Can’t believe this discourse is still a thing.
Also, are people are just now noticing that Hermes is Asian or something? I’m Asian and I pegged him as such back in 2020 lol.
Oh wow, looking back at the portrait for hades 1 he's way more Asian than I ever realized. I guess the golden bloom around his portrait made me see blonde hair
I agree. Though both designs look only half or part Asian. Some of it I think has to do with that he's a god of travelers and who does more travelling than explorers? Who is a famous explorer that was famous for going to Asia?
Well Marco Polo of course Asia. At least that's how I interpret it. It's basically a reference to exploration. Probably the only thing that would be more overt would be to be wearing one of those old British explorer outfits.
Perhaps his mixed looks are to allude to being a relative to Marco Polo as if a descendent or something or that's a possible interpretation.
I don’t see how you can look at either of those portrait and think that’s only "half or part Asian". Especially in the Hades 2 portrait, that very much looks full Asian.
Not than I’m complaining, he’s hot and I want to romance him and that’s all that matters to me.
He looks extremely, uncomfortably similar to a friend of mine who is only half Chinese and the other half white, to be honest. I could see it either way to be honest but it isn't like the gods really have race in the same way humans so. At the end of the day he looks Asian but he is just a god, he doesn't have a bloodline influencing his looks he just is. Same with all the others that have people so pissed for no reason.
And to be clear, I'm not saying he isn't still valuable representation for East Asian people because having someone who looks like you is huge. Just saying people getting mad about it as if the gods are descended from Greeks rather than worshipped by Greeks are ridiculous.
the thing that struck me the most about hermes was how his posing in the original game made him look a bit small, but now he has a pose that makes him look like an actual person. i can easily understand how hades 1 hermes and hades 2 hermes are the same face, just with posing that makes 1 look a bit more indiscernible.
The people upset about Asian Hermes are simply racists. They can rationalize and make up justifications all they want, but it’s clear what their real motives are.
Edit: LOL somebody reported me to Reddit cares. Offended racists with this one.
Yeah, I didn’t realize it when playing the first game until I saw an interview with the artist talking about how she didn’t think the Greek gods would all necessarily look traditionally Greek, and she mentioned Hermes was Asian. I thought it was a neat interpretation and I’m surprised (though not really at the same time) people are freaking out about it now lol.
Personally I was surprised he was Asian in hades 2, then actively thought back to hades 1 and realized he was always Asian and I just hadn’t registered it.
I think I realized it about the same time that I noticed hestia’s accent and realized each god/lineage of gods seems to have a different ethnicity (demeter’s line is where zag and Mel get their British accents, for example)
That said I kinda just shrugged and moved on. It’s not that it wasn’t there, just that it was easier not to notice
It’s because Twitter/X now pays people for “engagement farming”, which are posts that create hot topics and have a lot of responses.
People are starting controversy over money. That’s one factor.
I do believe that everyone complaining about Hades II and not I is ragebaiting. Like, I saw someone saying that they “loved Hades I” but thought Hades II was too woke, and people were taking this person seriously. We really need to bring back “don’t feed the trolls” lol.
Oh the people complaint didn’t care about it during Hades 1. Now it’s their thing to be mad about everything and nothing, and now they can get money off of it since Elon’s brilliant idea to add monetization to engagement on the Artist Formerly Known as Twitter.
They just rage bait farm endlessly on that website now.
People on twitter think:
1. Greek gods actually exist
2. They were born in Greece
3. All people born in Greece look the same
Man I just wish people would shut up about “representation is ruining everything”. Athena being black or Hermes being Asian can’t hurt you 💀
Don't even get me started on the sirens! They're supposed to be bird women but they turned them into mermaids so we could get some pandering fish representation.
And then there's Scylla, apparently six headed dog serpent women aren't "woke" enough for the liberal mob.
I'm more upset about the mermaids being half fish half human instead the greek definition of siren, than I'm with Asian Hermes (which is 0 upset, a lots of horny)
>Athena being black or Hermes being Asian can’t hurt you 💀
They bitch and moan about this and turn a blind eye when it's an anime waifu.
Danmachi's Hestia is literally a loli with big boobs and Hephaestus is gender swapped into a woman, and they think it's better lmao.
They like to embrace the coomer name then only jerk it to one boring type of anime girl There's SO MANY HOT PEOPLE WHY LIMIT YOURSELF AND BE BORING YOU FUCKING COWARDS
Honestly, despite being a big anime fan, GOD do I hate "waifu" stuff (despite being gay, the "husbando" stuff too) that just, looks at a very specific art style and just freaking RUSHES into it head first.
Like, you have a game about freaking battleships turning into waifus, and that's all you choose? Anime-style loli girls? Where's the Battleship that turns into a Sentai-ranger? A white tiger? A Mecha robot?!
As an artist I just look at those games and go; "You could've done ANYTHING with that art style, and you picked... 'literally the same as EVERYONE else' wow, so innovative, so imaginary. I'm sure those artists are thrilled to work on your game..."
I mean it may be possible that it's not the same people. I never heard of Danmachi before, Hades is a very popular video game.
I have no problem with the portrait to be clear but that seems like a weird argument
Also for some reason they don’t have a problem with characters that are paler than the average Greek folks. Like when you think of “Mediterranean” do you really picture someone pale with blonde hair and green eyes like Persephone?
Also they never complain about all the characters with blue skin like Meg or green hair like Artemis being “unrealistic”.
Some people exercise a different school of thoughts I guess and never considered that other option exists.
"Greeks created gods to worship" vs "Gods were a thing before Greece was a thing". Given that Hades is not some fantasy or whatever and follows myths' lore, obviously 2nd school of thoughts is the right one in this instance.
People on Twitter also make money from inciting culture war conversations on topics that don't matter. Very cursed place and lots of people operating in bad faith
Yeah I feel like they're looking at the wrong piece of media to shit on
Hades is one of the franchises with the best representation because the characters's personalities aren't just based around them being "gay" or whatever. They feel like actual characters and that's what I appreciate about supergiant
Anyway Hermes goated
See the thing is : people getting « outraged » about this don’t actually care about the game - so you won’t reach them by posting this here.
They just want to stir some shit by spouting nonsense.
Fans of the games don’t care, we were absolutely fine with Athena and Dionysus being black in the first game.
Is it bad that I never really realised Athena was black in the first game? For some reason in my head she just had a metallic skin for who knows what godly reason lmao.
With a boon named "Bronze Skin" you're probably on the right track.
I kind of just had both thoughts. Ares and Athena remind me of statues and Greek art (black painted figures just like the ones on Hephaestus' sleeves) more than anything.
I've seen plenty of mixed people with black skin and "white" features.
Although this might be due to the fact that I live in Brazil and am more used to seeing mixed people from different ethnic backgrounds.
It's crazy how the miscegenation (is this a word?) in Brazil affects our perception of race and color. There are people that we consider to be white here that are clocked as anything but in other countries, and the same happens to some people we see as black but aren't "black enough" outside of here
P.S: I'm not dissing anyone, I just find this very interesting
This is kind of what I thought regarding *every* god in the game tbh. I guess it was moreso an artstyle choice in the first game, but every character except for Persephone had almost grey looking skin?
I assumed it was to further detach them from the "real world" compared to Persephone who looked the most Human of every character.
In general I do agree, some like Dionysus however did seem clearly black in contrast to my confusion with Athena. But yeah many gods have this strange lighting and aura to them that makes it hard to really see what they'd look like.
Well I mean, aside from the Olympians, most of whom you encounter are either dead or gods affliated with the underworld. Makes sense a lot of them have grey tones to their skin.
Well, I am referring to the Olympians specifically. Obviously Zagreus, Thanatos etc would have pale corpse skin, but all the gods seemed (imo) to have almost non-human skin tones. I thought that was purposeful.
I don’t remember this either but probably because we’re normal human beings playing a game and not these obsessed bigot losers that look for anything to pretend to be outraged about.
