**__Astral Ascent__**

**Spring 2024**

**Extreme Special**

**Contractor: @Frazzle**

**Fav Playable Character?:** Kiran. Gimme that counter, baby

**Least Fav Playable Character?:** I played [geomancer lady] the least. Only tried her out once and she seemed pretty interesting but…. Counter tho…

**Fav Build:** I tended towards anything with health regen and then anything that spat out little mob summons or swords or whatever. Just litter my screen with BS, please.

**Fav Zodiac:** It's a bit silly bc he's the first you see, but I really liked Taurus. But I think that's bc he and Kiran are absolutely in love so their interactions were fun. After that, I liked Ares and her hotheadedness, even though she kicked my ass a lot.

**Fav Zodiac Design:* I like how Aquarius was just a little guy. He kicked my ass a lot, too.

**Fav Zodiac Challenge:** Sagittarius’ was the easiest, just a little memory game. I quite liked Taurus's aerial combo challenge, too. Anything with doing higher damage/combos were easy, too.

**Fav OST:** There's a nice part in the home theme that swells and some strings do a little theme and that's a nice motif. The Orichalcus fight when the voices kick in is so dramatic, too.

**Review:** Playing this game was kinda fighting an uphill battle for me, honestly. I had debated picking it up but I thought, well no harm if I don't complete it so why not.

See, I just really hate rougelite structure. I always felt alone in this, especially with the Hades hype. Hades was the game I discovered my hatred for the macrodesign of this subgenre’s structure, actually. Which was hugely disappointing because I've been a big Supergiant Games fan since Bastion and everything about Hades except for its gameplay loop is as quality as ever. I just could NOT get past it and dropped it quickly. And now instead of making another completely different game like they did for every release so far (which is something I've loved the company for) they're making Hades 2 and…… whatever, I'll stop there.

So I've always felt kinda left out. What do others see in it that I don't? How do they not get instantly peeved at having to fight RNG to get back to the boss you were progging? But apparently my opinion is mirrored in this community specifically, so I'm really not alone, wowie.

In contrast to this rougelite structure, I much prefer progression systems that have clear levels, with or without checkpoints. For example, my indie contract was Gravity Circuit where I spent many many deaths just respawning and trying again over and over. I enjoyed feeling like I was getting better and learning the fights and how to “read” them. With the rougelite structure, there is a lot of mitigation of RNG that impacts the starting field when you get to another attempt at a boss. There's too many elements so it feels like it takes away my opportunity to improve myself to beat the boss. It doesn't really feel like I'm doing the fight completely from my own skill and instead need to hope the elements of a good build fall into my lap. So even once I beat a boss, it doesn't really have that feeling of accomplishment for me. I would have always beaten it on one of my runs eventually because of how the leveling system works and because I got a good series of drops for a good build. I find it very frustrating and I think it's because my personal focus when playing a game is that boss fight specifically being hurdle and not the end cap to a longer run attempt.

Additionally, I really really don't care for the point where you do a full clear and they say “cool, now do it 6 more times to beat the story.” Like, huh?? SIX more times? You want me to go through the same 4 areas six more times??? The absolute audacity. Progression doesn't really feel rewarding when the game just kinda decides when you progress. I don't know if this is an element of the subgenre or if it's just something this game did, so I leave it to the reader to place blame accordingly. Regardless, I do feel like this game kinda poorly explained the “you gotta do it 6 more times” part. Orichalcus just one shots you and at first I legit couldn't tell if it was scripted or of it was just a big super I fucked up dodging. I assumed the former but I just couldn't FULLY tell. And then they introduced the Destiny Level stuff so I did one of those and then…. Idk maybe I missed it but I felt like they didn't explain the “six more times” part well. I don't know what that does in lore to beat him and I didn't see much indicator that 6 times was the needed amount to beat the story.

Ultimately, this all comes down to preference. I have a very specific reason why this structure grinds my gears and it's largely because it goes against what I want out of my video games. And honestly in a lot of other ways this game is exactly what I want.

I like how the game feels and the combat is nice. I just dearly dearly wish it wasn't trapped in this shitty macrostructure.

I am unable to beat this game. I understand that all I'd really have to do is keep doing runs until I'm able to level things well enough to overcome the challenge, however that is not the issue. The issue is the game has become actively unfun to play. I see a run attempt as a colossal waste of time and energy that puts me in a really sour mood thinking about it. There is nothing fun about this game anymore. I cannot continue to play it and must take my L.

I really wanted to play it and understand this type of game. I simply cannot. I have been walled and there isn't any value left in continuing it.

**Score:** **6/10**

Required: (Insert Image of Run Count, can be found when selecting a save file)

Uncompleted challenge. I really gave it my all but I’ve been mentally defeated. Maybe I’m just bad.

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These two are gay for each other.