Something went wrong. Try again later
    Follow

    Shovel Knight

    Game » consists of 36 releases. Released Jun 26, 2014

    An action-platformer paying homage to 8-bit classics like Mega Man and Castlevania. It is developed by a small group of former WayForward employees, with funding through Kickstarter.

    Just finished Shovel Knight.

    Avatar image for nags
    Nags

    189

    Forum Posts

    0

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 0

    Got it on Wii U. Amazing game. Short but great. Really scratches that Megaman and Castlevania itch.
    Some real love was put into that game. Was expecting a polished pixel art indie title (and it was that) but it was much more. The end actually got me misty eyed. As well as every time you have to catch the Shield Knight, just to wake up at the campfire the next day. Gave me those feels.

    The Mole Knight and Tinker Knight level (music) themes are my favorites in the game.

    What version did you get?

    Are you enjoying it?

    Did you beat it?

    Avatar image for wemibelle
    Wemibelle

    2742

    Forum Posts

    2671

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 76

    User Lists: 11

    I got the PC version. Runs perfectly and looks phenomenal on my monitor. Plays pretty damn well with the Dual Shock 4, too. I've beaten, including all music sheets and upgrades, and had a great time with it. My only real complaint is the usage of the "knocked back when being hit" trope of this style of game, since I feel it adds bullshit artificial difficulty. Will probably do the NG+ at some point in the near future. As for the music, I found most it to be fine but not really memorable. Kinda disappointed by it actually, especially coming from Jake Kaufman. I do really like the second-to-last level stage music though--it's pretty damn good.

    Avatar image for nags
    Nags

    189

    Forum Posts

    0

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 0

    The Wii U version lets you use the touchscreen to switch sub-weapons on the fly. No need to pause the game to do it. You can still do it the old-fashioned if you want. I got so used to using the touchscreen for weapon switching that I can't really play the game any other way. No steam version for me. Besides, I would consider the Wii U version to be the definitive.

    Avatar image for deactivated-601df795ee52f
    deactivated-601df795ee52f

    3618

    Forum Posts

    6548

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 1

    User Lists: 1

    Played through it on Wii U. Overall I'd say I really enjoyed it. The game has a lot of heart and although it takes a lot from older games, it still feels like its own game. (Which is something that's crucial when there's so many of these 8 bit throwback games)

    Definitely gonna play through it again on new game plus, and I'm looking forward to the inevitable sequel.

    Avatar image for shorefirems
    ShorefireMS

    11

    Forum Posts

    0

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 0

    I've finished it on 3DS. Fantastic game, very well made and I was surprised by how affecting the ending was to me.

    That game controls very well with a Dpad, and although the 3D effects didn't add much, I'm very glad they released a version for 3DS.

    That game is a good portable game, taking it to work and playing a few screens during break or a longer session during lunch was very convenient.

    They'll be posting more and more content in updates, so I can't wait for this great game to grow even more.

    Avatar image for development
    development

    3749

    Forum Posts

    61

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 0

    #6  Edited By development

    Played on the PC.

    I liked the first half much more than the latter levels. Way too much use off the insta-death falls in later levels. Sometimes that was the only gimmick for large portions of levels. Just isn't fun, and it's silly when the game seems to make a point to give you those heart containers. It should be giving you parachutes instead. Maybe if the damage was like Zelda, and it just took a couple hearts of damage away instead, it'd be better.

    Anyways, I really enjoyed the rest of the game, and the animations, sounds, and music were all top notch. 13/19 stars.

    Avatar image for esrever
    ESREVER

    2923

    Forum Posts

    5

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 18

    I finished it on PC with the 144fps bug and it was so much fun. I tried playing it without the high frame rate and it was just toooo slow.

    Avatar image for ervonymous
    ervonymous

    1299

    Forum Posts

    2643

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 0

    Playing on PC. I wish they gave you an Easy / Normal difficulty option at the start instead of just making NG+ harder, it's closer to old Mega Man levels of difficulty with no turkey, double damage and all but two checkpoints off. The boss rush gets a lot more interesting with turkey only after every other encounter. I'm slowly going for the no deaths / destroy all checkpoints run on a fresh save file, only taking on levels I'm comfortable with. Treasure Knight's up next.

