I wouldn’t say I think it’s going to “obsolete” Hades for me. I think there’s room in the genre for multiple games, and the combat does feel different. Everybody loves to compare things to Dark Souls, but it’s definitely a lot more deliberate than Hades. No hashtag dashstrikelife play style can be had here. There’s none of the character interactions or, I think, fun but frivolous base building, either, but the theming that is there really works for me, and I think the torch mechanic is novel and fun. After my run I had to shut it down and go away for the evening, but I really wanted to fire it up again all night, and I think that says something.
Honestly, I don’t know what “Souls-like” is defined as. Also I didn’t like Dark/Demon Souls when I played it.
You start out with 6 stamina points. Each roll, each secondary attack, each charged primary attack takes away 1 stamina. You get 1 point back when you do a perfect dodge and 2 points if you do a parry. The gauge itself refreshes after a few seconds. The combat itself is smooth and it really feel like you’re making impactful micro decisions throughout.
To put this into perspective I hate parry system in almost all actions games. It always forces you to play the way the game want. There is usually a roadblock in those games where if you don’t want to parry you’re stuck. Curse seems to mitigate that with the stamina system.
I suspect Curse of the Dead Gods is ideal for people that are masochists and want a game that will smash their face into solid objects repeatedly.
I cannot deny it.
Well, I don’t think that’s me, but although I am enjoying it it hasn’t made me immediately jump back in for another run, yet, like both Dead Cells and especially Hades have done. It does not make you feel powerful the way Hades can, certainly.
Did you ever get a chance to get back to Wizard of Legend?
I don’t think Curse of the Dead Gods is particularly hard. I also appreciate that the rooms encourage a little bit of exploring and poking; some rooms have secrets or little alcoves with treasure. On the other hand, the enemy variety is seriously lacking. Each temple seems to have 4 or 5 total unique enemies, plus the floor bosses. I’m also not a fan of the “win a short run to earn the right to start over on a longer run” mechanic. If I’m having success, let me keep playing all the way through. Making me start over to see the next area is just padding, especially when there’s no narrative to the game.
I reached the first boss on my third game:
I would say that it’s harder than Dead Cells and Hades, comparing the base/lowest difficulty of each. And it also has less metaprogression to help you, so it isn’t a question of unlocking things. You only can have up to 3 blesses actives (think only having 3 upgrades in the Mirror of Hades), and in fact at first only the first slow is unlocked, the rest need to beat bosses to unlock them. Apart from that, you only new weapons, improve the variety and quality of the starting weapons offered, and number of times you can refresh altars. That’s it.
I’m surprised by how similar is to Hades. In things like attack animations, some special effects, some attack indicators on the ground that use the same jagged border, the codex with enemies and deities, the bow works the same way, and more. Even the font type and distribution of some UI screens is similar!
So is it as fun as Hades?
Yes, and it is still kicking my ass.
@TurinTur I made it to that guy on my second or third run and actually managed to beat him by a hair. I thought this temple was in general easier than Jaguar. Wondering how much longevity this will have, but for the $13 I paid I can’t complain too much. I’m almost positive it’ll reach the arbitrary $1/hr ratio that so many people have settled on.
@Balasarius I would say no, but to me it feels pretty damn different. Hades is much dancier, and this is weightier and I never feel like I am steamrolling, but I only have like an hour in so far. I haven’t finished up all the questlines in Hades, but at this point, 50 hours in, I don’t feel a lot of pull to fire it back up. CotDG, on the other hand, I will definitely be playing more of.
Regarding the enemy variety, it’s not fantastic but looking at their respective wikis it seems like CotDG has over half the number of enemy types as Hades and a bunch of what look like bosses, or if not then probably two thirds the number of enemy types.
So I went back to Curse after my humiliating defeat and got used to the controls. The game up to tier 2 is much easier than Hades. I went 5-0 and learnt a few things.
- You can cancel dodge out of everything.
- Charge attacks are extremely useful. They charge quite a bit faster than you think.Charged Whip + Mace combo can kill most basic units.
- Try to match your weapons. Whip and Mace. Sword and Shield. Try to make sure you have a range weapon.
- Don’t worry about corruption until you reach tier 3. It really shouldn’t be a concern.
The game is great so far.
There were certain times in the game where I felt like Indiana Jones. I picked up some coins off the ground. It triggered a fire blast trap. I rolled pass it only for the ground to catch on fire. I could normally outrun it but there was conveniently place exploding barrels that triggered by the ground fire.
So I rolled, and rolled and rolled. I ran out of stamina rolling away from the many barrels only to end up at the end of the tunnel with 2 enemies in front of me and flanked by fire.
Yep, still playing this one in my solo time, have about three hours in I think and no inclination to quit. I’m really digging it, despite the minimal presentation.
Speaking of minimal presentation, I’ve been playing a lot of gunfire reborn in the evening with my friend and sometimes another person, and there is definitely some jank there, too (most irritatingly if the Rainbow tag dart hits like a top corner of an enemy the beam tends to do no damage), and I really wish enemies had some pain stagger, but overall it’s strangely compelling.
I take it all back about Curse’s difficulty. The last temple is wonderful and amazing and makes me wish I was a better gamer.
I think the last temple is comparable to Hades’ heat 30-40.
I hadn’t played in the last two days, but I returned to it today, and I was able to somewhat easily beat the first three temples. I guess it was a question of getting accustomed to the pace, that is a bit different from other roguelites, and learn the enemy patterns.
Second boss done. So second tier dungeon completed. He almost kills me…
Still, I’m not enjoying it as much as other games. It’s a tier below Hades, Gunfire or DC.
In overall presentation and “build variety” I’d say it’s below Hades, but I enjoy the actual moment to moment gameplay more. I like it more than Gunfire Reborn.
I don’t think anything can beat Hades in build variety besides maybe Path of Exile.
Curse does have boss and environment variety though. In addition after you beat the final boss (Curse of Death) new stages get unlocked. The traps and light mechanics are also more important due to the damage output. I also noticed some new stage themes.
RoR2 devs announce having sold 4M (!) copies of their game, and a new update on the 25th with a new survivor, the Bandit
Skul Hero Slayer had an update with a pair of dozen new items and a new npc/shop
Dandy Ace also releases on the 25h
Browsing Steam I found this game, which seems drinking heavily from Binding of Isaac in style, but with the twist of being a 2d action platformer like Hollow Knight or Dead Cells.
Space Gladiators
It is having very positive reviews.