33 Immortals: Early Access Preview - A Revolutionary Take on the Roguelike

While I feel that judging a game while still in early access may be jumping the gun, I also feel that the moment you start charging money for something you open yourself up to criticism. 33 Immortals while still in development is still a worthy and interesting take on a roguelike. In short, I feel there is enough here to be worth time and money—if there wasn't, I would hold off on a review until the product was completed.

What is 33 Immortals?

Loosely based on Dante's Divine Comedy, you play as a rebel soul battling through Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso (the last not implemented yet) to challenge God's wrath and your low place in the afterlife. You and your allies stage your rebellion from a place called the Dark Woods, where NPCs give out quests and lore tidbits while selling gear, upgrades, and cosmetics.

The hook? Depending on what raid you select, you load into a run with up to 33 allies—hence the name. You collect upgrades and complete dungeons to unlock a portal to a raid boss, where everyone who survived battles as a massive group (should enough people survive to be considered massive). Win or lose, you gain currency and complete missions to purchase permanent upgrades and cosmetics in the lobby.

The PUG Empire 10-Point Rating System

Before we dive into the details, here's how we evaluate every game that crosses our radar:

Gameplay Mechanics (1.0 point) - How does it feel to play?
Graphics & Visual Design (1.0 point) - Does it look good?
Audio & Sound Design (1.0 point) - How's the audio experience?
Story & Narrative (1.0 point) - Is there a compelling story?
Replayability (1.0 point) - Will you keep coming back?
Multiplayer/Social (1.0 point) - How's the online experience?
Performance & Optimization (1.0 point) - Does it run well?
Innovation & Originality (1.0 point) - Does it bring something new?
Value for Money (1.0 point) - Is it worth the price?
Overall Fun Factor (1.0 point) - Bottom line: is it fun?

Now let's see how 33 Immortals measures up.

1. Gameplay Mechanics: 0.90/1.00

If you've played Hades or other top-down roguelikes, you'll find quite a bit familiar with 33 Immortals. Currently there are 6 weapon types that all feel unique and can be customized further to fit your preferred playstyle. Even on controllers, the movement feels tight and responsive. While still in early access, the mechanics feel very complete—the early access part seems to be focused on adding levels and dialing in progression.

What Works:

Tight and responsive movement, even on controllers
Six unique weapon types with customization options
Multiplayer raid format brings novel dynamics to the genre
Permanent upgrade system provides long-term progression
Mission-based progression gives clear goals

Minor Issues:

Not all weapons are created equally
Random nature means certain builds can underperform
Quest-based progression may force unwanted playstyles
Time investment to get builds online can be lengthy

Score: 0.90/1.00 - While there's room to improve progression, it's impressive that balancing a large multiplayer experience still hits all the notes you would expect in a single-player experience.

2. Graphics & Visual Design: 0.90/1.00

As with most in the space, 33 Immortals takes a lot of nods from Hades. While I can understand some pushback on following the market leader, the added chaos of the multiplayer environment makes familiar cues more than welcome.

Visual Design: One of the main issues the art team needed to contend with was making player characters unique and stand out while not making them distracting. They accomplish this by allowing each player to choose:

Character color
Cloak color
Weapon color
Cosmetic pets
Halo designs

This makes every player identifiable as on your side while making your character easy to keep track of—unless you're very unlucky/unoriginal and multiple players share your exact style.

Artistic Merit: 33 Immortals does an excellent job of bringing the terrifying depictions of hell in Renaissance paintings into a video game world. The traditional devils, demons, and damned souls mixed with unsettling depictions from the Bible and Christian lore give the game's enemies a unique and intimidating look that you couldn't mistake as being from anything else.

Score: 0.90/1.00 - While starting at a familiar place, the setting and enemies help easily differentiate from the game's peers. The art team has impressively solved the problem of making player characters readable while not needing to break the art style so every player can stand out.

3. Audio & Sound Design: 0.70/1.00

Sound Design: Attacks, blocks, and combat sounds are punchy and add to combat's feel. Cues for attacks, dodges, and abilities help inform the player of danger and resources available without needing to look away from the action.

Music: The moments of bombastic bells and swelling choruses are stand out, but most of the tracks are inoffensive to the tone and unremarkable.

Score: 0.70/1.00 - Sound effect design is excellent and informative to the player. While there are some high highs in music, most tracks are forgettable.

4. Story & Narrative: 0.90/1.00

Narrative: Loosely based on the Divine Comedy, you play as a rebel soul battling through Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso (the last not implemented yet) to challenge God's wrath and your low place in the afterlife. You and your allies stage your rebellion from a place called the Dark Woods, where NPCs give out quests and lore tidbits while selling gear, upgrades, and cosmetics.

Mission Variety: NPCs and daily quests offer quite a bit of variety in goals once you're in the raid, leaving it to you to choose to accomplish your own goals faster or simply help the team as best you can. Some may not enjoy being forced into a playstyle they don't prefer for quest rewards. I found they didn't take long or become too onerous even if outside my preferred way to play.

Score: 0.90/1.00 - While story isn't what most come to this style of multiplayer game for, it is there for those that want it. While secondary, any story exploring Christian lore is largely untouched in the Western world and presents a narrative on subjects rarely explored in games.

