Hades almost starred in his worst character

At the Hades, the legendary Greek hero who killed the Minotaur, Theseus, is a pain in the ass. He is a bossfight, a swashbuckler who treats each encounter as an overproduced wrestling match. Zagreus, the cold and controlled prince of the Underworld, may have a good reason to want to leave, but in the eyes of Theseus, he will never be more than a child from hell. This dynamic helped to highlight what Zagreus did, Hades‘protagonist, a fan favorite. But in the early versions of the game, Theseus’ role was reversed.

Theseus is hero material only in the legend, a feeling that the developer Supergiant Games ended up sharing. During a recent talk at the Clubhouse, Supergiant co-founder Amir Rao said that the first concepts for Hades starred Theseus. It was creative director Greg Kasavin who launched the Hades launch into the winning game it is today. “He kind of had the idea that we could probably keep everything in the game, but reshape it like Zagreus,” said Rao. “These different ideas, all these different characters, they all kind of came together. I think in a day or two he convinced everyone that it was a better idea. ”

In the early days of development, Hades – then referred to as “Minos” – followed Theseus while exploring the labyrinth of Crete. The roguelike would have capitalized on the labyrinth’s tortuous nature to remove its unlimited dungeons. Kasavin says The Verge that Supergiant wanted to play with the many variations of the Theseus myth as part of the game. “The idea would be that every time you play, it would be a different kind of retelling of the myth of Theseus,” he says. Despite going through several iterations, the team felt they could not have solid control over who Theseus was as a hero. “So, cerebrally, he was interesting,” says Kasavin. “But when we were trying to bring him to life as a protagonist, he took the risk of being kind of generic. But once we start adding specifics to it, he just doesn’t feel like Theseus anymore. ”

Not only that, but the game looked very bleak, says Kasavin. When the team went on vacation, Kasavin continued to research. He eventually stumbled upon myths about Zagreus, son of Hades. Something clicked. “It turns out that there are not many myths about Hades, apparently, because the Greeks were simply afraid of him,” says Kasavin. “So they didn’t talk about him … It’s like, wait a minute. Hades is one of those super iconic as a household name, Greek gods. And there are still so few stories about him and does he have a child? ”

Kasavin presented the idea to Rao; it allowed them to rewrite their story into something more exciting, but it kept many central parts of the game. “We just found a kind of better angle on the protagonist, on the general theme and on the technique of storytelling in that one stroke,” he says. “Things really happened very quickly from there.” It also brightened the tone of the game, retelling the myths in a severe way and rephrasing it as a lighter tale about a very powerful and dysfunctional family – where everyone is a little stingy, no one ever really dies, and Cerberus, the fearsome dog from hell, it’s just the family dog.

As for Theseus, he was also rewritten from a boring hero to an exhibitionist villain. Kasavin says that his return to the game “was not a foregone conclusion in any way”, but that it allowed the team to play more with his character. “The part where he is naughty is something that I feel is deeply rooted in the mythology about him,” says Kasavin. “He is considered a hero, but some of the actions he takes are highly questionable.” At death, he becomes a little more self-conscious, opening the way for Hades to launch Theseus and Asterius as a tag-team, a pair of Luchadors from beyond the grave. “Theseus has a presence of spirit in the underworld to recognize that his own fame, his own heroism are linked to the encounter with the Minotaur,” he says. “And he meets Minotauro in death and is like, Oh, you were my biggest opponent. You are wonderful.'”

Against Zagreus, says Kasavin, Theseus is a hypocritical and obstinate hero who doesn’t listen to anyone. He is overconfident and even disagreeable in all aspects of his personality, with one exception: “If he has a redeeming quality, it is that his friendship with Asterius is sincere”.