Hades 2’s early access launched earlier in 2024. The early access gives players access to dozens of hours of content, giving a glimpse of aHadesgame that is far bigger than its predecessor. While this is an incredible amount of growth,Hades 2’s early access runs the risk of showing too much of its story within its EA itself, rather than leaving the best parts of it to its full release.
This article contains story spoilers forHades 2.
Early access typically leaves much of the game’s story unavailable to players, so that it can be experienced by everyone for the first time once the game has its full release. For example,Baldur’s Gate 3’s early access only included Act One, leaving the events of the rest of the game a mystery. In comparison, unless there is a major story twist,Hades 2’s early access has only excluded one final boss fight. While this strategy plays a role inbuilding hype forHades 2’s full release, it also removes much of the anticipation and surprises it would have had for players if they had remained a mystery.
Hades 2 May Have Revealed the Final Boss Too Early
Hadesalso went through a period of early access before its full launch but left much of its storyline as a mystery that could only be experienced in the full release of the game.Hades 2follows Melinoe through two different narrative paths, with the first being the Underworld path to Chronos, the Titan of Time, and the second on the surface, towards Mount Olympus. The Underworld storyline includes a complete final boss fight with Chronos, the final antagonist ofHades 2, while the surface path’s final boss has yet to be revealed in early access.
While the surface path’s final boss hasn’t been revealed yet, the main problem with Hades 2’s early access is the premature reveal of the Underworld’s final boss. WhileHades 2’s marketing and early storymake it clear that Chronos is Melinoe’s greatest enemy, and is likely her final obstacle, Chronos' appearance in early access may mean that Supergiant Games showed its hand too soon. Instead, if Melinoe’s path had ended when she enters Tartarus, leaving the final bosses for both the surface and Underworld a mystery, players would be left guessing as to where Chronos would appear.
Hades 2 Didn’t Need to Show Too Much in Early Access
Hades 2’s early accessshows that it’s a much bigger game thanHades, with dozens of hours of content even if it excluded all of Tartarus' content and subsequent conversations regarding it from early access.Hades 2takes the best gameplay mechanics, story tropes and themes, and art ofHades, and expands upon them all to make them arguably better than its predecessor, all while creating some great new mechanics of its own.
This approach toHades 2means that even early access has a longer runtime thanHades. Melinoe and the NPCs she encounters have more lines, there are far more unique NPC encounters inHades 2than Zagreus encounters in the previous game, and having two separate paths for Melinoe to take essentially doubles the amount of content.
Leaving out Chronos wouldn’t have hobbledHades 2’s early access because it already has so much content for players to explore. As the final battle with Chronos has been revealed, theremay not be much left to reveal for the full release ofHades 2, unless Supergiant Games has a surprise in store for players. Chronos may be a red herring, either with another, worse, villain waiting in the wings to be discovered on the surface path, or Chronos may become redeemable, with a significant amount of post-story content forHades 2that brings back Melinoe’s family and the familiar cast of characters fromHades.
