[Update] Has Been Heroes review - A great RPG or a has-been experience?
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| Has Been Heroes
Updated April 4th, 1:44 PM: Thanks to the day one patch, things are a little more bearable in-game which is really great to see.

Having played through the first levels again, the initial battles are definitely slightly harder, but the boss fight at the end is challenging without being totally impossible.

The boss fight of level one now consists of one skeleton mage who darts between the three lanes. Whenever he's hit badly, he'll move into another lane and throw out a few shadow skeletons. Though it seems intimidating, these can be taken out in one hit.

The game still feels a little unbalanced though. The boss is easier, yes, but the fights all feel tailored to what luck you've had during your journey.

In some play-throughs you have a ton of spells to use and faster stamina recharging, while on others you're on the bare minimum and got absolutely pummeled.

It's a start, for sure, but the game's latest improvements haven't made playing it much more enjoyable than before.


Has-Been Heroes is an oddball of a strategy RPG. Whether it's adjusting to the control scheme of the Switch that's difficult, or whether it really is a strange game, it's hard to decide.

But you're either going to love or hate this mind-numbingly unforgiving game - it just depends on how much you like to suffer.

Whichever way you look at it, Has-Been Heroes has the core of a decent game, but as the levels roll there's definitely no mercy for the weak.

Fight with honour

The game's backstory is pretty standard. You control three heroes who've been charged with getting the king's two daughters to school safely.

Of course, nothing is ever that straight forward, so before you begin the game properly, the whole lot of you are killed. And then brought back to life by a god-like figure.

Before that, there's a huge introduction of the heroes' glorious pasts with promise of action, adventure, and humour, but it all filters away after the first couple of cutscenes, leaving us with some somewhat lifeless conversations and the occasional text box.

There's a little bit of Trine between the layers of Has-Been Heroes, even though Frozenbyte has opted for a lighter, cartoony design with this one.

The controls aren't difficult, but it definitely takes a while to get used to them.

During battles, your foes are moving constantly and, though they're moving in slow-motion, it doesn't leave you with a lot of time to think things through.

The battles take place across three different lanes, and if you're not quite fluent in the Switch's layout just yet, strategising and positioning your characters can be a little bit of a challenge.

Fight with courage

It's one of those game that you have to try, try, and try again before you can make any real progress. That is, until things become almost impossible.

Everything starts off pretty rosy in the first Winter Wonderland-like area, with battles that are challenging but beatable. As soon as you get to that first boss fight, however, any confidence you have goes straight out the window.

Jeez, the waves just never end and the boss itself is utterly relentless. For an entry-level scrap, it's a little ridiculous.

What's more, if you die during the boss fight you and your Heroes don't respawn - it's game over, man. You'll shoot back up into the clouds, the god-like chap counts the amount of souls you've managed to collect, he might give you a prize, and then you're kicked out to the main menu.

You're not knocked back to the prologue, at least. Though, you do have to go through the same levels again and again to be able to fight the boss - die - and start over.

Or, just die a bunch, whatever

Has-Been Heroes leaves you a bit uncertain. It's a game you know you could love if it gave you the chance, but as soon as you get close it decides to push you away.

If the difficulty level was steadier, and the story more apparent, this could definitely be a game to get addicted to. As it is, it leaves you unsatisfied and a little irate as you're stuck making the same mistakes over and over again.

[Update] Has Been Heroes review - A great RPG or a has-been experience?

Has-Been Heroes has the bones of a great strategy RPG, but it doesn't let you get close enough to love it
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Emily Sowden
Emily Sowden
Emily is Pocket Gamer's News Editor and writes about all kinds of game-related things. She needs coffee to function and begrudgingly loves her Switch more than she lets on.