5. Replayability: 0.70/1.00

What Brings You Back: The random nature of the genre means every run will offer some surprises, even after you've seen everything. Every run you gain progression and resources to become stronger and dial in your build. Even once completing a build, moving on to a different weapon can keep things fresh for a while.

What Limits It: The raid bosses are 33 Immortals' biggest strength, and with only 2, some players may lose interest. Mix that with a big grind required to do well in the second stage, and it feels as though progression needs some work.

Score: 0.70/1.00 - 33 Immortals makes a great first impression but quickly becomes more tedious once you clear the first raid. While builds and power progression are extensive, the gap between beating the first bosses and not getting flattened by basic enemies in the second stage leaves you in no man's land—where the first stage is too easy but the second too challenging. Some may not be able to hang on during that lull, but for those that don't mind a bit of grinding, it doesn't present an insurmountable issue, though one they would do well to address in development.

6. Multiplayer/Social: 1.00/1.00

With such a novel multiplayer model, it's a bit disappointing to see the normal 4-person party limit. With all the inspiration and refitting of the classic MMO raid format, I'd like to see a large party option. That being said, the multiplayer works wonderfully, and the push/pull of needing to work together and selfishly striving to gain power is a singular experience that few games, if any, offer.

Score: 1.00/1.00 - The multiplayer experience is truly unique and executes the vision flawlessly.

7. Performance & Optimization: 0.80/1.00

While the game never seems to have an insane number of objects, it does have quite a few enemies and projectiles at all times. Mix that with the amount of players and different objectives they're accomplishing, you would expect some slowdown even with a simpler art style.

Slowdown does exist but not where you would expect. During the God's Wrath events, where everyone needs to dodge projectiles, a bit of stuttering seems to happen every time.

Score: 0.80/1.00 - Generally solid performance with occasional hiccups during specific events.

8. Innovation & Originality: 1.00/1.00

Revolutionary Elements: The large number of players in a genre where even basic multiplayer is novel stands out immediately. Making a raid boss feel like a raid boss and not just a damage sponge has been attempted and mostly failed by games outside the MMO genre, and 33 Immortals nails the feel with complex mechanics. Your personal playstyle really feels like you're offering something unique to the group.

Limitations: Those raid bosses are currently few in number.

Score: 1.00/1.00 - Even with the small sample size, the simple ability to accomplish that raid feel inspires confidence.

9. Value for Money: 1.00/1.00

Price Point: Currently $20 in the early access window

Content Volume: Even at roughly 75% of content that will be offered at release, there are still tens of hours or significantly more for players to sink their teeth into.

Value Proposition: 33 Immortals sits at or below the price point of its single-player counterparts, making it a solid value.

Score: 1.00/1.00 - While still incomplete and updating, if you enjoy the genre it is well worth the price, and the early access shouldn't scare you away.

10. Overall Fun Factor: 0.90/1.00

The Joy: Loading into a raid with a bunch of people and scattering to accomplish tasks with limited ability to communicate can sound frustrating, but it leads to fun and flexible gameplay that offers players many ways to help the team. The low-stakes multiplayer is unique and gives you the fun of close team play with your friends in your squad and a broader spectacle when all the players are brought together.

The raid bosses make you feel like an army juggling the adds the boss summons, dealing damage, and reacting to the curve balls the different phases can present.

The Frustration: Much like most roguelikes, the start can be rough. You're underpowered and lack options and can feel dependent on your team for a late run. Dying feels doubly worse because while you're low level, you weren't helping the team much before. If the squad gets you rather than a higher level player, it can feel like you doomed the run. If you're high level, a blunder can feel like the only chance your team had died with you.

Score: 0.90/1.00 - 33 Immortals offers a gameplay experience that feels truly unique. While taking nods and learning lessons from others in the roguelike space, nothing else on the market feels like 33 Immortals. It scratches the itch of an MMO raid with all the unessential parts replaced with tight roguelike gameplay. Even in its early access state, it has more than enough of a content offering, and the unique gameplay ideas are more than deserving of praise.

Final Verdict

Overall Score: 8.8/10.00

Should You Play It in 2025?

Play it if:

You enjoy Hades-likes and MMO raids
You're interested in innovative multiplayer experiences
You don't mind early access titles

Skip it if:

You want to wait for full release
You cannot tolerate any level of grinding
You're looking for a single-player experience

Recommendation: You should absolutely play 33 Immortals even if early access usually turns you away. It is more than worthy of your time and offers abundant enjoyment even in an incomplete state.

Pros and Cons

Pros

Excellent boss fights with true raid mechanics
Combat and build variety
Unique multiplayer experience unlike anything else
Strong visual identity with Renaissance-inspired hellscapes
Solid value for the price point

Cons

Grindy progression, especially between raid tiers
Limited number of boss fights (currently 2)
Early access means incomplete content
Only available on Xbox and Epic Games Store
Some weapon balance issues

Final Thoughts: 33 Immortals is a bold experiment that successfully merges roguelike gameplay with MMO raid mechanics. Despite being in early access, there's enough content and polish here to recommend it to fans of the genre. The innovative multiplayer approach creates memorable moments that you simply can't find elsewhere. If the developers can address the progression pacing and add more raid content, this could easily become a genre-defining title.