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Hades 2 early access review: a roguelike of witchy crowd control with a sparkling new castWhat fresh hell this is
What fresh hell this is
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Supergiant Games
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Supergiant Games
Scylla and the Sirens are a rock band of mythical boat wreckers who insist they have tons of fans. (They do not.) As a boss battle inHades 2they are a deadly trio that has bested me more times in the last few hours than I care to admit. But as a sign of things to come for this early access roguelike sequel, they are an encouraging bunch of characterful malcontents. The harbingers of a confident, slash-happy action game, and another poppy adaptation of classic Greek japes.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Supergiant Games
Should be easy. Off you go on a dungeon-running jaunt of encounters, boss brawls, boon scrounging, and character questioning. Those familiar with the first Hades will feel at home in the lush realms of Erebus, Oceanus and beyond. Newcomers will find their feet quick enough thanks to straightforward tutorialising. At least when it comes to hacking and/or slashing. As for the story, there might be more head-scratching. I’ve already said I admire Supergiant’s dismissal of once-pivotal characters in ourimpressions of the Hades 2 tech test. Even so, the sequel definitely benefits from at least some existing knowledge of the previous cast.
Not that the current cast disappoints. The voice acting is satisfying and clean. The dry mothering of Amelia Tyler’s witch goddess Hecate will be doubly powerful to anyone who enjoyed her as narrator inBaldur’s Gate 3(those sinister bedtime-story tones). Other actors put in the work. The skeptical harrumphs of Becca Q. Co’s Nemesis. The comforting Yorkshire chatter of Dave B. Mitchell as Hephaestus, implying he is not only the god of smithing but also the god of pints.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Supergiant Games
But the biggest teller of the game’s confidence is in meeting Narcissus. He has an unmistakable Kenergy about him, somehow managing to portray a sad, lovable himbo even without final character art. You see, unfinished character designs currently appear as a dark figure in a placeholder shroud. Some of these gods are so hot, you dare not yet look upon them.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Supergiant Games
Previously, Zag would fire little bloodstones that lodge inside enemies, giving baddies a negative status effect as you go about your fight. But Melinoë instead gets a wide area-control ward that stops enemies in their tracks. It can get buffed as you go on, turning it into a whirlwind of constant damage, or a ward that follows you around instead of being imprinted on the spot.
As someone prone to panic on busy screens full of VFX and enemy sprites, I’m grateful for the crowd control. When the pressure is on and I’m surrounded, it becomes a go-to instinct to drop a ward and dash away to catch your breath; a much-needed “I’m overwhelmed” button. Melinoë’s ability to sprint (hold down the dash button) also helps me feel more mobile and slippery than Zag ever was.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Supergiant Games
Others focus on hurt. Zeus might give your special attacks thunderous damage or electrify your body so that you auto-zap any enemy that hits you. Other gods may grant bonuses like a speedy restoration of your magick in exchange for a much shorter bar. Hephaestus, the blacksmith god of Guinness, might provide armour (temporary extra hit points) or imbue your weapons with infrequent, powerful swipes.
Things get more complex when Selene the moon goddess eventually shows up alongside the other boon-gifting gods, granting you a Hex ability. This is a powerful magical attack that might allow you to transmogrify enemies into critters, or fire a hideously powerful beam of energy, or become a nightmare version of yourself with whole new attacks. There is a trade-off, though. To perform a Hex you first need to burn through a ton of magick, which means you have to enter encounters at full tilt, magick akimbo, if you want to get the most out of Selene’s gifts. It’s basically like enacting the “make it rain” gesture. But instead of blithely upending stacks of paper money you are spamming arcane death.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Supergiant Games
Those dungeon dives are only part of the craic, of course. The many currencies and bartering mechanics of the game’s hub zone require a broker’s mindset and possibly a big spreadsheet. You don’t get the depth of Hades without a certain amount of complexity when it comes to upgrade materials and required items. At one point I was thinking: “Okay, I can swap Bones for Nectar, then use that to schmooze more Gift Card Thingys from Charon, then exchange those for a shipment of Fated Fabrics…”
So yes. There’s a feeling of getting caught up in archaic underworld economics.Hades 2wants you to have a long and varied to-do list (literally - the three Fates still give you a list of prophetic tasks to accomplish) and part of this is making sure you have a wide spread of resources to scrounge. That to-do list of arithmetic did start to feel a bit overwhelming. But then again, I hate sums.
There are quality of life things to help with this. At the cauldron you can mark recipes with a “forget-me-not”. This means a little icon (a finger with a knot tied around it) will appear on certain doors during your run, marking the optimal path for whatever resource you’re gathering. It’s a small but helpful touch that I don’t remember from the first game. Environmental conditions also cause certain items to crop up more often. Rainfall, for example, means you will find lots of mushrooms. It all adds more depth to the rando-gen possibilities of a run.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Supergiant Games
There are misgivings. As with the first game, I like it less the more bullet hellish it gets. The trade-off for beautiful and flashy effects is that sometimes the battle becomes hard to read. Much of this is a matter of getting used to exact splash ranges of gassy attacks. The imprecision of these painful clouds does keep you on your toes but it can also feel a little unfair. Sometimes you’re simplycertainyou weren’t in range of that puff of scarlet smog. Likewise when some small element of the environment - a cluster of roots or a stray outcrop - hampers a critical escape. It’s hard to know what among these frustrations is accidental and what’s intentional, designed to reward the growing expertise you’re certain to accrue with hundreds of runs.
