Over the years I've put probably 200+ hours into this games since its release. The gimmick of telling a continuous story in a rogue-like is certainly unique (or maybe was in that way) and it's fortunate that it's handled by Supergiant Games, a developer known for its storytelling. But if the core gameplay loop doesn't satisfy you, then a big story is not gonna give a rouge-like any kind of longevity.

And does Hades deliver in this aspect? It for sure does. It's fast-paced, an appropriate amount of challenging (though I have to say that as soon as I beat the game once I continued beating my runs like 19 times out of 20) and its presentation is top-notch. It's more restricted than what I've been used to up to that point (I'm a HUGE Isaac fan with around 2000 hours in that game) but it did make me want to start another run almost immediately after beating my father Hades in this story. I remember playing it near constantly when it came out while listening to Stromlight Archive audiobooks. It was just hypnotic.

Though, I do have to add that people who search for a lot of variety will not find it here. I did constantly switch between weapons during my time with the game and they do differ from one another but it did not take long to get really familiar with each of them. Like, I don't remember any particular run out of the many I have played here and it is because they balanced it in a very precise way but I do feel like breaking a run is the most fun, funny, and rewarding experience in these games (again HUGE Isaac fan over here).

Anyway, I'm very excited for its sequel and I'm looking forward to see if they're gonna throw in any twist to keep it from getting old.

Look, it's polished as hell. It looks amazing, it feels great to control (at least initially) and it's cute and fun and all but there's a reason I only finished it on the third attempt and it's because the vast majority of its content is just filler.

This time I consciously made the decision to get as quickly as possible from world to world (a thing my completionist brain usually doesn't let me do while playing a collectathon) and it was nice experiencing all the new worlds and beating the final level against Bowser and all but EVEN that way most power moons you collect just don't feel like they were worth your time.

The only sections I consistently enjoyed were the added power moon levels that are basically a throw back to Super Mario Sunshine with its special abstract levels where you play without the water backpack. Everything else felt just really lazily thrown around that required little no thinking or skill to accomplish.

Literally, the only sequence that gave me trouble was the actual bonus ending that you get to do after collecting 500 power moons (out of what feels like 800-900 in total). I do understand that they made their worlds bigger and want to fill them with more stuff but when collecting power moons feels like I'm just picking up coins then they clearly lost their way.

I did and do semi regularly replay Mario 64 and Sunshine (not Galaxy because I never had a Wii) and they are engaging every single time I pick them back up because they give me 7-8 distinct challenges or levels per (admittedly smaller) world but the pacing is just so much better. Nintendo really pulled a Ubisoft here with constructing (at that point not even impressively) bigger worlds and filling them with mindless filler.

Anyway, I would probably love this games if they limited each world to like 20 distinct challenges instead of like 60-90 collectables because the core gameplay is as expected polished and fun and the gimmick of possessing enemies and things (can't believe I didn't mention it yet) is mostly kept fresh and interesting. That's why it still gets a positive rating.

TLDR: Do not give a fuck about the power moons! Go in and play through the quickest route you can find and you'll have a jolly time. Everything beyond that diminishes the returns exponentially.

I'm someone who does a daily sudoku puzzle on the New York Times games app and naturally every once in a while I feel myself drawn to other number games. It's just an itch of mine that needs scratching.

Hexologic is such a numbers/math puzzle game and a fairly short one at that. Actually also not a particularly hard one, at least for me. But I did start and finish it in one sitting because of its cute presentation, its speedy introduction of new puzzle elements and its super polished state.

If you have the same itch, this will give you an enjoyable afternoon!