A Deep Dive into Hades II’s Branding
Unleashing the Power of Ligatures with Typogram
Ah, the original Hades game — it brings me right back to those days of 2020, stuck at home, with nothing better to do but try my 231 times to beat to the next level in the underworld of Hades. Through this game, I finally made some sense of the family tree in Greek mythology. The sequel, Hades II, just released its early access in May 2024; I can’t wait to get back into its gameplay and stories.
Besides the excruciating gameplay (you read it right, excruciating), the branding of Hades II also caught my attention. Branding plays a crucial role in creating a memorable and recognizable identity for a game, and there are so many memorable game branding that come to mind: Pac-Man, Super Mario, World of Warcraft, Grand Theft Auto, Among Us, Animal Crossing, to name a few.
Hades II’s branding received a significant upgrade from the original title. One of the most notable upgrades in Hades II’s branding is the incorporation of ligature, which adds a unique and stylish touch to the game’s visual identity.
The Art of Ligatures
Let’s define what ligature really is: Ligature is when two letters change themselves to acknowledge each other spatially. Some people may mistake ligature as connecting two letters, which is true in many cases, such as the famous usage of it in The Met logo, it is not necessarily always the case. Sometimes, letters just change themselves to make room for their neighbors without physically connecting.
Initially, ligatures were born out of practical reasons. An f often extends its arm outside its metal-type base, and while it fits with most other lowercase letters like o, e together, the letter i with the dot hanging out will clash with f. Therefore, we mold a special fi glyph to make the most perfect rendition.
In the digital type era, ligatures are no longer created out of necessity, but their origin story has given them a sense of tradition and prestige. Only premium fonts include a wealth of ligatures, designed to communicate legacy, heritage, and elegance.
Ligatures are often seen in brands that we see every day. While roaming around Manhattan, it’s also easy to spot shop signage that features ligatures. Here are some photos I took near 34th Street:
The Evolution of Hades’ Branding
Hades is a roguelike game centered around Greek mythology. Roguelikes are a game genre that features permadeath, meaning if the player dies, they start from ground zero. This type of game is much more brutal and unforgiving.
The original branding successfully conveys this harsh and challenging gameplay using distressed and distorted typography. The rough, gritty appearance of the text in the original Hades branding effectively communicates the game’s punishing nature, where every decision and action can have permanent consequences.
A side note: when creating distressed typography, it’s always better to start with a regular typeface and then distress it yourself rather than choosing a pre-made distressed font. I can explain the reason behind this with an analogy of stone-washed jeans: You first make the jeans out of regular denim and then stone-wash the jeans, instead of make jeans using pre-washed fabric. By manually distressing the letterforms, you have greater control to ensure that the distressing looks natural and intentional.
While the original branding of Hades is not bad, it felt unfinished, especially with the half-baked ligature between the H and A. The A cuts its left leg short to acknowledge the letter H, but the latter pays no mind to its neighbor, maintaining the mundane look of a typical serif H. Like unrequited love, the half-hearted attempt at the HA ligature in original Hades left much to be desired.
Hades II: Where Gore Meets Elegance
Hades II’s brand logo carries over the praised distressed look with a refreshing take on the HA ligature. The letter H extends its right serif and curves up to form a nice swash, paying tribute to the sacrifice the letter A made by shortening its left leg. The letterforms complete each other gracefully, creating a more harmonious and visually appealing ligature.
The Hades II logo is a prime example of how ligatures can be used to create a unique and recognizable wordmark. The combination of distressed letters and a well-executed ligature results in a surprising mix of gore and elegance that somehow just works.
Unlocking the World of Ligatures with Typogram
Inspired by the effective use of ligatures in Hades II’s branding, you might be wondering how you can incorporate this technique into your own projects. This is where Typogram comes in. As the creator of Typogram, I admit that I am biased, but please allow me to say this: I genuinely believe that Typogram is the easiest and most empowering graphic design tool for creating logos with ligatures.
The hardest part of incorporating ligatures in your design is finding the right fonts that contain the desired ligatures. Ligatures are a non-standard feature in fonts, and even if a font has ligatures, the coverage varies from one font to another. As a designer, a significant part of my profession involves becoming intimately familiar with a wide range of fonts, allowing me to know which ones have the appropriate ligatures for a given project. This level of expertise obviously takes years of work experience to develop. So, how can you find ligatures more easily?
Typogram provides a solution by filtering fonts based on your selected text, showing only those that have ligature coverage applicable to your content!
Select the text object you want to apply ligatures to. In this example, we’ll use the Hade’s brother “Poseidon” for our demo.
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In the right sidebar, find the dropdown menu labeled “All Tools” and change it to “Ligature.” This shortcut filters the properties and tools on the sidebar to only display ligature-related options. Don’t worry; you can still expand the full set of tools below if needed.
Click on the “Font Family” dropdown to expand the font menu, then click on the “All” tab.
Notice that all the fonts have been automatically filtered by the “Has Ligature” option. Every font shown here contains ligatures that are applicable to your selected text, “Poseidon.”
Let’s select one of these fonts, “Fleur,” and explore its ligatures. Fonts with a diamond icon are premium, exclusive fonts available to Typogram through our collaboration with The Type Founders! These high-quality fonts are more likely to have ligatures, which is why you’ll see a disproportionately higher number of diamond fonts when filtering by “Has Ligature.”
After choosing “Fleur,” the available ligatures for your selected text are displayed at the top. In this case, there are two options for the letter pair ‘on.’
How to find ligature based on specific letters
If you want to find ligatures for a specific letter pair, such as “ei,” you can do so by changing the select tool from “Move” to “Select Letter” and then selecting the “e” and “i” letters.
Now, go to the font menu, it is already filtered by “Has Substitutions.” Ligatures are essentially multiple glyphs substituted with a single glyph. Since we selected the letters “e” and “i,” we’re only seeing fonts that can substitute these two letters with a ligature glyph.
I think “Mezzotint” looks pretty cool! Let’s select that and check out the substitution glyph. After applying the “Mezzotint” font to the letters “e” and “i,” we can see its substitution glyphs in the side panel above the font menu. The ligature may look subtle, but it’s elegant. You can click on it to apply it to the canvas for a more detailed look.
If you’re satisfied with this font and want to apply it to the entire line of text, there are a few extra steps. Good news, the font name is automatically copied to your clipboard when you select it in the font menu. Simply select the text, paste the font name into the search bar, and apply it. The “ei” ligature will be preserved, so no need to worry about that!
Here’s a bonus tip: Select one letter at a time to check if there are suitable substitution glyphs available. Substitution glyphs often carry a unique design that can further elevate your brand! The Poseidon brand could use a swashy capital P!
With Typogram’s intuitive tools around ligatures and substitutions, you can fine-tune your ligature design until it perfectly captures the essence of your brand. Whether you’re creating a logo for a game, a business, or a personal project, incorporating ligatures can help you stand out from the crowd and make a lasting impression on your audience!