Why I Keep Returning to Hollow Knight

[00:01] i've played it at least once every year since the game came out in 2017. every time i foolishly think to myself i'll just play a couple hours i don't i'll just play a couple hours i don't need to finish

[00:17] unearthed the same feelings in me as hollow knight this video isn't just about the game being good but why it continues to be compelling to answer that i need to look not just at the game itself but about

[00:30] industry and how it compares to the games that inspired it games that inspired it so let's descend into hollow knight game industry between the big budget aaa games and the micro budget indie

[00:46] games made by small teams that's an over generalization but i think the industry has polarized along these lines with little than just a difference in budget too but in how that budget

[00:58] influences their design choices the bigger the game the more likely it is to offset its cost with every newfangled form of monetization and microtransaction it's all so exhausting and it has

[01:11] games of this nature but it's not just about paid add-ons all of these games audiences meaningless low effort

[01:24] side content that balloons the size of the game this has an enormous impact on most of these games there's a lot to be said for ending a story well and most big budget games aren't designed to end when the credits roll they end an

[01:38] indeterminate number of hours later after the player just sort of gets bored with the side quests and moves on so many of these ginormous games feel like if the godfather had an extra hour of run time that was just michael doing

[01:51] on the complete opposite side of the industry are a handful of indie games that are focused entirely on taking the player on a singular and complete ending on the highest of notes in the last year or so i've played outer wild

[02:05] the witness aesthetically and mechanically the games couldn't be more different outer wild is an outer space exploration of archaeologist piecing together how an ancient

[02:18] civilization fell disco elysium is a town murder mystery role-playing game where you play as a drunk depressed cop return of the oberdin is also a time traveling mechanics and pointillist graphics the witness is an abstract

[02:32] puzzle game with a minimalist story and an unnerving atmosphere but what all of these games have in common is that during their final hours they cast strange frenzied flow state gaming where i feel

[02:45] like i am racing towards the center of the universe and the answers to the not a single element of their design distracts from this even though some of them have optional content like disco elysium they all feel like

[02:57] they might actually be connected to the central story and besides the game does character in the game unique that i really do want to hear what they but the other thing these games have in common is that when i finished them

[03:11] i was done finishing those games felt like being kicked out of the matrix being jolted back into reality i haven't actually played any of them past their credit rolls but i think about them constantly they are games that i wish i

[03:24] them again for the first time each of these games are phenomenal experiences in different ways that i can't recommend enough so it isn't really a criticism to point out that they are also short-lived so i've started to feel like

[03:37] most of the video game experiences i have these days are either frustrated by monetization and bloat or singular world-changing experiences that are over and then there's hollow knight like all of the indie games listed here hollow

[03:49] state of gaming thanks in part to the silky smooth feeling of the combat which makes me feel like i am in a cartoon version of crouching tiger hidden dragon it's a game that's endlessly replayable

[04:02] hollow knight had dlc 2 but they were released for free and none of them get in the way of the main thrust of the story of these two poles in the industry with the strengths of both and the weaknesses

[04:15] of neither okay but what exactly is hollow knight video games are really just a collection of their inspirations hollow knight is a metroidvania souls-like game that's a lot of jargon

[04:29] so let's break down each of those words metroidvania is the name of a genre of games styled after the metroid series and the castlevania series these are run to the right until you win type of games like mario

[04:42] these games are non-linear you are exploring a two-dimensional space that interesting ways at the beginning of the the abilities they'll need to travel everywhere but eventually you'll find

[04:54] the items or learn the skills that you need to access other parts of the map shortcuts between locations and secret rooms in locations you've been before this requires the player to be mindful of their environment at all times and to

[05:06] backtrack across the world when they get those new abilities which makes the environment than they would be in for instance a mario game all of that is a perfect description of the exploration mechanics in hollow knight

[05:19] someone looked at the maps of metroid in castlevania and then just did those games but with a bug aesthetic at the same time hollow knight is a souls-like game souls like describes any

[05:31] game that emulates the design philosophy of games by from software which includes demon souls dark souls 1 2 and 3 bloodborne and sakura the off with the first dark souls game though and i think

[05:43] than any of its own sequels there are at least three game is all of which are found in hollow knight difficulty environmental storytelling and interconnected geography number one

[05:57] and interconnected geography number one difficulty character is pretty weak at the start and can be killed easily by even the

[06:12] so players have to actually learn their opponent's moves and strike at the right you're also punished enormously for failure when you die in a dark souls outside the room you died in like you would in most

[06:25] other modern video games but instead you respawn at the last bonfire you sat down at which might be a five minute hike away from the prick that just killed you money when you die you are given exactly one chance to retrieve your loot if you

[06:39] can make it back to the place you were killed the result of all of this is that the same path in the game until they have built up a familiarity with the these aren't games that you can just rush your way through at least not for

[06:53] for all of those reasons even after years of not playing dark souls 1 i can remember the layout of that game top to bottom as if it was my childhood number two environmental storytelling the second quality that defines the

[07:05] conventionally told in dark souls you get a cutscene at the the world but after that it's sort of up to you to have characters walking around with you making sure you understand each plot

[07:19] piece together every bit of the puzzle you're welcome to but it's not required the benefit of this is souls like games very rarely take control away from the actually playing the game not watching a cutscene which again

