[Hades II] These deities are hotter than Hades (Early Access NOW)

Delzhand

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=593xCDfumN0

As the resident Supergiant cultist, I was super pleased to see this. I am... sans computer for a while, so I won't be able to partake, but I always wanted to see this team expand on the work they did with Transistor.

This is their first early access title, which I think is a good fit for roguelites.

Endless_Serpents

Nice! Hopefully the character’s mum is Persephone and she makes an appearance. She’s one of my favourite gods.

Gameplay looks like Transistor and a touch more SHMUP.

SeGaTai

I think I've bought every super giant game, and am sure I'll buy this, but currently debating if I should actually play it in early access or just wait for the finished game

Apogee

SeGaTai wrote: »

I think I've bought every super giant game, and am sure I'll buy this, but currently debating if I should actually play it in early access or just wait for the finished game

Likewise. Only thing holding me back is the idea that I'll be playing an incomplete game now, whereas I could play the complete game later... decisions, decisions.

altid

Add one more to the "conflicted" pile. I love SuperGiant's games but a big part of that is that they're complete narratives. I don't know how that will fit with early access. Being an epic store exclusive (aka "yet another launcher") isn't exactly helping either.

I know I'll get it eventually, it's just a matter of when and where.

Frozenzen

I am utterly conflicted over this. I don't buy early access due to not enjoying paying to beta test things, but supergiant.

I'll probably cave and buy it in a month or two to be fair, their games so far have all been amazing in multiple ways.

Anzekay

I've played like 6 or 7 hours of this so far and it's pretty stellar

I had some trepidation about a Rogue-like from them, since I wasn't sure how their usual narrative goodness would work with it... but it turns out it meshes super duper well.

Whenever you die, you wake up back at the House of Hades and the story progresses little by little from talking to the characters there, or monologues from Z himself and so on. It's super charming and this really neat breaking up of the usual Roguelike grind.

It's also astonishingly complete for an early access game. I've managed to get fairly far but there's no usual EA "sorry this isn't finished yet" wall that I've seen, and all the story stuff up to that point seems fairly complete. It's just lacking some polish and different weapon or powerup options beyond the handful it starts with.

If you're at all skittish about playing an EA game, totally wait- it's gonna be real good once it's finished. But if you're keen and sort of on the fence, it's a pretty wonderful game right now too.

Dirty

altid wrote: »

Add one more to the "conflicted" pile.

I'm conflicted too. I love Supergiant, but I hate roguelites/likes.

Road Block

Yeah same boat as most here. Love Supergiant but not sure I want to play it before it's complete. Plus not super keen on having it tied to the Epic Launcher at this point.

That being said looks dope.

Endless_Serpents

Just a thought, instead of being an edgy boy named Z (I think I heard that somewhere), the player should be Persephone trying to escape Hades to start spring. Then after the ending you get dragged back eventually because you’re bound in contract.

Or even a version of Orpheus would do.

Or maybe a woman that had her memories erased by the river Lethe, who turns out to be Hectate, the Cthhonic goddess of the underworld that Hades more or less replaced for most ancient Greeks.

I guess pretty boy is an easier sell. Shame though.

Heir

I have a feeling I'll play the shit out of this...once it's out of Early Access.

Is this an Epic exclusive forever or one of their "timed" exclusives?

Albino Bunny

Endless_Serpents wrote: »

Just a thought, instead of being an edgy boy named Z (I think I heard that somewhere), the player should be Persephone trying to escape Hades to start spring. Then after the ending you get dragged back eventually because you’re bound in contract.

Or even a version of Orpheus would do.

Or maybe a woman that had her memories erased by the river Lethe, who turns out to be Hectate, the Cthhonic goddess of the underworld that Hades more or less replaced for most ancient Greeks.

I guess pretty boy is an easier sell. Shame though.

Zagreus is also channeling Dante super hard which is pretty good.

Also I've being playing a good chunk of this. It's all super slick Supergiant stuff. The character's are all great and the art and music are naturally stellar.

