Hollow Knight

Hollow Knight is an action-adventure game developed and published by Australian independent studio Team Cherry. The game is loosely based on Hungry Knight (a game created by Team Cherry) and started out as a Kickstarter on November 19, 2014, and then released as a full game on February 24, 2017.

Plot
You play as a nameless little knight who arrives at the ruins of Hallownest, a once flourishing kingdom that was brought to ruin after "an infection", created by a being called The Radiance, spread throughout the kingdom that turned the citizens into mindless creatures that won't hesitate to attack anyone. Later in the game, you discover that the little knight is a failed vessel, one of the many thousands that failed to be chosen as the Hollow Knight, but was able to escape The Abyss, a place that all Void originated from.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) The game tells a sad and tragic story that shows a bit of how Hallownest became the gloomy and depressing kingdom it is now.
 * 2) Tight and precise controls that you can alternate to your will.
 * 3) Highly challenging but mostly fair gameplay accompanied by an action-packed and frenetic combat system.
 * 4) Incredibly beautiful and impressive graphics and art style for an indie game, especially on the Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4 versions. You may want to just sit in a bench and admire the visuals of Hallownest.
 * 5) An absolutely massive world that feels like it will never end, which constantly makes you have the urge to keep exploring every bit of it. Even when thinking that you've discovered everything in the game, you'll still come across new secrets.
 * 6) Tons of content to do in-game that was added either in the game already or after Hollow Knight's release. As a matter of fact all the expansions are completely free!
 * 7) Up to 47 challenging bosses to face off against, most of them with beautiful designs, fun attacks and awesome soundtracks.
 * 8) The characters are memorable, well-written, have great designs, and are one of the best parts about Hollow Knight.
 * 9) Undeniably magnificent and fantastic orchestrated soundtrack by composer Christopher Larkin, who is also behind the soundtrack of Hollow Knight: Silksong. Some of the best tracks in the game are White Palace, Greenpath , Hornet , Grimm , and City of Tears.
 * 10) There are these special abilities called 'Charms' which can give the Knight temporary powers at the cost of Charm Notches, which can vary in the number of Charm Notches required to use the Charm you want to utilize. You can also mix up Charms and upgrade them for interesting results.
 * 11) It will often unexpectedly thrive on its atmosphere which can be gorgeous and relaxing or scary and horrific-looking to witness.
 * 12) The Godmaster DLC allows you to fight all of the bosses you've encountered before, makes you go up against 5 pantheons (AKA boss rushes), and brings in lore about the Godseeker herself.
 * 13) Pretty humorous voice acting with made up words and kooky sounds that contribute to the uniqueness of the game's universe.
 * 14) Tons of replay value which actually feels nearly endless.
 * 15) The game has five main endings, one of which is mutually exclusive to the rest. The latter four are unlocked by acquiring the Void Heart charm, and which one plays depends on the actions of the player.
 * 16) The game is up to 20 hours long normally (not counting all of the side content and DLC). If you are willing to reach the 112% game completion, it might take you more than 100 hours of gameplay. All for a price tag of $15.
 * 17) You can unlock 2 extra gamemodes while playing which are Steel Soul mode (a permadeath mode) and Godseeker mode (which has you challenge the gods of Hallownest).
 * 18) The game is full of deep lore that's intentionally subtle and opens up more about the fallen kingdom of Hallownest. Every piece of dialogue is complex and uses a dictionary of difficult words for expressing messages.
 * 19) The True Final Boss of this game is breathtaking, extremely difficult, and is a perfect way to finish off the game.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Some enemies like Soul Twisters and Primal Aspids can be an absolute hindrance and can be really unfair at times.
 * 2) The Bosses can either be completely balanced and fun or incredibly tedious.
 * 3) Despite all of the depressing content and loads of disturbing stuff in this game, it somehow got an E10+ (PEGI 7 in other countries) even though said content exists. The corpse piles of dead bugs in a few areas, an on-screen death of a character being stabbed by one of the bosses, and the entirety of Deepnest are great examples of this issue.
 * 4) The Pantheon of Hallownest is a long and absolutely painful boss rush against every single boss in the game including the dream variants. There are no saves (unless if you're playing the Switch version in which you can put the console to sleep to take a break), it all has to be done in one go, and to make matters worse, in order to beat the Godmaster DLC, you have no choice but to complete the Pantheon in order to get the other two endings.
 * 5) A ton of the funded Kickstarter stretch goals never made it into the game. Good examples of this are the side quests, bosses in the White Palace, the Wii U port (although that isn't really a bad thing) and an alternate storyline for the Colosseum Of Fools.

Reception
Hollow Knight has stuck a spectacular reception from reviewers, fans, and players and was universally acclaimed as one of the best metroidvania games of all time, as well as one of the best indie games ever made. On review aggregator site Metacritic, the PC version of the game received an average score of 87/100 based on 27 critic reviews, meanwhile, the Switch version of the game scored a 90/100 based on 27 critic reviews, and received the acclaimed 'Must-Play' badge. The game since then has sold 3 million copies worldwide.

Videos
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Trivia

 * On February 14, 2019, a sequel to the game was announced by the name of Hollow Knight: Silksong, in said game, Hornet would become the new playable character.
 * A boss fight with one of the characters, Dryya, was planned to be added in the 'Ancient Basin' area of the map, protecting the 'Glade of Hope' subarea, the boss fight was later cut and the subarea was renamed to 'Spirit's Glade' and moved to the 'Resting Grounds' area.