Hades

1. Summary

Years after launch, Hades still collects near-unanimous praise, mostly from players who are only now getting to it. Many say they bought it on a sale, play it on a Steam Deck, or are on the way to (or back from) Hades II. Three things come back again and again. Dying moves the story on, so a failed run still pays out in dialogue and upgrades. The combat is quick and responsive, and the six weapons and the boons the gods hand out change how each run plays. The art, soundtrack and voice acting get some of the warmest words in the corpus. Players who usually avoid roguelikes often say this one won them over, and several credit God Mode, the optional assist setting, with letting them reach the story without feeling judged.

The complaints come from two kinds of player. Some, a few hours in and often already unsure about the genre, object to restarting from the first room and fighting the same four floors and bosses again; repetition comes up in 31% of the negative reviews. Others, dozens of hours in, object to the endgame. Reviewers say the credits only roll after ten successful escapes, and that story beats, relationships and achievements wait on a character happening to appear or say the right line. Smaller groups mention cluttered screens, button-mashing that strains hands, weak keyboard and macOS controller support, and the occasional lost save.

2. What keeps coming up

What players praise

Every death moves the story onHigh

Story, writing and dialogue are what players write about most, almost always with praise for how the structure works. Dying sends Zagreus home to the House of Hades, where characters react to how he died, what he carried and whom he met, so losing a run still moves something forward. One player writes that "Hades makes every death meaningful", another that the game "makes death not a punishment", and a third that "Hades is one of those games where losing doesn't feel like losing." The amount of voiced dialogue gets its own praise: "I haven't had any repeated conversation in over 25 hours of my playtime," and after the first escape "it feels like Hades shows up with a wheelbarrow full of new content." Megaera, Thanatos, Dusa, Hypnos, Skelly and Cerberus are the characters players name with the most affection. The Greek setting wins over myth fans who expected to be picky about it. A minority finds the story thin or the characters too chatty, covered in the split section below.

Combat and buildsHigh

Players describe the controls as smooth and snappy. The variety comes from mixing six weapons and their aspects with Daedalus hammer upgrades and boons from the Olympian gods, and one reviewer's summary is "Fast, elegant combat. Sharp writing. A soundtrack that never misses." Duo boons and builds that break the game are a favourite topic. The Pact of Punishment (Heat) gets credit for letting players who have already won raise the difficulty one condition at a time. Reviews calling it "addictive" or confessing to "just one more run" are common, often along with a story about a 3 AM session or a ruined sleep schedule.

Art, music and voice actingHigh

The art direction, the music and the voice acting are mentioned constantly, and nearly always in superlatives. Players single out Darren Korb's score and the Orpheus and Eurydice songs, several say they listen to the soundtrack outside the game, and one credits the composers by name: "Darren Korb and Ashley Barrett knock it out of the park once again." For many reviewers the hand-painted portraits and environments are what drew them to the game in the first place.

For people who don't like roguelikesMedium

A steady stream of reviews say Hades was their first roguelike, or that they normally avoid the genre. One calls it the "roguelike for people that don't like roguelikes," and another says the game "made me realize i dont hate roguelites". Permanent upgrades and story progress mean a bad run still counts for something. Players who mention God Mode describe it as damage resistance that grows as you keep dying, and mostly say it let them see the story without shame: "I like how the devs are very understanding in explaining this option, unlike other games where the player is mocked or achievements get locked if they turn on easy mode." One player with disabilities says it helps them manage fatigue.

Runs on anything, especially Steam DeckLow

Steam Deck players like being able to pick it up for a few minutes and put it down between rooms, and one calls Hades "perhaps the quintessential game for the platform". Others praise how well it runs on old laptops, integrated graphics and Macs: "it does not expect you to run it on a water cooled $4000 machine." A few Linux players report that it runs cleanly.

Value on saleLow

When price comes up, it is almost always positive, often naming a sale price between $3 and $10: "Spent $3, got 80+ hours of pure addiction." Others call it worth full price, while a few would only pay a sale price (see below).

Where players are split

Fresh every run, or the same floors againHigh

Many positive reviews insist the loop never gets repetitive because builds, encounters and dialogue keep changing. Repetition, boredom or tedium still comes up in 31% of the negative reviews, and some players who recommend the game admit it eventually wore on them. Their specifics match. The floors always come in the same order (Tartarus, Asphodel, Elysium, Styx), the end bosses rarely change, and a death sends you back to the first room. "Staggeringly, offensively tedious," one negative review begins; another player asks, "Wait, I have to redo the Meg section EVERY TIME?" Players who want checkpoints say so ("if there was a checkpoint every 1 or 2 levels this game would be a 10/10"). Most of these complaints come from people a few hours in who decide the genre isn't for them, and several praise the craft while saying so. Players on the other side say the game clicks once you stop treating the hub as an interruption: "The metaprogression and the narrative aren't interruptions, they are part of the gameplay loop."

