Midway upon the journey of our life, I found myself within a dark forest. And there were cocoons everywhere. Sadly, I had a swing at a few, and this turned out to be a mistake. Mothy, woven foes emerged and I was overwhelmed. I woke up, cursing, in a glade surrounded by standing stones. Ahead lay a sort of tented bedroom, and the whole thing promised to start over.
Repetition is at the heart of Hades, and it's at the heart of Hades 2. It's bound up in quite a tangled, complex way, I suspect. It was strange to hear that Supergiant was cranking on a sequel, given the studio's fondness for daisy-chaining delicate, unique games that all seemed to be in conversation with one another. But then, it was weird to hear that the first Hades was headed to Early Access back in the day, given the studio's fondness for shipping things that seemed, if not perfect, then deeply considered, thoroughly completed.
Well, Hades 2 is a lot like Hades so far, and it turns out that that's exactly what I wanted, even if I didn't know it. Movement is still a decisive sock-clad glide over polished parquet. The world is still delivered in Euro comic book panels, with those delicate black lines and flashes of light to suggest smoothest stone. Combat still sees awkward players like myself clutching dash and attacking in a kind of crow-footed death grip. The gods are still TikTok influencers designing, now and then, to dip into their comments. Here's Aphrodite with an attack boon – it wouldn't be an enormous surprise if she then launched into everything she ate at Coachella.
So what's changed? From a morning's play, it's hard to tell. And that's because of those cocoons. Hades was repetition, but it was repetition with variation. You set out and came back, but there would always be wrinkles, and surprises, and that's still true here. One run gives me a grassy spell of cocoons. Another delivers a boss. Onwards. Backwards. Forwards again.
The protagonist has changed, with Melinoë, princess of the underworld, replacing Zagreus. And replace she does. My instinct is to suggest that she is smarter and has more of her life together, as it were. There's less of the perverse needy self-sufficiency of Zagreus – if nothing else, the first game was a perfect insight into the mind of an upper-sixth kid who just wants their parents to notice them. Melinoë is aiming to defeat Chronos, and yes, I am reading this from a blurb, because, while I care deeply about the relationships in Hades games, the threads of narrative always take a bit longer to sink in. For the first few hours I'm just joyously hitting things.
And I still am, here. Yet to unlock any new weapons, but the staffy-spear is great so far, turning me into a sort of homing needle of pointed damage. Each tour of the underworld still offers a mixture of gifts and choices from the gods – more of this, but less of that? Do you want this to explode? Do you want to dash that deals in fire or ice?
This alone means that no two runs are the same. What doesn't change, however, is the dark haunted forest that the first stages take place in. Trees bowed like old men, willows that are rotting as much as weeping. The hub has grass underfoot and a huge cauldron at its center. It feels deliriously witchy, even before you learn that character upgrades are dealt in the form of arcana cards. And yes, Supergiant's able to conjure that thin heady steam rising from a cauldron beautifully – the kind of thing that would lead Scooby Doo, trance-like, into delicious trouble.
I'll admit, I'm not at the point yet where I can separate new faces from the familiar gods, or put a finger on mechanics I haven't encountered before, even basic ones. I'm still in that Hades update rush, squeezing attack and dash, smashing stuff, dodging stuff, revealing in what I do believe is Hades' single greatest idea, which is the calm moment you have once a room is cleared and before you go onto the next one. You survived! Just wait for a spell, take it in, don't be rushed into picking a door.
If I had to offer some kind of verdict on this Technical Test build, I'd say this: starting with the familiar – or at least starting with something that feels superficially familiar to a casual like me for the first few hours – is a wonderful way to kick off a game that is going to warp and weave its way through early access, just like the first Hades did. How many years did Hades take to obtain this good? This swift and surprising and comforting and brutal and endlessly replayable? Well that's where Hades 2 starts from. Just be careful around those cocoons.
#Hades #kicking #special #weapon #familiarity
