I’m afraid it’s time for another classic example of me finally getting around to something long after all the hype has died down as it’s time to look at what many people classed as their Game of the Year in, um, 2020: Hades. Now I loved Bastion and Transistor, two previous works by Supergiant Games, so I’m not sure why the most highly regarded of them all has taken me so long but at least I can confirm it lived up to the hype and then some! Let’s take a look…
Background:
Ever seen a Greek God with a minigun? Well, you have now!
Hades was officially released for PC and Nintendo Switch on September 17th 2020, though it had been on Steam Early Access since December 2018, allowing the community to give feedback to the Dev team in real time. It was later ported to the PS4, PS5, XBOX One and XBOX Series X/S on August 13th 2021.
Gameplay:
Hades is an isometric action game with Roguelike elements (or a “Rougelite” as the phrase goes) where you control Zagreus as he dashes, hacks and slashes across several dungeons with a variety of weapons, both close and long range, plus a unique Cast attack as well, where Zagreus can throw a crystal “Cast” into the enemy and do extra damage if an enemy has the object stuck in them. Each time you die you go back to the hub world where you can talk to NPCs and move the story on a bit before picking a new weapon and heading back for another run. As you go through a run you pick up Darkness which can be used to buy permanent upgrades to health, extra “lives” (or tokens for “death defiance”) and other such upgrades, and later on you can spend Titan Blood on permanently upgrading the six unique weapons, which is where Hades slides into the “Roguelite” side of things, though all the other Boons and buffs are lost in between each run. You can also equip special items given to you by NPCs that will grant you greater damage, an extra life and so on and even swap them out in between dungeons, though once you’ve used one once you can’t re-equip it again in the same run. The same goes for charms that summon NPCs to your side, though you don’t get those for some time into the game.
Taking on foes in the extremely unsubtly titled “Barge of Death”.
The dungeons, specifically Tartarus, Asphodel, Elysium and the Temple of Styx, are randomly generated through mixing up a selection of rooms and putting in a random array of enemies and power-ups, though they all end with each dungeon’s respective boss. The power ups come in the form of Boons given to you by the Gods and fit into several categories, like giving you more attack power, the ability to reflect attacks, automatically attacking enemies after they attack you, and a summon attack that you can charge up and unleash either in small chunk or a more powerful fully-charged move and many more. You also get some Boons that change your basic strike or special attack, giving them extra damage, a different move, a poison effect, that kind of thing, and can modify the cast as well: changing it from an item that gets stuck in enemies into a placeable item that fires lasers as just one example. You can also buy upgrades from Charon the River Styx boatman both permanent and temporary, and you can apply new attacks to your weapons by getting special Hammer icons, plus meet NPCs in the dungeons who can also impart items, though normally just health or power upgrades (as each Boon has a rarity and a level rating!)
An odd fishing spot… Yes, there is a fishing mini-game! Can’t be a modern game without one, apparently!
There are plenty of Gods and plenty of Boons, plus plenty of upgrades and bonuses all randomised so you can see how each time you die and go for another run you know the next run will be significantly different from the last. It’s an extremely pleasing gameplay loop that thanks to the permanent upgrades, the storyline moving forward and just getting better naturally there was a real sense of progression as well, bosses that were really hard the first time will eventually be a cake walk, which is where the next thing comes into play: the “Pacts of Punishment”, which you can use to add more of a challenge like enemies having unique attributes or Bosses having new phases or attacks, just to keep you going and giving you new rewards to go after. Add in collectable currency that can be used to buy new items for the hub world (some just for aesthetics, others handy gameplay things like an item that is pretty much just an achievement list that rewards you with in-game items), adding new rooms into the dungeons and giving gifts to NPCs in order to increase your friendship with them, there is a hell of a lot to do! Luckily the gameplay is so tight, responsive and fun that not only do you not mind the grind but you actively look forward to starting your next run through to see what kind of Zagreus you end up with by the end.
