Hollow Knight - Dark Souls Metroidvania... with bugs!

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Finally killed the boss, it actually had a post death attack, really fucking bullshit. Onward to act 2.

This faggot can eat a fat fucking dick holy shit

Spoiler: Boss

View attachment 7874675

You can cheese him pretty easily by running around the arena and exploiting bis sweeping attacks. It would have been much better if the game gave you iframes after a plunge attack, and didn't make boss sprites auto hit you for full damage on touching their hitbox (which is really annoying design.

That's half the fun of Metroidvanias. Running around looking for secret paths and smacking random walls, jumping and climbing random stuff.

It's fun when you know that you can explore freely and aren't gated beyond a power up.

 

[Strangolapreti]

The first bells-type game of the 2000s

You are really pulling it at this point and even then you're wrong and my answer is just gonna be as previous:
There's a twin bee mistery dungeon game released in the 2000s. I'm not fucking with you, mistery dungeon, but twin bee.
Just say its the first spool simulator to have been ever made and let's be over with this.

I know but that was early on and presumably just a teaser of what's to come...

Git
Gud
-john silksong

 

[Jotch]

You are really pulling it at this point and even then you're wrong and my answer is just gonna be as previous:
There's a twin bee mistery dungeon game released in the 2000s. I'm not fucking with you, mistery dungeon, but twin bee.
Just say its the first spool simulator to have been ever made and let's be over with this.

They just keep releasing them, holy moly. There was one in 2024. The bells type genre is really oversaturated.I have to relent that Silksong is completely unoriginal then, they copied the bells from Twin Bee.

Though I will say, after getting the sprint power movement and fighting has become a huge amount more fun and I can see how the theoretical skill ceiling for this game could be so high that no mortal man could ever reach it.

 

[Strangolapreti]

They just keep releasing them, holy moly. There was one in 2024. The bells type genre is really oversaturated.I have to relent that Silksong is completely unoriginal then, they copied the bells from Twin Bee.

I may be wrong, think the very first bells type videogame was Kangaroo.

Though I will say, after getting the sprint power movement and fighting has become a huge amount more fun and I can see how the theoretical skill ceiling for this game could be so high that no mortal man could ever reach it.

Hollow knight's movement was simple and relatively easy to master with the addition of few later tricks, most of them not even required for its hardest challenges like the white palace and path of pain; unless you are playing a modded game, noone is asking you to descending dark in order to exploit its invincibility frames.

It's a little like Celeste, minus the narrative retcon to make it all about trooning out nor the hypocrisy of making a story about overcoming difficult and shit and mental strain on one side and offering invincible god mode while telling you "it's not a cheat, it's accessibility option, we don't want your lack of skill to prevent you access to the rest of the story...)

Hollow knight silksong is a tale of a more elaborated moveset that requires more finesse and leads to being able to traverse early to mid-game (and even some late game) platform sections in multiple ways, I still haven't witnessed any extremely demanding or ultimate platform challenge, some stuff was present, don't get me wrong, but it felt less like it was actually hard and rather crossing stuff while unprepared.

 

[Professor Donger]

Just got the wall jump

I also ran to a boss, died to it and forgot that I hadn't rested on a bench in a while and ended up spawning a whole postal code away.

 

[Balanced Boomer]

A three man team taking their time to make an incredible game for twenty bucks has me once again looking at bloated triple A nigger companies wondering what their fucking excuse is besides just being greedy faggots blowing shitloads of money for no other reason than to justify needlessly larger budgets to rationalize fucking their customers over for overcharging for a product that could have been made for a fraction of the cost.

 

[Safir]

Does she say sha in this game even once?

I like Hornet, she's fluffy. I like her mechanics, too. I like that I get a full spool of silk after slicing up the shade cocoon. I don't like pretty much all other differences from Hollow Knight.

