Hades - Polygon's GotY
- Thread starter HiddenX
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Bah Polygon couldn't pay me to clink links to their site.
Overall a boring year for large budget RPGs and I don't foresee Cyberpunk getting many awards this year because it released in December. Not my rules though just journalists.
Overall a boring year for large budget RPGs and I don't foresee Cyberpunk getting many awards this year because it released in December. Not my rules though just journalists.
Hades is actually pretty fun. At first I thought it would get old super quick but it keeps introducing new characters and gameplay elements and mixing things up with alternate boss versions, etc. I wouldn't say I got hooked on it but its a good little game, for sure.
Where the fuck is Elden Ring?!
TheSHEEEP
Keeper of the Watch
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I think the idea is that some time needs to have passed to truly judge the impact of a game after release. E.g. some games can be super hyped, then die a death so quick you won't remember them next month (e.g. Marvel's Avengers).
But if you still got a game on your mind months after release, it must have done something right.
Can't really do that on December releases. Makes sense.
Of course, that just means these awards should NOT be handed out in the same year but early-ish the next year.
And of course it is also in stark contrast to journalists just having to review a game at best before it even comes out.
But those two are just basic games journalism being at odds with itself and the real world...
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I've been hesitating to buy this game for a while, mainly because I'm not sure to like very fast-paced arcade action anymore. Also, I never could get hooked enough on Transistor to play past the first few hours, for some reason.
But from the Noclip and gameplay videos, it looks so rich in so many ways, the story, the art style, the music, the setting, the original idea... Perhaps later.
I'm really glad they get awards and positive feedback, they look like a great team and they have very original ideas and a unique style! So refreshing.
But from the Noclip and gameplay videos, it looks so rich in so many ways, the story, the art style, the music, the setting, the original idea... Perhaps later.
I'm really glad they get awards and positive feedback, they look like a great team and they have very original ideas and a unique style! So refreshing.
To complete SirJames comment, it's a quite good fun game despite not really tuned for my age, reflex level, very fast decision skill level, fast global analysis skill, nor for my general action skills abilities.
It isn't perfect and I had to switch to god mode, and did it a long time after the game suggested me do it (obviously quoting from some stats there's a difficulty problem for me). Despite in god mod, I didn't finished a full run, only reached a few time the last combat. Still I got a quite good fun for many hours, no count but easily 40H-80H and more 80. If I gave up it was a bit more because of the inability to progress into building along a run, too many elements to memorize for me.
In this kind of game, top down view but not controls Diablo like, I don't see anything close for many aspects of gameplay:
- Mouse+Keyboard is a lot more adapted and tuned than usually in this sub genre. Still a bit more for Controllers but not that much required.
- The combats gameplay is just a lot more tuned than usual. I would say the only game roughly comparable would be Children of Morta, but on that aspect it is far behind. And other games I would compare to Hades are all shooters top down based and no way with similar controls and actions.
- For amount of content, most games of this genre are tiny with 10 short but very challenging levels, this game doesn't follow this crap design.
- There's an absurd level of vocal acting, with constantly new dialog replay after replay, well ok, that's interesting and for sure totally unique, but for me it's not really great even more because the Greek gods context don't appeal me much.
I can add for some other aspect, less unique to the game:
- There's a huge amount of builds, the difficulty is to decipher the good one among the mass which requires a lot of memory or hand notes, I don't think there's real guides to manage the variations and the RPG aspects.
- To soften the difficulty management, as usual there's a long list of permanent upgrades, few does better on that.
- To provide more diversity through replays you don't have a roster of characters but a roster of weapons, plus some drops along a run that can change heavily a weapon. In my opinion it's not the best achievement on that aspect but a solid quality.
- To provide more diversity through replays, a large part of character building is dependent of drops along the run, there's a solif job on that, but I think Children of Morta does a better job on this at a price of a more random difficulty.
All in all, it's a rather unique game, I'm not surprised it sold an awful lot, nor that it got some rewards. In my opinion the best game of the dev.
- Bastion is more repetitive, shorter, much less amount of content, too kiddish mood for me.
- Transistor has amazing music, intriguing story, but action is not that good no matter the setup and controls types used. For me the most stunning of dev games, alas I doubt I'll ever finish it.
- Pyre is rather weird on many aspects, I'm used to like weird stuff, but I never get in. And it's not the action part that helped, I also never get in and never enjoyed.
It isn't perfect and I had to switch to god mode, and did it a long time after the game suggested me do it (obviously quoting from some stats there's a difficulty problem for me). Despite in god mod, I didn't finished a full run, only reached a few time the last combat. Still I got a quite good fun for many hours, no count but easily 40H-80H and more 80. If I gave up it was a bit more because of the inability to progress into building along a run, too many elements to memorize for me.
In this kind of game, top down view but not controls Diablo like, I don't see anything close for many aspects of gameplay:
- Mouse+Keyboard is a lot more adapted and tuned than usually in this sub genre. Still a bit more for Controllers but not that much required.
- The combats gameplay is just a lot more tuned than usual. I would say the only game roughly comparable would be Children of Morta, but on that aspect it is far behind. And other games I would compare to Hades are all shooters top down based and no way with similar controls and actions.
- For amount of content, most games of this genre are tiny with 10 short but very challenging levels, this game doesn't follow this crap design.
- There's an absurd level of vocal acting, with constantly new dialog replay after replay, well ok, that's interesting and for sure totally unique, but for me it's not really great even more because the Greek gods context don't appeal me much.