[07:33] helps build a sense of immersion and connection to the world and it makes the rewarding because it's self-motivated number three dark souls is also a metroidvania game just in three

[07:47] you're exploring an interconnected environment and getting stronger to open up new areas but another quality of metroidvanias is that because they are traditionally in two dimensions their game design necessitates some amount of

[08:01] in order for the environments to loop back on themselves in 2d you pretty much need to send the player up or down which creates a layered environment the original dark souls retains this idea to an astonishing degree

[08:13] work your way up to undead parish or down through the depths and into the abyss all without interruption this kind of vertical design is a key part of the original dark souls but it's not necessarily a key part of the

[08:26] games are as vertical as dark souls 1. they sometimes distinct environments will have smaller loops and shortcuts within themselves regions bloodborne has a kind of gentle slope to

[08:41] it with the forest area at a lower elevation than the cathedral but there aren't say a half dozen regions located directly beneath part of the original dark souls that i have really missed i

[08:53] want more games to have this kind of design actually i don't just want more unscratchable itch for more games like this a huge part of exactly where you were

[09:06] learning what you needed to do to get from one place to another and it's why that world has entrenched itself so firmly in my memory i don't the other from software games the combat feels similar but the

[09:20] because there's less of an emphasis on verticality and the other reason is around the map much more easily in the endgame of the original dark souls you get a power that lets you teleport to any of the other

[09:33] up until this point if you descended down into blighttown and wanted to go back up to sen's fortress you had to manually climb from now you can click a button and speed the process up which is fine because at that

[09:46] in the other games you're given this power right at the start and i can't really overstate how much this diminishes a huge part of the way i get invested in these kinds of worlds the ease of teleportation makes things

[10:00] connected to the environment it makes it easier for me to get to the care about the combat it's also not something i can just opt out of in order to level up in dark souls 3 and bloodborne you're actually required to

[10:14] which for me shatters the immersion the game is building within the environment knight's world design is much closer to the original dark souls than any of the other from software games like metroidvania games it has an extremely

[10:29] and the relative elevation of each region makes sense in the logic of the world and helps to characterize that region and the ones the ancient basin only makes sense at the bottom of the world the city of

[10:41] tears is obviously the capital city of this world because it's at the center there are ways to fast travel around the world but they are not given immediately diegetic they are part of the world there isn't this contrivance of

[10:54] teleporting from one place to another or into a dream or whatever you have to find train stations or stag stations which then physically take you to another spot on the map now to be clear i'm not some dark souls

[11:07] it's not a perfect video game that can't be iterated on or changed but the specific kind of experience i had with the exploration in dark souls had a profound effect on me and the only other game that has scratched that particular

[11:20] impression that hollow knight is just a is its own is its own unique experience

[11:37] exploring the fallen kingdom of hollownest fallen kingdoms are a trope of the souls like genre but where the souls games mostly use that backdrop to create a sense of horror and dread hollow knight almost always

[11:50] presents it as a place of beauty as well every moment of hollow knight is is bursting with color it's a joy to simply wander through the world as if it were an art museum it's never just beautiful though it's

[12:03] sadness loss and melancholy because again you're exploring a ruined world the evidence of death and tragedy is to hollow knight isn't just the game itself but the state

[12:16] part of the appeal of all post-apocalyptic media is being able to collapse and achieve a sense of catharsis or have gone back to hollow knight are times when i am feeling despondent about

[12:30] about global warming and now the pandemic the game meets you at that feeling it begins in darkness you comfortable in that gloomy space

[12:42] even if it doesn't actually get better hollow nest is ruined it will never be put back to the way it was at least not during our time there but that's okay there's a trend on tick tock right now where people film themselves

[12:57] something a lot of people find them soothing and reassuring they get the sense of things being back to normal same function psychologically in so many games

[13:09] everything is out of place and chaotic at the beginning and if you're a you've solved every problem found every missing item and returned hollow knight has that sense to an extent too there are people to save and

[13:23] items to find but the ending is not one of cathartic celebration instead it feels more akin to the release of phantom pain here's what i mean because of its souls-like and

[13:35] metroidvania design the player is sent through the same passages again and at first every enemy is difficult and you'll probably spend a lot of time you encounter eventually though once the player knows

[13:49] do they'll likely realize that they can run game when they are backtracking through the levels and as you uncover the mysteries of the game's plot you'll also learn

[14:01] evil they're sick they've been infected by a at everything around them making them obstacles for you but not your enemies as a result holoness stops becoming a place you are slowly conquering but a

[14:16] place that you are supposed to take care of the more i wander hollowness the there even though it is ruined even though there is tragedy around every world you instead acclimate yourself to the chaos there is

[14:31] knight it would feel completely at odds with sword and restore everything back to the way it rest beat back the infection and the darkness

[14:44] just a little bit despondency about the state of the world comes from a lack of an inability to control or influence what's happening around you hollow knight simulates dealing with that feeling and in its closing moments

[14:57] it instills in me a sense of peace the game is on its own merits phenomenal but the context in which it exists within the wider video as a product of its inspirations and as a piece of post-apocalyptic media made

[15:11] feels on the horizon elevates it into something i am drawn back into again and again and again [Music]

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