https://www.eurogamer.net/hades-2-early-access-launch-on-steam-reaches-over-100k-concurrent-players-24-hours-after-launch
Hades 2 released in early access last night, and it is already pulling in some impressive numbers.
I'll never understand people jumping to play unfinished games. There's no way most of those 100k people are actually going to participate in the ea feedback / qa process, so all they're achieving by playing early is spoiling the game for themselves with an inferior version. It's not like this is made by an inexperienced studio that might keep it in ea indefinitely neither, you literally just need to wait a year to play it when it's released. /r
The first game was amazing. This one really doesn't feel unfinished as-is though. There's likely to be tons of balance changes, and I'm sure there will be bug fixes and more performance optimization updates to come... It's still super fun, why wait
When I was younger and had more time to not worry about merely existing, I used to enjoy chasing the updates and trying to find every glitch and exploit and do as much silly shit as possible before patches went live.
I'm just enjoying the game at my own pace. If/when I encounter bugs or issues I'll report them, but it's not like you have to dedicate yourself to it.
Some art will probably be replaced too. I remember Charon in the original hades had his generic robed character portrait replaced with a better one. Zagreus even complimented him on his new look when it was added to the game, which was a nice touch.
Yes, it’s unfinished, but my experience with the original Hades is that Supergiant knows how to make sure their product is at a certain level of polish before making EA available. I haven’t played much, but they seemed to hit the mark again.
Guess the first one was even worse than this one at this stage of development, but nobody knew about the game yet. I'm still waiting for the finished product (as I did with the first one), I don't want to spoil me.
I understand the sentiment and I generally agree with you but I think I can make a case for Hades as an exception.
I picked up the first one in ea because I was thirsty for a new roguelike and some friends raved about it enough to me, and it was already a great game. The changes that came over the period I played were additive in the sense that they just opened more options in a game that already felt complete to me (mostly anyways, but more on that in a sec). But to defend it I can’t just say “oh well it felt like a finished game” there also needs to be a tangible benefit to playing it in early access. And there was! The early access versions of the game included meta banter between the narrator and Zagreus, little jokes about new things appearing or things that should be there but aren’t, references to the fact that pieces of the story’s scaffold were still being set up. It sounds small but it was just more of the wonderful character charm that oozes from every corner of that game and I actually kind of missed it a little bit once the full release came. Anyways I haven’t picked up Hades 2 yet (been making more of an effort to clear my backlog lately), but I’m thinking about it. And as far as the ostensible “point” of early access—community feedback and income to support development—Supergiant has given me ample reason to trust that they’ll make it worth it for me as a player if I don’t want to wait for the polished final product.
A Supergiant game in Early Access is more finished than most fully-released triple-A titles.
Plus, as with the first Hades, they work the continued development into the narrative of the game.
What made you think I want people to quit having fun? If anything it would be more fun to play once it's finished, and it's not like there's a shortage of games to play in the meanwhile.
Edit: I just want people to give more thought into the games they play than "whatever's on top of steam today". Just because it became available now doesn't mean you have to play it right away.
And it's entirely possible they have given it that thought and decided "yes, this is worthwhile for me."
Because they get to play it early. That's it. I played BG3 early and still had a lot of fun replaying Act 1 when it came out.
The studio gets a number of things, as well. While direct feedback is small, that is still valuable as they could never test that many hardware and software variants. They also get automated data from the software phoning home on crashes if that's enabled. And they get an influx of cash in the last few months of development as their sales spike gets a bit flattened. It's a winning strategy if you don't have the funds for a huge marketing blitz to drive initial sales.
Yeah, I feel like it's paying for the priveledge of being a beta tester. I am exited to play it, but I am not dropping money until the full release.
I understand your point but you can also be satisfied with an early access game for what it had when you played regardless of later improvements. Valheim is a great example of this: you'll be hard pressed to find someone that wasn't satisfied with it, despite being unfinished.
You're getting downvoted but I agree. The first game is one of my most played on Steam and I was invited to the technical test for the second. But I probably won't be buying it any time soon. I absolutely hate the trend of buying unfinished products. While this developer is most likely not taking advantage, so many others do. Why should we pay money to beta test your game???
I've purchased a fair number of early access games from indie developers.
For me the benefit is that it's often cheaper during EA, so I get it at a discount, and it already feels like a complete game worth the price I'm paying. I know they are actively working on adding more to it, and having more things added to the game for me to explore extends its lifespan for me. So I get more enjoyment out of it than I would waiting for 1.0, at a cheaper price.
For small developers it gives them the funds to continue development, and feedback that helps with game balance.
There's no way most of those 100k people are actually going to participate in the ea feedback / qa process
On first launch it asks if you're willing to have your play data submitted. So even if people don't actively send feedback they are still providing data about what systems/weapons/upgrades they engage with more or less, how successful their run is with any given weapon or upgrade, how frequently they win or lose in a given fight, etc.
Nice. Won't be playing it till the full release, I still have Hades 1 after all, but all this attention will probably make the game even better than the original
i bought it immediately after work monday and have been playing nonstop in all my spare time. no bugs/glitches whatsoever. the only "placeholder" things i've seen are copy/paste images for the keepsakes in the display case
It's really, really good! Tougher than the first game, but that's a welcome change. After about ~10 hours of gameplay, I already feel like it's the best sequel I've played.
I've been playing video games my whole life and I loved the first one, but I'm never able to "git gud"
I play these games as long as I can before my skill ROI becomes basically 0, so I'm one of those people who would really like an easy mode
That's pretty much what God Mode is. The option that gives you a small permanent defense % boost after every single death. I'm too old to git gud so I've used it to boost my progression in Hades. The feature seems to still be present in Hades 2.
Oh! I thought it was like most games' god mode (unlimited health, one hit kill, etc.) I didn't know that's what that was! Time to pick it back up!
It is! You can go to the Steam store > New & Noteworthy > Most Played to see current player counts for the top 100 games. Hades II is currently #6, ahead of Helldivers even!
Considering the absolute faceplant helldivers took thanks to Sony I'm not actually that impressed by that comparison alone