    The dream sequences still give me chills, the music is so hauntingly serene and melancholy.

    Avatar image for csl316
    csl316

    17004

    Forum Posts

    765

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 10

    Beat it the other day, ended up liking it more and more as I went. Though the phase locket kind of broke the game. I'd patch out the ability to hit dudes while phasing.

    Avatar image for nags
    Nags

    189

    Forum Posts

    0

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 0

    @shorefirems: Oh, I had no idea they were going to add content to the game. Definitely looking forward to it.

    Avatar image for bollard
    Bollard

    8298

    Forum Posts

    118

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 3

    User Lists: 12

    @esrever said:

    I finished it on PC with the 144fps bug and it was so much fun. I tried playing it without the high frame rate and it was just toooo slow.

    What bug is that?

    Avatar image for tennmuerti
    Tennmuerti

    9465

    Forum Posts

    1

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 1

    User Lists: 7

    #12  Edited By Tennmuerti

    @development said:

    Played on the PC.

    I liked the first half much more than the latter levels. Way too much use off the insta-death falls in later levels. Sometimes that was the only gimmick for large portions of levels. Just isn't fun, and it's silly when the game seems to make a point to give you those heart containers. It should be giving you parachutes instead. Maybe if the damage was like Zelda, and it just took a couple hearts of damage away instead, it'd be better.

    Anyways, I really enjoyed the rest of the game, and the animations, sounds, and music were all top notch. 13/19 stars.

    Yep well put, that's mostly my feelings on it too.

    Avatar image for rmanthorp
    rmanthorp

    4654

    Forum Posts

    3603

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 1

    User Lists: 14

    #13 rmanthorp  Moderator

    Moved this to the game page instead of the character page.

    I've not played the game yet but I can't wait to pick it up - glad people are enjoying it!

    Avatar image for shorefirems
    ShorefireMS

    11

    Forum Posts

    0

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 0

    #15  Edited By ShorefireMS
    No Caption Provided

    @nags: I'm very excited about the upcoming updates, and from what I understand they will all be free content updates to the game.

    On a side-note, it looks like they'll be releasing merchandise and apparel as well. Gonna have to get some Shovel Knight rep out on the street.

    Avatar image for conmulligan
    conmulligan

    2292

    Forum Posts

    11722

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 11

    #16  Edited By conmulligan

    How's the 3DS version? I don't have a Wii U and I'm not really that keen to play it on PC. I was going to wait until the inevitable Xbox One or PS4 version, but given how well it's been received I'm getting antsy to give it a go...

    Avatar image for shorefirems
    ShorefireMS

    11

    Forum Posts

    0

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 0

    @conmulligan: I've beaten the campaign on 3DS and working through New Game+ right now. The platforming handles real well with the D-pad and face buttons on the 3DS. Music is clear and the screen comes through nice and pretty on my 3DS XL. I found it real easy to pick up and play at work or at home.

    I haven't had much use of the Streetpass arena, I live in Mississippi so a streetpass is rare enough, much less a Shovel Knight Streetpass. The 3D layering of the screen is fine, it works well but isn't anything to write home about.

    Tip: if you play it on 3DS, you may want to adjust your button layout. The default way to use a relic is Up and Y, which I found very annoying. The alternate option is to use R, which I found much much better.

    Avatar image for conmulligan
    conmulligan

    2292

    Forum Posts

    11722

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 11

    @shorefirems: Nice, that's great to hear. I'll check it out this weekend.

    Avatar image for miyuki
    Miyuki

    181

    Forum Posts

    0

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 5

    User Lists: 14

    I have the Wii U version, and I love it. Fantastic throwback, but it manages to improve the genre. I haven't finished yet!

    Avatar image for zornack
    Zornack

    263

    Forum Posts

    162

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 1

    #20  Edited By Zornack

    I beat it the other day on 3DS. It's great. Looks great, controls great and sounds great. I do think the balance is a bit whacked, though. You get way too much health way too quickly which trivializes combat too early in the game. By the third boss I could pretty much just tank and spam attack and I'd be in no danger of dying. I would have preferred a difficulty curve which forced me to dodge more.

