I love Metroidvanias, and I enjoy the sense of accomplishment that comes with overcoming difficult games, so I had been looking forward to playing Hollow Knight for quite some time. However, I’m a father, and I have a demanding job, so my gaming time is extremely limited. Unfortunately, after roughly five hours of play, I came to the conclusion that the developers of this game have absolutely no respect for the player’s time. The checkpoints are few and far between, the fast travel system is woefully inadequate for such a large game world, the mini-map mechanics are frustrating, and the death penalties are steep and not explained ahead of time. The combination of these things leads to a ridiculous amount of backtracking, which isn’t fun (for me, at least), and which I just wasn’t able to get past, especially since player and story progression happen at a snail’s pace. Sure, the graphics and sound are great, and the controls are tight, but the basic gameplay loop is just that: basic. The combat and platforming are serviceable, but nothing to write home about, and certainly not compelling enough for me to overlook all my frustrations and all my wasted time. I can see why people love this game, but it’s not for everyone, and it’s definitely not for me. If time is your most valuable commodity, look elsewhere.
I'm a huge fan of turn-based tactical games and D&D, and as such, I absolutely LOVED this game. For me, carefully creating and fine tuning a party of adventurers to command in tactical battles is the very definition of gaming goodness, and ToEE does not disappoint! It really is a shame that I just can't bring myself to give it 5 stars... First and foremost, this game is hindered by bugs. There's no way around it. In fact, I was barely able to even get the game running at all. And, if looking through the forums is any indicator, I'm not the only one who experienced these issues. Second, there is very little storyline here, and figuring out what to do next can be confusing, especially at the beginning of the game. However, if (like me) all you care about is the battles and leveling up your party, this isn't THAT big of a deal. Finally, you NEED to have the Co8 modpack to get the full experience. It fixes bugs, adds additional content (very important for the crafting feats), bumps the level cap to 20 (instead of 10), and lets you create all 8 party members (instead of 5 + 3 NPCs). You could play without it... but DON'T! TL;DR- ToEE is turn-based tactical role-playing at its finest... almost.
