You can see what went wrong and immediately apply it in the laboratory of the boss arena. In Celeste, when Madeline bursts into a radiant explosion, or Cuphead takes more projectiles to the mug than he can handle, your next attempt is only a button press away. Cuphead and Celeste, however, both handle the feedback loop between death and attempt in ways that don’t feel like a needlessly tedious and tiresome routine every time you fail. And to some extent, I see why the comparisons are made. I often hear Hollow Knight mentioned in the same conversations as Celeste and Cuphead, punishing indie games that have earned their reputation for difficulty. I just wonder why this decision was made. All of this before the next attempt at battle. But these awesome boss battles were marred by the grim reality that, if I failed, I would have to dash my way across several enemy-infested screens to return to the boss room, where I would then have to battle my shade to recover my geo and soul-meter. Every fight feels just out of my reach at first. I think of the Dung Defender, Hornet, and the Watchers, just to name a few standout examples of good boss design. Each encounter feels epic, fights in a way that you can master, and sticks out as unique from all the rest. In fairness, Hollow Knight’s epic boss battles are a resounding success in the game’s world.

And that kills my motivation because the walk back isn’t even a skill ceiling – it’s just repetition. Hollow Knight is mind-numbingly boring when you lose progress. Some games like Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy intentionally undermine the progress you’re making in a game, and I have written about why the high-stakes failure condition in that game is good game design. Because risk-taking led to death, and death meant starting over and losing much of my progress, I found myself playing a lot more conservatively than I would have otherwise.

I was discouraged from risk-taking behavior in my exploration throughout the game. This translated into a playstyle that I wouldn’t have adopted if the game was designed differently. In addition to the punishment of moving you physically far away from your goal, the game requires you to traverse enemy-infested screens and platforming sequences from hell. Some games even lock the door behind you once you’ve decided to conquer a boss, but Hollow Knight seems to do the opposite, sending you halfway (or further) across the intricate map. To remove you so far from the action discourages the tendency that most games teach, which is to keep trying. Hollow Knight sparingly places its benches across the map, a design decision that I can’t really understand in terms of player motivation. Instead, you spawn about ten screens away. Here’s the rub: when you die, you don’t spawn ten steps away from the boss arena.

Though the boss encounters require you to learn a boss’ attacks, patterns, and phases, the fights are always fun and encourage you to reach new skill ceilings. Hollow Knight is more frustrating than it is difficult, in my experience. Hollow Knight is not an easy game, but it certainly doesn’t require the kind of player persistence of games like Sekiro. In Dark Souls, your spawns are anchored to bonfires in Hollow Knight, your spawns are anchored to benches. No doubt that the developers of Hollow Knight, Team Cherry, were influenced by From Software’s Souls series, and one of those influences is the checkpoint system. The game maintains a deliberately difficult combat system that many players think should allow for easier, or at least customizable, options. But the game has one design decision that ultimately drove the nail through the coffin of my playthrough, and that decision was to limit respawn points to far-away benches.ĭifficulty in video games has become a trending topic due to the recent release of From Software’s newest title, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. The game boasts perfectly unique and immersive environments, a glorious soundtrack, and high-energy fun combat. This was an emotional decision to make, because Hollow Knight is such a masterfully crafted piece of art. This past weekend, after 27 hours in the game, I made the decision to stop streaming Hollow Knight.

Hollow knight walkthrough