Unfinished: Hades: 12/12/2018

Really didn't expect Supergiant to have another game (nearly) ready at this point.

Cool art and I'm a sucker for isometric.

Will give it a look when it's actually released.

I don't normally go for roguelikes or even early access games but I've been enjoying this so far.

This looks great. Dead Cells launched in a similar mostly finished state and they just kept adding weapons and content on a constant basis. If this follows the same path it should be a great success.

I've never played a Supergiant game that I didn't like, but this may be the first I skip due to just not being a huge fan of rouge style games.

This looks stylish as hell. But, besides style, the thing I've always liked about Supergiant games is that they play so different from the other games that are out there. But this looks like a ton of other games.

Yah not a fan of run based randomly generated tilesets.

just a question. When the team starts most videos with a sad or low energy "its another one of those" or "you know ___ game...THEY made another one" but go on to like the game. My question is...since their critics do they just get tired like i mean super duper tired even when a game is good...do they expect something pushing a new genre each time to excite them...like a game that you cant say is like another game you played...example katamari or rock of ages. Cause i would never expect shooters, hack and slash, open world, or action adventure (what they play mostly and say this phrase) to be very revolutionary. Mostly expect them to just be good takes with a difference here and there.

So I just bought this about an hour ago and the Epic store won't let me access it in any way. The store page shows an Install button that does nothing and the library tab doesn't show it at all.

Wondering if anyone else has had any similar issues with the store? I was hopeful that some solid competition would give Steam a reason to get their **** together but this is a horrid first impression (even Uplay works on the most basic level). I contacted support and I'm hoping it's not just one team working all the Fortnite stuff and also assisting with Store issues -_-

This game is rad and I'm really liking it so far.

I just see that as "a better Gauntlet."

This game looks super cool, but I really don't wanna buy it and burn out on it before they finish it.

"They shoot a beam out and rotate" is the first-person platforming of third-person isometric action.

@dumari: I had the same issue Sunday night. It was late and I didn't feel like dealing with so I went bed. It resolved itself, and the game was in my library Monday morning and I could download it.

Do you ever get away from the green environments? Everything I've seen is that green light slime looking atmosphere and am just wondering if that changes

@steveurkel the zone after the first boss is a very different color, and presumably zones beyond that will also be different tilesets.

To address the randomness issue: the rooms are (as Jeff briefly mentioned in the video) hand-crafted/pre-created, there doesn't seem to be any procedural generation happening beyond what rooms are appearing/what order they're appearing in. Which means you do notice repeat rooms after a while with the game at this point, but the combat and core gameplay loop is engaging enough that it didn't bother me.

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More generally:

Nabbed this game over the weekend because I couldn't resist the Supergiant polish and I'm really enjoying it so far, the combat is reminiscent of Bastion which makes it stand out enough from a lot of its roguelike peers - that and the *tons* of voice acting and character/world-building. There's a couple of characters that clearly share placeholder art, but it's gorgeous enough and the voice acting is so solid that it didn't detract from my play experience even if I were evaluating it as a non-early-access game.

Considering the current version is something like 0.11, Hades is extremely polished and an excellent early access debut. I think I've exhausted most of the main content loop that's in the game so far after 20 or so hours with it (getting through 4 completed runs in that time); though I've still been discovering a neat new thing on the margins every other run or so.

If you feel like waiting on more updates before you take the plunge on this game that's entirely fair though: the game's only going to get better, and shotgunning it now does leave you sad that there isn't more already simply because it's so good.

Man Darren Korb is just the best. Hopefully Ashley is in there as well.

Build That Wall (Zia's Theme) is still possibly my favorite piece of video game music ever. Let's see if this game will finally beat it.

Hmm... One percent human is a very generous threshold, Ben... Very suspicious

@cherryberry: Turns out it 'fixed itself' for me about 3 hours later. What an infuriating system -_-

I liked Supergiant's previous games well enough that even a "genre exercise" from them would be a day-one purchase for me. Although now after watching the QL, it seems like the world and characters are more fleshed out than what I've come to expect from a rogue-lite game.

First half of this QL I was not interested at all, but the second half showed some promising things. I wish you could perma-unlock perks like the instafiring bow, though, just looks like a much more fun way to play the game. Very interested to see what the next "major update" is.

I hoped Supergiant would try something new. All of their games have a similar look (perspective, graphics, voices) and play kinda the same with some variations.

This looks bloody tough.

nyx nyx nyx

Ugh, this just looks devilishly good.

I think Klei Entertainment also show a countdown the next patch for their games in early access. I remember Don't Starve and Oxygen Not Included both had that.

Ben really taking a stand against cannibalism. I may have to unsubscribe.

i love supergiant's art and style- but i'm having a hard time getting excited about the setting and the gameplay.

i'll defo check back in once it hits 1.0 though.

So much of the art in this game has to be influenced by Takeshi Koike / Yoh Yoshinari (Madhouse/Redline/Animatrix/Trava Fist Planet) which is awesome, it's cool to see the environment be this colorful but keep Koike's signature flat black shadows and detailed hard linework. If they did that by accident, still cool.

Between this and Ashen, Journey, Outer Wilds, robo recall (and mod kit, for a ground up vr shooter, sounds cool?) and UE4 support for creators, epic has a pretty compelling reason to install their client, these games were an awesome surprise. I hope Steam in turn does anything as a result/response to curate their storefronts better.

@dudeglove: I didn't want to be that guy, but it kept bugging me when the crew acted like Hades is the equivalent of Hell. Thanks for bringing this up.

For those that are curious, as dudeglove mentioned, Hades is more or less the underworld for all mortals. It is separated into multiple realms - Tartarus being the closest in proximity to our concept of Hell. In this instance, Supergiant lists the character as being in Tartarus so the tone and environment art make sense in this instance (good on them). Just wanted to clarify for others since the crew kept implying Hades as a whole was 'hell' (at least that's how I interpreted their comments).

With that in mind, I'll be curious to see if Supergiant expand the game out to explore the meadows and Elyssium as well. Hopefully they do, and they can create a unique, awesome art style while still being evocative of those particular realms within Hades.

/* disgruntled classics major here */

Maaan I super don't want yet another launcher and store tying my digital purchases together. I'm 95% digital and the age of "where are my licenses tied to" is starting to become confusing. I can't even remember where all my albums for music are located now!

Gotta say though I'm very interested in this. Transistor is a near perfect game for me and I listen to the soundtrack all the time. They made a good decision by buying rights to sell it early there because it's got me eager. Thank you for posting this.

This looks great; I look forward to playing this once it's fully released. Thanks for the QL.

I have the Fury Sisters' first album on vinyl.

I was always pretty lukewarm on the roguelike thing, but I'm fully checked out now, which is too bad, because the narrative/artistic aspects of this seem really cool.

Most probably no one is going to read this, but just in case: does anything notable happen if you give Achilles the eighth bottle of ambrosia (the max you can give him right now)? I mean in the vein of the little, slightly-expanded cutscenes you can get by giving ambrosia to other characters, like with chatting with Dusa in the lounge and getting Orpheus to sing again. I know I could just go back in and nab another bottle for him, but I finally got as far as you can currently get in this game tonight, and it really seems like a beautiful place to walk away from the game for a bit. I don't want to miss anything that might be patched out for the characters I like, though.

Dang, it's tough not having a dedicated Steam forum or whatnot for this game.

I just finished this game for the first time after being addicted to it. It is currently my GOTY. It has great game play, beautiful art style, an amazing soundtrack and a great story that unfolds with each attempt. I highly recommend it to everyone.