Hades 2 Review
“A Great Way to Kill Time” Written by: Hunter (@ReaperHunter23)
It’s fair to say that the first Hades was a rather important game to me. On top of the addictive gameplay, there was a warmth to the story and characters of the game that made it comforting. Especially when considering the circumstances of the world at the time of its release. It was also the game that got me started down the path of reviewing games for fun, which in turn has resulted in me being able to better express my thoughts on what I enjoy about games in general. Needless to say, once I finished Hades I was eager to see what Supergiant Games did next. I cannot say I was expecting a sequel. Yes, in the winter of 2022 it was revealed that Supergiant would be tackling their first sequel with Hades 2. They declared an intent to follow the same pattern of early access and refining until an eventual full release. I was over the moon when this was announced. The world of Hades was large and the notion of seeing more of the studio’s takes on Greek Myth was very appealing. Hades 2 went into early access in the spring of 2024 and I subsequently did my best to tune out all the details people would chatter about while I patiently waited for the full release. Well here we are on the other side of that full release, so let’s take a look to see the results of the God-like Rougelike coming back for round 2.
Image Credit: Supergiant Games
Hades 2 takes place an untold number of years after the events of the first game. Chronos, the titan of time, has returned to life and usurped the throne of the underworld. He has also taken most of the residents of the House Of Hades prisoner in the process. We play as Melinoe, the daughter of Hades. She was taken to safety just before Chronos attacked. She then spent her whole life training in the ways of Witchcraft and combat in order to kill Chronos.
The story of Hades 2 is pretty good. I think it works nicely as a companion piece to the first game. The first game’s story was a more honed in character study. While Hades 2 is a broader, more grandiose story with much higher stakes and more external ramifications. The way the game touches on the theme of agency was fascinating. Both in the way it's denied to some characters and in how it's reclaimed by others throughout the story.
The menagerie of characters in this game was very compelling. Melinoe herself is a good protagonist. The game does a good job at showcasing a number of different facets to her character. She regards most other characters with an air of politeness and respect. She is very straight-laced and task oriented, but she is also fairly insecure about a number of different issues she has been faced with. Unlike Zagreus in the first game, her task wasn’t something she chose, it was thrust upon her by circumstance. As such, questions like “Who is Melinoe once her task is finished?” are brought up for the player to consider as you get closer to the end of the arc.
The other new characters are a lot of fun to interact with as well. Hecate serves as the primary mentor figure in the game. Personality wise she is stern but understanding. Whenever Melinoe expresses doubt or tries to downplay her achievements, Hecate makes sure to squash that line of thinking while making it clear there is still work to do. Dora, the lazy shade being given decoration duties was a fun wrinkle in her interactions. Arachne being one of the friendly dungeon NPCs provides a pretty good side story for both her and Melinoe. Odysseus as the tactical advisor was a delight. Especially since he had already encountered a number of the enemies that Melinoe comes across in his many adventures. The new Olympians that were introduced such as Hestia and Hephaestus were fairly likeable as well. By Olympian standards at least.
I enjoyed getting to see the returning characters in a different context this time. As far as the Olympians are concerned, the mythology surrounding them is vast, so it was cool to see a different aspect of them touched on. I feel like this contrast is most apparent in the Arachne side quest where: Athena was one of the gods helping Zagreus in the first game and the buffs on her boons were great, and this time around Melinoe gets to learn that her family isn’t above a little bit of petty cursing once and awhile. I thought Charon was another cool instance of this contrast. In the first game he was just peddling his wares in between ferrying souls. This time around, him being able to get around to so many places is a pretty big tactical advantage for the war that is taking place.
The two returning characters that were elevated the most for me were Artemis and Demeter. I already really enjoyed both of them in the first game so I’m glad they turned out so well this time too. With Demeter it was cool to see her with a little more life to her. In the first game she was really dour and bitter for a lot of the story because she believed Persephone was gone. This time around you really get to see how reconnecting with Persephone softened her. Like there was no point in this game where she makes an offhanded remark about freezing Dionysius's grape orchards out of spite. Artemis was elevated by a couple of things. For starters: the bond she has with Melinoe as one of the Silver Sisters. Between her, Hecate, and Selene, Artemis was the one that felt the most like she was supporting Melinoe as an equal. Of all of them she was the one that pops up to physically give you a hand with your runs. Her boons still rule so you get to take a piece of that assistance forward with you every time you run into her. She’s the one that felt like Melinoe’s best friend by the end of my playthrough. Artemis is also the songstress character of the game, so that automatically makes her my favorite.
Image Credit: Supergiant Games
The gameplay of Hades 2 is pretty similar to the original at first blush. The buttons you press all generally do the same thing: attack, special, cast, and dash. However, the additional moveset added to Melinoe’s kit as well as the properties of the base moveset make the gameplay of Hades 2 pretty distinct from the original game.
One of the biggest change ups to the gameplay is the magic meter and the omega moves. The omega moves act as charged attacks that draw from your magic meter. You get one for all three of your offensive actions. Your magic also recharges in every room, so there’s no drawback to going full send as often as you want. The use case for the omega moves ranges from pretty satisfying to something worth focusing your builds around. The blades and the axe both had omega moves that were just a lot of fun to pop in the middle of an encounter. The torches and the skull both had a use case where magic and omega moves were a bit more crucial to the gameplay cycle of the weapon.
