Dream no more
Every year in this pleasant little industry we have on our laps, two major sides to the general gaming fandom arise from the disparity ushered in by the sparking of The First Flame. The big AAA world-burner games that are, to coin the name of that first achievement from Modern Warfare 3 that I've never forgotten after all of these years, 'too big to fail'; and the more demure and refined shade of independent fandoms which may not burn as loudly but often, due to the more intimate nature of the relationship between fan and developer, burns a lot brighter and longer. A great AAA game will usually flare up in popularity for a few months, in incredibly rare cases it may be good enough to last years, but typically the next entry will drag everyone's attention elsewhere. Good indie titles seem to almost imprint on the very souls of their fans to the point where those very people will swing their bulwarks in it's defence and readily sing it's praises from the rafters until there are none left who haven't heard of the game in question. That was how, after all of these years, I finally got around to playing the indie darling cult-classic Hollow Knight.
I tell you this story because, if you've hung around this blog for a while, you'll know that platformers aren't typically the sorts of games that I shoot for. I'm not good at them, they can get repetitive fast for me, and I even got bored playing the beginning areas of Metroid Dread, so you know I'm predisposed against this style of game. But after the third consecutive year of hearing this thing's name dragged into otherwise sensible conversation, seeing the infectious, feverous stupor behind these rapid soul's eyes, well I've had to give the source of the infestation a little look over at some point, just to see what all the fuss was about. Afterall, that was how I discovered 'Star Wars Empire at War', despite being a total strategy dunce and now that's my second favourite Star Wars game of all time! (Actually... I have played Fallen Order since then. Hmm... Nah, Order can take Third.) With a positive mental attitude and an appetite to be invested, I snatched up this game with the cute little stag beetle on the cover and dived into Hallownest for the first time.
In an utterly basic premise, because I would be totally sickened with myself were I to tread on the carefully manicured storyline that Team Cherry orchestrated, Hollow Knight is a game about bugs. But of course there's more to it. It's a magical society of sapient monarchist bugs, sprawled in a vast and undeniably deep 'dark fantasy' world called the Hallownest. You arrive in these lands as a voiceless Knight, find the solitary surface town of Dirtmouth practically abandoned and get to the work of unravelling the mysteries of this place and it's many decidedly truculent inhabitants. (98% try to kill you the second they see you; so that's a bag of worms to unravel all on it's own.) How everything plays out from even that beginning point is too interesting and intricate for me to lay out here, but I will say there's a clear and incredibly well-executed mimicry of Dark Souls-style storytelling on display here. Drip fed myth wrapped in stories and bequeathed in a box of mystery. And knowing the love I put upon Dark Souls' name, you know that's not a comparison I make lightly.
So then the obvious next question would be: is this a Souls-like? To which my answer is no. Whilst there is a mechanic of dying and leaving a wraith with your currency that you then have to hunt down, that's where the similarities end. This isn't an RPG with stat sheets and the like, and there's no tons of weapons and armour sets to go hunting down for obscure boosts to some ridiculous stat like 'Resistance'. Instead what we have here is a much more time honoured genre of game in a 'Metroidvania', which is to refer to the sort of game designed in the style of old school Metroid. (And Castlevania, I guess, but Castlevania grew into that sort of game, Metroid more pioneered it.) So the name of the game is exploration, discovering the environment, mapping your progress, spotting dead ends and then becoming intimately familiar with the place so that you backtrack across the land once you've got this one piece of gear that works in this certain area. It is perhaps one of the most time-consuming types of platformer one can make as it requires a 3 dimensional design philosophy to always account for the relationship between areas, how shortcuts might fit in, the places in which the story will lay itself out, and all that nattering organisational stuff. (It sounds like a headache.)
I've played a fair few games like this in the past and have a sort of love-hate relationship with the set-up. On one hand, when done well it can result in an incredibly organic feeling game world that you come to memorise as one might a childhood haunt, so much that you squeal with wonder a little everytime you uncover some wild new route that connects to areas you thought you knew so well. Hollow Knight performs this style of game incredibly well and discovering it's little nooks and crannies sometimes surpasses the handle on this genre that classics like 'Symphony of the Night' manage in their execution. I've stumbled into odd little caves and discovered whole new environments that are entirely non critical to the core story and just full of little secrets and charms, or sometimes even just a snippet of lore. Yes, Hollow Knight is the sort of game which is so proud of itself that it can place its hardest optional platforming challenge in an area where the only reward on the otherside is a 5 second cutscene, and it still feels somewhat rewarding. (Tell Miyazaki and I'll deny I ever said it, but sometimes I think this world might even be superior to some Souls ones!)
