Don’t worry about essence yet. Main use is to unlock the true final boss (and the awesome areas before that) but for now you should be just exploring and beating bosses.
I do think the game could have been 50% shorter and still as good. It’s the longest 2D Metroidvania I’ve played by far, and while it gains something thanks to its size,perhaps not enough compared to the amount of players abandoning in despair.
Last play session I unlocked the path to get to him quickly, but died. So tonight I decided to try again. After losing 5-10 times, I got him so he flew around like a popped balloon. I thought I won and celebrated.
We fell through the floor and he was bopping around. Thinking I killed him I tried to catch him. I lost a bunch of health before I realized he was harming me. So I try again. I can’t get him to that stage again for another 10 tries. I manage to get him to that stage maybe 4 times and can’t win. I did last longer one of the times.
I mean, I have fun fighting this guy but it is wearing on me. I decided to switch out my charms so I had to trudge back to town. I’m now using the one that increases health, one that gives me a protective shell, and the one that extends my blade. Next time I play I’ll trudge back and try again.
I must have missed a couple bosses before this area. I wonder what loot I missed.
I wish I remembered what charms worked for me with him, but it was definitely one I had to fight a frustrating number of times. And that transition through the floor where you think you beat him was just dispiriting.
I switched to the Dreamshield and the thorn thing (plus the sword range increase charm) and won on my 2nd try. Was a relief!
Well done!
I got the Voidheart edition on PS4 since it was on sale for black Friday.
The game is a gem. Not too hard, but not too trivial either. Very open and the game doesn’t hold your hand too much, so every discovery is a treat. You can’t quite reinvent the wheel with metroidvanias, but the game really goes the extra mile. Tying your healing with hits on enemies is an elegant touch. Shopkeepers have personality and their description of items isn’t the same as the one from your menu. The color palette is a bit muted and dull, but it fits with the insect theme of the game. The music is quiet and beautiful and the sound design is top notch. With a bit of practice, you can identify items and enemies by sound and you’ll probably be humming Cornifer’s tune by the end.
It doesn’t have SotN’s sheer variety of enemy and items, but SotN was an unbalanced mess whereas Hollow Knight is laser focused and well thought of.
Definitely one of the best metroidvanias I’ve ever played.
I agree. See my impressions upthread :P
The only letdown is combat. It’s good and tight, but very samey and limited (once you get proficient at it) due to the item variety not extending into different types of weapons.
But it is up there in the Metroidvania genre…
I tip my hat to those that can play this game as it was intended to be played. After dying far too many times I surrendered and used cheat engine to make myself immortal. Not being sent back to the last bench on death increased my enjoyment of the game, though some of the jumping challenges still weren’t good for my blood pressure.
Overall it was a well done and interesting game, and I have to remind myself not to play this type of game again, or at least use cheat engine sooner.
I just started reading this topic after beating the game.
Hahahaha, so the banker steals your money, I didn’t even know that. It’s not a bummer, it’s hilarious! I honestly didn’t even remember to check on her so I never noticed she does that.
Scratch what I said about the game not being too hard. All the extra bosses and fights are kicking my ass. Can I manage 112%? I dunno. Then again, I forgot one area of the game where you find the ability to become invincible during dashes, so I was missing a crucial tool. Turns out I’ve been scuba diving for lobsters with my dick out all this time.
Double post:
Well, nevermind. I can beat all the bosses with practice, but the Pantheon of Hallownest is just a whole other ball game. It’s every single boss in the game in one continuous run. A single attempt can last 30 min. It’s nuts. You need nerves of steel and a bladder of iron for that.
Oh man, this game has bosses?
The original thread title here really applies to me. I just don’t see the appeal of this game at all. Maybe once I find a map, I could see this becoming fun, but that seems so far away at this time, why put myself through basically torture instead of just playing other games that are fun?
Well, no offence, but if you’re already lost and bored before fighting the first boss and getting a map, you should probably run for the hills.
I still think it’s one of the greatest metroidvanias, though.
Wait, you’re saying the part before you find the first boss and the map is the fun part?
I just hate being lost like this in any game. Every room looks the same, I hate running into the same dead ends over and over and dying when I’m trying to backtrack. Once I have a map, I’m hoping I won’t be lost anymore, then I can actually start enjoying the game maybe?
I don’t remember where it is, but maybe you should check a walkthrough to find the first map and then see how you like it from there. If you still don’t like it then maybe it’s time to cut your losses.
No, I’m just saying that if you already have trouble getting lost and dying, the rest of the game is way way waay harder and more complex.
Besides, the guy selling the map is like four rooms from the dungeon entreance, I think?
He is, that’s the problem. He asks for money, but since he’s so close to the entrance, there’s no way to earn enough money by the time you get to him. So you have to keep going down to earn enough money, but then trying to climb upward back to him seems impossible. But when you die, you lose all your money again, so going back down to him, you again don’t have enough money.
But if you go where you died and kill the shadow you leave, you get your money back again.
But I agree it’s probably time to cut your loses. It took me getting to the third boss to die for the first time (I found the healing mechanic very easy to farm early on), and I still found the game really hard later on. Unless there’s something weird going on, this might not be the game for you.
And I think this is third to Super Metroid and Symphony of the Night in the genre. But it requires a Dark Souls like perseverance (lots of influences from that game in world and level design, but also in attitude towards challenge and reward).
Have you been able to get to your ghost so you can get your money back?
Also, dont screens repopulate so you can go back and forth to get money?
Ok, the game is definitely going to be too hard for you.
It’s definitely a “Dark Souls” clone, for better or worse (mostly for the better, IMO). It’s funny how they stated in the Kickstarter that the game is inspired by oldies Zelda 2 and Faxanadu, but it’s really like modern games SotN and Dark Souls. They even added a Dracula-ish boss!
The Dark Souls influence is just enormous. They went whole hog with the Dark Souls school of storytelling : silent hero explores decaying kingdom with a nearby village that can be lightly repopulated, containing a great evil by sacrificing yourself, buncha “lore” sitting around, the Dark Soul the Void, NPCs that move around and mumble incoherent, irrelevent stuff and often die for no good reason.
It’s a valiant effort as far as story goes for a metroidvania, which don’t really much story at all, but I don’t want everyone to copy the same formula.
There’s a kind of standalone DLC campaign with the Hornet as playable character coming up. Interesting.
I usually can’t find my ghosts, no, I usually end up lost and in a different area.
Money is not a problem, as far as I’m aware. The only thing I found for sale is the map guy, but he’s so high up, I’m not sure if I can jump high enough to go upward screen to screen. I usually just go downward in a dungeon until I get to a dead end, and then I start trying to find my way upward. Some ledges are low enough that you can jump to them, but most jumps downward in this game are permanent, so it’s easy to go down, but hard to go up.