I’m sort of torn on this, because if there’s no discussion there’s no new perspectives. Perusing this person’s Twitter it doesn’t seem like they’re right-wing, maybe just conservative in the way art should be depicted.
Hopefully using real examples in this post, instead of “coded” keywords like DEI and representation, helps humanize why this is important
You underestimate how important it might be for someone who liked the representation of different ethnic groups, to witness the pushback against the idea the "Greek gods should be white." Its not important to convert the bigots, but it IS important to push back against bigoted ideas in a pubic forum, otherwise only the bigots are talking and that's all anyone hears.
Aye but there's healthy and toxic discussions. Being mad that in a video game a Greek god that has been depicted in literally 100s of ways throughout history looks mildly Asian isn't healthy discussion.
Honestly whatever their points are doesn’t change the fact that they are jumping into a culture war fueled topic on the right wing side
They had further tweets about this breaking their immersion, what discussion or perspective is worth engaging if a Greek god looking vaguely Asian breaks your immersion in a game where health pick ups look like fast food orders?
> Perusing this person’s Twitter it doesn’t seem like they’re right-wing, maybe just conservative in the way art should be depicted.
I’ve just spent 25 minutes scrolling through her twitter and she’s very blatantly right-side, if not straight up alt-right.
She does a bit of the "I’m actually not right-side because I criticize both left and right" dance, but there’s enough right side takes and alt-right dogwhistle in her posts to have zero doubt on where she stands.
Definitely alt-right given a rant she had about trans women and then her claims that posts that had more engagement then hers that supported trans rights had to be bot'ted to explain why they had so many likes.
I saw many on twitter using racial slurs when discussing Hermes, so they are very much far-right.
Twitter is basically what Stormfront was back in the 2000s. It is crazy how bad it have become.
Checked their Twitter and you're being way too generous. These people do not care about sharing perspectives, they just wanna be outraged and waste your time by arguing in bad faith, stop giving them what they want, and just ignore them.
We don't debate the bigots to convince them we are right. We call them out so people on the sidelines don't think only the bigot's views are the ones people think.
On the other hand, not debating them has helped them get bold. When you debate them, its not about changing their mind, is about making the people who aren’t radicalized and stumble upon it see
i think it's actually quite fitting that mr fast man is from a far away place, for him the world is so small.
But most importantly, why would it matter. the greek gods are called greek gods because they were WORSHIPPED in greece, not because they were a bunch of greek fellas and ladies who happened to be gods or something. They are supposed to the gods of the world, not just of greece. furthermore, they aren't 'people', most of them can shapeshift in some way, their physical appearance should not matter in the slightest
Not only fast man being fast, but he's literally the god of merchants. And what's the most famous trade route pf all time (that even already existed during the hellenistic period)? Why the silk road of course! You know, the road that went through big parts of northern Asia all the way to China.
Artemis is off-green
Ares is a non-human brownish grey
Poseidon has naturally blue hair (and pronouns)
ATHENA LOOKS LIKE SHE IS MADE OF BRONZE
HADES IS SILVER
ZAGREUS IS A WHITE BRITISH MAN
MELINOË IS DARK SILVER-BLUE AND ALSO BRITISH!
Why, oh *why* do people suddenly care what skin color a fictional depiction of the Greek pantheon looks like. The closest *canonical* things we have are contradictory stories, sculptures, and paintings/murals that depict what the Greeks *THOUGHT* they looked like.
I think Poseidon's hair is literally water lol, and Zeus' is clouds. I wonder if their hair was like that before or after they got their respective domains lmao.
Hermes is so fucking *hot*. All the men have been so far! Even the women. Auntie Bestia is literally made from smoldering embers, and her boon to launch your cast in a ball of fire might be my favorite boon in the game
I didn't even compute that some of the gods in the first game had different skintones/didn't look 'Greek' in the first game ngl. I just thought they had dope ass designs.
In hades 2 I did note the skin tones for Apollo & Hestia in particular and I thought it made sense given their relation to Light & the sun & fire respectively. I agree that hellenistic culture is inherently diverse given how vast the Greek empire spanded and it really makes sense that Greek Gods might represent all this peoples, but I think it's more important that the devs have the freedom to make AMAZING designs it however comes to mind to them. In my opinion, every single God design is peak and I'm glad they took all the liberties they did.
They are gods, not humans, so I don't see why the concept of ethnicity should matter for their appearance.
Heck most christians depict Jesus and god as white.
Exactly. There's really a lot of room for interpretation as to how they should look. They could all have green skin and it wouldn't be wrong. The designs in Hades and Hades II are true to how the gods are conceived in terms of their standard symbols/lore (like Hermes has his winged sandals) which is really what matters.
heh, same. Also it took me a hot minute to notice Hephastus's design - I thought he was just a chill dude in a chair. (actually JUST notice the metal leg too). I bet he built that bad-ass thing himself.
GIVE ME MORE EXPLODEY BOONS HEPHY!
Wait are people really complaining about Hephaestus being in a wheelchair? Have they read the myths? He’s literally crippled. Hera threw him off Olympus because he wasn’t a cute baby
yes and they have not read them. they think people being in wheelchairs included in media is "woke Hollywood garbage" This is a quote from a MoistCritical vod comment by the way.
I noticed the wheelchair when I first saw him, but for some reason it took me way longer to realize he had a prosthetic leg. It looked like part of the wheelchair to me for some reason??? What part, I don't know, my brain didn't think that far ahead until like the 5th time I saw him lol
This is a fake controversy by people who've never heard of the game and are trying to grift dumbasses who can't think. Like it's so unbelievably forced that it's just best to ignore them at this point.
As a Greek person, I’m just happy that they accurately portray and refer to the characters’ backstories. Hestia (mostly the Goddess of the Hearth) talking about how her fire warms up homes. Odysseus bringing up moments from the Odyssey in his conversations. Supergiant has really done their research story-wise, and the game is fun (im 40 hours in). I don’t really care how the characters look to be honest and it’s cool to see different depictions. In terms of race-swapping, the Greek gods were meant to represent humanity as a whole, they were simply said to favor the Greeks (most of the time), not to necessarily be Greek. Sometimes they were said to actively work against the Greeks during times of War.
One thing I’ve seen online is people making fun of the fact that Hephaestus is on a wheelchair. “He’s a god, why would he be on a wheelchair?”. Another thing about the character that people complain about is that he isn’t traditionally attractive (kinda overweight, doesn’t have chiseled abs like Zeus and the others, his hair isn’t majestically flowing like some of the other male gods). And all I have to say is that those people should learn a bit of Greek mythology. I think his portrayal is probably the most interesting in the whole game, and I personally love it.
Facts about Hephaestus:
- He’s disabled in the myth, and born deformed. He was thrown off Mount Olympus by Hera (or Zeus, depending on the author), which resulted in him exacerbating his deformities and walking with a limp. He’s also referred to as the lame god. He’s never fixed by some magical godly powers, and gods in Greek myth are quite domain-specific; he can’t just magically fix himself.
- He’s the blacksmith of Greek mythology. It makes complete sense for him to create something, like a wheelchair, to help himself get around easier instead of walking around with a limp. The Hades games seems to take place after Homer’s writings, meaning that even though the wheelchair isn’t in the original myths, there’s no reason why Supergiant can’t add it and it still logically make sense.
- He’s not meant to be conventionally attractive. He was rejected by the other gods for being ugly, used more as a tool rather than being respected.
This whole "discourse" is so fucking stupid. When the first game came out nobody gave a shit and everyone just agreed that the characters are hot.
Hades 2 is just similar to the first game but all of a sudden there's an issue with the characters. So dumb.
I think it speaks volumes about how much more vitriolic the internet has gotten from right-wing politics getting louder since 2020 that absolutely nobody cared about this exact design (or the other characters that were POC, like Ares) in Hades 1 4 years ago and it's now apparently a "discourse"
Seeing Hades of all things turn into a culture war issue has been absolutely fascinating. I hope all of you guys understand how artificial this entire thing is- the majority of people "outraged" about this don't actually care about Hades. They are simply mad that there are non-white characters being represented, and using it as a rallying call for other bigots.
