Quick Look: Hollow Knight

This game is really good and more people should play it.

I so can't wait to play this!

I've heard such mixed opinions on this one. Curious to see what the Beast Coast thinks.

It launched with severe performance issues on PC but they have patched it and now it's a dream to play. I love this game.

This reminds me, I should really finish Ori and the Blind Forest. Hopefully this comes to PS4 or the XBO.

That six eyed creature in the spiky cave at 11:36 sounds like the bad guy in Inspector Gadget.

This game is very very good and I would recommend it heartily! I'm playing it on a TV with Steam Link and it's just so gorgeous and super fun. The music is incredible and honestly I was a bit lukewarm on it until I got the ability from the area Alex was in. I'm loving my time with it so far for sure.

There is totally a fast travel system and you kind of were supposed to have come across it by the point in this video!

This game is the definition of a hidden gem.

@ninnyjams It's easy enough to miss, I think.

Good video, guys. If you come back to it, @alex, I recommend practicing the downward slash (down+attack in mid-air). It's super helpful against enemies like the shield knight, and the last flying bug you fought. Hollow Knight starts solidly, but it really comes into its own a little ways after Greenpath.

is this the dark souls of 2d dark souls games?

@ripelivejam: I would say Salt and Sanctuary has that title, but Hollow Knight definitely takes some aspects of Dark Souls. Benches being campfires, and going to find your spirit in order to regain your geo instead of souls.

I'm really happy to see a Quick Look of Hollow Knight! It's been my favorite indie game of 2017 so far and it absolutely deserves as much attention as it can get. Watching Alex attempt Greenpath seemingly without realizing that you can look down to pan the camera and bounce off of enemies by slashing downward at them was pretty entertaining.

This might be my favorite Metroidvania ever, and I've played most of the heavy hitters. One of the few games I've bothered getting 100% in. It's fantastic.

My one complaint is that I'm not a fan of the way they tell the story. I actually have no idea what's going on in this game plot-wise. I'm just not a fan of the whole "let's not tell players what's going on and force them to piece the story together through extremely vague and confusing bits of lore sprinkled throughout the world" school of storytelling.

I fucking love this game. It's the first time I've actually discovered a game and completed it before GB coverage was a thing. The game is amazing and more people playing it will only show them how wonderful it is.

Except for a couple places near the end everything in the game is great.

Game of the Year material, my current top contender

I don't think Alex knows you can downward slash, would of made some stuff easier.

I hope this doesn't take too long to come to the switch, it would be great if it was in May or June

Thank you for doing a QL of this game Alex, I'm glad it gets coverage because more people need to know about it.

@silversaint: Yeah the downward slash is incredibly useful in this game since a successful hit bounces you back up so you can just keep slashing down at an enemy. It is also required to get across some sections of the map.

I played an hour or so of this when it came out and really liked what I saw. However, I'm not sure if was just me, but I found the platforming just floaty enough that I couldn't land a jump to save my life. I'll definitely give it another try as I really love a good Guacavania.

My current game of the year as well though I've not played several of the heavy hitters yet (planning on playing Persona, BotW, and Nier at least from the list big games I can think of). Music is fantastic, art is great, gameplay is mostly great (there's an optional section where the mobility vs the required platforming felt slightly off to me, but since it is an optional area I'll only slightly ding them for it).

I've never seen this game before but that art style has me sold. Looks amazing.

I'm about ~30 hours in and am thoroughly charmed. I never expected to like the game so much, not even when I started playing it. The first area is the weakest, and the jungle is much more interesting but still not close to as interesting as the game gets. The art gets stronger, the atmosphere gets more diverse, and every new power opens up movement or combat in an entertaining way. I love the badges that let you add riffs, like no knockback on you, or being able to dash more frequently. But the big thing is the further in you get, the more wrinkles in the lore and world design you encounter. There are a shocking number of clever, creepy, or honestly cute twists around that world.

It's captivating for me so far. My current GOTY topping Horizon, RE7, and NIOH, though I loved all of those too. Also 2017 has been a wildly good year for games so far.

Not too sure why but this is the only game I have on my computer currently that doesn't seem to want to work with an XB1 controller. It is always having the character move to the left as soon as I start a game which makes it basically unplayable. I have seen other comments from people saying the same thing so I believe it is hit or miss but just wanted to throw that out there since it was definitely a bummer for me. I just play with a PS4 controller now but prefer the XB1. It is very odd that this seems to have been an issue for some people but never addressed in a patch. Wonder what it is that is messing it up.

Looks fantastic. Might wait for the Switch version... to have something to play on the Switch?

I feel like the camera is a little too close, but otherwise this looks pretty interesting.

This game was so awesome. I just finished my first playthrough last night (took me about 30 hrs and I got 97% completion).

