Why Hollow Knight Is A Soulslike (A Descent Into Madness)
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Video Chapters
00:00 Intro
01:05 Chapter 1: Hollow Knight's inspirations from Fromsoftware
02:58 Project Orochi Sponsorship
04:25 Chapter 2: The overlooked similarities
09:55 Chapter 3: The gameplay-shaped elephant in the room
12:06 Chapter 4: Wait, is Dark Souls a Metroidvania??
13:23 Chapter 5: Genres suck, I hate it here
16:02 Conclusion: Hollow Knight is a...
Video content:
contains promotional material and cutscenes for Dark Souls 1 and 2, Elden Ring, Salt and Sanctuary, Ori and the Will of the Wisps, Demons' Souls, Nine Sols, Hollow Knight: Silksong, Cuphead, Lords of the Fallen and Outer Wilds
The following (video) content by content creators were used in the video (in order of appearance):
Earth's Evolution in 10 minutes by What If
Hollow Knight- Beating the Soul Warrior to get the Shade Soul by Shaded
Bloodborne - Why I love the rally system by Julien
30 minutes Timer - hourglass with digital timer, ASMR sand sounds, no music by The Hourglass Timer
Dark Souls Walkthrough - Everything possible in... Kiln of the First Flame [Finale] ► 23 by BlueLizardJello
Dark Souls Map by 9S on sketchfab.com
Hollow Knight - White Palace 1.0.0.6 Speedrun - 3:24 by MohnStahLer
Dark Souls Remastered - Walkthrough Part 15: Anor Londo by FightinCowboy
Sekiro Shadows Die Twice - Underwater Headless Boss Fight & Location - Ashina Castle by PowerPyx
Faxanadu Retro Game Gameplay - Gameplay by IGN
Tags used in the video:
silksong,hollow knight,hollow knight silksong,stizzl,team cherry,dark souls,soulslike,soulslikes,is hollow knight a soulslike,metroidvania,soulslike games,hollow knight dark souls,hollow knight video essay,hollow knight gameplay,hollow knight genre,video game essay,video game genres,video essay
#hollowknight #darksouls #soulslike #metroidvania - Hry
As always, thanks for watching! I will add to this pinned comment if any questions about the video arise. Otherwise I will see you in the next year!
~Answers to questions on the video/things I wanna address~:
1. I do a lot of comparing and contrasting and by doing that, one might get the impression that I dislike some of the video games I mentioned. And while I don't *love* every single one of them, I do absolutely love *some* of them. Additionally, not every game has to be interconnected the way DS and HK are to be good or great, and having that kind of interconnectivity is not an immediate plus, I just tend to like it in general
2. "But wait, HK is way too speedy to be compared to DS when it comes to gameplay in any way, therefore it cannot be a soulslike!" Well, newer soulslikes like DS3, Bloodborne, Sekiro or Elden Ring are a lot faster, so just because the gameplay of the "original" soulslike cannot be translated that well to HK does not disqualify the entire argument. By the same metric I could also say HK is never ever a metroidvania because the first metroid games feel sluggish and slow when compared to HK's snappy and precise movement and that would also be not sufficient on its own as an argument imo.
This makes complete sense. It’s a metroidvania soulslike. Combines the challenging combat and the exploration (mind you, not the platforming, aside from the path of pain) of the two to make a great game
Hollow Knight *IS* my soul
You are so real for that
Like
We've never seen artorias and the hollow knight in the same room so you might be onto something
THK doesn't have a nice doggo tho
Here is my take:
There is nothing inherently wrong with naming genres/subgenres after other games.
Metroid was the precursor of the "2d platformers with non linear maps and a gameplay loop of going through a dungeon, getting a new ability, backtracking to old areas and using said abilities to unlock access to further dungeons and finding tens of hidden collectibles along the way" games, and Castlevania was the first series to later incorporate these elements because of Metroid. And so, this subgenre was called "Metroidvania" and I couldn't care less. It instantly gives you the idea of what game you are about to buy, so I say it gets the job done.
Names are just arbitrary strings of letters we use to represent certain concepts, so arguing whether the name is accurate or not is pretty pointless in most cases.
If "JRPG's with unconventional gameplay mechanics and stories that fuck with the player on an emotional level" like One Shot and Omori were called "Undertale-likes" or something, it wouldn't be of any harm whatsoever. I'd even say it would very benificial, as it could help this subgenre get more attention by both seperating it from the rest of JRPG's AND connecting it to a classic we all know and love.
