https://lorerunner.com/premieres-8#Hades
Website: http://www.lorerunner.com
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https://lorerunner.com/premieres-8#Hades
Website: http://www.lorerunner.com
All original works are the property of respective owners.
source
There's no audio.
The big reason I think that Audio/Visual is such a point of fixation, especially in games that have dull/boring/sloggy gameplay is because a compelling audio/visual style plays heavily into immersion, thus making the gameplay feel like less of a slog. following that to its logical conclusion, the audio/visual style can become an incentive in and of themselves. This is especially true of Supergiant games with their propensity for dynamic scoring and lush stylized visuals. Thanks for the content and best wishes.
Love hades, me and my friend theo 100% the game during the pandemic, I got it on the switch so I could play it at work.
This is why I like these videos, your genuine honesty. There are reviewers that are honest, but they're not genuine. Hope all goes well at the dentist.
What really got me to enjoy the game was how every problem I have with rogue-likes/lites was compensated for. The story is enjoyable, the characters engaging, and with everything that carries over from loop to loop made it so I didn't feel like dying was a kick to the balls progression-wise. Yes, the RNG on the boons and upgrades blows, but there was usually enough consistency and variety to keep the game from getting boring.
I legitimately never care about the ingame music while I play the game. The first thing I always do when starting up a new game for the first time is turn the music off. However, there are some games that I think have really good soundtracks, but I'll always listen to them separately rather than in the game.
I honestly don't get the audio/OST part of these reviews either. I live and breathe music like most people and I definitely love OSTs like Final Fantasy in general, Nier, Devil May Cry, Doom and the list goes on. But I don't get when a guy reviewing a game says "the music is the best part of this game" and the problem is that they aren't talking about a bad game, they're talking about a game like Xenoblade or Doom. I get it, some OSTs are so iconic in it's games that sometimes it makes us even want to replay an old favorite. But to me it feels like the guy would prefer to listen to an album on spotify rather than to play a game on his console.
It's just that, I'm in it for the game, you know? The gameplay and the story, and there isn't a single game (besides rhythm games) that I would play the first time or to it's entirety on a replay, just because I love the graphics and the soundtrack. Even games where I actually get hyped for the OST like Devil May Cry or Yakuza I know I would buy the game and play it even if it didn't have any sound whatsoever.
Note that I'm not complaining about music or sound design being mentioned in reviews, the thing is that these aspects have been over emphasized in my opinion, as if it's something that would redeem a bad game or elevate a great game to masterpiece status.
I only rave about Supergiant music because I want more films and games to value music more than a post production thing.
I love when music is diagetic or integrates with the story or gameplay and crave more of it.
I absolutely love this game. It's probably one of the few games that has made me wish I could meet the developers to shake their hand and tell them what an incredible game they created.
I played it for the first time at the beginning of this year (2022), and I was blown away. It's my first rogue-like game.
Yes, the aesthetic aspect of this game is great, but that's not why I love it
It's the gameplay. 37 attempts it took me to reach the surface for the first time (yeah, I suck), and every single one of those attempts was different. I love that, even though you're trying again to escape because you failed, it ALWAYS felt like I was making progress. Either becsuse I was able to reach a new floor, or because I got a new weapon, or new buffs or power-ups, or because I advanced a character story, or because I upgraded a relic, etc. Every single run felt like progress.
I managed to escape 10 times to make Persephone return to the underworld in 13 more attempts after my first escape.
I toyed around a bit with the challenges, it was fun. I didn't continue because I wanted to move on to other games, but I know I will return to play more just for fun.
And I agree, the voice acting in this game is fantastic. It's amazing. I also agree with what you mentioned about the controllers. Very responsive.
Overall, this was a very enjoyable game.
Lore, I am curious about something. When I play Hades (or any rogue-lite like Isaac, Rogue Legacy etc), I usually play about an hour per day. That hour is extremely fun, but near the end I get Rogue-burnout. Then I continue the next day, and I am excited to get back into it. I know that for your streams, you need to be laser-focused and play each game around 4-5+ hours per day. Do you think that this "cramming" could have contributed toward your main negative?
Uhh yea. Clean unsubscribe.
Didn't play the game because I didn't like the visual style – which is important to me when I have to look at it for hours.
Personally I think a portion of the problem was also that this game is not very conducive to a multi-hour (5+) session/s. I took a really long time to actually beat this game because I consumed it in bursts, as I think is what the intention is. A run is usually about 20 minutes total, so it's perfect for killing an hour real quick. Late game your builds/runs become not only more and more susceptible to manipulation, but also manage to maintain a sense of progression. My main thing was the weapon aspects, the celestial aspects for the weapons completely change your gameplay style, and using accessories you can start crafting perfect runs. I think there's a lot of value in a game structured like this, it's the perfect little pick up and play kind of game.
