (a spread of arrows) is awesome if you add some extra damaging effects to it. That, combined with the boon from Zeus that makes your cast into a chain lightning, seems to be the best way to bombard the bosses from a distance while trying to avoid their attacks. The spread of arrows also makes the three witches chamber on the second level a piece of cake, which it doesn't seem to be with the other weapons?

*hugs thread*

fwiw lukas, i'm at about 38 attempts now, but i was at theseus/minotaur at around the same time as you (15-20 attempts in i think), and unlocked the gun around the same time. my very first time with the adamant rail, i made it all the way to the endboss.

xp tuomas i initially felt the same with the weapons, like i needed something long-range to survive. but over time i've figured out how to effectively use the others as well (note that i still haven't beaten the damn game, though i've come close!).

i think for the bosses, particularly the late game, it's pretty essential to have at least one good long range option (whether that's the weapon intself, or a cast or a beefed up special) but also essential to have an attack that lets you get in close and deal tons of damage in a short time (while they're vulnerable). for me, so far, that close attack often seems to involve a dash-strike that repels, or some other sort of chained attack where i can be almost invulnerable for a short period.

some of my best runs, against the bosses, are the opposite of ranged - i'm just dashing through and around the boss, invulnerable for almost the entire time. of course, at some point the intermittent damage adds up to death, as i still haven't won this way!

then again, in other runs i'm hovering on the edges, picking my spots and being extremely careful, and also getting very close.

ok i need to play hades now

I'm kind of conflicted in getting the game! On the one hand, I'm tired of hard games and my consoles are littered with barely played rogue likes. OTOH the near universal praise and reviews like this paint it to be a possible exception for me? https://kotaku.com/i-guess-i-actually-like-roguelikes-now-1845131675

Sorry to be wishy washy!

hahaha

honestly, it does lean toward being a "hard" game. it is not as difficult as celeste - just throwing that out as a reference, if you've played it.

i'm tempted to try to compare it to the difficulty of dark souls games, but they're just too different. i've never gotten to the end of a dark souls game, because i always get stuck on some boss 25 hours in and get so frustrated that i quit. there are similar boss obstacles in Hades, but the difference is that there aren't nearly so many. for me, the Escalating Series of Bosses model is much more manageable when it's only a handful, as opposed to the dozens in a dark souls game.

all the same, the actual gameplay of Hades is consistently engaging but challenging - if you don't pay attention, you can quickly take a beating. it's not the kind of game you'd recommend to a newcomer to videogames, it kind of has prerequisites. (note that i'm talking about adults. obviously 6-year-olds can pick up anything and master it within a week due to their god-like abilities boons)

the thing is, leee, i think you'd like all the OTHER things about it - it's just so polished and well-done, i'm actually still interested in some of the sub-plots, 40 hours in, as they are dished out to me in small doses every once in a while. the persona of hades is very close to an unrepentant version of the grumpy dad in God of War. the difference is, instead of wanting to murder the little boy in the God of War's boat, instead you ARE the little boy, but you're trying to murder your dad, and he definitely deserves it, and the god of war is called Ares and he can upgrade your cast spell so that it shoots out spinning black-hole rifts

condensed down to a recommendation for your CNN appearance later:

• it's only $25, which to use an increasingly overused 2020 adjective, is "generous".
• worth checking out even if you're on the fence, just know that dying is part of the cycle of existence

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

I mean, I was friends with felicity for over a year before we discovered we both were huge roguelike junkies (she: Nethack, me: ADOM).

Souls games are definitely inspired by rogue-likes insofar as they have a version of permadeath, kind of a permadeath-lite (dying before retrieving your souls/runes), and a similar feeling of “having to learn something cryptic by just attempting it over and over”…

…but I think the inspiration river flows the other way: Hades and Dead Cells are inspired heavily by Souls games. Doesn’t Dead Cells even have a “git gud” Easter egg?

xp Slay the Spire is fantastic though be warned, I'm something like 500hrs into it and I still find myself going back for more, though maybe it's that I'm just not very good at it!

I can now get past the first boss consistently! But I'm getting a bit shredded in the next area, of course. Still using the shield, being able to block if necessary is just too good.

I get that it's integral to the game system to do a full run each time in order to keep acquiring stuff and strengthening your character over time, but I would still kill for a checkpoint after each main area.

Beat the Hydra on my first try! So I've gotten through some of Elysium once, mostly thanks to some Ares boons (the ones that add doom to your special attack).

