Games I Played in 2025 - Hollow Knight: Voidheart Edition
Console: PC, Switch, XB1, PS4
Developer: Team Cherry
Release Date: February 24, 2017 (Voidheart Edition: September 25, 2018)
Hollow Knight: Voidheart Edition is a complete version of Hollow Knight including its DLC The Grimm Troupe and three free content packs Lifeblood, Hidden Dreams, and Godmaster. Hollow Knight is a 2D metroidvania with a strong emphasis on boss battles, gameplay customization, and exploration with a moody, dreary atmosphere. An indie darling from the first day its Kickstarter campaign went life (if not before), Hollow Knight is almost universally beloved and widely considered as one of the greatest indie games ever, if not greatest games ever full-stop. I had only tried it once years ago and bounced off of it, not being in the mood for it, and I came back to play it, as many did, since its extremely anticipated sequel, Silksong, is finally coming out.
A GORGEOUS, DEAD KINGDOM OF INSECTS
The first thing that stands out in Hollow Knight is the game's visuals, all beautifully hand-drawn and animated practically perfectly. While it's a dark and somber game full of bug characters, it's nonetheless drawn with a cute artstyle, with even scarier enemies not being that visually scary due to being so rounded and simple. It's easy to grow fond of the many NPCs due to this and the quality of the dialogue, and many of them are quite memorable. The environments are gorgeous, with detailed backgrounds aplenty and a lot of little worldbuilding details scattered around. From the game's opening to the end, I was almost constantly impressed and gushing internally about the visuals. Every new area was a treat to explore and ogle at, and it didn't really get old even as I went for near completion of the game. However, I do have to note that the game's gorgeous, layered visuals sometimes work to its detriment, as I found some enemies would end up hidden behind a piece of the foreground during exploration at times or, more damningly, some boss projectiles or tells would have similar coloring to the background, making them really hard to read at a moment's notice.
The game's color palette is mostly cool tones, especially dark blues, which adds a lot to the world of Hallownest feeling dead and cold. Coupled with the game's generally melancholic tone, it brings in a kind of storytelling really reminiscent of the Dark Souls series and other FromSoftware titles, though it's a lot easier to grasp even casually, and doesn't require as much digging. However, it's still similar to them, in that the goal of the game can be kind of vague unless you really pay attention, and a lot of the storytelling is shown through optional player interactions, rather than big scripted story moments.
Unlike the Dark Souls games, however, there's a surprising amount of levity, with some characters just being comic relief and others having pretty silly personalities in spite of their serious roles, or at least a handful of good lines peppered in their dialogue. It gives the world of Hollow Knight a lot of depth and believability, more than one would expect just from looking at it. The characters aren't necessarily that deep, though, and don't really grow at times, but that's fine. There were also a few moments that genuinely got me a little emotional, which is more than I can say about the Dark Souls-like games I'm comparing it to.
Similarly to those games, while Hollow Knight isn't a horror game, it certainly has horror elements to it. And in this case, they work amazingly. Several areas in the game are genuinely unsettling, including one that will be particularly bad for arachnophobics. While it goes without saying since it's a game where all the characters and most of the enemies are bugs, some of the bosses are also kind of repulsive in the best way if you think about it. And some enemies have great sound effects that make them scary. Hollow Knight masterfully balances between cutesy, whimsical, gloomy and scary across its entire map and story without one ever getting overwhelming for too long. It's really impressive.
TANGLED WEBS AND MUDDY LABYRINTHS
As a metroidvania, a lot of Hollow Knight's gameplay is about platforming and fighting your way through enemies and challenges while exploring the world. The game centers around the hub town of Dirtmouth, starting empty and quickly getting a few stores and inhabitants. Dirtmouth is extremely dreary, and the only NPC around at first has a generally pessimistic, cynical view of the world. Starting from Dirtmouth, the player will then get to gradually comb through 14 areas of varying sizes. As upgrades such as a double jump, a wall jump, and more are unlocked, exploration and backtracking becomes an absolute joy. It's a bit dry at the beginning, but it truly comes into its own as the player's freedom of movement expands.