That praise comes all down to the execution of The Hallownest, the subterranean collection of terrarium-esque distinct biomes the populate this rather hefty and dense world. These environments are lovingily drawn and rendered with that moody, eerie atmosphere of a rich world recently made utterly empty which Dark Souls veterans will be more than familiar with. Aiding this is the gorgeous musical score by Christopher Larkin which broods and gently whispers in the Forgotten Crossroads, skitters and crawls in the Deepnest and howls and whines in Kingdom's Edge. (Or Howling Cliffs- dammit, I forgot there's an optional area named after that!) It is unerringly beautiful, from the depths of the Abyss to the summits of Crystal Peak, and those who may have glanced the odd screenshot and feared for those dour blues need not be concerned; though the palette is typically demure, you
do have explosion of
greens and
purples and billowing cloudy
golds depending on the biome you're trekking around in. It's just one of the many ways the developers successfully segment their world in order to make the space feel naturally enormous whilst in reality being actually rather comfortably manageable. Going from one end to the other might take all of 10 minutes, (provided you know what you're doing and have all movement tools) but it feels like an epic adventurous trek, and you
know that's what I seek most of all from my game worlds.
Speaking of 'worlds', I want to vent a little bit about how the Map works, because I think it alone tells you the sort of experience that Team Cherry want exploration to be for the player. When you first rock up to the Forgotten Crossroads, you have absolutely no map. At some point you'll happen upon a studious Weevil with a pleasant hum and a penchant for leaving discarded quills about the place leading to his location. (a clever environmental tool for finding him in future encounters from Team Cherry.) He'll
sell you a map to your location (each area has it's own map), so that's already pretty eyebrow raising for not being a freely given map like most games prefer. Then you'll learn that the map has some locations filled out already, which doesn't cover the breadth of the area and nor does it update. No, you have to trek all the way back to Dirtmouth in order to talk to his wife to purchase a quill and
then you can update the map. But even then the map
only updates when resting at a bench. (this game's substitute for bonfires) Of course, even at
that point you're using the map like an 18th century cartographer, trying to desperately match the shape of the world with the shapes on your paper, because you yourself don't appear on it! For that you need to source another item in the Charm called 'Wayward Compass'. And so you can glimpse the intentions of the developers; they want your exploration to be organic and fuelled by curiosity rather than "Well I haven't been to
this part of the map yet" which sets you in the mindset for learning to look at the world and really start appreciating the helpful quirks to the world which makes every corridor distinct and new.
Which brings us, I suppose, to Charms: Hollow Knight's gear system. Rather than throw dozens of new rapidly depreciated spears and swords at the Knight, Hollow Knight gives the player a single blade (adorably called a 'Nail') Which it expects the player to slowly level up over the course of the game in a manner befitting a proper Metroidvania. But builds and playstyles do still exist in this meaty little package through the inclusion of Charms, little trinkets that the player can equip a certain number of (dependent on their power level and the amount of Charm notches owned) and which all provide a unique boon of some sort. We've seen these sorts of systems done before in other titles, but once again I have to take off my hat to Hollow Knight for doing justice to this setup. You see each charm is unique, which means you're not going to be digging up some minor bauble which grants plus 4% to attack damage, but beefy Charms like 'Fragile Strength' which increases damage by 50% but breaks if still worn when the player dies. Or 'Thorns of Agony' which lashes out some revenge damage everytime your little Knight gets hit. 'Quick Slash', which boosts the speed you swing you Nail, might work well with 'Fragile Strength' which also synergies with 'Steady Body' (nullifies player recoil) in order to make your Knight effectively able to pingpong charging enemies and do rapid damage around as long as that particular foe can suffer knockback. That's just one potential set-up and the game has a total of 40 charms. Mixing and matching is essentially setting yourself up for a different build and can be done totally freely at any bench, fleshing out topics like boss strategy to a whole new dimension through rapid build adjustment. I won't claim to be an expert and I'm still finding new Charms that I love for the day all the time, and that just goes to show you how well a deceptively simple system works at drilling depth into a game like this.
