I'm switching back and forth between Hades 2 and Rotwood at the moment, which is probably why I've found myself tangled up in how the two games are similar and how they're different.

On paper, you can make them sound really quite similar: Like Hades 2, Klei's latest is an action-RPG in which you take your character and head out through a series of enemy-filled rooms, defeating all the monsters you see in each room to earn a choice of perk or upgrade of some kind. You slowly build your character for each run, then, by picking upgrades and then picking the next room based on the kind of upgrade it's going to offer. Throw in bosses and permanent character upgrades and different weapon classes and, hey, isn't that sort of Hades?

In reality, though, nobody would mistake these two games. It's a bit like how I can instantly tell whether the LA-based luxury realtor reality show on television is Selling Sunset, Million Dollar Listing or Buying Beverly Hills: sometimes the similarities are superficial, while the differences go deep.

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