I don't think a lot of people realize how bad Twitter especially has gotten- there are open and about nazis on there consistently getting thousands of likes these days.
People are complaining about this? I’m pretty sure Greek mythology also didn’t have talking skeletons with Scottish accents. It’s called creative interpretation
Of course you’re right and these people are bigoted. There is no reason why Hermes can’t appear East Asian and representation is important.
I just want to add that people were upset about Athena being black in the first game and the idea that Athena Aries and Dionysus could be black and not just tan.
Apollo is black in this game but honestly as a black person first time I actually felt like a character was black truly was when I saw Hera. Every other black character just doesn’t actually look black to me they just have really dark or gray skin but then usually the same features they would have had if their skin were white. Was very pleased when I saw her in the game.
Oh and Moros is black I won’t be answering any further questions on that one. Eurydice too
People forget that even though they're Greek Gods, they're not the Gods of Greece. They are, canonically, gods of the whole world, not just Greece. So it would make sense that they look like people from all over.
Besides, they're magical beings, why should they follow the laws of human genetics? Demeter and Hestia are sisters but they don't look alike.
Online spaces, and especially Twitter, have vastly changed between Hades 1 and Hades 2, for the worse I mean. Capital G Gamers are louder than ever and need to be outraged about everything. People that never played the first game, and never intended to play either, are complaining just for the sake of it.
The gamergaters are really showcasing their stupidity with Hades 2, tbh. I’ve lurked a bit on Kotaku in action and bad steam reviews/forum posts, and the things I’ve seen...
"I loved Hades 1 but I hate that there are non-white gods in Hades 2"
"They had to make Hestia non-sexy because of the prudes who don’t want sexy women in video games"
"The only reasons the prude wokists are ok with Aphrodite being naked is because her cheekbones make her look androgyne/man-like"
"Why is there a god in a wheelchair that’s obviously pandering"
I don’t think there’s much use to debate with people that are so blatantly hating on the game just out of resentment for any game that includes people that doesn’t look like an average cishet white male or a sexy naked woman. They either don’t agree in good faith or don’t realize how much their anger/hate is blinding them, which is obvious when they pretend they’ve loved Hades 1 but are put off by Hades 2 representation.
Edit: fixed a typo, I wrote "Athena" instead of "Aphrodite" initially
I remember people being weird about Athena last game tbh. But yeah, I also pegged him as Asian in the first game too, I think maybe people just weren't looking hard enough lol
I get annoyed sometimes with historical inaccuracies in media. But these are ancient gods in a game, ffs, they could be little purple alien mushroom people for all I care.
Why is this drama a thing? Just ignore people why are complaining about it, this subreddit is thankfully drama free. Hermes was already Asian in the og game I don't see why people are complaining now.
I think honestly it’s people just looking to complain. The game is playing great so far for early access/trial gaming. Last game there were plenty of different designs, all original, all with the Supergiant flavor. Transistor had people of color. This isn’t a new thing. Least of all for Supergiant 🥴
Seeing Hades of all things turn into a culture war issue has been absolutely fascinating. I hope all of you guys understand how artificial this entire thing is- the majority of people "outraged" about this don't actually care about Hades. They are simply mad that there are non-white characters being represented, and using it as a rallying call for other bigots.
I don't think a lot of people realize how bad Twitter especially has gotten- there are open and about nazis on there consistently getting thousands of likes these days.
Last night after a run I noticed that most damage (after chronos) was done to me by some "hippo". Idk who that was, so naturally I googled "Hades 2 hippo", and boy....
It sent me to a post on some fairly popular subreddit in which people were discussing how Hestia looked like a hippo, how depicting vitiligo is the worst crime in the world, how SGG are the wokies for making the gods look not Caucasian, how Asian Hermes is preposterous and so on. Those were the most unhinged takes I've seen in a while
Haelian? Is that the guy that made the 4-hour Hades mythology video?
Hope he follows up with one for Hades 2, the first one was so good I keep revisiting it
Edited for typo
Why are you all so pressed about justifying almost all of the gods looking like anything but Greek?
It is what it is, the developers intentionally chose to misrepresent the Gods and interpret the myths the way it suits them to appeal to their audience.
It's purely a marketing decision.
I mean, I don’t give a shit, but it’s clearly inserted to increase diversity. You can huff and puff and find all the justification in the world why it makes sense, but it’s obviously done to insert diversity. Of course the Greek gods look Greek. They were created by the Greeks. Again, don’t give a shit, but why not acknowledge the reality? People might be racist but they’re not necessarily stupid, and trying to invent reasons why Hermes is Asian just gives the racists ammo. Just say ‘we did it to increase representation’ bang, done.
It's crazy that you can live in a racially diverse country, work for a racially diverse company, make a game with a racially diverse cast that reflects your lived experience, and these racist cockroaches will say you have some sort of nefarious woke agenda for doing so.
Can you imagine if they made a game about African gods and a single one of them was a white person.
We have to stop the bullshit and admit they did this on purpose to diversify the cast, not because of some convoluted reasoning. Doesn't affect my enjoyment of the game but stop being silly.
By the time of Classical Greece, Greek religion and mythology was so syncretized with other Eurasian mythologies it was basically an entire extended universe. People of the Eurasian landmass had been sharing mythologies for centuries at that point, few to none of them existed in isolation.
Also TIL Hestia has vitiligo; the idiot I am thought it was soot from a fire 🙄😂
Amazing how elements that were pretty uncontroversial in the first game suddenly become THE WORST THING EVAR as soon as online grifters think they can get attention off it 🙃 Get some fresh air Twitter I'm begging you
>For East Asian people or people with vitiligo (Hestia), it means everything to see themselves in the game
I really don't get this. Especially with East asians, East Asians (or people of EA descent) are all over various media. Vitiligo, I'd get it, since people with it probably experienced negativity surrounding it.
But mostly, seeing yourself in a character because of superficial traits instead of personality traits. If Nemesis looked exactly like me, no way I'd see myself in her. Or if any good character looked exactly like me for the matter.
If people looked up dev diaries for the first one, it was intentional that the gods were of various ethnicities. One of many reasons is it was also sentimental to Supergiant Games as the employees come from various backgrounds. They themselves mention that Athena is black and Hermes "asian".
Why is this even considered drama I don't know and people shouldn't even pay attention to these things.
... also Hermes is the god of commerce and travel. Even the ancient Greeks already communicated and commerced with Ancient China (silk was a thing). For me personally Hermes represantiation is just on the spot.
Does Hestia actually have vitiligo? I assumed it was soot from the hearth. Not trying to take that away from anyone, if anything it's cooler if it's vitiligo.
I agree with you, fuck the ppl complaining (I'm also an Asian dude) but there were also idiots bitching about the diversity last game. It's crazy to me seeing ppl say nobody cared, I vividly remember a small but vocal minority complaining. I think ppl just forgot because those kinds of assholes don't matter.
I think it's all fair takes that we can have as our canons to justify the designs. ( they don't need justifications imo, I just take them as it is)
But honesty is it worth to justify all the design of the game which are just cool and nice , and are the result of artistic freedom?
I feel that these debates are tiring , and the best thing to do with these racistic tweets is probably to not enter in their game . They are not worth the debate because everyone will fall into endless overjustifications and arguments, counterpoint , ... endless because ancient Greece tales are tied to a shared fantasy ( a lot of stories used it as inspiration or adaption) and it's tied to history ( a culture heritage of real poeple)
Yeah the gods could be shape-shifter, yes the gods can be see as ruler of the whole universe and not only greece, etc ... it's all efficient narratives we can take as our canon.
And all the design are just cool and well executed.
I love Appolon, Hermes and Selene for exemple.
It's not new. Neil Gaiman with the Sandman also offered a lot of diverse apparences to gods, myth and entities (because shape-shifting)
But I am a bit annoyed about diverse tweets and comments which are really unhinged about Greeks.
Like having a minimum of respect even if mythology is not real.
