I Wish Hades 2's Tarot Cards Were Actually Tarot Cards

In the 24 hours between releasing in early access 🎉and me ordering a brand new Steam Deck OLED to play it on, one of my housemates retreated to his room entirely to play it nonstop, including during his work day. Eventually, I went to his room and checked on him to make sure he hadn’t died and become fodder for his cats, only for him to release a deluge of praise for the game in my general direction the moment I passed through the door frame.

In the flood of words, I picked out a few things. Baths, spells, headmistress, dommy mommy, combat… then my ears perked up. “Tarot cards”. I’m a longtime user of Tarot cards, having been gifted my first Tarot deck by my mother when I was 14 – by gifted, I mean I saw a Tarot for Dummies set in the New Age section at the bookstore and begged my mother to buy it for me. I’ve been collecting decks ever since, and though my use of Tarot isn’t so much spiritual as it is a way to see what patterns my brain recognises, I’ve long been enamoured with the meanings of the cards and how different cultures and mythologies interpret the Ta🥂rot.

“Like, for real Tarot cards?” I said, interrupting his monologue. He said “yes”, then clearly started to say something else, but I’d already held my palm up to his face and announced “Say less”, feverishly typing on my phone with my other hand s🎀o my Steam Deck order would be placed and its delivery arranged before I’d left his room.

Unfortunately, Not For Real Tarot Cards

Hades 2 is an unabashedly witchy game and accordingly, most of the changes from Hades to Hades 2 are witchy in nature. Melinoë is a witch, trained by the witch goddess Hecate, who uses magic to strengthen and change her attacks. She uses incantations to unlock impr🐠ovements to her base, locations, abilities and more. She grows and harvests her own ingredients for incantations or just to trade. Tarot cards fit right in with this very Wiccan culture.

And yet, when I actually got to these Tarot cards in the game, I found myself disappointed. They were not, in fact, ‘for real&🌳rsquo; Tarot cards, they were just very obviously inspired by Tarot. Each Arcana Card boosts Melinoë’s powers with passive upgrades or new abilities, giving you a way to fine tune her build. Each card is named something like ‘Eternity’ or ‘The Wayward Son’, emulating the naming conventions of Tarot while pointing to different characters or events within Hades and Hades 2. It’s cool, don’t get me wrong – I love that Tarot is incorporated in this way, and I do not feel strongly enough about Tarot cards to complain that it’s not an accurate enough portrayal of the tradition.

God Mode Is Still The Perfect Way To ღPlay Had💎es 2

Supergiant once again makes it easy to appreciate the story and characters of this uni🌳verse🐠.

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I do, however, feel like it’s a missed opportunity. Because I’ve loved t✅he mythos of the Tarot for so long, I, like every Tarot reader, have a different and 🌌deep relationship with every card. Different cards canonically have different meanings, but the interpretation of each card is highly subjective and can be used to refer to many things.

Many of these perks could easily have bee🌸n tied to the iconography and names of the major arcana of traditional Tarot cards, and I daresay that there would have been an extra l𝕴ayer of thematic complexity for people familiar with the meanings of those cards. Just thinking about the art that could have accompanied each card makes me drool.

So Why Not Tarot Cards?

The simplest explanation I can find for Supergiant not using real Tarot cards for its Arcana system is that there are simply too few major arcana cards. The major arcana cards are 🙈the ones you probably recognise even if you’re not familiar with the practice – Death, The Fool, The Tower, and so forth.

🐈The minor arcana are basically like playing cards: four suits, going from one to King.

There are only 22 major arcana cards, and Hades 2 has 25. That’s a problem. They could have dipped into the minor arcana as well – each of those cards also has its own distinctive meanings, but thosไe cards are far less recognisable than the major arcana.

Maybe it just made more sense for Supergiant to make its own cards instead of f♐itting effects into interpretations of existing cards, and that’s fine. The game doesn’t suffer for it, and neither do I. I’m just a l🏅ittle sad that there’s no real Tarot tradition involved in a mechanic that so heavily references it. And also, imagine the Tarot deck merch we could have gotten out of it.