Hades

What’s The Game? Hades

What’s It All About, JG? It’s a roguelike dungeon-crawler released in 2020 by Supergiant Games, and if your eyes are glazing over already, wait, come back! You play Zagreus (I’ve heard that name before somewhere), son of Hades, of Greek myth. He’s trying to escape the Underworld, feeling unloved by his father, and to make it to the mortal realm and his mother, Persephone. Alongside the action, the story gradually unfolds, as Zagreus finds out more about his Olympian family, who help him along the way. The Underworld is divided into three distinct regions, each of which will contain a randomly generated series of rooms which Zagreus has to hack and slash his way through to move on to the next level. Each region has an end-of-level boss of increasing difficulty, the defeat of which allows access to the next level. Once all three have been defeated, there’s a final series of quickie rooms, then the Final Big Boss. But who could he possibly be?

Why Did You Give It A Go? Because I can’t spend all of my gaming life just playing different iterations of The Legend of Zelda (I can totally spend the rest of my gaming life just playing different iterations of The Legend of Zelda). So it was time to step away from puzzles and Hyrule and head out into a genre I don’t have any experience of at all.

Is It Any Good? It’s possibly the most compulsively playable game I’ve ever encountered, so that would be a big, hearty, unquestioning yes. And yet from the setup that’s not something that’s guaranteed because there’s so much here that sounds like it ought not to work. Greek myth has been exploited and used so often now it’s a cliche in its own right – everything from Ray Harryhausen stop-motion classics to Doctor Who using sci-fi drag to retell those myths (there’s literally a story called “Underworld”, though it’s awful so let’s not have that delay us), to sword-and-sandal TV shows, to YA redressings like Percy Jackson. The repetitive nature of the game structure ought to mitigate against interesting storytelling, reducing everything to a here-we-go-again series of retreads. The three-act structure of the levels (plus a little extra at the end) doesn’t sound like it gives a lot of scope for variety. And so on.

Not only does Hades overcome each and every one of these examples, but it also manages to turn them to its advantage. Overly familiar with Greek myth? Well, by choosing a character like Zagreus – someone barely known even to people who are very familiar with Greek myth – we have a chance to engage with someone new that the player won’t be overly familiar with. You don’t need to love Greek myth to enjoy the game, because the game plays amazingly whether you’re into that or not, but the way that the mythology is used really adds to the immersive feel of Hades.

And by having Zagreus be a part of the Underworld but looking to travel in the “wrong” direction – fighting to escape the Underworld rather than battling to get into it, à la the Orpheus and Eurydice story (also featured here) – we get a different spin on a familiar trope. There are plenty of familiar icons from Greek culture and mythology – absurdly-muscular men, beautiful women, urns and columns and temples, and so very many more – but they’re not overdone or over-emphasized. They’re allowed to act as background detail and colour to the game, adding a distinctive character but not becoming punishingly-obvious signifiers.

The gameplay itself is of course the most important aspect here, and in this Hades too is an absolute triumph. There’s plenty to keep the player engaged again and again and again as every run you get a little bit better, every run you get a little more money or darkness, every run you discover something new. The cumulative nature of the runs is one of the most important aspects of the game – even if you do a run and make an arse of it, you can still gain knowledge or material good that you can take into the next run so you make that little bit more progress. There are plenty of different weapon types to try too so if one isn’t suiting you, you can always swap it out for another. And within each weapon are four different Aspects which can be unlocked with Titan blood (earned by completing levels) so you really won’t run out of weapons to experiment with. It’s just another way that the game keeps the progress coming.

And what’s so great about Hades is the amount of progress you’re able to make. This feels like a game where the limiting factor is the amount of time you have available to play it rather than any constraints of the game itself. It’s so easy to just let hour after hour fly past as you do just one more run so you can beat a new enemy, discover a new room, or gain a new boon from a god. The compulsive, addictive nature of the gameplay really can’t be overstated here, it’s what drives everything and keeps you coming back for more. Indeed, the ability to crack the addictive element while keeping everything fresh is one of the game’s absolute masterstrokes. It’s rare, if ever, you get to a point where progress becomes impossible so there’s always an excuse to come back for more.

One of the best aspects of this is the “Pact of Punishment”. This is revealed once you defeat the Final Boss for the first time. Because defeating the Boss isn’t the end of the game (unless you want it to be). Instead, before you start another run, you have the option to choose different obstacles which will make that run harder. These are called Heat Levels within the game and with each new obstacle you add, your heat level goes up one. Maybe your end-of-level boss will get a new ability. Or there will be a time limit imposed on how quickly you need to finish a level. Perhaps you will have more enemies to fight or the enemies you do fight will be stronger. You can choose which punishments to take but each time you do you need to take more so the heat level increases. Thus, the game continues to progress and get harder as you fight to up your heat level as things become more and more difficult, all the while revealing further story elements and plot points. You really need to up your skill level to keep developing but it becomes impossible not to want to do that. The game practically demands it. It’s another masterstroke – a way of keeping you engaged with the game even after you’ve defeated the Big Bad.