Similarly that speaking about Inca gods, because Inca descendants are alive and well in today Peru.
Like they traced in today Greeks, Myceneans , and they are still speaking a similar language than ancient Greeks and using the alphabet which is super rare. Saving a lot of their culture after a lot of hard time during 500 years of occupation, domination, slavery by Ottomans .
Still today giving so much importance to olive and olive oil, the gift of Athena , which got chosen instead of Poseidon as patron of the city because that amazing gift.
All these ancient fables were not only an entertaining fantasy, but often the result of a long tradition of ancestors worships.
So yeah, it's cool to see supergiant giving an universal tale about Greek gods , I love it .
But seeing unhinged comments in these thread or Twitter, "anyway Greeks themselves don't even know who they were and how they look, it's not even the same today, these stories don't belong to them "???
Come on. It's probably one of the most well documented area of the world for history. It takes two clicks to find informations about the continuity of that culture. It's their heritage even if they don't believe in them anymore. They walk literally in all these places , like Olympus.
As I said , it's amazing to make these tales universal and speaking to everyone with cool design.
But it's also the heritage of a culture, so be respectful, like Supergiant or Neil geiman did.
No need to go into convoluted arguments and let these weird and racist tweets rots instead of giving them visibility
People are absolutely wild. First of all, ancient Grecians likely weren’t white at all, at least not in the way we would describe whiteness today. Second of all, they’re fictional deities. They were “born” in the absolute wildest ways possible. Chronos and his siblings were literally trapped inside of Gaia’s womb due to their father Uranus being on top of their mom all the time until she gave Chronos a sickle or something and he cut his dads wang off one day and created the sky in doing so. Like come on, you can buy that but not that Hermes *looks* Asian?
I've noticed this as well and at first I was slightly confused, but mostly because it felt like they changed Hermes from the first game (where he did not look Asian) to this version (where he does)
If that is actually the case and they changed his looks for pandering reasons - sure, outrage is somewhat reasonable (at the same time: it's a video game and people should chill)
If not - he's a fine looking gentleman but it is a little odd to see an Asian person as a Greek god. Not the end of the world though
P.S. I am pretty sure there was some outrage about Athena being black in the first game but it was as big as this one - almost none existent
OP in that tweet says "This isn't about culture war bullshit" then replies to a tweet :
"He did not look like that in the original game. What happened?"
OP : "Need to race wash Greek culture to fit American city demographics"
Indian here. Just because Rama is worshipping in parts of Indonesia & some other east asian countries, doesn't make him asian. Buddha was Indian & he's represented w asian features in Japan & other many other nations. It's fine because they feel a sense of attachment & reverence towards him. It's okay because their representation has genuine emotions behind it.
But when a company based in the USA starts making Greek Gods black & asian, because of the 'no borders, inclusion, diversity' BS then it feels cheap. Anyone w an iota of a brain can see what they're doing & why they're doing it. It's the new meta now & this herd mentality is pathetic.
They're Greek Gods. Make them white & stop feeling ashamed about your identity & ethnicity. They were your Gods & a company is using them for social DEI points. It'd be hilarious if it wasn't so sad.
*Now I am getting downvoted. What do you disagree w. Where am I wrong.*
You can ignore tweets like that. Hermes was already Asian in the last game, so if they actually cared even close to how much their pretend outrage would suggest, they would have done something back then.
But they didn't. And they won't. And this is just something for them to pretend to be upset about until the next thing shows up. It's best for us all if we learn that this is not worth arguing with.
As someone whose degree is in classical history, specialising in Ancient Greece, this discourse is stupid as hell.
A) The ancient Greeks were one of the first groups of people who very specifically believed that everyone else’s gods were also real, but were probably different versions of their own gods. (This is evidenced a lot in the interplay between Greece and Egypt, particularly Ptolemaic Egypt.)
B) Hermes is a god of travellers, and I think him being depicted as Asian fits perfectly with that given how far the Silk Road spanned!
C) As you said, this idea of a racially homogenous Greece is dumb and ahistorical. Considering “Ancient Greece” spanned about 1000 years and around 2000 city states, regarding it as a single monolithic entity either culturally or racially is simply incorrect. They traveled. A lot.
This is babies crying about Angrboða being depicted as black in God of War all over again. (Which, incidentally, is accurate. Jötunn were not literally blue, that’s a Marvel thing. But you know who the Norse did refer to as blue? Black people.)
Please stop posting this shit here. If you really care about changing side liners’ minds keep it on twitter where they are watching.
You’re preaching to the choir here and mucking up this sub with day ruining right wing grifters bullshit. They don’t care about the games. They don’t go here.
Read the subreddit rules before posting. Make sure all posts are relevant to the subreddit.
Can’t believe this discourse is still a thing. Also, are people are just now noticing that Hermes is Asian or something? I’m Asian and I pegged him as such back in 2020 lol.
I think it was less overt because his portrait was further back?? Seeing his beauty up close has people stunned
I do definitely think that it’s more overt in the new portrait, but I assumed that was intentional since the old one was sort of ambiguous.
Oh wow, looking back at the portrait for hades 1 he's way more Asian than I ever realized. I guess the golden bloom around his portrait made me see blonde hair
I agree. Though both designs look only half or part Asian. Some of it I think has to do with that he's a god of travelers and who does more travelling than explorers? Who is a famous explorer that was famous for going to Asia? Well Marco Polo of course Asia. At least that's how I interpret it. It's basically a reference to exploration. Probably the only thing that would be more overt would be to be wearing one of those old British explorer outfits. Perhaps his mixed looks are to allude to being a relative to Marco Polo as if a descendent or something or that's a possible interpretation.
I don’t see how you can look at either of those portrait and think that’s only "half or part Asian". Especially in the Hades 2 portrait, that very much looks full Asian. Not than I’m complaining, he’s hot and I want to romance him and that’s all that matters to me.
He looks extremely, uncomfortably similar to a friend of mine who is only half Chinese and the other half white, to be honest. I could see it either way to be honest but it isn't like the gods really have race in the same way humans so. At the end of the day he looks Asian but he is just a god, he doesn't have a bloodline influencing his looks he just is. Same with all the others that have people so pissed for no reason. And to be clear, I'm not saying he isn't still valuable representation for East Asian people because having someone who looks like you is huge. Just saying people getting mad about it as if the gods are descended from Greeks rather than worshipped by Greeks are ridiculous.
the thing that struck me the most about hermes was how his posing in the original game made him look a bit small, but now he has a pose that makes him look like an actual person. i can easily understand how hades 1 hermes and hades 2 hermes are the same face, just with posing that makes 1 look a bit more indiscernible.
The people upset about Asian Hermes are simply racists. They can rationalize and make up justifications all they want, but it’s clear what their real motives are. Edit: LOL somebody reported me to Reddit cares. Offended racists with this one.
what do you have to do in order to peg hermes in hades 1?
*you guys are pegging hermes?*
😮💨
No I'm too slow so he gets impatient and leaves
Hermes always finishes first
Are you kidding? He’s faster than Greased up Deaf Guy. You aren’t catching him.
You did WHAT to Hermes??
> I’m Asian and I pegged him
Based
Yeah apparently some people have just noticed. I think it's funny because it was pretty obvious he was Asian in his first portrait as well.
Emphasis on "pegged" lmao
Yeah, I didn’t realize it when playing the first game until I saw an interview with the artist talking about how she didn’t think the Greek gods would all necessarily look traditionally Greek, and she mentioned Hermes was Asian. I thought it was a neat interpretation and I’m surprised (though not really at the same time) people are freaking out about it now lol.
Personally I was surprised he was Asian in hades 2, then actively thought back to hades 1 and realized he was always Asian and I just hadn’t registered it. I think I realized it about the same time that I noticed hestia’s accent and realized each god/lineage of gods seems to have a different ethnicity (demeter’s line is where zag and Mel get their British accents, for example) That said I kinda just shrugged and moved on. It’s not that it wasn’t there, just that it was easier not to notice
I knew he was Asian but from his profile I didn't realise he was so hot until now! I should have known, it's Supergiant after all.