Some of the platforming portions towards the end were incredibly frustrating though.

Thanks for covering this game. I don't think it's getting the attention it deserves. It's a behemoth which took me over 80 hours to get the 100% completion stat and all of the various achievements. It's an unbelievable bargain at its current price. Be prepared to put the hours in, though! It's slow paced at first, but as your abilities expand you are flying (sometimes quite literally) through areas the entire size of what is shown in this quick look in less than 60 seconds. Everyone should play this game - I genuinely believe it's one of the best that has ever been made.

Can anyone describe why they think this is awesome? Just watched the quick look and the quality and aesthetic of it seems really solid and great; but does the game-play eventually do something that elevates what's shown in the quicklook?

This music sounds so good, like the best parts of the Spirited Away soundtrack.

@murdoc_: Well, you get abilities and get different charms that do a lot of neat stuff, though some of the abilities are pretty standard for a metroidvania. Like wall jumping, dashing, double-jumping etc. Once you get those the moving around feels really fast and fluid. And especially with the charms once you get enough notches to add a bunch of them, you can experiment with different combinations for builds, like if you want really good defensive buffs and abilities, or focus a lot on the attack power, or perhaps healing.

been debating playing this but it seems to scratch that aria of sorrow void that has been missing for over a decade now and think I might pick it up after I burn out on uprising in overwatch and finish grinding flying in wow legion today

switch version would be really cool but guess ill just play this with keyboard and mouse for now doesn't seem like it will be that hard to control without a gamepad

i dont know how anyone could think this game doesn't have a nice aesthetic, it is absolutely gorgeous.

nintendo it is TIME FOR A NEW METROID ffs we are dying here

@humanity: An important thing is you can use the stick to look up or down spelunky style which helps a lot with the field of view and seeing what you need to see.

@steveurkel: This game has some areas later that are require SUPER tight control, unless you really love playing a game like this on keyboard I do not recommend it. A late game platforming heavy area will make you want to break your keyboard. Think Late game super meat boy levels of precision.

I am only now realizing that Hollow Knight is a rad metroidvania and not a Shovel Knight DLC

Since I've decided I love the Switch now, I look forward to playing this when it shows up there.

This game was way bigger and way better than I thought it would be. Really enjoyed it. Especially loved the atmosphere, first 2D game I've seen come close to rivaling the Dark Souls style of world building.

Wow! Another 2-D sidescrolly platformy thingy. Again! Wow!

Haha I was one of the people screaming for a QL of this game. Its a great game, I clocked around 34 hours and 82% when i beat it so yes its a huge game. You'll get powers well into the 20 hour mark. If you love metroidvania's this is a truly great one, probably the best since Ori or Elysian.

@westernwizard: Yes I'm at that super late game part as yes it reminds me of the late game meat boy stuff!!!! Really challenging but rewarding. Not sure if I'm going to get the last 7-8 charms and complete the warriors journal though but i want to at least get the real ending and fight the real last boss.

Speaking of abilities,

@alex didn't really show it off in the quick look, but you also start out with downward slash that lets you pogo jump off enemies and spikes and some of those breakable foreground objects, allowing you save yourself from some damage or even get some extra height from enemies and objects nearby to reach unreachable ledges before various upgrades. As well as traverse some areas that seem unpassable, or just evade enemies while also attacking them from above. It's very satisfying to use but kind of hard to convey in text.

It's fairly Ducktales-esque? Although you can't just pogo anywhere on the normal ground like you can in that game. Still, it remained one of my favorite abilities/attacks all the way to the end. Fun!

@westernwizard: thanks I'll use the ps4 or pro controller then (I have arthritis which makes controllers less comfortable than a keyboard in my lap) and see how that works. I was having an issu3 with ps4 on Bluetooth always being over 10 ms and random disconnects then changed in device manager how it uses battery for the dongle and now it's perfect).

I'll take your word for it thanks for the advice

Will be picking this up on Switch as soon as it's available!

@schindigg: Yup that's why I kept going and completed that part lol. Now I'm trying to decide how much closer to 100% I'm going to get. I'm missing... 5 charms I think? Also need something like 10 grubs (I have the map reveal so I know where the rest of them are), but holy crap that would be a lot of work. I can already fight the last boss now.

The music in this is an absolute delight. Charming aesthetic all around.

I'm not huge on Metroidvanias though, sadly.

I will definitely play this on the Switch when it comes out. Seems like a cool game for small spurts of playing.

Wait... this isn't a new DLC package for Shovel Knight. Ah well. It does sound like one from the name though.

I really liked this game despite having a few problems with it. While Metroidvainia does explain what this game is, I think calling it an Exploration game is more appropriate here.