While a lot of the areas have distinct theming, I did find that a lot of them blend together. Two areas are green and brown in a similar way, and the rest are either various shades of dark blue, or grey. As a result, I often found myself glued to the map every time I changed rooms. I wouldn't say it's a negative, though, because the map in general is fantastic, and the associated cartography mechanics are one of my favorite things about the game. With every area, the map is undiscovered and needs to be purchased from an NPC hidden somewhere inside it, or at the store in Dirtmouth at a higher price if he's gone. This map is incomplete, and you need to fill it in by exploring and then resting at a bench (analogous to the Dark Souls bonfire, where you can change your equipment and heal, at the cost of respawning enemies) to update the map. Having to buy the pins instead of having them by default also makes it feel like a more substantial mechanic, not to mention that you look at the map in real time; you can get hit while looking at it.
Exploring each area is a joy, with each one feeling quite distinct despite my earlier objections about their color palettes. As with any game in the genre, some are more fun than others, but it's also really cool seeing how they're all interconnected. There's some good hidden shortcuts in there that are worth marking on the map with the pins, for example, as well as areas that are inaccessible upon your first visit. Without using the map functions to their fullest, it can be a bit difficult to remember what was where due to the color palettes (at least, it was to me). The main problem for me was finding hidden areas, as the map doesn't really communicate if there's something you haven't found in an area outside of the obvious room exits. As a result, I did find it difficult to seek out optional content on my own once my map looked "complete" during my clean-up session at the end of the game.
Speaking of optional content, though, Hollow Knight is chock-full of it, to the point that just doing the main "story" path is actually pretty underwhelming, relatively speaking. It's a pretty standard metroidvania in that regard, with only three major things to do, and then a final boss. The game truly shines when you add on the optional content, even if a few quests are a bit of a chore. But that's the beauty of it: it's all optional, so if you don't want to do it, you most likely don't have to! Still, it's impressive just how much of the optional content is actually fun to do. However, you do end up passing through the same areas of the map over and over again, while perhaps never returning to some. It's understandable considering the way the fast travel system is set up, but it's still worth noting. Something else notable is that quests are fairly easy to follow for the most part, unlike the Dark Souls series, despite being set up in a similar way, where it's just talking to an NPC and then finding them somewhere else. It's unlikely you'll end up not finding out how to continue a quest if you pay attention and explore a bit.
Except, in my opinion, for one of the most out of the way secret areas, the White Palace. Though presented as a lore-critical area that genuinely takes a lot of time to reach, I think the White Palace is the only area in the game that is actively unfun and feels slapped together. This is because, unlike the rest of the game, the White Palace is a platforming area with trial-and-error design, more reminiscent of Super Meat Boy or late-game Celeste than something a metroidvania would have. Tight platforming sections, instant respawn obstacles, incongruous buzzsaws and spikes that feel far more "video gamey" than anything else in the game due to how arbitrarily they're placed, a complete lack of combat, and trial-and-error design with obstacles that are out of view of your initial vantage point make this area feel completely out of place from the rest of the game in a bad way. If this sort of platforming challenge were more common throughout the game I'd be more welcoming of it since I don't particularly dislike this sort of thing, but as is I found it incredibly jarring, surprisingly lacking polish and fun factor, and disappointing overall.
There's also an optional sub-area in the White Palace called the Path of Pain, which is an excruciatingly hard platforming puzzle that requires advanced techniques and lots of deep execution. This was added with the game's only DLC expansion, The Grimm Troupe. Outside of the Path of Pain, The Grimm Troupe DLC adds a new quest line tied to some new NPCs, new lore, new enemies, new equipment, and new bosses. This quest is... fun, but only alright, as it's essentially doing the same thing three times, fighting a boss in the middle of that, and then deciding whether to fight a way harder version of that boss or ending the quest early. It's a cool boss and theme, but I found it a little lacking overall. Still, since it's included in Voidheart Edition, it's hardly an issue.
NAILING THE COMBAT... MOSTLY
Combat in Hollow Knight is deceptively simple, and there's three methods of attacking: normal attacks, Nail Arts, and Spells, with the latter two being unlockable options. Using their Nail (really just a sword), the player can attack forward and upwards, as well as downwards when airborne; the latter bounces the player up into the air upon landing the attack on an enemy or hazard. There's a noticeable, intentional delay between each attack that reminds me of how Castlevania handles its traditional whip attack, but there's also a little recoil when landing a hit, which can be hazardous in tight spaces. It feels good to hit enemies no matter what, though, and the recoil serves as great feedback.
