Around halfway through my journey towards conquering Hades 2, I picked up an innocuous upgrade. There was little to differentiate this boost from any of the dozens of other boons I'd already selected in my quest – I chose it to help me survive as long as possible against the combined forces of my enemies. But a few encounters later, I realized it had made a tiny change that had a huge impact on how I felt about the rest of the game.
This article contains very minor Hades 2 spoilers.
After Melinoë unlocks the ability to move freely around the surface world and conquers Polyphemus the Cyclops on the outskirts of Ephyra, the next phase of her journey takes her to Thessaly. As in any other region, there's a friendly mythological figure here to give her a helping hand, and in Thessaly it's Circe, an enchantress best known for waylaying Odysseus on his journey home. In Hades 2 she offers Melinoë bonuses that affect her Arcana upgrades, her familiars, or her physical presence.
It's one of the latter that I take the first time I meet Circe. Offered a choice between shrinking Melinoë to gain move speed or dodge chance, or making her larger to increase her HP and damage, I opt for Big Melinoë, and watch as she shoots up several inches before Circe's eyes. The witch of Aiaia coos over my new form before I dash off to beat the rest of Thessaly, but there's still plenty more for me to discover.
Growth hormone
As I progress, there's something else that's different about Melinoë that I can't quite put my finger on. It's not until I bump into Eris, Thessaly's final boss, that I realize what it is. Strife Incarnate gets a couple of dedicated voice lines about my enhanced size, which is a nice little easter egg, but it's only when Melinoë responds that I notice another change – the pitch of my character's voice has dropped. It's almost imperceptible, but it's in-line with my new body. It's a tiny detail, but I'm delighted when I work it out.
And from there, I start to notice more and more similarly minute flourishes. The next time I come across Circe, I pick the shrinking spell to discover Melinoë's voice gets higher-pitched instead. On a completely different journey, I discover that Hecate has a specific voice line that she'll only speak if you manage to defeat her without taking a single hit, where she admonishes you for not even giving her a chance to win. Another time, browsing through the Keepsake display case between regions, I hear the notes of Arachne's theme played as a delicate chord when I select her silken sash.
It's no great secret that Hades 2 is filled with little moments like this. It's an aspect of the game that's been around in some form since the original, although the much greater scope of this sequel means there are plenty more places to seek them out. As a mythology nerd, it's particularly fun to find Supergiant's most subtle nods – like the narrative interplay between the various characters of the Odyssey, all of them oblivious to the presence of their foes and friends within this story. And as a Baldur's Gate 3 fan, spotting the kinds of easily-missed interactions that only show up when a specific character is confronted with a specific item is exactly the kind of thing that has me flirting dangerously with the idea of a new journey along the Sword Coast.
In my Hades 2 review, I mentioned that I found the game's progression curve uneven, and felt that some of its harder bosses were only as difficult as they were in an attempt to stretch out the overall experience. That sensation made some of the climb towards the late game frustrating, getting in the way of what I'd enjoyed so far, and masking what I'd loved about Hades 2 until I reached the true ending of the game.
In those moments where I felt most at the mercy of the game's hardest bosses, it was the little details like this one that kept me diving back in for another run even when I was sure I was going to get unceremoniously booted back to the Crossroads. It's those same little details that are keeping me going well into the endgame. I know there's still tonnes for me to find, and there are many, many nights to go before I've found Hades 2's every secret - big or small.
