Quick Look: Hollow Knight

ignore alex , there are hidden areas littered everywhere , no wall chickens tho

ok I bought this game and just got around to where alex is in the game

let me just state one thing up front - do not play this game with the switch pro controller!

for starters you have to use joy2key and any movements on the stick or d pad make your char go flying way farther than they should almost impossible to control yourself ... I switched to a ds 4 controller but every few minutes it flashes red and says latency over 10 ms which is bad for this game when the controls stop responding

but yeah dont use a pro controller for this game ... it is so good though thanks for the recommendations everyone! I am having a lot of fun but when I click apply to change resolution it defaults back to 1920x1080 everytime is my main complaint

i am happy that the metroidvania well which was near bone dry a few years ago now runneth over. i thank shadow complex for spearheading that initiative.

@westernwizard: Yah I noticed that but I think a better solution would be to zoom out a bit giving you more situational awareness while also having the added bonus of your character models looking "sharper" since you're not all up in them. Game has a great art style but that specific hand drawn look doesn't lend itself all that well to close ups.

The music and art in this game are amazing.

This game is amazing. Picked it up 3 days ago and boy is it impressive. The style, music and exploration is so darn good. Hollow Knight is doing for me what Axiom Verge did for Jeff.

Reminding me of Ori in a good way.

I think I'd give more credit to the regular string of GBA & DS 2D Castlevania games (and their massive absence after 2008's Order of Ecclesia) being a huge part of why people want to continue playing and creating this style of game, despite the potential burnout of so many similar ones in a row. Shadow Complex was great of course, but it didn't exactly open the floodgates and lead to more games of that type on the home consoles like we all hoped it would, unfortunately. We're still waiting for a followup to Shadow Complex itself!

The Metroid / Castlevania / exploration / action / platformer draw is real, as is the major publisher reluctance to make that sort of game, as evidenced by the lack of a Shadow Complex 2 and bold new 2D Castlevanias or Metroids from Konami & Nintendo. Further proven with the successful Bloodstained kickstarter (as well as others like Chasm, Ghost Song, La Mulana 2, etc). Hollow Knight was born of a kickstarter, too! But I had no idea it even existed until it hit Steam. It's crazy how a massive game like this can still fly under the radar of someone who claims to be a big fan of the genre.

Anyway, Shadow Complex was a great one-off but it was mostly the super indie scene keeping it alive since then on PC until slightly bigger and awesome home console stuff like Guacamelee! and Ori and the Blind Forest and Axiom Verge started showing up 4+ years after Shadow Complex on the next generation of systems. Now we still have tons of shorter and smaller scale indie games in this vein coming, then the occasional larger scale ones like Hollow Knight. It does not seem to be slowing down, thankfully. Yet still not enough to sway Nintendo into revisiting a 2D Metroid.

This is hella cute

@westernwizard: What do you mean by map reveal? Is there something you can get to show stuff on the map you haven't gotten? That's one thing i wish was better was the map and showing where you beat or collected certain things.

I say this every time I see something like it, but man, I love forest environments in games that look like they dropped out of Nausicaa. This, Ori, Dust...all good forests imo.

super want to play ori now

@schindigg: So, there are certain things that help. Once you get a certain item it'll show two things (tombs and trees, won't say more than that if you haven't gotten them yet) that you missed, and late game you get a map that shows where all the grubs you missed are. Super useful for collecting two optional things that are only required for 100% but still.

Combat seems a bit too simplistic and stiff, but maybe it's just that I got spoiled by Dust

lol Dan what a chump

I really like the soundtrack to this. The game seems great too.

This game is incredibly good! The art and musical score are fantastic!

This game is really good but the complete lack of direction really turns me off. I understand what it's going for (trying to be like old school Metroid) but I found myself just wondering around aimlessly for a couple of hours before I gave up and looked up a guide. And that kind of sucked some joy out of it for me.

Game looks really cool. I may give it a try.