The only real downsides currently are that 4 weapons feels a little slim on choices and that I think they could knock the bosses health in half and still be just as hard while being far less likely to hit the tedium part of the middle 1/3rd of the fury fight.

Endless_Serpents

Ah, Zagreus. That’s a bit better.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure it’ll be great! And I love Dante. But, eh, what if mythical woman or child of Morpheus though? That’s all.

Delzhand

I'm happy with the game so far. A roguelike makes good on my chief complaint about Bastion and Transistor - the combat felt so excellent, but once you'd finished the game there simply wasn't much left to do. I've only made it to the first boss once in perhaps... twenty excursions?

And I'm still finding new mechanics. I'm not sure if they're rare or if the game just drip-feeds them based on how many times you've played. My last run ended in a room where I was to survive for 45 seconds against rapidly spawning armored enemies.

Fencingsax

Am I insane or did an ad get inserted into that quote?

Heir

I just picked this up. It's super fun, but boy do I suck.

Finally made it to the first boss...she kicked my ass.

I'm liking the bow overall as my weapon of choice.

Jubal77

Game is pretty tight for a first early access. Although they still fall in the trap of making melee pretty weak in comparison to ranged. The iframes some mobs get is just a pain in the ass. Having a lot of fun so far though!

Genji-Gloves

This game is solid for a early access and reckon it will be hit on the heel of dead cells.

Best results so far is the shield and upgraded two dashes.

The voice acting/style/music is up to supergiants usual great standard.

Glazius

Got some pretty lucky god pickups and Charon buys and finally made it past the first boss. Wow, the lands beyond are punishing.

Also loved

seeing Meg hanging out in the lobby afterwards. I don't know why I wasn't expecting it, she's dropped me down there a couple dozen times.

Albino Bunny

Yeah, the area post the boss really feel like "this is the early access soft wall" in that it's just infinite dudes in every room.

Mahnmut

There's an acceleration as you get more Darkness and improve your gameplay skills -- you're taking less damage, so you're getting more Divine Boons and other upgrades as you go through Act 1, because you're able to pick them instead of going after healing. In a good run you'll enter Act 2 with WAY more damage output than in a bad run, and reaching the end of Act 2 becomes super achievable.

Evil Multifarious

The boss of act 2 is crazy hard and the camera decisions do not help.

Jubal77

My run last night though... had health at the start....common boon in first room...like health and cash in next room. Then health and a boon that turned out to be all common as well. Then a charon. Then the twins. It was like.... a big reset this one run heh.

Sad to see most of the melee issues are still present though.

Evil Multifarious

I think you're underestimating the damage output of a dedicated melee build

You basically have to build for dedicated single target damage if you want to beat bosses

The bow is good and consistent and the thrown weapons are great, but a melee shield (especially the rush) or sword build is very strong for boss killin'

Big fights become such an overwhelming gonzo bullet hell that you're barely safer at range than in melee, and tbh AOEs seem even more important

milski

I have beaten the Hydra with a super broken dash build and almost beaten it with a broken shield toss build, but usually I wind up losing on set 2 or 3 of the mini hydra heads. The big issues I have are that all their hitboxes are terrible (and head only), and that the giant bullet wave the main hydra spawns has enough hitstun you get chain hit if trying to dash out of it, making taking a hit a guaranteed like 40 damage in some instances.

Excited to try the new patch though!

Jubal77

Oh ive had some strong sword builds. And shield I like because of its ability to "push"lock heh. Its just if you get bad common upgrades it struggles more. And there is still some issues with pushback for melee special that means you will always get hit by thrown item from twins or the like. And I get it they dont want the melee special to be spammable. But the frame lock post use is still a bit long.

Mahnmut

milski wrote: »

I have beaten the Hydra with a super broken dash build and almost beaten it with a broken shield toss build, but usually I wind up losing on set 2 or 3 of the mini hydra heads. The big issues I have are that all their hitboxes are terrible (and head only), and that the giant bullet wave the main hydra spawns has enough hitstun you get chain hit if trying to dash out of it, making taking a hit a guaranteed like 40 damage in some instances.