Nail Arts are special attacks that are done by holding the attack button to gather energy, and then releasing it once fully charged. Movement is unimpeded while charging, which is great. There's a spin attack, a heavy slash, and a dash slash. To be completely honest, I often forgot these even existed, as I found them awkward to use and borderline inefficient when I could just use a few normal attacks instead. Still, some people will swear by these, so I love that they're in the game. There's also three Spells: a projectile, an exploding invincible dive, and an upwards AoE attack. These cost a resource, the SOUL gauge, to execute, and they can be very powerful when used correctly. Again, while I used them more than Nail Arts, I still found it more natural to just stick with the normal attacks, but Spells are very much a viable main attack method, and are even better when you don't have to juggle with healing. My main issue with the Spells and Nail Arts is that it is hard to tell if the damage is "worth" the trouble. With no lifebars or damage numbers, it can be difficult to tell how much damage you're really doing, and if these big moves are doing enough damage for you to consider them worth doing.
Because the SOUL gauge has two purposes: it's a resource for Spells, or a resource for healing. It's gathered by landing normal attacks on enemies, and both Spells and healing cost the same amount: 33% of the gauge. Spells are instant, while healing requires the player to stay unmoving for a second or two, and any SOUL spent trying to heal won't be refunded. This intrinsically gives battle both a push-and-pull dynamic, and a risk-reward mechanic: do you risk casting Spells instead of healing? Do you instead risk healing and leaving yourself open? Do you risk striking the boss when you normally wouldn't so you can get more SOUL? This system makes all the boss battles interesting at a basic level, which I think is really impressive. You don't need the boss to be complex to make a satisfying battle with this system, you just need it to test the player's endurance and decision-making.
This is helped by the simple health system attached to the game. Instead of a health bar or having multiples of 100 for health, you have health in the single digits and all attacks deal one damage, or two if they're very powerful attacks. As a result, battles never get too overwhelming as far as health management. While you'd assume that the fact that every attack dealing the same damage would make things feel a little samey, in practice it really doesn't, and the low amount of health means that every attack is worth dodging; there's no real incentive to damage boosting through fights in most cases.
The biggest factor when it comes to customizing your experience, however, is the Charm system. Inspired by the first two Paper Mario games, this mechanic allows you to equip Charms that change the gameplay in various ways, such as giving more attack, getting more SOUL from each attack, greatly boosting your health but disabling healing, getting summons, or even transforming into a slug while healing. These are all hidden across Hallownest, being one of the biggest incentives to explore and do optional content, and they are limited in a few ways. Each one has a set amount of Notches it takes up, from 1 to 4 (with only one costing 5), and you can equip as many as you want as long as you have the notches for it. There's even a secret little thing you can do by trying to fit in a Charm that costs too many Notches about 5 times, where you'll be "Overcharmed" and be allowed to use it, at the cost of taking double damage. Naturally, you gain more Notches as you explore and do side content, getting to the maximum of 11. It always felt like I was missing one or two Notches at the maximum to get to use everything I wanted, but I don't know if that's a negative.
By balancing all of this with the movement in the game (double jumps, dashes and wall jumps), you get a battle system that's simple on the surface, but highly customizable and demanding some pretty good execution the longer you go on. This applies in boss battles, obviously, but also during exploration. Platforming and exploring while fighting or avoiding enemies is a joy, and the push-and-pull of the SOUL gauge means that engaging with enemies is constantly rewarded until it's full, which removes some tedium from going back and forth between areas.
It really helps that the game's enemy variety is fantastic, with each area having unique enemies, enough so to justify an entire bestiary with extra lore. While I think the areas are all a bit too samey in terms of color, the enemies present certainly add to the individuality of each area. They're never overwhelming, though some require special care to tackle properly, which is great. Again, though, it can get a bit frustrating when revisiting certain rooms over and over again while doing side content. Nothing that's a dealbreaker, but the cracks start to show a little.
The bosses are also generally great, though some of the early ones feel more like big enemies than real bosses. The boss battles are one of the game's biggest highlights, as almost all of them are fun to figure out and have the "difficult but fair" mentality attached to their design. While they can be difficult, the bosses tend to be on the simpler side, with only a few attacks that train your pattern recognition and reflexes and that's it. Most of the time, your mistakes are the reason for your death, not some artificially difficult thing.
