What I Played This Week (10/18/2020)

It’s just Hades, I played a lot of Hades. I’ll probably get back to Squadrons at some point when I can find somebody to play with. (Dear reader, do you want to play Squadrons? Let me know).

The build that got me my first completion.

Hades: This was the week where I finally got a clear in Hades, and it took 61 attempts. And then since that first clear I have gotten 5 more clears. I’m not sure what clicked since getting that first win but I can pretty consistently get at least to Styx and pretty often make it to the Hades fight. It’s really incredible that I’ve played ~75 runs and I still haven’t noticed much, if any, repeated dialogue. Especially since 99% of it is spoken, it’s a really incredible feat of game production.

*Light Spoilers below about what happens when you finish a run for the first time*

Hades also makes a really smart and interesting decision to not put credits after the first clear. Most run-based games have other endings that require multiple runs or specific actions to be done mid-run to reach the “real ending”. Slay the Spire has the 3 keys, Spelunky has an item that has to be acquired in each level. I don’t care to try and find those secrets myself, or even just look them up when I’m playing other run-based games. I got to the end, they played credits, I’m done, or I play until the fun runs out. Hades’ decision to not put credits after the first completed run and more importantly the dialogue between Persephone and Zagreous after that first completion makes it clear that there is still more game to be played and the story is not over. The reward for continuing to play is not a secret ending, it’s the continuation of the story which I assume will lead to an ending at some point. Hades, like all Supergiant games before it, has a system to manually increase difficulty. In Hades it’s called the Pact of Punishment and unlocks after you complete a run for the first time. This is the most I’ve really interacted with one of these systems in any of their games (I think I used the one in Pyre a couple times because I felt like the standard game was too easy). You could, hypothetically, continue the story without interacting with the Pact, but you would stop receiving the reward items (Titan’s Blood, Diamonds, and Ambrosia). Because the story is so compelling and I want to keep playing to see where it goes invites me to use the Pact more so than the similar systems in earlier Supergiant games. Having the story be the primary thing driving me to keep playing a run-based game is new and a huge testament to how good the story has been in Hades.

Hearthstone: I also played some more Hearthstone, there was a balance update to battlegrounds, it seems good.

Mini Metro: I got 7th on the Daily Challenge on Saturday, the game is good. They’ve announced some upcoming updates for the game which is exciting.