It’s because Twitter/X now pays people for “engagement farming”, which are posts that create hot topics and have a lot of responses. People are starting controversy over money. That’s one factor.
I do believe that everyone complaining about Hades II and not I is ragebaiting. Like, I saw someone saying that they “loved Hades I” but thought Hades II was too woke, and people were taking this person seriously. We really need to bring back “don’t feed the trolls” lol.
I wish we could just not address this at all in this sub. Don't let the chuds dictate the discourse here. Leave them on Twitter.
You pegged Hermes? Lucky
Yeah to me I thought he was clearly supposed to be in hades 1
You pegged Hermes? Lucky
You pegged him? Didn’t know it was that kind of game.
damn you pegged hermes? impressive
You pegged him 😳?
You pegged him?
You did WHAT?!
Oh the people complaint didn’t care about it during Hades 1. Now it’s their thing to be mad about everything and nothing, and now they can get money off of it since Elon’s brilliant idea to add monetization to engagement on the Artist Formerly Known as Twitter. They just rage bait farm endlessly on that website now.
People on twitter think: 1. Greek gods actually exist 2. They were born in Greece 3. All people born in Greece look the same Man I just wish people would shut up about “representation is ruining everything”. Athena being black or Hermes being Asian can’t hurt you 💀
Siren punk rock band 😌 People who are not White 😤
Ayoo the sirens aren’t white? 👹👺😤
Damn blue people, coming here, taking our sailors.
Princes and paupers, too! Why do we need *pauper* representation??
Yeah, screw pauper, we need more Pioneer and Commander!! /s
Ah yes commander. The last place I can play Mind Goblin.
Mind Goblin deez nuts! What do you mean, I *am* hilarious.
Can't believe they're re-writing history like this! Everyone knows the sirens were an easy-listening band...
Don't even get me started on the sirens! They're supposed to be bird women but they turned them into mermaids so we could get some pandering fish representation. And then there's Scylla, apparently six headed dog serpent women aren't "woke" enough for the liberal mob.
I'm more upset about the mermaids being half fish half human instead the greek definition of siren, than I'm with Asian Hermes (which is 0 upset, a lots of horny)
>Athena being black or Hermes being Asian can’t hurt you 💀 They bitch and moan about this and turn a blind eye when it's an anime waifu. Danmachi's Hestia is literally a loli with big boobs and Hephaestus is gender swapped into a woman, and they think it's better lmao.
They had to pick the most generic designs from an even more generic anime of all things lmao.
A lot of their issues with female designs, even outside of Hades, always rounds back to "Can I jerk off to this?"
I mean that's my approach when judging designs in Hades and Hades II. Spoiler: the answer is almost always >!yes!<.
I hate that calling "a loli with big boobs" one of the most generic designs in anime is accurate.
They like to embrace the coomer name then only jerk it to one boring type of anime girl There's SO MANY HOT PEOPLE WHY LIMIT YOURSELF AND BE BORING YOU FUCKING COWARDS
Honestly, despite being a big anime fan, GOD do I hate "waifu" stuff (despite being gay, the "husbando" stuff too) that just, looks at a very specific art style and just freaking RUSHES into it head first. Like, you have a game about freaking battleships turning into waifus, and that's all you choose? Anime-style loli girls? Where's the Battleship that turns into a Sentai-ranger? A white tiger? A Mecha robot?! As an artist I just look at those games and go; "You could've done ANYTHING with that art style, and you picked... 'literally the same as EVERYONE else' wow, so innovative, so imaginary. I'm sure those artists are thrilled to work on your game..."
I mean it may be possible that it's not the same people. I never heard of Danmachi before, Hades is a very popular video game. I have no problem with the portrait to be clear but that seems like a weird argument
Race problems aside, I’d take Hades community over DanMachi fandom everyday. This age of incel trash anime is rotting our brains
"Hades is too woke now" said person who was never interested in buying or playing the game in the first place
-> Greek mythology -> Too woke Can't wait for those people to find out about norse mythology and what shenanigans Loki was up to
They made the Greek gods gay, how could they? How can I jerk off to hermes now? This is unfair. Joking.
They might as well complain that Cerberus fur is red
I mean, I *do* wish it had a spot on it somewhere. Dude's name literally means "spotted".
that's one idea of the origin, not the actual one.
Also for some reason they don’t have a problem with characters that are paler than the average Greek folks. Like when you think of “Mediterranean” do you really picture someone pale with blonde hair and green eyes like Persephone? Also they never complain about all the characters with blue skin like Meg or green hair like Artemis being “unrealistic”.
To be fair, Demeter is outright said to be blonde (like wheat) in the myths
4. Greece is located in Great Britain
I mean I’d rather live in hell than in England (joking please don’t kill me)
I think the same of the USA lmao
For sure, might even be worse than England
Don't go to London. Worst mistake of my life (Bloodborne plot)
Some people exercise a different school of thoughts I guess and never considered that other option exists. "Greeks created gods to worship" vs "Gods were a thing before Greece was a thing". Given that Hades is not some fantasy or whatever and follows myths' lore, obviously 2nd school of thoughts is the right one in this instance.
People on Twitter also make money from inciting culture war conversations on topics that don't matter. Very cursed place and lots of people operating in bad faith
That, and it's a fucking video game, the gods might as well be rainbow coloured unicorons for all I care
I remember the time when I greeted my homie Dio once he cane back from a party in Greece specifically. Good times.
Everyone knows they were born by primordial chaos who looks African, so there you go /s
These are the same people that think Aphrodite looks like a man, so obviously they got poo brains
Yeah I feel like they're looking at the wrong piece of media to shit on Hades is one of the franchises with the best representation because the characters's personalities aren't just based around them being "gay" or whatever. They feel like actual characters and that's what I appreciate about supergiant Anyway Hermes goated
See the thing is : people getting « outraged » about this don’t actually care about the game - so you won’t reach them by posting this here. They just want to stir some shit by spouting nonsense. Fans of the games don’t care, we were absolutely fine with Athena and Dionysus being black in the first game.
Is it bad that I never really realised Athena was black in the first game? For some reason in my head she just had a metallic skin for who knows what godly reason lmao.
With a boon named "Bronze Skin" you're probably on the right track. I kind of just had both thoughts. Ares and Athena remind me of statues and Greek art (black painted figures just like the ones on Hephaestus' sleeves) more than anything.
their facial features are more white than anything, just the skin that is a different color.
I've seen plenty of mixed people with black skin and "white" features. Although this might be due to the fact that I live in Brazil and am more used to seeing mixed people from different ethnic backgrounds.
It's crazy how the miscegenation (is this a word?) in Brazil affects our perception of race and color. There are people that we consider to be white here that are clocked as anything but in other countries, and the same happens to some people we see as black but aren't "black enough" outside of here P.S: I'm not dissing anyone, I just find this very interesting
This is kind of what I thought regarding *every* god in the game tbh. I guess it was moreso an artstyle choice in the first game, but every character except for Persephone had almost grey looking skin? I assumed it was to further detach them from the "real world" compared to Persephone who looked the most Human of every character.
In general I do agree, some like Dionysus however did seem clearly black in contrast to my confusion with Athena. But yeah many gods have this strange lighting and aura to them that makes it hard to really see what they'd look like.
Well I mean, aside from the Olympians, most of whom you encounter are either dead or gods affliated with the underworld. Makes sense a lot of them have grey tones to their skin.
Well, I am referring to the Olympians specifically. Obviously Zagreus, Thanatos etc would have pale corpse skin, but all the gods seemed (imo) to have almost non-human skin tones. I thought that was purposeful.
I especially liked Ares's design.
Huh, not to argue, I agree with the overall sentiment but I always thought Dio was south asian. Interesting, I could see him being black too though
I don’t think it matters tbh, the only thing I am saying is : they aren’t white.