Excited to try the new patch though!

I like the hydra changes in the patch, actually! It feels a lot less crowded in there (and my sense is it's easier overall).

milski

Just cleared the Hydra on my first run with the new patch. The bow feels kinda weak right now, but it's hard to do poorly with instant shot charge + Crit on attack + bonus crit damage + extra crit chance + weak on dash + weakened foes take more damage + deflecting cast + 40% extra attack damage from Chaos.

I was ba-roh-ken

Mahnmut

The bow's my favorite so far (I only have 2 wins, bow before this patch and bow right after). I think its strength is that the long-range Attack means it's easy to keep up a steady damage output no matter how often you need to reposition.

Agree it seems best to stack up as much Attack damage as possible. I've found myself not using the Special very much?

Jubal77

Last night I had a spear run with twice upgraded aphrodite dmg + weak special. And once upgraded aphrodite weak + dmg main. I destroyed meg and made it pretty deep in asphodel. Still pretty new to the mobs in there so it was a really fun run.

Arcsurvivor

How does this game compare to Bastion? I liked that game for the art and different playstyles.

Delzhand

The moment to moment mechanics are nearly identical. For example, if you can hit the power-shot with the bow in Bastion, you can do it here. It's just the framing and progression that are different.

Delzhand

I jumped back into this today and there have been two major updates. One adds Dionysus, and the other adds Thanatos, although it seems like he might be more a story thing? I've done several runs and haven't seen a single boon from him.

The last patch added a gun weapon, although... directly comparing it in the first patch and the second, they changed it so you can reload while moving (which is good, because previously you had to dash cancel or get stuck), but it added a spread to the shots, which makes it notably less reliable for chain stunning. The special is really unweildy still, too.

Mahnmut

This week's patch also adds Megaera's sisters as variants for the first boss fight!

Delzhand

I just had an insanely fortuitous run with Exagryph. I got Zeus' chain lightning early on, then picked up the upgrade that gives you much faster fire and expands your ammo by 6, then I got Athena's wrath, an upgrade that starts every chamber with 25 wrath, and then I nabbed Zeus' Legendary effect, which generates 4 chain lightning balls with every attack.

Cleared Hydra like it was nothing and was really sad that I couldn't keep going.

Thirith

When I started playing Hades shortly after the reveal, I wasn't exactly into it, but whether it's just me changing my expectations or the ongoing patches and updates improving the game feel, I'm now nurturing a low-grade addiction to the game. It's very much "Just one more run..." fodder. I also like that it gives me incentives to change up my build; usually I'm the kind of gamer who does things exactly the same way every time.

altid

I finally caved in and picked this up at the very end of the sale on the epic store. I’m very glad I did, I’ve been playing it constantly since! As expected, Supergiant have done an excellent job here. The gameplay is great and there’s a good amount of content as it stands. It really is the "just one more" type of game. Really like the "rogue-lite" concept and the way they've delivered story through it. It makes it so that death and failure are expected and removes any sense of frustration (especially with all the various bits of dialogue that result from it). It's something Supergiant did pretty well with Pyre as well, making it so that failure isn't necessarily a bad thing.

So yeah, really looking forward to the final release and hoping it gets the attention it deserves.

EriktheVikingGamer

The recent Hermes patch definitely also added some extra oomph to the game as the Hermes boons are all fun to use and literally speed things up in interesting ways. Dodge chance and move speed from his keepsake also makes for some fun moments.

chuck steak

I haven't played since the first few months of early access, and kind of forgot that I bought it actually since I haven't used the Epic store for anything but this game, but am pretty hyped now to get back into it. Though I'm not gonna get too into it, since I know I will be buying it on the Switch too I'm sure.

Frem

I picked it up because it was cheap, and it's great so far, but I'm kinda sorta afraid that I'll hit the end of the ...story? Incidental dialog? and have to wait to progress.

Some Supergiant folks were at MomoCon, and it sounded like it'd probably be another year before it's out of early access.

KoopahTroopah

When does this join other PC stores?