Reviews VideoGame / Hades

The hype is justified.

If you're curious about whether you'd like the roguelike genre, try Hades.

Your Player Character: Zagreus, son of the god of The Underworld. Your mission: Escape From Hell. Your setting: Classical Mythology, with various myths and monsters rubbing elbows with you. Your genre: Action RPG Roguelike. You fight your way out of Randomly Generated Levels, picking up Perks offered to you by the Random Number Gods of Olympus — Zeus, Athena, Demeter and more. You try and fail, and try and fail, and try and fail; but that's actually part of the story, part of the ordeal, and you never Game Over even though you die a lot. And then, after many hours and attempts, you finally make your way past the Final Boss... Only to discover that there's much more to the story than you first realized.

Artistically, the game is impressive. Fluid sprites and animations lead to orthogonal enemies with recognizable silhouettes and attack patterns. An exuberant hand-drawn art style helps paint the Greek pantheon larger-than-life; the voice acting is superb. Play controls are tight and accessible. The large number of Perks keeps the game interesting; you're never going to repeat yourself, even when you try for Complacent Gaming Syndrome. Persistent leveling mechanics, such as the ability to choose your weapon and exploit a Point Build System, eke you ever closer to escape; some portions of the run are random, but others are dependable. And a complete run takes less than 40 minutes: Just One More Level!

But even more than that, the game is exceedingly high on the Sliding Scale of Gameplay and Story Integration. The randomness of roguelikes is justified: of course Hades is constantly rearranging itself to trap the dead within. Zagreus's quest to find his Missing Mom instantly resonates with anyone who read about that little ordeal. Getting to hang out with the greats of Greek Mythology is, for certain people, a huge thrill. ("I get to Fix Fic who???") The blend of dependability and randomness results in an environment that fosters skill and adaptation. And above all, the game is really good at teaching: it uses the (integrated) Achievement System and permanent upgrades to walk you through everything, and it gives you feedback about how you messed up, including an NPC whose only job is to comment on The Many Deaths of You. The game is a perfect marriage of flavor and mechanics, with every decision having both a Doylist and Watsonian justification.

There are games I recommend to people because they have interesting tweaks and twists on established formulas. And there are games I recommend to people because they are just straight-up fun. Hades is one of the latter. You don't have to appreciate, or even notice, the artistry of its design to enjoy it. It's just a really well-made game. There's not much else to be said; there's not much else that needs to be.