I will say, though, that towards the end of the game and the later parts of the optional content, the bosses start pushing the limits of what this entire battle system is capable of. Some of the hardest bosses do 2 damage instead of 1 on every attack, or they start requiring some pretty strict timing and reflexes, moreso than the rest of the game. While this is to be expected of a game based around boss battles, it gets pretty intensely difficult with few moments to heal even with a Charm that makes healing quicker. And I'm of two minds about these bosses: I think it's cool to see the game pushed to its limits like that, and they are satisfying to finally conquer in most cases, but it also starts to funnel the player into the playstyle they find most comfortable. I basically never found success by changing my Charm build from normal attack-focused to Spell-focused or Nail Art-focused, or even just based on movement and support. The one time it did, though, it felt amazing. It's cool to see a game willingly push its own limits and challenge the player to push them with it, but for me it instead ended up highlighting the inherent flaws of the battle system, where the difficulty level ends up plateauing unless you make the boss faster and stronger.
Nowhere is this illustrated more than in the game's boss rush area, Godhome. Sporting 5 boss rushes of various difficulties, it's here that the unevenness of the game's boss design starts to show. I went to this area at the very end of the game, when all I had left to do was to clear the first 4 boss rushes (the 5th one is completely optional and way longer). The first two were fine enough, with new bosses at the end that were quite difficult, and then the third one had me stumped until I didn't feel like playing anymore. The individual bosses were mostly easy for me, but deep in the boss rush was one boss I find difficult in an unfun way, and then the new boss at the end was very difficult to read for me... but to retry I had to go through the entire boss rush again, blitzing through 7 easy bosses, hoping to get past the 8th one, then beating the gimmicky 9th one carefully before getting another chance. It's not necessarily bad, but for me it really showed the limits of what this game offers.
SOUNDS OF A BROKEN KINGDOM
Christopher Larkin composed the soundtrack to Hollow Knight, and I can't imagine a more perfect soundtrack to accompany this game. It's somber, evocative, mysterious and beautiful during exploration, and exciting during difficult bosses. Piano, harp, strings, woodwinds, it all creates such a beautiful soundscape that it somehow makes this dreary world full of cartoony little bug guys feel larger than life and worthy of your attention. I don't even know what to truly comment about it, it just fits so perfectly that I'm at a loss for words. He was the absolute perfect choice for this project. It's not necessarily music I'll listen to outside of playing the game that often, but I can't deny its quality. It's wonderful seeing this little indie game getting such a grandiose score.
PROS AND CONS
PROS
• Fantastic world that's fun to explore no matter what.
• Great dialogue and deep lore that's fun to dig into.
• Exemplary balance of tonal shifts within both the dialogue and gameplay.
• Incredibly fitting soundtrack.
• Very well-designed and engaging battle and movement mechanics.
• The Charm system adds a lot of customization and build variety to the game.
• Tons of secrets and optional content to engage with.
• Beautiful artstyle, with cute characters that can be gross and scary at times, and absolutely gorgeous layered backgrounds.
CONS
• The game pushes its systems to its limits, which can make their inherent flaws clearer instead of hiding them.
• The start of the game is a little dull when no movement abilities are unlocked.
• White Palace doesn't fit with the rest of the game in a bad way, feeling far less intentionally designed while also jarringly changing the game's genre into a precision platformer.
• Some areas of the map are visited through multiple quests and during a lot of side content, while others barely are touched; the balance feels off.
• Nail Arts don't feel as useful as normal attacks and Spells, and are a bit awkward to use.
• The background and foreground can sometimes hide enemies, projectiles, or attack tells.
• The game's color palette is a bit too restricted, which makes quite a few areas not feel different enough visually.
WORTH PLAYING?
Absolutely. The "cons" section is mostly nitpicking at the end of the day this time around, and I'd consider Hollow Knight one of the best video games ever made in spite of everything that I mentioned as a negative. It's an indie masterpiece, and a must-play for any fan of metroidvanias or even just 2D action games. It's astonishing to me that such a small team made this, and their excellence is clear just from this title. Hollow Knight isn't necessarily one of my favorite games, but it's one I wholeheartedly respect and love, to the point that I almost feel embarrassed not having played it sooner.
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