• in HK, I was killing long-dead, recently animated corpses of bugs to save what remained of my civilization. In SS, I'm killing overzealous pilgrims enthralled by bad guys, because they're in my way. But why are they in my way? Supposedly I'm going to talk to the bad guys and ask them why their slaves (now dead) captured me. Why can't I just leave? Even if the needle is going to do the talking, is it really worth murdering thousands of civilians?
  • even worse, PILGRIMS hire volunteers to kill other pilgrims for their rags!
• not-Cornifer is fucking annoying, I hate the character already. They should just put Iselda in this game.
• the Knight is silent, Hornet oohs and aahs with every jump, which makes her feel less graceful even though she should be more graceful.
• Hornet "speaks" (the Knight could only "listen"), which makes dialogues stretch for longer, which sucks, because they're
  • boring,
  • no more interactive than the Knight's listening,
  • and more annoying for lack of interactivity.
• to add to this, not-Myla has DOOMED written all over her and I can't tell her anything FOR NO FUCKING REASON.
• the game makes me choose between collecting money and knowing where I am, which makes exploration suck. I suppose I'm going to get an expansion and become able to equip two tools at the same time, but this means quite a way into the game, instead of adding variety, both slots will be spoken for by basic quality of life features.
• no sha. I bought the game to have sha on demand and there's none.

 

[Strangolapreti]

A three man team taking their time to make an incredible game for twenty bucks has me once again looking at bloated triple A nigger companies wondering what their fucking excuse is besides just being greedy faggots blowing shitloads of money for no other reason than to justify needlessly larger budgets to rationalize fucking their customers over for overcharging for a product that could have been made for a fraction of the cost.

Corporatism is the place where captalism truly die, where incompetency is rewarded and the people in control fails upward.

 

[Smity Werbenjagermanjensen]

Got to final boss of Act 1, and I have to say I'm really not enjoying just how more brutal this is, I expected a difficulty bump, but I wasn't expecting just about every boss and most standard enemies to do 2 damage, and how the game holds off on giving you any extra masks or upgraded weapon, it seems the target for this game were the sweats that did the pantheon challenges.

 

[Tenshi Eating A Corn Dog!]

Got to final boss of Act 1, and I have to say I'm really not enjoying just how more brutal this is, I expected a difficulty bump, but I wasn't expecting just about every boss and most standard enemies to do 2 damage, and how the game holds off on giving you any extra masks or upgraded weapon, it seems the target for this game were the sweats that did the pantheon challenges.

The upped damage really made getting an extra mask a big nothing moment too considering getting your first extra mask does nothing for fights where you're still getting killed in three hits anyways. It's really only good for those combat rooms you get locked into.

 

[Professional Noticer]

• in HK, I was killing long-dead, recently animated corpses of bugs to save what remained of my civilization. In SS, I'm killing overzealous pilgrims enthralled by bad guys, because they're in my way. But why are they in my way? Supposedly I'm going to talk to the bad guys and ask them why their slaves (now dead) captured me. Why can't I just leave? Even if the needle is going to do the talking, is it really worth murdering thousands of civilians?

I don't get your gripes with the game, you either aren't reading or have some comprehension issue.

It's very clear that you are killing pilgrims that have became feral as they are going on their pilgrimage. They attacked you on your way to the summit, they are aggressive and preventing you from going on your way. The game even addresses this, there is a small talk where the bug near the bench at the first village asks you how these pilgrims are doing and Hornet says that they have sadly lost their minds and attack everyone equally.

You are complaining about her killing everyone she meets, when she clearly doesn't, she talks to several bugs on her way. Any bug that doesn't try to kill, she strikes up a conversation.

Also, "why can't you just leave"? Idk, maybe there would be no fucking game if you just left?
The game's story revolves around Hornet climbing to the summit to find out more about why they captured her. How would your game be, she turns around, calls a bug uber and goes home?

 

[Balanced Boomer]

Man, it's been a while since I've played a game where I actually give a shit and look forward to meticulously 100%ing it at a slow and enjoyable pace. What a nostalgic feeling, actually caring and having fun.

 

[Professor Donger]

I don't get your gripes with the game, you either aren't reading or have some comprehension issue.

It's very clear that you are killing pilgrims that have became feral as they are going on their pilgrimage. They attacked you on your way to the summit, they are aggressive and preventing you from going on your way. The game even addresses this, there is a small talk where the bug near the bench at the first village asks you how these pilgrims are doing and Hornet says that they have sadly lost their minds and attack everyone equally.

You are complaining about her killing everyone she meets, when she clearly doesn't, she talks to several bugs on her way. Any bug that doesn't try to kill, she strikes up a conversation.

Also, "why can't you just leave"? Idk, maybe there would be no fucking game if you just left?
The game's story revolves around Hornet climbing to the summit to find out more about why they captured her. How would your game be, she turns around, calls a bug uber and goes home?

