Jotunnslayer: Hordes of Hel Early Access Impressions
For a game that transformed an entire genre, it is crazy to think that Vampire Survivors has ONLY been around just over three years. It took the twin-stick shooter, removed a stick, and added auto-aim. The number of clones/copies spawned is unreal but there have been several successful ones including Brotato, 20 Minutes Till Dawn, Soulstone Survivors, and Deep Rock Galactic - Survivors.
What if we took that dopamine-filled gameplay, made it look like Diablo, and added some Norse mythology?
Developed by Games Farm and ARTillery, Jotunnslayer: Hordes of Hel is a roguelike horde survival game currently available on Steam in Early Access. The gameplay follows a simple, familiar pattern: pick a class, pick a map, and play until you die or the timer hits zero. Alright, that might be way too simple of an explanation and Jotunnslayer deserves more than a sentence.
There are currently four classes you can choose to play in the current version: Berserker, Seeress, Flame Sister, and Revenant. The Berserker is a dual-axe-wielding warrior who can enter into a state of rage that increases his damage for brief periods. He is built to withstand punishment with a higher health pool and attributes to increase his damage as he takes damage. The Seeress fulfills the caster role with AOE damage done at a distance while maintaining a shield when things get a bit crazy. The Flame Sister is akin to a rogue with fast movement and attacks but little protection if you get overwhelmed. Last but not least (for now) is the Revenant. He is a marksman who has been possessed by a ghost spirit and said ghost spirit will hunt down enemies while you rain down arrows all over the place.
Now that you picked your class, you can select a vacation destination. Right now the only choices are Nilfheim and Musphelheim, so cannot feel your fingers cold or hell-like heat. It is not ideal but you work with what you got. There are three difficulty settings, normal, hard, and insane (Nilfheim also has easy to get you started). You must beat the previous difficulty to open up a new one. Difficulty determines the enemy's difficulty, raid time, objectives, and resource bonus, all of which increase as the difficulty increases. Objectives are in-run quests that need to be completed for rewards and to be able to summon the boss. The number of objectives completed also goes up with difficulty. For the masochists amongst you, there are difficulty modifiers that will increase resource gain but at a cost such as enemies have a chance to cheat death and become invincible for 5 seconds (cool cool).
Similar to Vampire Survivors, the characters auto-attack with the skills you select. Unlike Vampire Survivors, you need to kind of sort of aim. Each class has a basic attack moveset and you need to point that attack towards the enemy face. You also have a dash ability as well as a unique ability tied to the weapon you choose before the run. Both of these abilities are on a short cooldown. What are these auto-attack skills I speak of? Players can choose up to 5 unique attack skills, 2 coming from their own skill trees, and the remaining three from powers bestowed on them by the Gods. When you kill enemies, experience gems will drop and every time you level up, you have to make a choice. The choice is either a class skill or a god skill OR a god skill and a god skill. Yes, there is a bit of RNG here but that is all part of the fun. Both class and god choices can be active or passive skills. Once you have selected the 5 attack skills, you will not see any new ones, only upgrades for the existing ones and passive skills to assist in the run. Each class and god have 4 attack skills to choose from with a 5th unlockable in the skill tree.
The Gods in-game now are Odin, Thor, Freya, and Loki. Not only does each God’s skillset play differently from the other ones, but the skills within can alter your playstyle. Perhaps you want the Berserker to have some range options; Thor’s lightning sounds fun. Maybe the Seeress needs a little melee support; Odin can provide you with a soldier from Valhalla. The passive skills are just as powerful: Loki can cause status debuffs and Freya can boost healing.
On any given run, you will coins and soulstones from the completed objectives, treasure chests, enemies, and of course, a successful boss defeat. Soulstones are used to purchase new weapons for each class while coins are used to buy skill points. In addition to several passive skills each class provides, both class and God attack skills can be upgraded to an evolved form. The evolved form appears as a 4th upgrade when choosing during a run and drastically alters the ability. For example, one of Thor’s abilities allows you to throw Mjolnir. The evolved form throws two hammers that cause a shockwave at its destination. The Berserker has an ability that sees an axe circling him but with a short cooldown. The evolved form has the axe constantly going around taking out anything that comes within range. Spent skill points can be “unspent” as you please at no extra cost. This was a nice feature as it does not require you to start from scratch when playing a new class after dumping all your points into another class. You can also “unspend” points to not have an evolved form appear as one of the choices.
Jotunnslayer: Hordes of Hel is shaping up to be a great addition to the roguelike survivor genre. Even in the currently released state, there are at least 15 hours of content (if you do everything available - all difficulties, all in-game trophies, etc.). The planned 1.0 launch will have 5 maps, 6 classes, 7+ Gods, more weapon choices, and an endless mode. If you jump in now, you can experience all the new content as it gets added and even provide feedback for what you feel does not work. I have played enough Early Access titles that I can confirm, the developers do see everything. This game is worth the investment. If Early Access is not your thing, at least put the game on your wishlist.