Enemies are, of course, a big part of the equation when it comes to Metroidvania games, as these are the many folks you'll be slaying to pieces on your journeys from one important story locale to another tough boss beatdown. Lots of games in this genre have these iconic trash mobs whom have you struggle almost as much as the end of level boss does; The Medusa heads from Castlevania, The Iron Knuckles and appropriately named 'Fokkas' from 'The Legend of Zelda II: The Adventure of Link' and pretty much everything with a pulse in Irithyll from Dark Souls III. I didn't really find that trash mob in Hollow Knight. Don't get me wrong, there were the odd tough enemy which had me sweating the first few times I faced them, but no one creature which had me sighing my guts out everytime I saw them. Which is somewhat indicative of the difficulty level which the entire game operates under. Hollow Knight is actually somewhat approachable to casual platform players in it's base body. Almost deceptively so...
Bosses are what the game is mostly about, although I will say that I expected them to take a much more prominent role in the structure of this game world. There were times when I had entered and explored a new area head-to-toe (as much as I
could for that first time) and didn't encounter a single boss creature, which sometimes made me feel as though I wasn't exactly progressing with pace. (In my Dark Souls-addled mind) When they
did take the time out of their day to come and meet me, they were certainly worth the wait. Great bug-themed enemy visual design, rhythmic and well animated attack sets and a fantastic array of unique tracks from the OST makes every single Boss memorable. (Even the silly throwaway bosses, like Gruz Mother) Although... and I'm being nitpicky here- they were all pretty easy. I mean throughout the whole game. I don't think a single boss from the main game had me actually sit-up and pay attention for the first entire half of the game, and even in the second half I never really sweated it out. This game didn't use me like a ragdoll and toss me aside like the Souls games usually do on my first run, and maybe that's a consequence of the comparatively straight-forward and easier to grasp 2 dimensional world, or maybe that's a conscious effort from Team Cherry to be accommodating to non-hardcore players. None of the base game bosses felt like throwaway trash, and I never found a vanilla boss moveset I thought to be 'unfair'. (In keeping with the general polished sheen of the whole game, I guess.)
Exploration was a somewhat consistent source of frustration for my early snippets of gameplay, and not just for that fiddly map system. Whilst this game's narrative drinks deep from the Dark Souls well of wanton obfuscation, Team Cherry actually dared to go one devotion higher by literally giving the player no motivation until they reach the middle of Hallownest. (which is a good chunk into the game, mind.) Meaning that for a solid few hours you literally have no idea where you're supposed to be going. This would be fine if not for the fact that a few of the directions you're supposed to take are so off-the-beaten path that it can be genuinely frustrating to walk back and forth feeling stuck about what to do next. Add onto that the fact that blocked routes (places in Metroidvania games that are designed to be dead-ends right now so that they can be navigated later with a specialised piece of equipment) aren't ever marked on the map. When you get to the middle stages of the game, and are juggling three different area maps in your overworld, it can be a real headache to try and figure out what routes you got caught off at and which you might now be able to traverse with your cool new gadget. And I know this is a genuine issue the developers themselves spotted late, because the first update for the game included the ability to buy little manual map pins that you can slap around yourself to keep track of niggling dead-ends.
On the topic of updates, there's a reason why I subtly specified 'the base game' when talking about Hollow Knight's difficulty. Everything was pretty easy
in the base game, no bosses felt cheap or overly annoying
in the base game. That's because Hollow Knight was treated to four rather substantial updates that each acted like free fleshed-out DLC packs to the game, most of which were decently embedded into the base structure of the world to feel like natural optional content. And whatever lingering glimmer of goodwill that Team Cherry felt towards their players when making the base Hollow Knight was clearly long expended by the time they reached these updates. Two of the updates in question added some mechanical things here and there, changed up small parts, sprinkled some extra depth to the odd bits and ends, and even added a couple of secret remix bosses. The last two were a declaration of war on anyone who found Hollow Knight too easy.