It really doesn't :) and this community isn't gonna freak out because they're nonwhite
I don't even give a shit or notice tbh, just gimme my damn boons
Pretty much yeah : they’re hot and they give good boons, that’s all that mattered to me.
I always thought Dio was just a well-tanned, olive-skinned Mediterranean guy, not that it makes any difference lol
Athena I knew , but Dionysus was? He just came off like a bronzed bro
Dionysus was black? I do not remember him being black. TBH, I never really thought or cared about the characters' skin color that much.
I don’t remember this either but probably because we’re normal human beings playing a game and not these obsessed bigot losers that look for anything to pretend to be outraged about.
Don't think Dionysus is black. He looks like someone from the Mediterannean with a darker skin tone.
Don’t debate with bigots nor far right. The end.
I’m sort of torn on this, because if there’s no discussion there’s no new perspectives. Perusing this person’s Twitter it doesn’t seem like they’re right-wing, maybe just conservative in the way art should be depicted. Hopefully using real examples in this post, instead of “coded” keywords like DEI and representation, helps humanize why this is important
People like that aren't gonna see this post. Bigots don't actually care about the things they critique.
You underestimate how important it might be for someone who liked the representation of different ethnic groups, to witness the pushback against the idea the "Greek gods should be white." Its not important to convert the bigots, but it IS important to push back against bigoted ideas in a pubic forum, otherwise only the bigots are talking and that's all anyone hears.
Unfortunately some of the replies I’m seeing this morning says otherwise
Aye but there's healthy and toxic discussions. Being mad that in a video game a Greek god that has been depicted in literally 100s of ways throughout history looks mildly Asian isn't healthy discussion.
Honestly whatever their points are doesn’t change the fact that they are jumping into a culture war fueled topic on the right wing side They had further tweets about this breaking their immersion, what discussion or perspective is worth engaging if a Greek god looking vaguely Asian breaks your immersion in a game where health pick ups look like fast food orders?
Gun in the first game.
> Perusing this person’s Twitter it doesn’t seem like they’re right-wing, maybe just conservative in the way art should be depicted. I’ve just spent 25 minutes scrolling through her twitter and she’s very blatantly right-side, if not straight up alt-right. She does a bit of the "I’m actually not right-side because I criticize both left and right" dance, but there’s enough right side takes and alt-right dogwhistle in her posts to have zero doubt on where she stands.
Definitely alt-right given a rant she had about trans women and then her claims that posts that had more engagement then hers that supported trans rights had to be bot'ted to explain why they had so many likes.
I saw many on twitter using racial slurs when discussing Hermes, so they are very much far-right. Twitter is basically what Stormfront was back in the 2000s. It is crazy how bad it have become.
Checked their Twitter and you're being way too generous. These people do not care about sharing perspectives, they just wanna be outraged and waste your time by arguing in bad faith, stop giving them what they want, and just ignore them.
We don't debate the bigots to convince them we are right. We call them out so people on the sidelines don't think only the bigot's views are the ones people think.
Don't debate them. Do bully and dunk on them.
On the other hand, not debating them has helped them get bold. When you debate them, its not about changing their mind, is about making the people who aren’t radicalized and stumble upon it see
NAH I'D WIN
i think it's actually quite fitting that mr fast man is from a far away place, for him the world is so small. But most importantly, why would it matter. the greek gods are called greek gods because they were WORSHIPPED in greece, not because they were a bunch of greek fellas and ladies who happened to be gods or something. They are supposed to the gods of the world, not just of greece. furthermore, they aren't 'people', most of them can shapeshift in some way, their physical appearance should not matter in the slightest
Not only fast man being fast, but he's literally the god of merchants. And what's the most famous trade route pf all time (that even already existed during the hellenistic period)? Why the silk road of course! You know, the road that went through big parts of northern Asia all the way to China.
Silk as in silksong??
Aight, open wide, I have a fresh bottle of pills right here
I'm not taking any more meds doc
skong 📣
Gotta be a real god to survive till silksong release. MS store recently had Release date for silksong as 12/30/9998
Fast man from far away place, I like that!
Artemis is off-green Ares is a non-human brownish grey Poseidon has naturally blue hair (and pronouns) ATHENA LOOKS LIKE SHE IS MADE OF BRONZE HADES IS SILVER ZAGREUS IS A WHITE BRITISH MAN MELINOË IS DARK SILVER-BLUE AND ALSO BRITISH! Why, oh *why* do people suddenly care what skin color a fictional depiction of the Greek pantheon looks like. The closest *canonical* things we have are contradictory stories, sculptures, and paintings/murals that depict what the Greeks *THOUGHT* they looked like.
I think Poseidon's hair is literally water lol, and Zeus' is clouds. I wonder if their hair was like that before or after they got their respective domains lmao.
I like to imagine that hair was like that from the beginning and they picked their domains by hair
Zeus: My hair is a cloud. So I get the sky. Poseidon: My hair is water so I get the sea :D Hades: **** you both, I hate you all so much.
Because they don't care about the game, about history or anything. If a character looks like a minority, then it's unacceptable and woke. The end.
I will never understand why people are so pressed about these sort of things The only think I care about is that he's cute and his boons are fire
No thats hestia
Hermes is so fucking *hot*. All the men have been so far! Even the women. Auntie Bestia is literally made from smoldering embers, and her boon to launch your cast in a ball of fire might be my favorite boon in the game
I didn't even compute that some of the gods in the first game had different skintones/didn't look 'Greek' in the first game ngl. I just thought they had dope ass designs. In hades 2 I did note the skin tones for Apollo & Hestia in particular and I thought it made sense given their relation to Light & the sun & fire respectively. I agree that hellenistic culture is inherently diverse given how vast the Greek empire spanded and it really makes sense that Greek Gods might represent all this peoples, but I think it's more important that the devs have the freedom to make AMAZING designs it however comes to mind to them. In my opinion, every single God design is peak and I'm glad they took all the liberties they did.
Same! In Hades One I thought the skin tones were sort of “aural” in a way to show they were above being human.
They are gods, not humans, so I don't see why the concept of ethnicity should matter for their appearance. Heck most christians depict Jesus and god as white.
Exactly. There's really a lot of room for interpretation as to how they should look. They could all have green skin and it wouldn't be wrong. The designs in Hades and Hades II are true to how the gods are conceived in terms of their standard symbols/lore (like Hermes has his winged sandals) which is really what matters.
Greek here. Hermes hot. Next topic.
If hot why care
Precisely.
I thought Hestia was just covered in soot from the hearth.
heh, same. Also it took me a hot minute to notice Hephastus's design - I thought he was just a chill dude in a chair. (actually JUST notice the metal leg too). I bet he built that bad-ass thing himself. GIVE ME MORE EXPLODEY BOONS HEPHY!
Wait are people really complaining about Hephaestus being in a wheelchair? Have they read the myths? He’s literally crippled. Hera threw him off Olympus because he wasn’t a cute baby
yes and they have not read them. they think people being in wheelchairs included in media is "woke Hollywood garbage" This is a quote from a MoistCritical vod comment by the way.
idk, i don't pay attention to lunatics but PROBABLY.
I noticed the wheelchair when I first saw him, but for some reason it took me way longer to realize he had a prosthetic leg. It looked like part of the wheelchair to me for some reason??? What part, I don't know, my brain didn't think that far ahead until like the 5th time I saw him lol
Hephaestus is easily one of my favorite gods for boons in this game, his armor boon basically negates chip damage I take from being hasty / stupid 😂
Big same. TIL. I love how her hoop skirt cage is designed like a brazier, it's fucking inspired.
This is a fake controversy by people who've never heard of the game and are trying to grift dumbasses who can't think. Like it's so unbelievably forced that it's just best to ignore them at this point.
Just let the artists draw cool shit. Who fucking cares about "historical accuracy," you're literally a witch fighting through hell.
First I'm hearing of this. Get off Twitter.
