Your friends are wrong. I completely agree with you. Bastion was amazing and I would love to see a follow up or a new ip that builds upon it without the roguelite genre.

I'm with you on wishing they'll move on after Hades 2, but I don't want sequels to Transistor and Bastion. I'd prefer they make something new again.

But really I can't blame Supergiant for playing it safe because the last time they tried to make something truly unique it bombed hard (Pyre).

Bastion was just not my cup of tea. Somehow the fighting felt too chaotic for me. I mean, it felt like it was just button mashing, no matter how much I tried to have some tactic for it.

Not saying it is a bad game, I can see why people like it. But from that point of view, no, I don't need another Bastion.

Agreed on this. They're just so good at making new interesting things that it feels like a bit of a shame to waste time on sequels. I even really enjoyed Pyre, despite it being generally considered the weakest of their games; it was such an interesting setting and premise.

Bastion and Transistor both had very satisfying conclusions to their stories and revisiting either doesn't feel necessary.

None of those games need sequels, and neither did Hades. I get why they did, because it was the first time they weren't veering on bankruptcy and could use a bigger safety net, but doubling down on this lack of creativity is hardly what I expect from Supergiant.

And to be honest I had the same feeling when I played Hades. I felt more like I was dependent upon getting certain modifiers and weapons together otherwise I just was not going to make any progress. And I don't think that's a critique of the game itself it's 100% in my abilities to play that sort of game. And from a personal taste standpoint my personal taste go towards bastion and transistor.

They're obviously a developer that I would be interested in anything new that they put out. But both bastion and transistor were two of my all-time favorites from the indie scene. And I would really and truly love to revisit both of those worlds in a sequel.

I can understand what you're saying with none of them needing sequels. Invaded that definition yeah sure none of them need them. But I would very much want a sequel to bastion and transistor. And if that puts me in the minority as far as that's concerned I'm okay with that. I'm not going to boycott their team because they don't make a sequel by any means.

Part of the appeal of Hades for me is how it forces you to learn how to fight with different combinations of weapons and modifiers, as well as how differently those weapons play.

All 4 games are great. And I do enjoy the one and done deal of the first 2. I don't mind finishing a game in a few hours. If anything, that's actually a bonus nowadays. Most games I stop halfway and never finish.

However, if you were to just focus on finishing the main story and consider that enough, I think you could finish Hades just as quickly. So to me Hades is just the same kind of game but with more replayability.

Bastion, Transistor, and Pyre 100% do not need a sequel. They are stories about the end of the world and are beautiful in how self contained they are.

I am not the biggest on the roguelike mechanics for such story heavy games but... I would be lying if I said that Hades didn't repeatedly break me with the way it was used to convey Zagreus's relationship with the other characters.

::: spoiler spoiler
Hades just putting down his weapon and letting you pass is easily one of my top ten of all time gaming moments.
:::

I am a bit skeptical on Hades 2. Then I remembered I was skeptical on Hades 1. As far as I am concerned, Supergiant (and Greg Kasavin) can do no wrong.

I strongly disagree on their roguelite "bug" being something they need to drop.

Bastion didn't land for me, so I didn't play it, but Transistor would have shined as a roguelite. Its combat system is far too complex, and has potential for so much more, than what can be explored in one or two playthroughs.

The same goes for Cloudbank as a narrative setting.

Transistor, but with Hades' gameplay loop and storytelling style would be insane. It already felt like a roguelite, but without a gameplay or narrative reason to go in for multiple runs.

Supergiant hasn't cought a roguelite bug... They've found the perfect narrative and game format to match the gameplay systems and worlds they like to create.

If I'm being honest, before Hades, I wasn't sure how much of a future Supergiant had in game dev. They clearly have talent for making beautiful looking worlds with great soundtracks and writing, but their gameplay was not exceptional for the genres they dabbled in. They didn't try to iterate either, flitting from genre to genre.

Hades was the result of them taking what they learned from Bastion and Pyre and applying it to a trend. They really nailed the gameplay this time. I think Hades 2 is even better, and I suspect it will be again be a GOTY contender when it comes out.

That said, I think they could very well end up branching out again from roguelites after this.

I enjoyed Bastion and Transistor.

I also preferred Hades to either.

Nah I think they do pansexual roguelikes best. More hot roguelike characters please. Especially if they're anthros like Asterius. :3

I think I'm just getting sick of rogue likes. It seems there is another one being pushed every time I open steam. I find them all way too similar and frankly the loop of roguelikes is annoying to me. So, I would like to see them develop something else, I don't see it happening.

Hades was good. Rogue legacy was good. Dead cells was good. Brotato was good. Vampire survivors was good. Wizard of legend was good. Star of Providence was good. After those, though, I hit a wall. So, overall I agree. I wish the industry would move away from the genre, but it's not happening anytime soon.

different people like different things, sounds like your friends like rougish games.

I enjoyed bastion, it was probably my favorite game of its year. I don't care enough about hades to even give it the time of day, no matter how hot they made zagreus. With few exceptions, I don't really like rougish games. The few that I do like I'd rather they be long form rpgs so that I can have a build long enough to enjoy it for a while.

That said, studios should be allowed to make the games they want to make. Forcing them to do art against their will results in bad art.

tbh, I loved SuperGiant's themes and aesthetics, but not their gameplay. So often early games of Bastion and Transistor felt squishy, or like I was playing underwater - the response loop from button push to effect on screen seemed laggy. Tried both on various platforms, never really got past that feeling. lovely soundtracks tho

I think I'm kind of done with Supergiant regardless. In both Bastion and Transistor, it felt like they had two out of three components to their gameplay loop but were missing something to prevent it from feeling repetitive; despite short runtimes, both very much did feel repetitive. I didn't even try Pyre, and I have little faith it would be for me. I do love roguelikes and can enjoy -lites from time to time as well, and Hades got a lot of buzz. However, I actually quite disliked worlds 3 and 4, and the level generation is among the worst I've seen in the genre. I get the sense that Hades is probably most responsible for people who claim they want "handcrafted levels" as opposed to procedural generation, because perhaps those people haven't seen it done well if they've only ever played Hades, a game with level generation so monotonous that the voice actor will call out a room we all recognize.

I loved Bastion and Transistor and wished for sequels for both. But SG clearly seemed to prefer to not make sequels for its games all these years; to my knowledge, it has never made one. I’m not sure what or who changed at the company, but Hades 2 is an anomaly.

Has anyone interviewed someone at SG to ask sequel questions? If not, maybe someone will once H2 gets closer to officially shipping.