The Grimm Troupe adds a delightfully fun mini-story largely unconnected from the main narrative that introduces a few charms and one of the hardest boss fights I think I've ever endured. Oh yeah, Nightmare King Grimm ripped my Nail in half, stuck the sharp end down my throat and used me as a mop to scrub up the excrement I involuntarily released in response to the sheer ferocity of his moveset. Good. God. Every single pirouette, dive, spike, bat flurry and ball-shooty-attack-thing was layered with enough cheese to stink out the Louvre. Reaction times were as strict as they feasibly could be, and layered with special little 'F#@> You' flourishes that made every mistake a practical death sentence. Ask me no longer if I've ever danced with the Devil in the pale moonlight, because after NKG I've mastered the Backwards Atomic Breakdance Boogie whilst serenaded by the cacophonous throbbing pulse of the nightmarish heart of Hell itself dragged up from the lakes of Pandemonium to sear its grim beat into the white flesh of my ear drums. The only saving grace of this travesty is that Nightmare King Grimm's theme slaps stupidly hard. Thank you, Christopher, your music alone kept my head above the billowing furrows of abject insanity.
Godmaster is the final DLC/free update and is served as a fitting send off to the game from the team. Functionally a boss rush mode, Team Cherry spared no expense intricately crafting a narratively sound implementation for such a mode to exist within the world of Hallownest and crammed enough content for an entire small game's worth of gameplay to be experienced in this one area alone. Godmaster is essentially a challenge to prove one's mastery of the game, with Pantheons of bosses that stretch from sweat-inducing to "Oh, my god this is going to take an hour to even attempt", Challenge modes against each individual boss that range from "Oh, the arena is slightly changed and he hits twice as hard" to "Help, the boss will kill me in a single hit. Save me from this carnage!" and even a brand new ending thrown into the game with remixed bosses and a seriously cool last showdown that's its almost a shame how few of the fanbase will be willing to endure the 42 straight boss rush required to see it. (I am not exaggerating.)
The only part of this game I can't breakdown for fear of spoiling the fun is the narrative, but maybe a more general assessment of it as a whole will give you an impression of my thoughts. Whilst coming across decently Soulsian in it's presentation, I actually found the bare narrative beats decently easy to follow so that I didn't suffer that typical Souls-like dilemma of "Okay, I beat the final boss and got an ending. Now what does that even mean?" But the storytellers take easily discernible glee in hiding the finer points and grander motivations behind the literarily enigmatic ramblings of some strange NPC tucked in the furthest reaches of the world behind an illusionary wall somewhere. It's practically nectar for people like me who delight in piecing together the significance of an addled Knight's turd sculptures and their wider lore implications. (Oh, he makes one of
you at some point... how delightful...) Unlike Dark Souls (I'm sorry for the constant comparisons but I swear they're made with love!) Team Cherry aren't afraid to snatch the player up for a few set piece moments that land beautifully not just for their gorgeously grand delivery but their relative rarity against the rest of the game. The set piece for the true ending of the base game in particular is just epic. It's worth going the extra mile just to experience that alone.
Summary
In conclusion, Hollow Knight is a hauntingly beautiful swanswong of a Metroidvania title, effortlessly colliding intriguing world design, engaging gameplay and a brilliant score. The amount of content and depth tucked away in all of it's little corners is enough to give a satisfying and surprisingly hefty first playthrough and lay enough groundwork for significant replay value. Some of the later challenges, specifically the postgame content, veers a little into 'ridiculously hard' territory at times, but for the most-part Hollow Knight remains an enjoyable and rewarding experience from beginning to end. Provided you're willing to buy into it's premise and immerse yourself in the world, Hollow Knight will snatch you away into a rich Dark Fantasy adventure that takes itself surprisingly serious considering the almost cutesy visage of The Knight on the boxart. I, personally, cannot put the game down to the point I've been dipping out of this review to bang my head on 'Godmaster' some more, that's evidence in itself for how addictive this lean little title can be. For those with a love for Platformers, Metroidvanias and all things Souls-esque, this is a must-buy recommend, and I think there's something here for you even if you're a platforming agnostic. With a little bit of deliberation on the sub-grade, I feel comfortable giving Hollow Knight a solid A Grade, flanked with an order to pick this game up if you haven't already; these are the sorts of crazy good games we need more of in the industry! My only lingering gripe is now I have this game's upcoming sequel, 'Hollow Knight: Silk Song', on my watch-list, towering that pile of 'anticipated games' to about level with the Burj Khalifa.