    Avatar image for hailinel
    Hailinel

    25785

    Forum Posts

    219681

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 10

    User Lists: 28

    I have the Wii U version and I'm enjoying it. I'm only a few stages in, but it's a fantastic game and the perfect way to do make a retro-themed platformer. The Wii U/Miiverse-specific features are also a fantastic touch. The 8-bit style Miiverse interface is amazing!

    Avatar image for retrovirus
    retrovirus

    1669

    Forum Posts

    130

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 17

    Just finished it on PC after 5 hours, 121 deaths. Really enjoyed the measured difficulty of the game. A minor quibble, though, was the loss of gold and subsequent corpse runs to grab the floating bags. It's not a huge deal, but I did find it aggravating more often than not trying to get them and ending up dying. Then again, there's enough treasure to go around that it doesn't impact you too much.

    Avatar image for esrever
    ESREVER

    2923

    Forum Posts

    5

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 18

    @bollard said:

    @esrever said:

    I finished it on PC with the 144fps bug and it was so much fun. I tried playing it without the high frame rate and it was just toooo slow.

    What bug is that?

    Loading Video...

    This is how the game played for me. If you enable vsync on a monitor with a high refresh rate, you get this.

    Avatar image for triumvir
    triumvir

    644

    Forum Posts

    103

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 5

    #25  Edited By triumvir

    Really liking the game so far (currently at Mole Knight's stage). Though I will admit to finding the difficulty to have strange spikes and a general unevenness (like how is Spectre Knight such a fucker while Treasure Knight is a joke?).

    Knock back is annoying but they give you plenty of tools to deal with it. My biggest gripe is that the loot bags you drop when you die should always be placed in areas where you can actually retrieve them without dying again, which is a frequent problem when you die in pits. Dark Souls may put your blood stain in tough places from time to time, but it is never impossible to retrieve as is so often the case in Shovel Knight. It sort of defeats the point of the system, when you can't reliably get your loot back. The treasure magnet potion is a poor substitute for a more reasonable placement system for the loot bags. If that was a design choice on the part of the devs, then I'd say it was a poor one.

    Avatar image for tophar01
    tophar01

    284

    Forum Posts

    6

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 0

    @csl316 said:

    Beat it the other day, ended up liking it more and more as I went. Though the phase locket kind of broke the game. I'd patch out the ability to hit dudes while phasing.

    Yea I used the phasing to just kinda brute force my way through boss fights, felt pretty cheesy, but hey cheesing is gaming.

    Avatar image for tophar01
    tophar01

    284

    Forum Posts

    6

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 0

    #27  Edited By tophar01

    I thought it was pretty good, I do think shovel knight sometimes feels a little slow compared to everything else going on and I definitely enjoyed the earlier stages more than the later ones but that's probably because I was terrible at it. Really dug the soundtrack though.

    Avatar image for deactivated-5cc8838532af0
    deactivated-5cc8838532af0

    3170

    Forum Posts

    3

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 12

    I played on 3DS and had a blast. Controls felt right at home on that d-pad. Also probably the first game I played all the way through with 3D turned on. Some of the layering with the backgrounds looked really good. Brought a little something extra to a visual style I was a little tired of. Just starting New Game + which is kind of a let down because it doesn't seem to change much other than removing a lot of checkpoints and health pickups. I'll still finish it again though.

    Avatar image for jiggajoe14
    jiggajoe14

    1826

    Forum Posts

    0

    Wiki Points

    0

    Followers

    Reviews: 0

    User Lists: 12

    I wanted to get this on wii u, but of course I'm letting my brother borrow it so I got it on PC. Just beat it. Thought the fight with the Enchantress was a real pain in the ass lol. Great game though.

    This edit will also create new pages on Giant Bomb for:

    Beware, you are proposing to add brand new pages to the wiki along with your edits. Make sure this is what you intended. This will likely increase the time it takes for your changes to go live.

    Comment and Save

    Until you earn 1000 points all your submissions need to be vetted by other Giant Bomb users. This process takes no more than a few hours and we'll send you an email once approved.