Hard and fair, or carried by upgradesMedium

Most players who talk about difficulty call it hard but fair, and the bosses (Megaera, the Bone Hydra, Theseus and Asterius) are the walls they remember breaking through, often after 20 to 60 attempts. A smaller group finds it unfair, citing armored enemies, projectile spam and traps, and some say God Mode still didn't get them past the first boss. Experienced roguelike players have the opposite worry: permanent mirror upgrades make the game "artificially easier", and one wrote, "I really don't know if I'm getting better at Hades as I play it." A few call it outright easy without Heat.

Hades or Hades IIMedium

Hades II comes up regularly, often from players finishing this game before the sequel or returning to it afterwards. The usual view is that the sequel plays better ("Hades II is clearly much more polished and refined") while this one has the better story and cast. Some prefer this one outright ("I still recommend this over the second game"). A few negative reviews written after the sequel tell newcomers to go straight to it: "The sequel is better in every single way."

Weapon and boon balanceLow

Most players say every weapon is viable, but some name weak and strong picks. The bow and the Adamant Rail draw complaints, one review calls the shield "wildly broken" in the other direction, and another says most boons "mostly just give either flat +damage or damage multipliers" instead of changing how you play. The Fated List and random god offerings annoy players chasing a specific build.

What frustrates players

The long road to the true ending and 100%Medium

Endgame complaints come from players with dozens of hours, not newcomers, and they name three things. First, several reviewers say the credits need ten successful escapes, which surprised players who thought one win finished the story: "I have to beat this game 10 times to beat this game," and another says "Something like 5 would have been enough." Second, relationship and prophecy progress depends on characters appearing and offering the right line, with Achilles and Patroclus, Hypnos and the Divided by Death prophecy named most: "rolling dialogue from npc's to hopefully get the one you need to progress a quest is beyond miserable." Third, completionists describe a grind for resources and keepsake levels. One long-haul player concluded that "The gameplay simply isn't interesting enough to sustain it for that length."

Busy screens, button-mashing and sore handsLow

Some reviews describe the combat as mashing or spamming, some fondly and some not ("the game ends up with you just spamming left click and dash"). A handful say the effects make fights hard to follow: "This game is visual clutter monster and an accessibility nightmare," and one player would not recommend it because "the particle effects were overwhelming", blinding them during fights with certain builds. Hand strain is a running joke with a real edge, from "my right thumb is wrecked" to one player's "chronic tendonitis".

Keyboard play and platform gapsLow

Players often say the game feels much better on a controller ("Started playing on controller recently, HUGE difference") and that aiming on keyboard feels clunky. Two Mac players say controllers don't work properly on macOS: "controller support is extremely broken on macOS," with triggers and buttons not registering. A few others mention the lack of true ultrawide support, few display options, and small text on the Steam Deck.

Lost saves, crashes and slowdownsLow

A handful of players lost progress, one to a save that had reset when they came back to the game, another writing "Entire save data got deleted and no way to restore it." A few report crashes that end a run, and others describe frame drops or input lag building up over a long session or in the final boss fight, on hardware that should handle it easily.

3. The player conversation

The tone is warm and playful. Most reviews are a line or two ("peak", "you can pet the dog", jokes about Zagreus's family and how attractive the cast is), and the longer ones read like recommendations to a friend. Late arrivals write a lot of them: people who sat on the game for years, bought it on a deep sale, picked up a Steam Deck, or came in through Hades II. Many say they expected not to like a roguelike.

There is little disagreement, and it falls into two groups who raise different problems. People a few hours in object to the loop itself (restarting from the first room, the same floors, button-mashing) and often say the genre is not for them. People dozens or hundreds of hours in object to the dialogue that depends on luck, the ten-clear ending and the completionist grind. Technical complaints (saves, macOS controllers, slowdowns) turn up in isolated reviews.

Sentiment barely moved across the year. Weekly positive shares stayed between 93% and 99% from late October 2025 to early October 2026. The busiest week, starting December 29, 2025, drew 430 reviews and was 94% positive.

4. What the developers could do

1. Add boss and route variety to the later floors. Repetition comes up in about a third of the negative reviews, and players single out the fixed floor order and end bosses that rarely change.
2. Guarantee story-critical encounters once their requirements are met. Completionists describe waiting run after run for Patroclus, Achilles or Hypnos to appear and say the right line, and one calls rolling for that dialogue "beyond miserable".
3. Offer a shorter route to the credits, or explain the ten-clear requirement up front. Some players stopped after finding out that one win doesn't finish the story, and at least two watched the ending on YouTube instead.
4. Give newcomers an optional checkpoint or a way to skip bosses they have already beaten. Players who quit early ask for checkpoints and boss skips, and restarting from the first room is the reason they give for leaving.
5. Add a setting to reduce particle and screen effects. Players who quit over readability say strong builds blinded them mid-fight and there was no option to tone effects down.
6. Fix macOS controller support and add ultrawide and windowed display options. Mac players report triggers and buttons not registering, and PC players note the missing ultrawide and display settings.
7. Make saves more resilient to resets and sync conflicts. Players who lost a save describe progress reset or deleted with no way to get it back.
8. Rebalance the weakest weapons and filler boons. The bow, the Adamant Rail and flat-damage boons draw recurring complaints, while the shield is called overpowered.