The skill with which Hades has been constructed deserves all the praise in the world. So much thought, care, and attention have gone into absolutely every aspect of the gameplay and it makes for one of the most satisfying playing experiences ever. And if that sounds like hyperbole – and I’d be prepared to grudgingly concede that it does – then just give it a try yourself and see what I’m on about. You really, really won’t regret it. This game is incredible.

How Many Of These Have You Played? I’ve never played a roguelike dungeon-crawler before, so the answer is zero. Having said that, the isometric perspective will be familiar to anyone, like my good self, who grew up with 8-bit computing. I’m thinking specifically of games on the ZX Spectrum like Head Over Heels, the infuriating(ly great) Bobby Bearing and Knight Lore, as well as near misses like Attic Attack and the mighty Gauntlet, a game which could plausibly be seen as an antecedent of Hades in many ways.

Would You Recommend It? Unhesitatingly. Indeed, you’d have to put me in a wooden box to prevent me from doing so. It’s a simply brilliant game and if you haven’t played it, you cannot begin to imagine just how much it will take over your life. I’ve ended up with an Artemis theme on my phone I’ve become that addicted to this blasted game.

Aside from the gameplay, though, one of the most impressive aspects of the game is the story. It becomes compulsively addictive to find out what happens next in the same way a soap opera or drama would be. This makes sense – Greek myth has been incorporated into drama and poetry for so long that retellings of it can’t help but feel epic and dramatic in their scope. Yet Hades takes the incredibly smart decision to play against type sometimes, keeping those familiar stories fresh.

Zagreus himself, for example, is unfailingly polite and considerate rather than being a blood-and-thunder rage machine smashing his way out of the Underworld. The latter would have been an easy characterization but the former makes him that more interesting as a character and thus much easier to invest in. Sisyphus, he of the eternal boulder-pushing, is also played against type as a rather sweet and charming character who’s come to regard Bouldy as his best friend and is always helpful and polite when Zagreus bumps into him. These unexpected takes on familiar characters add so much dimension to the game.

Having said that, liberties are taken a bit. In exploring Greek myth and family, certain sensibilities have been quietly airbrushed so, for example, there’s no hint of the incest that is very much present in the original mythology. Gods we meet along the way sometimes confirm to type – Aphrodite is passionate, Dionysus is a party-dude booze-hound, and so forth – and sometimes not. It’s nice that we’re reminded that Artemis is a hunter and that not all of those kind of skills fall to male characters. Similarly, the power accorded characters like Demeter help the game break free of lazy stereotypes about Olympian gods.

Another stereotype that’s broken free of, fascinatingly, is heterosexuality. This is a game that joyfully embraces the possibilities of a time and a people with a much more relaxed approach to sexuality than the usual rigid approaches. This means that, as Zagreus develops bonds with characters when the story progresses, it doesn’t have to follow the predicted paths. Even if you don’t opt to have Zagreus and the ridiculously hot Thanatos have a full-on affair (and you absolutely can) there’s clearly a past and history between the two characters that goes well beyond simple male friendship. This is, it’s worth pointing out, a very thirsty game.

But if you don’t want to go down that line, you don’t have to – Zagreus will be quite happy having a relationship with Megaera if that’s where you want to take the game. Dionysus is quite clearly bi – happy to have a good time with any passing… well, anyone, really. And Achilles and Patroclus are an in-game gay couple. In this, the game can have its cake and eat it, giving plenty of queer representation if you want it and allowing it to be in the background if you don’t. It’s very unexpected for a game of this sort but it’s incredibly welcome, judged and balanced pretty much perfectly, and just one more reason that Hades is head and shoulders above most games. Though it’s perhaps best not to probe the relationship between Theseus and Asterius the Minotaur too closely…

The truth is, I could go on like this for a while. There’s simply so much to enjoy about the game that it’s hard to pack everything into a review like this. And wait! I haven’t even mentioned Skelly yet, an absurd semi-Joe-Pesci animated collection of bones that looks after your weapons and sees you off on each run! Skelly’s awesome! Um, anyway. Like I said, this could go on for a while. But rather than list out yet more reasons why this game is so brilliant I will simply urge you to go and buy it. You can get it on the Nintendo Switch (where I played it), Windows, macOS, PS4, PS5, and Xbox, so if you game you really shouldn’t have a hard time tracking it down. And tracking it down is exactly what you should do. There’s a sequel in the works which I am absurdly over-excited for, and which hopefully will be released this year (it’s in Early Access at the time of writing). So yeah, go check out this game. It’s fucking brilliant. Oh, and if there’s one thing I know it’s this.

I believe in Bouldy. And Bouldy believes in me.

Scores On The Doors? 9.5/10