The RPG mechanics and progression systems on display here are tightly designed and enticing, it's difficult to put down once you've gotten into the groove of a given run. Between Omens, Tainted Essence upgrades, and milestones, you have a lot of numbers to drive up in the pursuit of a more powerful party. The gear based approach to skills and abilities also incentivizes flexibility and creativity in character builds, since characters are bundles of stats and perks that can be used in multiple ways, rather than being locked to a specific class and playstyle. The randomized nature of which stats you get also forces you to adapt your strategy in terms of party composition, which keeps runs fresh.

On the other hand, the "tactics" on display here are quite limited. It becomes apparent very quickly that the most important thing to optimize for is crowd control, and while there is some enemy variety here that should encourage you to make tactical decisions in terms of target priority and deployment, an optimized party tends to nuke it with the rest of the horde. As a result, a lot of battles outside of the ones near the end of a given cycle feel like formalities, with the goal being to optimize your score so you can get the rewards you need to develop your party enough for them to beat the boss and nothing more.

The other thing I don't much care for is the world they've built. There just isn't much here, and the constant Marvelesque quips from your squad as the fight against hordes of undead monstrosities undercut whatever atmosphere this nominally "dark" fantasy world could have had. I think Hades has clearly demonstrated the value in storytelling and worldbuilding in the context of Roguelites, mechanics heavy though they be.

Despite these failings on the tactical and aesthetic elements, the strategic portion of the game; building your party and haven to squeeze as many resources you can in preparation to confront the boss on the final night is enjoyable enough to make it worthwhile.

In many ways this is everything I hate about games. A dopamine loop shorn of any meaningful context or decision making. Numbers go up and shit dies but since you have so few ways to meaningfully interact with the game besides choosing what rewards you select it just ends up being a totally empty treat-treadmill. As a result, it is engaging in the worst way possible, somewhat similar to the mindless engagement one gets from playing a slot machine. It is utterly meaningless from every angle, and the only reason I don't rate it any lower is because it at least has the decency to not rob people blind with microtransactions, even if it robs them of their time.