Funnily enough my favorite Supergiant game is … Pyre. 🙃 The discussion about pacing and the seconds and minutes problem is an intriguing one. I have played 100h+ of Hades and never felt the seconds and minutes problem myself. Upon deeper analysis I believe this to be a result of a.) I am a big rouge-lite genre fan; the rouge-lite genre has a certain flow to runs I would expect (run length, run variation, hub progression etc.) and Hades in my estimation hits most of the constituent aspects on the nail and b.) session play time: I rarely played more than three hours in a session, since the game required a high degree of concentration (early on due to lack of knowledge of how to construct builds, late due to the increased difficulty/mutators); this meant roughly 3-5 runs per session spread out across a month. Paradoxically the only place where I felt I was not getting anywhere and was questioning the pacing of the long game was the middle section (in the 40-60) run range. Thank you for diving deep into the topic and fighting tooth discomfort. Provoking critical though is one of the reasons I follow and support your work. 🧡💛🧡
I think the fixation on the visuals or music is there because of the saturation of the Triple A Market. That is my personal take. People love to see games that stand out or are interesting to see and experience amongst a generic market.
In another way, surface level stuff about media has always attracted the public more than the actual meat and bone of the work and what they attract to to highlight or write about.
Wooo! I got a shout out right at the start of the video for making the pulling teeth comment in the stream!
I didn't mind dying, because it was always awesome to go back and talk to the crew.
Also, after my second succesful run it kinda clicked and I needed to go out of my way to actually lose a run without pack of punishment activated.
For me the boredom kicked in only after like 35ish succesful runs so I can super not relate to your experience, but its nice that you are so open about it, thatswhy I'm subscribed
Glad you decided to do this rumination video. Watching you talk through some some of the issues, mostly about the length of each run and the number of loops, on the stream last night made me realise why I stopped playing the game even though I enjoyed it.
I absolutely loved this game. I went into it almost completely blind, but I felt the click from the first play session. That being said, I'm a bit more tolerant of grind and repetition than most people, so I can understand why that would be a turn off.
I'm also fairly obsessed with the audio [more than visual] impression of a game, so this game also ticked the boxes there.
SPOILERS
I think what struck me most about this game is pretty much what you touched on. It's a story that feels bigger than it is on the macro scale, because of how it's presented. In it's base parts, it's a story about a child who find out he's adopted on one side and wants to seek out his real mother, and comes up against resistance from a parental figure because of undisclosed factors. It's just a compelling story that made me want to see it through to the end in general.
Thanks Lore, you explained perfectly why I didn't like Hades but I could never put it into words myself. It's like they didn't have full faith in their game and assumed they needed to pad it out somehow to get better playtime metrics or something.
Anyway, now I know. Game was wasting my time and I felt it even if I was not consciously aware of that fact.
Love your work Lore and as an Aussie I can confirm we do in fact ride in the pouches of kangaroos…
The big rooms are made so that when you fight actual REAL enemies that are dangerous and can actually ignore you and kill you, you have a way to make space and just not be overwhelmed. The Temple of Stixx is the inverse: Usually enemies are cakewalks but the precision afforded by the big rooms is gone. Yes, The temple still has big rooms, but trust me, those rooms are naaaaasty as all get out and the MiniBosses are NOT FUN to fight. You complain about Elysium enemies having too much health? Imagine a rat from the Temple having double that and hitting you for a 1/8th of your health each bite.
The repetition of the game is like a nonissue. I think the problem is that the game is very much intended for it to be micromanaged to the absolute extreme and as a "stream" game it is pretty boring unless the player is also playing the razoredge alongside it. It's a game that feels so good to beat on something like 1HP, before a big attack occurs, after salvaging an awful start/awful build or when it's optimized to the point that enemies drop instantly and bosses are done in as few damage sessions as possible. A Speedrunner's game.
The loops are fine. Each room is treated as a "chance" to upgrade when complete. The upgrade and the reward changes depending on the thing you collect and reducing the number of stuff you can do does reduce the ability to do so. I don't think making the challenge faster helps too, because then the game is just never stopping to give you a breather unless you get lucky for one or you reach the room before the boss and that can get some people to not plan out their strategies.
Dunno, this game did so much for me in terms of gameplay, was addicted for a while and had to drop it down purposefully because I was seriously planning to beat the Contract of Hell challenges before I realized that was gonna eat me 100+ hours of my life into something I already more than proved myself capable(I got the absolute best ending possible and maxed out 3 Weapons + Zagreus darkness). Sorry I cannot relate you on this, but on restrospective, I do find it curious how you got yourself as an RPG guy when RPGs are probably the most labor-repetition games out there, especially with that hint…