You can (and should!) go fishing in Hades

The Long Winter update includes a new ‘Rod of Fishing’

Will 2020 be the year we all become head-over-heels obsessed with Hades?

I’m not quite at that point yet, but Supergiant Games’ mythological roguelike action title has only grown more compelling with each passing update. The latest Early Access update, The Long Winter, speaks to me even as a curious outside observer. It adds one of my distractions in all of video games: fishing.

These are the big-ticket items for the January 21 update:

• Demeter: the Goddess of Seasons brings winter to the Underworld! Seek out her powerful Boons.
• Rod of Fishing: capture (& sell!!) Underworld river denizens with this new House Contractor item.
• Aspect of Guan Yu: earn this unique new Aspect of the Eternal Spear, and vanquish your foes.
• Underworld Decor Galore: scores of new items are available at the newly renovated House Contractor.
• New Legendary Keepsake: forge an unbreakable bond with Dusa, and summon her to petrify your foes.
• Boon Info & Victory Screen Update: pin multiple Boons onscreen for easy reference and sharing.
• New Daedalus Hammer Upgrades: look for multiple new upgrades for each weapon.
• New Story Events: uncover new secrets in hours of added narrative (with more than 1,000 new voice lines).

Some players have expressed concerns about widespread nerfs, which you can see in the patch notes.

“Though I wish our progress on the game could always be linear, we sometimes take steps forwards and sometimes take steps sideways or backwards during Early Access,” Supergiant Games studio director Amir Rao said in response to those criticisms. “When it comes to balance, our broad goal is to make sure Hades is filled with compelling choices and has a high dynamic range from run to run.”

“After each Major Update, we always make follow-up patches to address any issues we learn about. We’ll have such a patch this week that makes further tuning changes to the game being discussed.”

The Long Winter update trailer also teased the arrival of a new weapon on March 10, 2020.

The Long Winter Update – Patch Notes [Steam]