Yeah its established very early on. That something is controlling the feral pilgrims like the Radiance did in the first game

Thoughts after about 6 hours of playtime

After I started getting used to her, Hornet is a lot of fun to play. She has a lot more options available to her than the Knight did around the same time and like a friend of mine said, feels more like a dancer to the knights robot.

Enemies being tanky and dealing more damage is a hit or miss thing for me so far. I like that the game challenges you to make sure you aren't picking dumb fights.

I don't like that some boss run backs are a pain in the ass because the enemies do two damage to you.

Money so far is way too scarce. Bosses should at least drop beads. I hope they patch that in.

Other wise though I'm having a lot of fun, I'll save a rating for it for when I beat the game but I'm still liking it about the same as OG Hollow Knight.

 

[Elite Kipchak]

things i like:
controls are good
cool character
pretty chill game overall

things i dislike:
infantile game design (ooh what's this thing dangling from the ceiling, guess you'll have to come back later with a new macguffin, oooooh isn't it so mysterious?! small bugs are hiding in small skulls, which means big bugs must be hiding in big skulls! don't you feel so smart, player?) (devs who do this should be lynched)
I would probably like it more if i was a tranny

verdict: 7/10, still brutally deathmogged by dead cells, which will likely continue brutally deathmogging all other metroidvanias until the heat death of the universe.

A few years ago I saw a lanky pizza face turbo autist sperging about hollow knight lore to a stunning 10/10 latina and I can't get over it. she was super into it too. if i had that power i certainly wouldn't use it for good.

 

[Cave Fisher]

Is it me, or is Pharloom not as engaging of a setting as Hallownest is?
I've gotten to its respective raining place (I'm starting to come around to the new movement system with the dashing and floating, but god damn the diagonal down slash has been pissing me off the entire game) and so far nothing's really stood out to me, whereas HK had me hooked as soon as I reached Greenpath.

Why can't I just leave?

I presume that with how much she's been weakened, it's probably smarter to build back up her skills, abilities, and weapons while figuring out what she got captured for in the first place and find the person behind it than take the likely dangerous journey back home where she's at risk of this exact same thing happening again.

 

[Jotch]

8 hours in.
I'm satisfied with the game, it's not a game changer like the original, but it's well worth the money. It's wonderful to the eyes and ears (except for the afro-bug). The story and gameplay though is nothing super special, but still enjoyable.

Fights are more difficult and faster paced than the first. As promised up front it's all about acrobatics.
Fighting anything is like learning a dance for the enemy where lots of it is in the air. The sprint/dash power really opens this up. I found myself spending probably half of the time I'm fighting in the air. The animations for this make it all feel very graceful. Really the art and sound of everything (except that damn map fuck) comes together wonderfully, but the actual functionality of the game feels underdeveloped.

Ironically these guys could probably mog the walking simulator market given the artistic talent.

 

[Professor Donger]

things i dislike:
infantile game design (ooh what's this thing dangling from the ceiling, guess you'll have to come back later with a new macguffin, oooooh isn't it so mysterious?!

Someone has never played a Metroidvania before.

This is their bread and butter

"Oh look this ledge is a little too high what's up there? Oooh guess you'll have to come back later"

Is it me, or is Pharloom not as engaging of a setting as Hallownest is?

As I'm adventuring and meeting NPCs I'm getting more invested. But I think Hollownest was just more interesting by proxy or you essentially walking into a post apocalypse.

Pharloom is its own thing and we're essentially learning about it with Hornet which is probably why it's not as interesting yet. Though I have met a boss that does refer to Hornet by her parentage which brings me a bit of hope that we'll find out more about what's going on.

 

[Jotch]

custody dispute

 

[Professor Donger]

custody dispute

It's not a custody dispute since Hornet's mother was in Hollownest, but I'm pretty sure it's basically confirmed that Pharloom was where Hera and the Weavers were from before they settled in Deepnest.

 

[Cave Fisher]

As I'm adventuring and meeting NPCs I'm getting more invested. But I think Hollownest was just more interesting by proxy or you essentially walking into a post apocalypse.

Pharloom is its own thing and we're essentially learning about it with Hornet which is probably why it's not as interesting yet. Though I have met a boss that does refer to Hornet by her parentage which brings me a bit of hope that we'll find out more about what's going on.

I suppose it makes sense they wouldn't just do "melancholic post apocalyptic fantasy kingdom" twice. Though that was probably my favorite thing about Hollow Knight's world and vibe.