Recent reviews by Jeanne D'arroz

This is one of these games that gives you dopamine, even while not playing it.

I am serious, This game is really good, and really unique, jsut thinking about playing about it feels nice. I have actually played the game for 11 hours, 5 with the EA release+ 6 in the demo, so my experience with it is a bit more than it seems. I wish I had more time to play. Well, Ill have more time in the holidays, but I digress

The flow state of the game is really, really good, having to swap to enemies offers in run variety that just feels really good. Each enemy is different, and well designed, no goombas here, so even though there are "only" 6 enemies, their execution is enough to make every battle feel interesting. Hell, it was like that when it is only 4 enemies, before you unlock the later 2.

Not everything is complete of course, the main hub is very much a work in progress, feels a bit empty as of now, and there is still 1 area left to be made, and to be honest, the Tachi enemy feels a bit unfun to play. Might just be a case of "I need to git gud" though.

But still, this game is very good overall, the core gameplay loop is not only solid, its pure excelency! and I have no doubts it will get even better from here.

The greastest most bugged game I've ever played

tl;dr: at the end

This is a very very good early access, and a worthy sequel, although I think some fans of the previous one might like it less.

Thats because I think the combat, has a slighty more "thoughtful" flow to it, you can't just span dash like in the first game, instead of spamming dash everywhere, it has a dash+sprint mechanic now, meaning to dodge attacks now you really have to mean it and not just "dash, dash! and pray it works. The combat now also has a very big focus on charged abilities, or Ω ablities, as it is called in game, which is basically a version of Attack, special and cast where you charge and spend mana to use a more powerful and sometimes different version of your abilities.

After an early game upgrade, this slows down time, which might make the game feel more slow than the first game, but at least to me I eventually got used to it, and playign the game feels normal.

I really liked those aspects of the combat, really makes you think more and engage with the systems the game gives to you.

I've seen some criticism saying that the enemies feel more spongy than the first game... and I have to disagree. The reason they feel spongy is Metaprogression, just like in the first one. At first you have a weak power baseline, and eventually unlock stuff that allows you to give much more damage and melt hordes of foes. Personally I dont like metaprogression in roguelike, but that is kinda of what made Hades, Hades, so complaining about that now feels idiotic.

Speaking of metaprogression, I really like the new resource system! It is honestly much more engaging than the first one, and it is cool that is not just an ever increasing darkness bar to get more upgrades.

Changing a bit of subject, The first areas you go through are very similar to the first game, fight an area, choose a place to go, rinse and repeat. But eventually, upon the third area, you'll discover that they are trying to do very different things, much like Styx in the first game, with each new area having a new main gimmick to it. And I like that, although some concepts do feel undercooked a bit. Spoiler o how they are like But the only that feels "complete" in execution is Tartarus. The other ones feel like they could use something a bit more to give more punch, for example, I feel like the Fields of Elysium could do more with exploring each area to get the minor rewards. Maybe secret areas? I dunno, I am not a game designer, and the devs say they're okay with criticism not having a solution attached to it.

The balancing of the game is still weird in some places, although frankly better than a lot of games on full release. Not all base weapons feel equivalent to each other, like the staff, blades and axe feel similar powerwise, but good lord, the Skull feels OP, melting enemies left and right with its Ω special, while the Torches feel like they need much more boons than the other weapons to get going. Haven't explored much of the alternate aspects, so can't give much of a review on them. Neither have I looked much into the new heat (called fear here) this time. Want to wait for further updates, so I am not too good by the time 1.0 arrives, haha.

Some gods also few weird right now, although it might just be inexperienced. Some of them I just cant wrap my head on how to create a good build with their attacks and with what weapon, like Hephaestus and Hestia, while others feel Busted, like Hera, who makes any quick AOE attack highly effective. They defintely feel different though, dont know why some reviews say otherwise


The story feels good definitelly on par with the first one, although in a way it has a more... traditional to other forms of storytelling, since the first game had an unusual story about family in a action game, while this one is about the war against Chronos, more in line of what you would expect with the genre. Not that the family themes are not there, but they definitelly feel more subdued. Chronos is a very fun villain to hate, and I still wonder how they'll deal with him in the true final ending.

Bug wise, the game definitely some annoying ones. Like, I often stumble on a bug that seemingly out of nowhere just forbids you from doing an specific thing. Like, sometimes it is regular moving, while still allowing dashing, and sometimes it stops you from charging Ω abilities. But supergiant has shown themselves to be a very competent Studio throughout the years, so I have no doubt bugs like that will be eliminated by full release.

tl;dr: The game currently has a slightly different combat system, focusing more on charged attacks instead of spamming dash and attacks at your enemies; there's some balance issues, as some god and weapons feel much weaker or stronger than the others, and theres some run ending bugs. Still, it's a very good game that I am liking a lot! They just need to iterate on some undercooked aspects of the game.