The problem starts when a given name is not well defined, as is the case with "souls-likes". What does represent? Does it mean the game is hard? Is it about the combat system? (which isnt really that unique if you think about it). Or maybe about the storytelling and themes? Noone really knows. The fact that people keep arguing about it is enough to show how fundamentally broken this term is.
Is it reasonable assume someone would enjoy Ori because they love Hollow Knight and they are both Metroidvanias? Yeah, probably. Is it reasonable to assume someone would enjoy Elden Ring if they loved Hollow Knight since these are both "Souls-likes"? Not really. They might, but just because HK is apparently a "souls-like" is no way to tell. Thats what makes a good and a bad genre name in my eyes.
There is also the overuse of specific names and the fact that games just keep evolving. There are cases like Dead Cells, which is at its core, a Rouge-lite. However, since the devs took some elements from Castlevania and Souls games, they decided that it also must be a Metroidvania and a Souls-like. Even though it has barely anything from souls aside from combat inspirations (and I guess the "fallen kingdom" thing but come on, lets at least seperate the setting and the gameplay, tying them together for the sake of a name just makes everything more messy). And calling it a metroidvania is almost like false advertising. Yeah, there are upgrades (only one of which is a movement upgrade btw) but the very important semi-open world aspect is completely gone. That doesn't make Dead Cells a bad game, I just want people to call it for what it really is, A ROUGE-LITE. Genres are supposed to (in case of video games) the describe overall gameplay loop, not point out every similarity to a previously established works.
To sum this little rant up, this whole "genre war" happens just because people can't properly define words they use and it makes my autisic brain mad. Thank you for reading
I would point out that rogue-lite and rogue-like are also examples of terrible name genres though. Someone who likes Hades or Dead Cells is not even likely to enjoy Rogue, nor is someone who likes Isaac or Gungeon.
Comparisons only work things you’re comparing are actually alike, and if the people you’re comparing to have experience with at least one of the topics, which tends to mean that Rogue-like is a useless term. Call it an Isaac-like or a Procedural Reset game and people won’t have to use google to understand what you’re really talking about.
@@shreeshfuup7058 Sorry for bad wording on my part. What I really meant in the "liking one game because of other game" paragraph was that "metroidvania" gives you a better idea of what kind of gameplay you might expect compared to "souls-like". It's not like "everyone who loves game A, loves every game in A genre", because that's silly. What I meant is that a more descriptive name helps you find/recommend new games.
So if we are talking about how desciptive the name is, I think rogue-likes and rogue-lites are great examples. They both mean a "procedurally generated game with a permadeath mechanic", and the difference between them is that one features meta progression and the other doesn't. There is a case to be made that seperating them is obsolete and only leads to confusion, but that's a whole different can of worms. But these names have a clear, agreed upon definition. Dead Cells and Isaac are very different, but they share a very similar progression system. They are called rogue-lites to attract people who want a game to sink hundreds of hours into in order to 100% it, and detract those who get frustrated with the perma-death mechanic. It describes what all of these games have in common. You can describe other aspects like combat with different terms. Isaac and Dead Cells are both rogue-lites, but one is a bullet-hell game, while the other takes a lot from souls combat (see how well "souls-like" gets the point across once you specify the aspects you are comparing? it fails only once you try to make it into a whole genre).
Also, I don't think "Isaac-like" or "Procedural Reset game" are any better. It was named "rogue-lite/rogue-like" and it stayed that way ever since. It doesn't matter that most people don't remember the original game. If you find a new word, you google it, and add it to your vocabulary. If these games were simply named differently, nothing would change.
Great thread from you two! I do think that genres like "metroidvanias", "roguelites/likes" or "soulslikes" have the disadvantage that they are inherently a bit more complicated to explain than something like "FPS" or "Sports" or "Platformer". There is some kind of entry barrier. Especially with roguelikes, I never really understood what the hook would be/what the gameplay loop would be like until I had played them myself, since I think e.g. reading about the genre is sometimes not sufficient. So there can be an inherent time-investment to make sure one really "gets" what the genre is supposed to mean. And as you mentioned, the name "soulslike" also sucks in that regard since the boundaries of a soulslike truly are not well defined. This probably also comes from, among other thigns, From making many "soulslikes" over the years that play with some of the elements that were previously established (which is why some dont even call Sekiro a soulslike).
You make good arguments about why metroidvanias still deserve to be named after metroid and castlevania games. Nothing to add here.
