Hades on iOS packs the depths of Hell into a solid mobile port

It’s been few years since Hades rocked our underworlds with an incredible cast of characters, beautiful art, pulse-pounding music, and, of course, its incredible roguelike action. Four years away from its original full release, Hades has found its way to mobile devices with the help of Netflix Games. From here on out, Netflix subscribers can play this game on iOS devices as they please, and dang if it isn’t a good port, packing in everything we loved about the game to a bite-sized form.

Like a bat out of…

If you’ve read our previous Hades coverage, you’ll know full well that we love this game. It was a highlight of the 2020 gaming year, winning praises from fans and critics alike and picking up some Shacknews Awards along the way, including 2020 Indie Game of the Year. If you want to know about the quality of Hades as a whole, check our official review.

The important think you need to know here is that this mobile port of Hades is good. They made it run perfectly on iOS, which isn’t too surprising given it could already run on Nintendo Switch and the iPhone 15 packs some decent power with the help of Apple’s A17 Pro chip. Throughout our run of the game, Hades ran buttery smooth and was as entertaining as it is on any other platform you can find it.

The controls can be a little unwieldy, but they aren’t the worst I’ve seen on an iPhone. The slight problem with Hades is that there are quite a few functions Zagreus can do and they’re mostly packed into a collection of on-screen buttons in the bottom-right corner. I often found my thumb sliding off the attack button to something like the dash or the projectile attack, and there’s some noticeable dead space between the buttons by default that can leave you standing there doing nothing if you’re not careful. Thankfully, the button configurations can be arranged with a number of layouts that move them around, give them different screen real estate, and more.

The sound coming out of the iPhone 15 when you play Hades is impressive, which makes sense because this game also has one of the most ridiculously good soundtracks you’ll find in a roguelike. Darren Korb’s hard-hitting adaptive soundtrack sounds as burly as ever and sets the mood when you’re piloting Zagreus through his father’s titular domain.

Everything is here in the iOS Netflix Games version of Hades. Nothing is left out. That means every collectible weapon, every god encounter, every area escalating in difficulty, and every tough-as-nails boss awaits you. If you need to stop, you can even save and sync your run to the Apple cloud and come back to pick up where you left off later from whatever room in which you stopped. Simply put, it seems like they thought of everything in this port and made it work fairly well.

Reach for the living world

Dipping back into Hades on iOS reminded me of everything that makes this game phenomenal, and it doesn’t stop being phenomenal in the catalogue of Netflix Games. The controls might make for a slightly new learning curve as you figure out the muscle memory of the multitude of touchscreen buttons. However, for that little gripe, this is another impeccable way to guide Zagreus out of his hellish predicament, or die over and over again trying.

These impressions are based on an early digital iOS version provided by the publisher. Hades comes to iOS through Netflix Games on March 19, 2024.

TJ Denzer

Senior News Editor

TJ Denzer is a player and writer with a passion for games that has dominated a lifetime. He found his way to the Shacknews roster in late 2019 and has worked his way to Senior News Editor since. Between news coverage, he also aides notably in livestream projects like the indie game-focused Indie-licious, the Shacknews Stimulus Games, and the Shacknews Dump. You can reach him at tj.denzer@shacknews.com and also find him on Twitter @JohnnyChugs.