Hades

[i]Very Good; but I question its S-Tier Status[/i] The difference between good and exceptional status in my opinion comes down to elements that can seem a bit nitpicky; but I think that is what holds Hades back from the highest accolades. First, I’d like to highlight the strong points of the title. The mythology theming is great and is continuous throughout all facets of the game including the ever-present story dialogs. The art style is also very visually pleasing. Combat feel and control is generally very good, which is essential since that is what this game is about 90% of the time. Enemy attacks and intentions are fairly telegraphed in most instances. Six different weapon types to select from; each offering solid variety from one another and a ton of boon enhancements to alter the playstyle. Also, the game makes good use of long-term progression currency sinks to keep you coming back run after run to make little improvements. Now for some of the areas that I think could have been better. The game requires a ton of repeated clears to advance the story to the conclusion; likely far too many for most players. The last biome seems considerably less developed than the prior zones. The interior areas are generally extremely small and the main obstacle generally becomes ground damage from poison spills or hard to see projectiles. The story element delivery is hit and miss and can get pretty repetitive constantly talking to every NPC each run and listening to the excess banter. However, I think it does work when placed at the end of a successful run giving that little extra incentive to keep completing clears. In a similar vane to the large number of repeat clears; you cannot skip past difficulty level increases. Each +1-difficulty level has to be cleared progressively and they are weapon dependent. For example, you cannot skip to +5 right away you have to clear +1,+2 first and you will have to do this for each weapon type. This added a lot of additional time required to get to the higher challenge levels and is overly restrictive. There are these hammer upgrades nodes that are extremely transformative to your active attacks. Often, they change the behavior of an attack making a weapon play very differently; good idea but I don't love the implementation of getting this intra-run. I would have preferred this to have been a loadout choice at the start of a run paired with the Aspects. Overall, this is still a staple in the genre but don’t come into it thinking it’s a perfect masterpiece.