Hades
One purchase, a real ending reachable in about a day's worth of play, and nothing else to buy — the roguelike answer to what Portal is for shooters.
- Is Hades pay to win?
- No. There is nothing for sale inside the game: no currency, no loot boxes, no paid convenience. A paid expansion, where one exists, is bought once from a store rather than offered to you while playing.
- How long to beat Hades?
- About 22 hours to reach the ending, based on aggregated player-submitted completion times.
The cost, in short
Pressure
000
To ending
022hrs
Scripted ending exists
Hours, depending on what “finish” means
- To the ending
- 22 h
- Everything, all achievements
- 92 h
Can you read the odds before you pay?
Nothing random is sold here
Bought once, with nothing for sale inside it.
How this rating was reached
Score of 0, same reasoning as Portal: no purchase of any kind exists beyond the initial price, so there is nothing to create pressure. 22 hours reflects aggregated player-submitted times to the first successful escape, per HowLongToBeat data as reported by DualShockers; players pursuing full relationship and post-ending content report closer to 90-95 hours because the roguelike structure keeps delivering story after the first ending. We record no cost to progress, same as Portal: there is nothing to progress toward beyond the purchase price, so there is nothing to record.
The monetization, in full
There isn't any, past the one-time purchase. No in-app purchases, no loot boxes, no season pass — the only other thing for sale on its store page is an optional soundtrack, which changes nothing about the game itself.
The ending is real, but it's not the whole game
Aggregated player-submitted completion times (via HowLongToBeat) put the first successful escape — the point where credits roll and the main narrative arc resolves — at around 22 hours. Unlike a linear game, though, reaching that ending doesn't mean you've seen everything: Hades is a roguelike, its story is delivered in pieces between runs, and players chasing full relationship content and post-ending story report closer to 90-95 hours.
That's a genuinely different shape of "ending" than a single-playthrough game, and it's worth knowing going in: the game plants a real, satisfying stopping point well before it runs out of content.
Why this game is on the site at all
It's the second zero-monetization-pressure reference point here, deliberately a different genre from Portal's puzzle-platformer — proof that a zero score isn't a fluke of one genre, and that "buy once, own everything" still exists in a market dominated by live-service spending.
Related games
- Balatro
Nothing sold inside · pressure 0
- Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Nothing sold inside · pressure 0
- Vampire Survivors
Sells extra content, not power · pressure 10
Sources
- 01How Long Does It Take To Beat HadesDualShockers (aggregating HowLongToBeat player-submitted data) ·
Full method behind these ratings: see our methodology.
Ratings are editorial judgments based on the sources cited above. They are not a guarantee of current pricing or mechanics, which can change after publication — check the source directly before making a purchase decision.