The weapons in this game are a lot of fun. I have finished at least one run with all six of them and while I haven’t quite finished one with each aspect yet, I’m getting pretty close. Each weapon has its own set of advantages and drawbacks. And I think they did a good job to avoid an Adamant Rail situation where you could get a pretty mindless setup going without working that hard for it. The Sister Blades are really fast but the standard attack is pretty stubby range wise. The skull has pretty long range, but has limited ammo. The axe hits like a truck but is really slow. The nice thing is that every drawback could be covered with the right boon. And every strength could be accentuated. The Sister Blades were my favorite weapon to use, with the hidden aspect being my favorite way to play.
The boons in this game are all a lot of fun to play with. If you didn’t play the original game and don’t know what boons are: They are buffs that will modify a designated part of your moveset. This can take shape in a number of ways. A fire effect on your standard attack for damage over time functionality, a wave effect on your special move to add some knockback, a freeze function on your cast to slow your enemies down even after they are unbound. I think you get the idea.
I think they did an excellent job at refining the way that boons interact with your moveset in this game. There are more combos that play nice with each other now. On more than one occasion I had a cast ring that was doing Demeter’s freeze and the Ares blade drop at the same time. The amount of play you have with the omega moves really broadens your options too. Generally speaking, any boon that buffs your omega move also makes the move cost more mana to use. It provides a very fair level of give and take. This move might be more potent now, but you can only use it a couple of times before you have to recharge your magic. I had a really silly run with the torches where I just took every omega attack buff that they would offer me. I managed to offset this with a really great magic regen boon, so it was smooth sailing as long as I paid attention.
I really enjoyed the way this game played with the space in regards to level design. One big addition to this game is that there are two paths that the story has you bouncing back and forth from. That on its own adds a fair bit of visual variety, but there’s also a lot of structural variety as well. I think the two regions that stand out to me the most in this regard would be the third region in the underworld path and the first region in the surface path. Underworld region 3 is an open air plane kind of area. The game enforces this by making the rooms pretty big and giving you multiple rewards per room. It was fun to scour the corners of the region looking for the small freebies that were being tossed my way. The opening area of the Surface path was equally as unique. Instead of you traveling through a linear region of “Either/Or” decisions, this one lays all of the rooms out in front of you and tells you to pick six of them. It just adds a cool bit of variation so that the runs don’t just feel like the same areas in different fonts each time you play.
Image Credit: Supergiant Games
Hades 2 is a game that knows how to present itself. From both an audio and visual point of view, this game is masterfully crafted. Visually speaking, the hand drawn artstyle rules. There were plenty of times that the game had me stopping to admire the canvas of the world they had created. The character designs are all absolutely top notch. This will be what I imagine Greek mythology looks like for the rest of my days now. It was really cool to see the returning characters get a new take on their look while still remaining true to what they were like before. Flourishes like Zeus’s thundercloud cloak or the woodland creature hanging around Artemis were great for creating more visual interest.
The designs for the new characters are nothing to sneeze at either. Melinoe herself looks rad. The crescent moon circlet she wears gets across her witchiness and her ghost arm looks awesome. Hecate is perhaps the most ripped spellcaster character I’ve ever seen. Her massive hat and veil really add to the mystique of her design. And the shoulder pads looking like faces really get across the three-fold nature that the game is always talking about with her. Something I really enjoy about the design for Chronos is that he almost has a more Egyptian feel to the way he looks rather than looking like the rest of the Greek pantheon.
The performances in this game are very well done. Logan Cunningham plays like four or five characters and his ability to make them sound distinct from each other is uncanny. Judy Alice Lee does a great job at capturing both Melinoe's determination to see her task through as well as her insecurities. Over on the less serious side of things, a lot of performances excellently capture how delusional some of the characters across mythology can be. My two favorite examples of that would be Scylla and Narcissus.
Soundtrack wise, the game knocks it out of the park. Hearing new takes on various motifs from the first game was really cool. The game just pulls out things I wasn’t expecting to hear as well. The third area pops off with this pipe organ track that was grandiose in a way that is completely unique from the rest of the music in the game. My favorite song in the game is Moonlight Guide Us. I have not been able to stop listening to it since first hearing it.
Image Credit: Supergiant Games
Summary
Hades 2 is an easy must play. If the first Hades was the culmination of all of the elements present in the rest of the games in Supergiant’s portfolio, Hades 2 is what the next evolution of that would be. Anytime I would lose a run, being able to talk to everyone at the camp would take the sting out of it. And by the time I was done talking to everyone, I was already saying “One more run” to myself. On top of that, the amount of secondary goals the game gives you that are actually worth the effort make it really easy to feel like you accomplished something even if you didn’t walk away victorious on every attempt. The addictive moment to moment gameplay feeds right into the excellently presented world and well done characters to make a gameplay loop that I still don’t really want to break free from. Suffice to say, my time with Hades 2 cannot be stopped.