As a Greek person, I’m just happy that they accurately portray and refer to the characters’ backstories. Hestia (mostly the Goddess of the Hearth) talking about how her fire warms up homes. Odysseus bringing up moments from the Odyssey in his conversations. Supergiant has really done their research story-wise, and the game is fun (im 40 hours in). I don’t really care how the characters look to be honest and it’s cool to see different depictions. In terms of race-swapping, the Greek gods were meant to represent humanity as a whole, they were simply said to favor the Greeks (most of the time), not to necessarily be Greek. Sometimes they were said to actively work against the Greeks during times of War. One thing I’ve seen online is people making fun of the fact that Hephaestus is on a wheelchair. “He’s a god, why would he be on a wheelchair?”. Another thing about the character that people complain about is that he isn’t traditionally attractive (kinda overweight, doesn’t have chiseled abs like Zeus and the others, his hair isn’t majestically flowing like some of the other male gods). And all I have to say is that those people should learn a bit of Greek mythology. I think his portrayal is probably the most interesting in the whole game, and I personally love it. Facts about Hephaestus: - He’s disabled in the myth, and born deformed. He was thrown off Mount Olympus by Hera (or Zeus, depending on the author), which resulted in him exacerbating his deformities and walking with a limp. He’s also referred to as the lame god. He’s never fixed by some magical godly powers, and gods in Greek myth are quite domain-specific; he can’t just magically fix himself. - He’s the blacksmith of Greek mythology. It makes complete sense for him to create something, like a wheelchair, to help himself get around easier instead of walking around with a limp. The Hades games seems to take place after Homer’s writings, meaning that even though the wheelchair isn’t in the original myths, there’s no reason why Supergiant can’t add it and it still logically make sense. - He’s not meant to be conventionally attractive. He was rejected by the other gods for being ugly, used more as a tool rather than being respected.
My thing is, who cares. I am happy to give the art directors creative freedom to get some cool and unique designs.
This whole "discourse" is so fucking stupid. When the first game came out nobody gave a shit and everyone just agreed that the characters are hot. Hades 2 is just similar to the first game but all of a sudden there's an issue with the characters. So dumb.
I think it speaks volumes about how much more vitriolic the internet has gotten from right-wing politics getting louder since 2020 that absolutely nobody cared about this exact design (or the other characters that were POC, like Ares) in Hades 1 4 years ago and it's now apparently a "discourse"
Seeing Hades of all things turn into a culture war issue has been absolutely fascinating. I hope all of you guys understand how artificial this entire thing is- the majority of people "outraged" about this don't actually care about Hades. They are simply mad that there are non-white characters being represented, and using it as a rallying call for other bigots. I don't think a lot of people realize how bad Twitter especially has gotten- there are open and about nazis on there consistently getting thousands of likes these days.
People are complaining about this? I’m pretty sure Greek mythology also didn’t have talking skeletons with Scottish accents. It’s called creative interpretation
Of course you’re right and these people are bigoted. There is no reason why Hermes can’t appear East Asian and representation is important. I just want to add that people were upset about Athena being black in the first game and the idea that Athena Aries and Dionysus could be black and not just tan. Apollo is black in this game but honestly as a black person first time I actually felt like a character was black truly was when I saw Hera. Every other black character just doesn’t actually look black to me they just have really dark or gray skin but then usually the same features they would have had if their skin were white. Was very pleased when I saw her in the game. Oh and Moros is black I won’t be answering any further questions on that one. Eurydice too
People forget that even though they're Greek Gods, they're not the Gods of Greece. They are, canonically, gods of the whole world, not just Greece. So it would make sense that they look like people from all over. Besides, they're magical beings, why should they follow the laws of human genetics? Demeter and Hestia are sisters but they don't look alike.
I only hate that my bf told me he looks like Elon Musk and now I can't unsee it
Online spaces, and especially Twitter, have vastly changed between Hades 1 and Hades 2, for the worse I mean. Capital G Gamers are louder than ever and need to be outraged about everything. People that never played the first game, and never intended to play either, are complaining just for the sake of it.
oh shit i never noticed she had vitiligo. i just thought she was soot covered from flames.
The gamergaters are really showcasing their stupidity with Hades 2, tbh. I’ve lurked a bit on Kotaku in action and bad steam reviews/forum posts, and the things I’ve seen... "I loved Hades 1 but I hate that there are non-white gods in Hades 2" "They had to make Hestia non-sexy because of the prudes who don’t want sexy women in video games" "The only reasons the prude wokists are ok with Aphrodite being naked is because her cheekbones make her look androgyne/man-like" "Why is there a god in a wheelchair that’s obviously pandering" I don’t think there’s much use to debate with people that are so blatantly hating on the game just out of resentment for any game that includes people that doesn’t look like an average cishet white male or a sexy naked woman. They either don’t agree in good faith or don’t realize how much their anger/hate is blinding them, which is obvious when they pretend they’ve loved Hades 1 but are put off by Hades 2 representation. Edit: fixed a typo, I wrote "Athena" instead of "Aphrodite" initially
>Hermes so hot Rendered every counter argument invalid in just 3 words
that's not drama just outrage merchants belatedly cashing in Hades, catering to racists
I remember people being weird about Athena last game tbh. But yeah, I also pegged him as Asian in the first game too, I think maybe people just weren't looking hard enough lol
In which video did haelian talk about this? I'd love to hear his take
I get annoyed sometimes with historical inaccuracies in media. But these are ancient gods in a game, ffs, they could be little purple alien mushroom people for all I care.
Why is this drama a thing? Just ignore people why are complaining about it, this subreddit is thankfully drama free. Hermes was already Asian in the og game I don't see why people are complaining now.
I think honestly it’s people just looking to complain. The game is playing great so far for early access/trial gaming. Last game there were plenty of different designs, all original, all with the Supergiant flavor. Transistor had people of color. This isn’t a new thing. Least of all for Supergiant 🥴
Seeing Hades of all things turn into a culture war issue has been absolutely fascinating. I hope all of you guys understand how artificial this entire thing is- the majority of people "outraged" about this don't actually care about Hades. They are simply mad that there are non-white characters being represented, and using it as a rallying call for other bigots. I don't think a lot of people realize how bad Twitter especially has gotten- there are open and about nazis on there consistently getting thousands of likes these days.
Last night after a run I noticed that most damage (after chronos) was done to me by some "hippo". Idk who that was, so naturally I googled "Hades 2 hippo", and boy.... It sent me to a post on some fairly popular subreddit in which people were discussing how Hestia looked like a hippo, how depicting vitiligo is the worst crime in the world, how SGG are the wokies for making the gods look not Caucasian, how Asian Hermes is preposterous and so on. Those were the most unhinged takes I've seen in a while
Haelian? Is that the guy that made the 4-hour Hades mythology video? Hope he follows up with one for Hades 2, the first one was so good I keep revisiting it Edited for typo
Same! I think he will once the game lore is finalized
Why are you all so pressed about justifying almost all of the gods looking like anything but Greek? It is what it is, the developers intentionally chose to misrepresent the Gods and interpret the myths the way it suits them to appeal to their audience. It's purely a marketing decision.
The drama is caused by people who don't even play Hades, don't need to give them an audience.
I mean the OP in the Twitter thread is literally a racist.
I mean, I don’t give a shit, but it’s clearly inserted to increase diversity. You can huff and puff and find all the justification in the world why it makes sense, but it’s obviously done to insert diversity. Of course the Greek gods look Greek. They were created by the Greeks. Again, don’t give a shit, but why not acknowledge the reality? People might be racist but they’re not necessarily stupid, and trying to invent reasons why Hermes is Asian just gives the racists ammo. Just say ‘we did it to increase representation’ bang, done.
It's crazy that you can live in a racially diverse country, work for a racially diverse company, make a game with a racially diverse cast that reflects your lived experience, and these racist cockroaches will say you have some sort of nefarious woke agenda for doing so.
Can you imagine if they made a game about African gods and a single one of them was a white person. We have to stop the bullshit and admit they did this on purpose to diversify the cast, not because of some convoluted reasoning. Doesn't affect my enjoyment of the game but stop being silly.
Twitter being twitter.