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)!

playing this for the first time (the first game). just got my first win on run 25, with the bow. i prefer playing the melee weapons but the back half of the game definitely feels harder with them

am i right in assuming that it's better to just use one of the weapon's two buttons each run? the game doesn't really seem to reward you for weaving attack + special rather than spamming whichever one has been upgraded more, at least on the base version of each weapon. so that's what i've been doing. am i missing something there? i feel like an upgraded cast tends to provide a more complementary secondary option in most cases

it's been awhile since i've played it so my memory is fuzzy, but yeah, often it is ideal to just focus on the one ability you upgraded. however it depends entirely on your build, some weapons/builds require a certain sequence of attacks to maximize damage output and some of them can be kind of finicky. there are also casts that are amazing, poseidon's for example can be one of the most powerful abilities in the game when used with the correct combo of upgrades. iirc what you focus on using can also change throughout a run, like once your build is complete then you start using a combo whereas before that you just use one ability

you might find more reasons to use a variety of moves as you unlock more of the mirror too

getting better, i've won my last 3 runs and have a win with every weapon now. starting to feel the diminishing returns so i'll probably be done when i finish the main story, but good game

i think i had about the same experience the first stretch of time i played it and i put it down for like two years.. until i had a craving for it and picked it up again and got into in a much more intense way. now i'm one of those annoying people that says things like 'the real game starts when you play at at least 10 heat'

Just started Hades II. Goodbye to my life this autumn.

only just got round to hades 1 (temporarily on hold for silksong)

i played it quite a bit in early access! trying to figure out whether to start over for 1.0 or pick up where i left off

hades ii is probably the most beautiful game i’ve ever witnessed

also very ivy. witches! tarot! totally horrific monsters!

I've just managed to get to Scylla and I love her design so much. Also pleased by beefy goth gf Nemesis.

game is much better than the first (which was good!) in every way except the story which was badly fumbled, it's extremely clumsy

a lot of fans are REALLY complaining about the story but i think it was fine - i knew going into 1.0 that it wouldn't hit the same for me as the first game. H2 is still a perfect game to me

i don't really care that much because the story itself isn't the point of these games and the moment-to-moment character stuff does its job, but the ending is messy and unsatisfying on a lot of levels. it's just a bit of a shame because i think they could have managed at least 'adequate' there and everything else is fantastic

oof story was a big factor in what hooked me in the original. So far it's not bad, but I've noticed a bit of a drop off in the quality of some of the writing on the interactions with the Gods (and somewhat disappointed with the God selection too initially). That said, I've really enjoyed the act of playing the game, def more than the original.

I only just unlocked the path to Olympus so I'm still in the early/mid goings of the game.

Just finished both paths. I'm going to be a responsible rogue-like addict and delete the game now/hand in my keys now. Very very fun. Dont care about the story. Do care about builds builds builds. Top stuff

oof story was a big factor in what hooked me in the original. So far it's not bad, but I've noticed a bit of a drop off in the quality of some of the writing on the interactions with the Gods (and somewhat disappointed with the God selection too initially). That said, I've really enjoyed the act of playing the game, def more than the original.

― octobeard, Sunday, 5 October 2025 23:25 (yesterday)

This is how I'm feeling with it at the moment (except probably not enjoying the act of playing MORE than the original, rather enjoying it about the same). I'm at the point where I'm getting hammered by the titan bosses at both ends of the path and consistently unable to beat either of them. Story is fine but I feel a bit less engaged with it: it's the scope creep problem, where I'm more engaged in a story about teenage rebellion, character growth and family than I am in a story about a massive gods vs titans war. As I say, though, up to this point it is a perfectly decent story, but I'm worried as I keep hearing that they "whiffed the ending" so I'm hoping it doesn't get really crap after I start beating the bosses.

One big plus point is a lot of the new characters are really fun - I love seeing the takes on iconic figures from the mythology. Also it made me finally read Euripides' Medea.

i think the story is good! i don't really even think it's about a gods vs titans war bc chronos is your grandpa (thus making it about dealing with a generational trauma more pervasive than just how shitty your dad is). the mechanisms by which they set up the loop are a little arbitrary... but that was true of the first game

True, true. I have now passed the task complete/credits roll ending and I *did* think it was pretty half-arsed and underwhelming. But it wasn't the worst thing ever and the writing in other places is still strong enough for me to think the game is brilliant. If it wasn't for comparing it to the first game I would probably be much more effusive with my praise, but invested fans do tend to be more annoyed by minor quibbles, so that's where my head is.