20th october, 2024:

The game is far more balanced than it was at the release, the torches feel more on par with everything, and the balance of everything else feels more polished.
Something I failed to mention in my original review is that the games story seems to want to strongly explore the horrible things the gods have done to mortals... and other immortals. The new god Prometheus made that much more obvious. I am excited to see what they'll do with that.

Not gonna write much more than this. Probably best to save for future patches and the final release

Dont listen to the guides, take the "dont turn off the phone path" first and when you send the D-Rine , then just watch the true ending on youtube.

Why do I say that? The "turn off the phone path" has a much better story structure, and it has a better written and climatic ending. The true end you get by doing the "dont turn off the phone path" last is just an epilogue that doesnt feel nearly as good, it would be like if the original VN true ending was over right before Okabe and Suzuha first travel to the past, with no further showing whats going to happen

Now as my overall thoughts to the VN: Pretty good, although it does feel like the writers couldn't juggle all it's plot points in a way that doesn't confuse the player or kill momentum in all it's routes and endings, some characters feel wasted Fubuki, Kaede and Yuki , seemingly joining the main cast out of obligation than to do something with them. It hurts specially with Fubuki and Yuki , the former just feels like they re goign to do something wit her, and then... nothing, and the other one REALLY FEELS like it's going to do something important and then... no. S**t plot twist instead, lmao. No seriously, what were they thinking by making Kagari have a plastic surgery to look like Yuki ??? .

But, that aside, I do think that the VN is very solid in a lot of endings and routes, I think that is a proper and thematic sequel to the original in a lot of ways, I genuinely think the overall path from Closed Epigraph to Promissed Rinascimento is a solid 9/10, on par with the Original story, and it's alt endigns are also super interesting, specially Twin Automata . And like, as minor of a role some get, I do feel like the OG cast get the thematic attention they needed in a sequel. Especially Mayuri, I do feel like she is just much better written here no matter the route, went from an A-tier character to S-Tier.

So yeah, It's a strange visual novel that varies it's quality from 5 to 9, depending on the path and ending you are reading. A must read for fans of Stein's Gate.

I love these games, I wish the conclusion to the series in the third one was actually good though.

Also, play it with the japanese voice actors for the first game, the english dub is kinda bad.

Not a very good conclusion, but lets be honest, if you already bought the first 2 games, you should just buy it on promotion and play it, there still some good stuff in it, like best boy Carlos

My favorite part was when funny italian man gets really angry and shatter the heavens.

This game is really good, and everyone complaining about the current difficulty is either a noob or an veteran player from RoR2 who cant swalow their pride and play on rainstorm before gitting gud.

No, but serisouly, on a more serious note, the game has been feelign really fun so far, and I think part of the backlash comes from RoR2 veteran players not being used to the lower, but higher quality, item density from RoR1. And much like RoR2 it's a matter of knowing the maps, and knowing where to explore to get loot consistently.

Not beign able to change between 1x and 2x sucks though, but the devs say theyll fix it so....

More in depth review when I have like... 100 hours or something

Man, this is one of the 39583 games that shows that Steam really should introduce a midly recommended button.

This would be a very good game... If it was in early acess.

Th entire game feels like it's an Alpha. A very playable alpha mind you, but an Alpha. But, most of the game's content feel shallow, or straight up unfinished. Which wouldn't be that big of a problem if this wasn't the type of game that you're expected to have multiple playthoughs, making the cracks be more apparent the more and more you play, making you getting better at it being very unrewarding.

There are some horrible problems in tutorialization too, some games mechanics are explained differently than what they actually are, almost as if the dev changed how they worked but forgot to change the tutorial text.

Adn the most glaring issue: The translation. It's bad. Like, it's really bad. google translator/literal translation bad. And given that this is a story driven game, it really hurts your ability appreciate the characters dialogue and their story. For example, there is a character that has difficult speaking. It took my second playthrough to realize that was on purpose and not the translation being bad.

The translation is also very confusing for the gameplay itself. The same mechancs will be given two different names, sometimes three, making you have to guess what you're even doing.

Which is not to say the game is bad in everything, the art is absolutely gorgeous, there is hundreds of different of beautiful drawn images, there's dozens of endings, dozens of marriage endings, and the game feels engaging enough for the first playthrough, and you get a good attachment to your daughter as she grows up.

So... Yeah. a 6.5/10.

Ps: The dev team is like, 2 people for most of the stuff in it. Which is absolutely insane given the amount of things this game has, as shallow as they may feel. Hopefully with the amount of copies the game sold they can afford to hire a full time dev team, either for a sequel, or to make the current content feel more cohesive and replayable.

Also, for the love of god. I pray they hire a new translator/translation team. The current ones are either scamming the devs, or they are really, really, amateur.

edit: After 6 months of reflecting about this game I realized I was being too kind to it. And after 6 months, with no news on a translation update, or just a.... update to fix the issues regarding shallow or bugged mechanics, I cant on good mind recommend the game.

Good game.

I also just want to see the discord record to go up.