Chaos. If there’s anything that would encapsulate the term roguelikes or roguelites, chaos would be its perfect descriptor. Rogues separate themselves from the rest of the genres by building a core gameplay loop where the moment-to-moment experience revolves around randomness and player decision. Each and every run is different, from enemies, stages, items, abilities that you get. Of course, frustration is inbound when randomness is decisive on the outcome.
I’m not the one to say, but stripping these qualities from a roguelite game turns it into a homogenous experience. Yes, I’m calling the poster-boy of roguelites homogeneous. Let’s get this out of the way first, Hades looks pretty, and has really good voice-acting. Some like it for its dialogue, but I find it too “internet-y” for my taste. Now I can begin my rant, can I?
Hades’ lacks spine. Rail-roading players' decision to get synergies and allowing them to filter their choices manually to remove frustration removes that chaos. Not only this, but the lack of variety, room-wise, enemy-wise, and choice-wise, exacerbates this homogeneity. What about player adaptation? Hades has none of that. Simply mash the same few buttons to kill the same few enemies, the same few bosses set in the same few areas with the same few room-designs. Same, same, same. Before someone screams skill-issue at me, I finished Hades at 32 heat.
Dying is perhaps the fun part of Hades. You hoard and slave away multiple meta-currencies that allow you to make the game easier, find yourself some dialogue you’ve never heard before, and finally, do the grunt-work all over again. Hopefully, you find some new meta-currency-locked drip-fed dialogue this time around.
I’m not the one to say, but stripping these qualities from a roguelite game turns it into a homogenous experience. Yes, I’m calling the poster-boy of roguelites homogeneous. Let’s get this out of the way first, Hades looks pretty, and has really good voice-acting. Some like it for its dialogue, but I find it too “internet-y” for my taste. Now I can begin my rant, can I?
Hades’ lacks spine. Rail-roading players' decision to get synergies and allowing them to filter their choices manually to remove frustration removes that chaos. Not only this, but the lack of variety, room-wise, enemy-wise, and choice-wise, exacerbates this homogeneity. What about player adaptation? Hades has none of that. Simply mash the same few buttons to kill the same few enemies, the same few bosses set in the same few areas with the same few room-designs. Same, same, same. Before someone screams skill-issue at me, I finished Hades at 32 heat.
Dying is perhaps the fun part of Hades. You hoard and slave away multiple meta-currencies that allow you to make the game easier, find yourself some dialogue you’ve never heard before, and finally, do the grunt-work all over again. Hopefully, you find some new meta-currency-locked drip-fed dialogue this time around.