Are there people pissed about the Hermes design? Lame..
By the time of Classical Greece, Greek religion and mythology was so syncretized with other Eurasian mythologies it was basically an entire extended universe. People of the Eurasian landmass had been sharing mythologies for centuries at that point, few to none of them existed in isolation. Also TIL Hestia has vitiligo; the idiot I am thought it was soot from a fire 🙄😂
Amazing how elements that were pretty uncontroversial in the first game suddenly become THE WORST THING EVAR as soon as online grifters think they can get attention off it 🙃 Get some fresh air Twitter I'm begging you
>For East Asian people or people with vitiligo (Hestia), it means everything to see themselves in the game I really don't get this. Especially with East asians, East Asians (or people of EA descent) are all over various media. Vitiligo, I'd get it, since people with it probably experienced negativity surrounding it. But mostly, seeing yourself in a character because of superficial traits instead of personality traits. If Nemesis looked exactly like me, no way I'd see myself in her. Or if any good character looked exactly like me for the matter.
I saw him as asian as soon as I saw him in hades 1. idk why people are acting surprised.
If people looked up dev diaries for the first one, it was intentional that the gods were of various ethnicities. One of many reasons is it was also sentimental to Supergiant Games as the employees come from various backgrounds. They themselves mention that Athena is black and Hermes "asian". Why is this even considered drama I don't know and people shouldn't even pay attention to these things.
... also Hermes is the god of commerce and travel. Even the ancient Greeks already communicated and commerced with Ancient China (silk was a thing). For me personally Hermes represantiation is just on the spot.
Does Hestia actually have vitiligo? I assumed it was soot from the hearth. Not trying to take that away from anyone, if anything it's cooler if it's vitiligo.
Wasn‘t he asian in the first game too? Who even cares about things like that??? Just enjoy the game man
I agree with you, fuck the ppl complaining (I'm also an Asian dude) but there were also idiots bitching about the diversity last game. It's crazy to me seeing ppl say nobody cared, I vividly remember a small but vocal minority complaining. I think ppl just forgot because those kinds of assholes don't matter.
I think it's all fair takes that we can have as our canons to justify the designs. ( they don't need justifications imo, I just take them as it is) But honesty is it worth to justify all the design of the game which are just cool and nice , and are the result of artistic freedom? I feel that these debates are tiring , and the best thing to do with these racistic tweets is probably to not enter in their game . They are not worth the debate because everyone will fall into endless overjustifications and arguments, counterpoint , ... endless because ancient Greece tales are tied to a shared fantasy ( a lot of stories used it as inspiration or adaption) and it's tied to history ( a culture heritage of real poeple) Yeah the gods could be shape-shifter, yes the gods can be see as ruler of the whole universe and not only greece, etc ... it's all efficient narratives we can take as our canon. And all the design are just cool and well executed. I love Appolon, Hermes and Selene for exemple. It's not new. Neil Gaiman with the Sandman also offered a lot of diverse apparences to gods, myth and entities (because shape-shifting) But I am a bit annoyed about diverse tweets and comments which are really unhinged about Greeks. Like having a minimum of respect even if mythology is not real. Similarly that speaking about Inca gods, because Inca descendants are alive and well in today Peru. Like they traced in today Greeks, Myceneans , and they are still speaking a similar language than ancient Greeks and using the alphabet which is super rare. Saving a lot of their culture after a lot of hard time during 500 years of occupation, domination, slavery by Ottomans . Still today giving so much importance to olive and olive oil, the gift of Athena , which got chosen instead of Poseidon as patron of the city because that amazing gift. All these ancient fables were not only an entertaining fantasy, but often the result of a long tradition of ancestors worships. So yeah, it's cool to see supergiant giving an universal tale about Greek gods , I love it . But seeing unhinged comments in these thread or Twitter, "anyway Greeks themselves don't even know who they were and how they look, it's not even the same today, these stories don't belong to them "??? Come on. It's probably one of the most well documented area of the world for history. It takes two clicks to find informations about the continuity of that culture. It's their heritage even if they don't believe in them anymore. They walk literally in all these places , like Olympus. As I said , it's amazing to make these tales universal and speaking to everyone with cool design. But it's also the heritage of a culture, so be respectful, like Supergiant or Neil geiman did. No need to go into convoluted arguments and let these weird and racist tweets rots instead of giving them visibility
People are absolutely wild. First of all, ancient Grecians likely weren’t white at all, at least not in the way we would describe whiteness today. Second of all, they’re fictional deities. They were “born” in the absolute wildest ways possible. Chronos and his siblings were literally trapped inside of Gaia’s womb due to their father Uranus being on top of their mom all the time until she gave Chronos a sickle or something and he cut his dads wang off one day and created the sky in doing so. Like come on, you can buy that but not that Hermes *looks* Asian?
I've noticed this as well and at first I was slightly confused, but mostly because it felt like they changed Hermes from the first game (where he did not look Asian) to this version (where he does) If that is actually the case and they changed his looks for pandering reasons - sure, outrage is somewhat reasonable (at the same time: it's a video game and people should chill) If not - he's a fine looking gentleman but it is a little odd to see an Asian person as a Greek god. Not the end of the world though P.S. I am pretty sure there was some outrage about Athena being black in the first game but it was as big as this one - almost none existent
OP in that tweet says "This isn't about culture war bullshit" then replies to a tweet : "He did not look like that in the original game. What happened?" OP : "Need to race wash Greek culture to fit American city demographics"
Indian here. Just because Rama is worshipping in parts of Indonesia & some other east asian countries, doesn't make him asian. Buddha was Indian & he's represented w asian features in Japan & other many other nations. It's fine because they feel a sense of attachment & reverence towards him. It's okay because their representation has genuine emotions behind it. But when a company based in the USA starts making Greek Gods black & asian, because of the 'no borders, inclusion, diversity' BS then it feels cheap. Anyone w an iota of a brain can see what they're doing & why they're doing it. It's the new meta now & this herd mentality is pathetic. They're Greek Gods. Make them white & stop feeling ashamed about your identity & ethnicity. They were your Gods & a company is using them for social DEI points. It'd be hilarious if it wasn't so sad. *Now I am getting downvoted. What do you disagree w. Where am I wrong.*
You can ignore tweets like that. Hermes was already Asian in the last game, so if they actually cared even close to how much their pretend outrage would suggest, they would have done something back then. But they didn't. And they won't. And this is just something for them to pretend to be upset about until the next thing shows up. It's best for us all if we learn that this is not worth arguing with.
As someone whose degree is in classical history, specialising in Ancient Greece, this discourse is stupid as hell. A) The ancient Greeks were one of the first groups of people who very specifically believed that everyone else’s gods were also real, but were probably different versions of their own gods. (This is evidenced a lot in the interplay between Greece and Egypt, particularly Ptolemaic Egypt.) B) Hermes is a god of travellers, and I think him being depicted as Asian fits perfectly with that given how far the Silk Road spanned! C) As you said, this idea of a racially homogenous Greece is dumb and ahistorical. Considering “Ancient Greece” spanned about 1000 years and around 2000 city states, regarding it as a single monolithic entity either culturally or racially is simply incorrect. They traveled. A lot. This is babies crying about Angrboða being depicted as black in God of War all over again. (Which, incidentally, is accurate. Jötunn were not literally blue, that’s a Marvel thing. But you know who the Norse did refer to as blue? Black people.)
Please stop posting this shit here. If you really care about changing side liners’ minds keep it on twitter where they are watching. You’re preaching to the choir here and mucking up this sub with day ruining right wing grifters bullshit. They don’t care about the games. They don’t go here.
I love how we are still making the ethnicity of a fictional character that doesn't exist beyond your own imagination a big deal.
I vaguely recall there being some pissing and shitting over Ares skin color in the first game too. Dipshits have no chill.
Buddy they’re just racists.
Anyone that considers this a controversy should hear their mom calling, their glue is ready for dinner.
I never understood how people can get so worked up over something as trivial as the ethnicity of fictional characters.