this post was submitted on 07 May 2025
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Counter to this: Don't cater to noobs.
Hollow Knight is one of the GOATs because it's hard, but extremely fair. Learn the patterns, and any boss can be beaten hitless; explore properly, and any boss can be returned to rematch -- after a death -- from a bench in 1 to 2 screens (late game even has a teleport ability!).
Honestly - we don't want to please more casual players unless it's part of balancing difficult moments. For example, considering the speed of combat, one of our refs is Laika: Aged Through Blood. But ours is still slower, so there will be features of classic metroidvanias in the mix. Simply because the player will have a gun in his hands. In the future - with various improvements
There's plenty of moments in hollow night where it can be way more than just 3 screens. Especially when you're exploring places for the first time and doing know where the next bench will be (I felt like there was no way near enough benches too).
It's what made me eventually drop the game. I didn't find it hard, I just could not be arsed. Felt like a waste of time when I've got so many other games bI could be playing instead of playing the same 10-15 minutes of gameplay over and over again.
I love metroidvanias too. One of my favourite genres.
Name them. I'd be happy to counter.
I mean it happened to me a few times when exploring. I don't know the names of the places. It was still kinda early on. I think the last place I tried to enter was the mushroom place? And i kept dying in there then had to travel what felt like half of a full zone to get back there because i had yet to find a bench in there.
Well, it's part of the gameplay that you have to come back to. The benches are an important part of the difficulty, just like permanent death is part of the genre.
I've not seen permadeath be something inherent to metroidvanias.
Also I understand that the benches are part of the difficulty but I also feel like it's slightly inflated because of the annoyance of doing so.
When I die in such games, all I can think about is the time I just wasted or am about to waste. No matter how good a game is, my life on this earth is too short and there are other games of the same quality or higher that I can play that will respect my time much better.
Then it would be a game I never touch; when there's no other way to learn than by dying, your game has failed in my opinion. I shouldn't have to beat my head against some pattern that I can't discover through lore or elsewhere in the game. I'm in my 40s and used to game competitively in the early 2000s, FWIW.
This is the essence of the genre of metroidvania and soulslikes. To die, learn, and start again, change approaches and tactics. Perhaps this is just not your genre
Souslikes, yes. For metroidvania, I would disagree. You did not mention soulslike in your post, unless I'm blind, or else I would have said nothing.