I know I shouldn’t have been surprised that a game so highly regarded and that won so many awards would end up being so great, but for whatever reason I didn’t expect it to be THIS good and this addictive. It ate up most of the end of December and pretty much the whole of January too, and I could still easily do another run right now.
Graphics and Sound:
Look at that artwork, read that text and imagine it spoken really well and that’s Hades for you! (plus gameplay)
The graphics are crisp small sprites on lovely detailed levels and the artwork for each character is beautifully detailed and drawn, I really love the art style they went with.
Similarly the soundtrack is unrelentingly catchy, just the PS5 menu music alone got caught in my head for weeks. The voice work is top notch as well, making each character burst with personality with Zagreus himself being perfectly sarcastic and genuinely funny (plus whoever thought to have Dionysus sound like a cheesy 60s radio DJ is a genius!) and the sound effects are great as well. Frankly just the gameplay would’ve been enough to get me to love this game but the look and sounds of the Hades world were fantastic too.
Story:
Thank goodness for Athena’s floating shields otherwise all these exploding chariots would be REALLY BLOODY ANNOYING.
Zagreus is the son of Hades who has recently found out that Nyx isn’t his mother but instead a Goddess called Persephone who was now living on Earth. Feeling betrayed by this revelation and wishing to see his birth mother Zagreus plans to escape from Hades (as in the place, though his father as well…), but his father throws all the obstacles of the afterlife in his way. In order to help the person she came to think of as like a son to her, Nyx arranges the help of the Olympians, claiming that Zagreus wishes to join them in Mt. Olympus. Over the course of Zagreus’ journey he uses the combat skills he learned from Achilles, meets people like Sisyphus (and his giant boulder buddy!), Eurydice and Patroclus, and befriends his fellow member of the House of Hades like his once-thought-brother Thanatos, Megaera of the Furies (with the other two sisters not being so friendly) and many more, while battling the likes of the Lernaean Hydra (which is now just a skeleton), Theseus and the minotaur in Elysium’s arena of heroes and many more.
*Spoilers below!*
Hades had to pick a place to fight his son with extremely sturdy pillars in them, otherwise he’d win every time!
Eventually Zagreus makes it out of Hades by bribing his loving dog Cerberus and meets his father outside the gates, eventually defeating him. He meets his mother but soon dies, finding out that he can’t survive outside of Hades for more than a few minutes. Not undeterred Zagreus begins to repeatedly break out and visit Persephone, each time finding out more of the truth: she left Hades out of grief because she thought Zagreus was stillborn, which was technically true but Nyx brought him back by dealing with the Fates themselves. Hades refused to tell her and didn’t want Zagreus to find her because she had technically betrayed the Olympians and so he wanted to keep her safe. Eventually though Zagreus gets through to her and she returns home to Underworld, reunites with Hades and returns to her role as Queen. Everyone is still worried about the Olympians finding out and it leading to something of a war but in the epilogue Persephone arranges a big feast which gets everyone on the same page. Meanwhile Zagreus has officially been hired by his father to constantly try to escape Hades so he may test new measures to make sure no soul could actually escape. (a fun excuse to allow you to continue to play!)
*Spoilers above!*
It’s a fun story and frankly a lot of the side stories are great too, it’s an overall great package.
Thoughts Now:
A rather plain shot of the Temple of Styx level, just so there’s one screenshot for each dungeon!
Hades was many people and website’s Game of the Year and I get it, in fact had I played this in 2020 I’m not convinced it wouldn’t have been mine. Great gameplay, really fun loop, top-tier artwork, voicework, soundtrack… it’s the complete package that very few games ever achieve. Even if you’re not a fan of the Roguelike / Roguelite genre you owe it to yourself to give it a run or two, trust me: you’ll soon be hooked. I certainly won’t be waiting a few years to play Hades II, that’s for sure!
Hogan Reviews 