I can add for some other aspect, less unique to the game:
- There's a huge amount of builds, the difficulty is to decipher the good one among the mass which requires a lot of memory or hand notes, I don't think there's real guides to manage the variations and the RPG aspects.
- To soften the difficulty management, as usual there's a long list of permanent upgrades, few does better on that.
- To provide more diversity through replays you don't have a roster of characters but a roster of weapons, plus some drops along a run that can change heavily a weapon. In my opinion it's not the best achievement on that aspect but a solid quality.
- To provide more diversity through replays, a large part of character building is dependent of drops along the run, there's a solif job on that, but I think Children of Morta does a better job on this at a price of a more random difficulty.
All in all, it's a rather unique game, I'm not surprised it sold an awful lot, nor that it got some rewards. In my opinion the best game of the dev.
- Bastion is more repetitive, shorter, much less amount of content, too kiddish mood for me.
- Transistor has amazing music, intriguing story, but action is not that good no matter the setup and controls types used. For me the most stunning of dev games, alas I doubt I'll ever finish it.
- Pyre is rather weird on many aspects, I'm used to like weird stuff, but I never get in. And it's not the action part that helped, I also never get in and never enjoyed.
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For builds, it's often useful just to think from the start of the run about what weapon your using and what types of attack buffs will be useful with that weapon. For example, Zeus' boon that grants small amounts of chain lightning damage to your weapon isn't great if your using a weapon that attacks slowly for big damage, but it's great if your using a weapon that attacks quickly for small damage. I never used a guide, I just tried to think about what attack combos would be most helpful and went from there. Often I'd take a relic that guaranteed a synergistic god would appear for my first boon, and then swap it out for a different relic after the first floor.
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I'm sure it's not a problem for many players, but I read post from players with the same problem.
Eventually it's hard to explain the cause, ley try:
- It's a collection of poetic names and they are important to remind, but the names have no link to their effects, even less their mixes potentials. That's already a lot to remind.
- Attack combos depends of many elements and there's many combos, but if one ingredient is missing those combo don't work. If it was that simple their would be guide I could try follow for a run, but nope, none cover the RNG aspects. If A then go for B, if C then A then go for D.
- The Building RNG aspects makes the learning curve even harder, you can't really plan a path and apply it, it's a lot more complex than that. You can't say, ok I'll play this combo.
- Another difficulty element is not having any overview of the possibilities, not even a partial overview of the possible plans from a point. But because of the depth of the whole, it's less that it's not offered, it's that it's impossible to offer otherwise some guides would show it.
It's quite playable anyway without any real mastering of the building, it's just that at some point it stopped me progress significantly, and quote the difficulty to progress on this aspect lowered my interest and I stopped played the game. But eventually I had already played it too much, I bet something like 80H.
Also despite the problems I could have had with the game (too low action skills, difficulty to improve my builds through a run) it's still one of the very rare action game I would suggest to play. In that sub genre I tried many those last months, and it's the only one I would suggest, not even Children of Morta. I wouldn't suggest either other games of the dev, expect perhaps Transistor, but only for a partial play because it is rather unique but not that fun to play fully.
Eventually it's hard to explain the cause, ley try:
- It's a collection of poetic names and they are important to remind, but the names have no link to their effects, even less their mixes potentials. That's already a lot to remind.
- Attack combos depends of many elements and there's many combos, but if one ingredient is missing those combo don't work. If it was that simple their would be guide I could try follow for a run, but nope, none cover the RNG aspects. If A then go for B, if C then A then go for D.
- The Building RNG aspects makes the learning curve even harder, you can't really plan a path and apply it, it's a lot more complex than that. You can't say, ok I'll play this combo.
- Another difficulty element is not having any overview of the possibilities, not even a partial overview of the possible plans from a point. But because of the depth of the whole, it's less that it's not offered, it's that it's impossible to offer otherwise some guides would show it.
It's quite playable anyway without any real mastering of the building, it's just that at some point it stopped me progress significantly, and quote the difficulty to progress on this aspect lowered my interest and I stopped played the game. But eventually I had already played it too much, I bet something like 80H.
Also despite the problems I could have had with the game (too low action skills, difficulty to improve my builds through a run) it's still one of the very rare action game I would suggest to play. In that sub genre I tried many those last months, and it's the only one I would suggest, not even Children of Morta. I wouldn't suggest either other games of the dev, expect perhaps Transistor, but only for a partial play because it is rather unique but not that fun to play fully.
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What is this god mode? If you're dying too fast does the game offer you cheats?
Yeah you can’t plan everything out, you just kind of have to use common sense when given a choice. I find it’s easiest just to worry about how you want to modify your basic attack or maybe your secondary special attack. That part you can plan out a little but you still have to be flexible.
I’m not especially good at action games but I still managed to finish the main story on normal, which requires multiple escapes. I normally never finish these games. At no point did I ever read a strategy guide for build advice.
God mod unlocks as an option if your having trouble. It’s basically easy mode and it adapts and gets even easier if you keep struggling.
I’m not especially good at action games but I still managed to finish the main story on normal, which requires multiple escapes. I normally never finish these games. At no point did I ever read a strategy guide for build advice.
God mod unlocks as an option if your having trouble. It’s basically easy mode and it adapts and gets even easier if you keep struggling.
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JFarrell71
SasqWatch
Hades is great. It has a very addictive gameplay loop. I'm not good at it, but it kept me very engaged for a couple of weeks.
It's a very very bizarre design.
If you win a run (but still have more run to do) the god mode bonus doesn't change, but if you failed the run it is increased a bit. the first time you activate it, it gives 20% reduction damages if I remind well.
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