i love this game so much, i'm obsessed with it. "most beautiful game i've ever witnessed" is correct. i haven't gotten to the credits roll ending but the central plot isn't really my focus in these games, so underwhelming i can deal with, as long as it's not distractingly bad i don't think i'll be bothered

just passed the credits, end was abrupt/weak but it's kinda a favor that they grafted anything at all onto a game like this, let alone stuff so extensive and witty and purty and voice acted and all

at first i thought it was way too overstuffed, like 'ooh, a new cast- cool! and we're mining... AND gardening... and a frog is following me. and they really have a tech tree for a shovel, huh' etc etc etc. (and the hex upgrades seemed convoluted at first and still remain middling, i think it's just the UI maybe and some of selene's voice cues)

but ANYWAY this surpasses the original in basically every way, everything they added paid off in terms of depth, i felt like i could achieve the intended 'flow' with the combat more than the first because of the new systems. first game was awesome but pretty twitchy at times. in this you have more subtle control over your build in a way that rewards thoughtful consideration, even just thinking "wow, that's a garbage item, when the fuck would i ever want this" before an aha moment later.

the first game essentially had the same inventory system, right? but it was barely used. i also found the upgrades in charon's wells to be a lot more cohesive in terms of being used in some sort of sequence that could pay off dramatically, especially in tandem with the hexes and casts

anyway, this can obviously be twitchy if you want but it can also pay off to slow down, even in the middle of an encounter. i think that lets the design shine a bit more

they released a patch today.. it looks like they actually made some story changes?? honestly didn't expect them to do that.

Major spoilers below for late-game plot points, also CW for discussion of shitty behaviour of Greek gods.

I guessed that Hecate was actually a version of Melinoë quite early on, because I didn't know Melinoë's place in Greek mythology and looked it up like a nerd, and there was talk of how she was often equated with Hecate. Also, Chekhov's Mask - has to be a reason for her wearing one, right? Was still a bit uncertain if it'd play out that way, as they're obviously playing a bit with the myths and the sources themselves often disagree - pretty sure they don't even nod towards the bits of myth that suggest that either Zagreus or Melinoë or both might be fathered by Zeus raping Persephone. Anyway, I was quite satisfied that I got that and also immediately knew Dora was Pandora of box fame - though I think that one might be super obvious, did anyone not clock that?

what's the ACTUAL deal with rarity and level?

i'd thought the basic concept was rarity as an increased base stat- say a 'common' attack boon will add +4 attack but the 'rare' version adds +7 attack or something. and levels are boosts to that base stat. (so in my understanding, with enough levelling, the 'common' attack could end up as powerful as the lvl 1 'rare' attack.)

BUT THEN there is a demeter (?) boon which increases the rarity of a random boon every x encounters. so now i don't know if i understand- why is it increasing rarity vs level? is that specificity meant to build incentive for a 'get all legendary boons from each olympian' achievement/prophecy or something? or a rarity boost is just that much bigger and more powerful versus a plain old level up. i dunno, just seems so fiddly and roundabout unnecessarily and everything else in this game is so tightly designed that i figure i'm missing something.

i generally go for boons based on their ability vs stats. but a couple boons will deliver a power increase vs a percentage increase (thinking of a persephone one here). i tend to think those must be better since the game makes sure to point out that multipliers will apply to the actual power stat. anyway now i'm babbling and confusing even myself. i don't even want to know if there's an order of operations for boon multipliers. i imagine THAT doesn't compound, i hope it's just additive

anyway, it's impossible to search for good info on this, and i'm not watching a fucking youtube, sorry. bring back 35 page ascii guides on gamefaqs

Levels from poms usually have diminishing returns, whereas increased rarity doesn't.

Like if you have a common boon that starts at 40% and level it up to level 4, it might go 40% > 60% > 70% > 75%

Whereas if you kept it at level 1 and increased its rarity instead, it would go 40% > 60% > 80% > 100%

Also, some boons can't be leveled up but can be rarified. So in general rarity is more potent than pom levels. The tradeoff is that it's much harder to increase rarity, and rarity is capped at Heroic.

thanks, and yea i've seen how levelling brings diminishing returns, i can see why rarity is worth pursuing now to an extent. but it does seem like the game emphasizes rarity beyond what its actual impact is. i suppose i'm only just getting up to double digit heat tho, maybe those kinds of margins are important later on, especially for finding duo boons. (i think having a legendary boon increases the chance of a duo, but i could be wrong)

i guess small gameplay spoilers?

my favorite weapon from the original, aspect of pan, doesn't seem that good in this. about to try aspect of morrigan, a bit finicky so far but carries a lot of oomph. i guess i just like when i'm spewing missiles and arrows and other ordinance all over the place any time i use a special or whatever. zeus chain-lightning remains the best for that along with artemis stuff. but still wish aspect of pan had the same bite. even with some hammer upgrades it feels like something's missing