Mina the Hollower

Mina the Hollower is a creative, engaging, and thoroughly well crafted game from start to finish. Achieved 1 run with 100% completion in about 31 hours (a good 4 of those might be from leaving it on, though.) Graphically taking the style of GBA or perhaps SNES, it manages to have a retro feel with excellent pixel art backgrounds and simple but lovable character designs. Songs are consistently groovy and do a great job having rich memorable songs using that old synth style. The story is fine, much like an early Zelda title you really just get the "stop bad guy and achieve task" to move you around the world with a couple of thoroughly predictable plot twists. The gameplay of Mina is, of course, the focal point. Mina is a great embodiment of how I like difficulty in my games. In my mind, difficulty is not something that exists for the hell of it. If a game is incredibly hard or punishing for the sake of being hard, that feels like a waste of my time as the player. I don't want to spend 3 hours beating a boss because they gave it a huge health pool or instakill attacks or made it unreasonably fast. Good difficulty in a game serves to task the player with finding new creative ways to solve the problem. The difficulty forces the player to learn and engage with the mechanics of the game to fully appreciate the depth of gameplay. Mina does this very well. The game gives you 5 weapons, 60 trinkets (equipable items), 15 sidearms, and various other upgrades and abilities along the way. Nearly every difficult situation you are put in can be aided by learning to use these tools effectively. Of course the majority of the game is exploring the world to find these tools, so it's entirely possible that you may not have the ideal tool when you need it. This is the necessary downside of the open world non-linear game that Mina is. This, however, makes exploration very satisfying and valuable, as each new area might have a tool that solves a problem you had somewhere else. The weapons and sidearms are mostly very satisfying to use with a few exceptions (there are some clunky sidearms I would never consider using and I really don't like the blaster primary). Combat is engaging and satisfying with the unique hollowing mechanic acting like a fun deviation from the standard dodge roll. Bosses are generally fun and engaging, again with a handful that fell flat (that stupid moth lady...) and the final boss was incredibly well designed. Small demerits for the following: - Some weapons and sidearms feel gimmicky and useless - Some bosses and enemies can be frustrating to fight (usually really fast ones that just run at you). As some other reviews have pointed out, the map design and enemy placement sometimes feel designed to torture, and that makes me sad. - The game would benefit a ton from an actual map. Not like the world map, but a real map. Hollow Knight does this incredibly well by having a rich map that still hides a lot of secrets. - I got 100% collectibles in my first run, and some of those secrets are ridiculous. There are a good handful of collectibles that I simply never would've found without looking it up. - While I like the idea, I personally really disliked the generator climb sections. The 3d effect and forced upward climb were confusing and didn't add anything to the gameplay. Overall a solid 9/10. Glad to see Yacht Club breaking free of the infinite Shovel Knight curse and making an absolute banger. All achievements looks like hell and I will probably not be doing it any time soon.

仿佛回到当年玩GB，GBC 的时光，这游戏还是挑人的，手感就和当年的GB游戏差不多，能看到很多经典游戏的影子，探索像GB塞尔达系列，主副武器有恶魔城的味道，boss的难度主要还是因为主角的‘复古机动性’ 变得格外的 黑魂味，需要反复研究走位 并且不能贪刀，还有死亡惩罚也比较魂，有武器升级机制和饰品，并且还能用钱来提升血量和饰品装备槽，反正我是越玩越上头，莫名找到了当年玩游戏的感觉，推荐给所有喜欢复古游戏玩家，难度个人感觉中等偏上吧，比GB塞尔达系列要难，推荐开始选链球，手长，打怪比较舒服

Call me Mina the way I be Hollowing out my cheeks under the desk at Yacht Club Games for creating this masterpiece. Post review

Great game, there is so much content and so many options in terms of weapons and items to equip. The biggest compliment I can give is that every screen is so unique that if I looked up where to find a collectable I knew which ones I missed right away from seeing screenshots. A few of those items might have been better as permanent power ups to free up trinket space, but it's the smallest complaint. Also there are a lot of secrets I only learned about after beating the game. Plus an exhaustive list of modifiers you can add once you beat the game. Be sure to talk to all the NPCs, the amount of hints they gave me that I ignored until going for 100% completion was crazy.

This became one of my favourite games ever. Everything from the music, the map design, the expansive world and all its inhabitants... Yeah, it can definitely be challenging at times. But please ignore the negative reviews from people complaining about difficulty. The game respects you as a player and doesn't hold your hand. There's an in-game manual with a lot of useful info, especially starting out, but ultimately you get what you put in with this game. Some people think that they are entitled to be good at every game and to enjoy every game they play, but you know what? The game might just not be for you - that's okay. But it's not the game's fault. It's not Zelda but it evokes the same feeling of discovery and exploration for me + high level of challenge and mastery at times that retro (or retro 'style') games demand from time to time.

I was going into the game expecting to be disappointed because it didn't look that great on the surface (obtuse dodging mechanic, difficult ball-busting Zelda-like, weird sub-weapon system), but after about an hour in I was absolutely hooked. The level design pairs extremely well the lack of an enforced item progression system like the LoZ games (such as bombs, hookshot, etc.) by just making the levels fun interactable obstacle courses that force you to understand Mina's mechanics; but on top of that, also providing unique ways to use those mechanics that never get old or rehashed constantly. The burrow is a refreshing spin on dodging, and the fact that it doubles as a platforming and secret hunting mechanic is a genius combination. It takes some getting used to, but there are trinkets that can make it easier to use. I also never found the difficulty to be that unforgiving, and I the game actually became easier as I progressed due to having more healing or tools to solve problems at my disposal. It could have been due to me not following the game's "intended route" and killing some bosses early for a boost of power, but I digress. As for the sub-weapons, I still find it a little strange they are gotten from specific locations, but the game provides solutions through underlab upgrades that allow you keep sub-weapons on death, or save a favorite one for later to help with secret hunting or side quests. And above all, the modifier system was a huge surprise for me. Change the game how you want! Make it harder! Easier! Weirder! Provide yourself with massive amounts of replayability through this system (like a built in randomizer!!!!) or through crazy quirky challenge runs like no shops, underlabs, or hell, make enemies 2x bigger! Or turn Mina into a god and one-shot everything in a power-tripping rampage! I'd go into it more, but you just need to play it yourself to discover everything it has to offer. I'm on my third playthrough now and keep wanting more. Fantastic game, I'm addicted, 9/10, Yacht Club released another banger.

This game is definitely not for everyone. The difficulty curve is a bit steep at the start, and the game does not hold your hand. If you manage to overcome this initial rough spot, the rest of the game unfolds like a brilliant experience.