Warning: this is quite rambly and probably not useful as a review.
So, it's a bit hard to review a game after putting 600 hours into it.
The last 500 hours have been great, though that does also involve mods (randomizer in particular).
On one hand, I do remember having some negative feelings on my first playthrough, and I almost didn't bother with the true ending.
On the other hand, this was my first metroidvania in years and I wasn't prepared. I diminished my experience by looking things up on the internet and being put off from going into a certain important area and getting stuck and this wasn't really the game's fault.
It's not perfect, but it kept pulling me back to finish it, and to finish the true ending, and to try out mods, and to get 112% completion, and to do steel soul, and to get all achievements, and to do PoP, and to do some speedruns (107% under 5 hours with a route I designed myself).
Once I was done with the things I wanted to do in Hollow Knight, I tried to find other games like it, but at this point I was so in love with the game that all other games felt bad. Took me a while to recover from that, but the whole experience was absolutely worth it.
So yeah, it's my favourite game. It's amazing, but I'm gonna take away half a star because there are a couple legit problems with the game.
So, it's a bit hard to review a game after putting 600 hours into it.
The last 500 hours have been great, though that does also involve mods (randomizer in particular).
On one hand, I do remember having some negative feelings on my first playthrough, and I almost didn't bother with the true ending.
On the other hand, this was my first metroidvania in years and I wasn't prepared. I diminished my experience by looking things up on the internet and being put off from going into a certain important area and getting stuck and this wasn't really the game's fault.
It's not perfect, but it kept pulling me back to finish it, and to finish the true ending, and to try out mods, and to get 112% completion, and to do steel soul, and to get all achievements, and to do PoP, and to do some speedruns (107% under 5 hours with a route I designed myself).
Once I was done with the things I wanted to do in Hollow Knight, I tried to find other games like it, but at this point I was so in love with the game that all other games felt bad. Took me a while to recover from that, but the whole experience was absolutely worth it.
So yeah, it's my favourite game. It's amazing, but I'm gonna take away half a star because there are a couple legit problems with the game.