Hades

I need to be honest upfront: Hades is a genuinely great game. The combat is tight. The writing is excellent. The art direction is gorgeous. It won a ton of awards for good reason.

But this isn’t a site about great games. It’s about games that fit into a busy parent’s life. And Hades has some friction there.

What it is

You play Zagreus, son of Hades, trying to escape the underworld. Each run takes you through randomly generated rooms filled with enemies. You die, you return to the House of Hades, you talk to characters, you try again. The story advances through failure as much as success.

The combat is fast, fluid, and satisfying. Different weapons and boon combinations create variety. The voice acting is exceptional. There’s a reason this game is on every “best roguelikes” list.

The session length problem

Here’s the thing: a successful run takes 25 to 40 minutes. An unsuccessful one can be shorter, but early on you’re failing a lot and each failure is 15 to 20 minutes.

That’s fine so far. The problem is what happens between runs.

Every time you return to the House of Hades, there’s new dialogue. Characters have things to say. Story beats trigger. There are resources to spend, upgrades to choose, relationships to advance. And none of it is skippable without feeling like you’re missing the point.

I spent as much time between runs as during them. A “quick session” of Hades was never quick.

The pick-up-ability factor

The story is genuinely good. But that works against pick-up-ability. After a week away, I’d forget where I was in the various character arcs. Who did I talk to last? What was happening with Achilles? Did I already give that nectar to Thanatos?

The combat comes back fast. The narrative threads take longer to re-orient.

The grind (it’s there, but well-disguised)

Hades is a roguelike with a progression system layered on top. You’re accumulating resources, unlocking mirror upgrades, leveling relationships. The game gets easier over time as your permanent upgrades stack up.

This is fine design. But it means the first several hours are harder than they need to be. The game expects you to fail forward, but if your sessions are limited, that forward progress is slow.

I hit a wall where runs felt too hard and the resource accumulation felt too slow. Pushed through eventually, but there were a few weeks where I bounced off.

What it gets right

The save system is generous. You can save and quit between any room. Runs autosave constantly. No progress lost to a kid waking up.

And once you break through the initial hump, the run variety is excellent. Different weapons, different boons, different strategies. I never felt like I was doing the same run twice.

The value is exceptional. Massive amount of content for the price. If you do have the time to sink into it, you’ll get dozens of hours.

The bottom line

Hades is a great game with real friction for time-limited players. Runs are a bit long. Between-run housekeeping adds time. The early hours are grindy while you build permanent upgrades. The story is good enough that skipping dialogue feels wrong.

I’d recommend it if you can commit to 45-minute sessions, or if you’re okay playing it slowly over months. If you only have 30 minutes and want to feel like you finished something, Balatro or Vampire Survivors fit better.

Not bad. Not for everyone. Know what you’re getting into.