Sidenote:
Funnily enough, after playing HK and going back to replaying Ori, I kinda disliked the game since apart from story/visuals and music the gameplay and exploration feels very flat when compared to HK. I think one always gotta take into account what a game's strong aspects are and what a potential player might want out of a game. If someone wants a 2d big interconnected world, then yes, Ori is a great recommendation for someone that played HK. If someone wants engaging combat with a small margin for error and wants multiple explorable pathways that go beyond just having a hidden secret item every once in a while, then I would recommend a souls game to someone who loved that about HK instead. (This same argument can be spun multiple ways, with some people maybe liking certain aspects of Ori and disliking the same kind of aspects in HK, therefore making HK a bad recommendation for them).
Either way, as we laid out, the genre discussion is quite complex and often overblown, and I think there are many interesting viewpoints to be had so thanks for sharing yours! @@guziencdaj103
Great video! Evidence was clearly presented and I’m happy with the conclusion. You “landed the plane” really well.
Thanks for the very nice comment, it means a lot! Glad I was able to get my points across quite well
stizzl has alerted the horde
They gonna be clawing at my gates soon
AoT and Beserk refrence in a Stizzl video? Peak fiction.
Of course, the Stizzl Variety Channel always pays homage to peak fiction. Especially more people need to read Berserkkkk
I do NOT like the Soul Twisters, Soul Warriors, and Soul Master, therefore it is clearly a Soulsdislike.
Now THAT is the true correct take
I too HATE Soul Tyrant
Ngl I love Soul Master and like Soul Tyrant@@sleeper6548
I'll do you one better.
Souls games are metroidvanias.
(Or, more specifically, have a certain overlap with MVs in world design - interlocking, slowly opening up world, somewhat non-linear traversal, etc.)
Where souls games build on a certain amount of the design DNA of MVs, Hollow Knights takes that and circles back on more traditional MV gameplay.
Relationships between genres really are an interesting topic.
Which once again shows that labels can be messy and tend to be more descriptive than prescriptive.
Nevermind, you touched on this. Really should not comment while watching.
Well, comments are good for the youtube algorithm.
Hell yeah, thanks for boosting the algorithm! (and for the comments themselves)@@evolutionground8946
IMO Hollow Knight's movement is too fast for me to call it a 2d Dark Souls. You basically zoom around in bullet hell battles wheras Dark Souls feels clunky and slow (in a good way).
Zelda 2 is honestly more of a 2d soulslike.
Hmmm I would argue that HK feels similar to something like BB or DS3 in speed, and as you said definitely not as clunky and slow as DS1 and DS2. I do think that calling HK fights bullet hell battles isn't really accurate though, only some fights have some attacks that have bullet hell elements (e.g. NKG or Obblobbles).
Also about the speed: There also might be a connection between 2d games normally being faster than 3d games in order to have a similar game-feel. I have no proof of that, but lack of the third dimension could probably lead to quickening up battles.
And btw let's just say that at least Zelda 2 hits the clunkiness level right on the mark💀
The lack of any mention of Grime in this discussion is criminal.
Would have loved to mention it but I have yet to play it! But yeah, from what I have seen, Grime also checks many "souls" boxes
@@Stizzl Can highly recommend. A tiny bit of jankiness aside, it's so good!
I'll definitely get around to playing it, it looked quite up my alley!@@zoothe44
Other than hollow knight i dont think ive actually played a soulslike and i dont know why, they're exactly the type of game i like so i guess thats what I'll start doing whilst we wait for silksong.
(Guess i won't threaten you as its close to the holidays so if you reply i wouldn't mind a recommendation)
Try bloodborne if you can it's got the formula of previous souls down. +The combat is more fast paced and active with a healing mechanic similar to hollow knight (you can hit enemies to get health you just lost) the only gripe I have is the beginning is a little confusing but if you explore every nook and cranny you should be fine. (Also some requirements for the true ending are a bit bull)
Thanks for the recommendation! I'll try it out soon!
Hmmm I think Dark Souls 3 is the easiest to get into and it is fantastic. Bloodborne, as someone already recommended, is maybe even better, but a bit harder than DS3. And Elden Ring is also an obv recommendation
I will be sure to play both of them.
That is the based way of thinking@@I_am_unfunny
Hollow Knight is actually an Armored Core-like, hear me out...
Wait...
THE KNIGHT IS A MECHA THAT IS BEING CONTROLLED BY VOID, OMG YOU ARE RIGHT
you still working on that sanctuary mod or no just please respond?
All that I will say at this point is that this was the last piece of information we have shared about the mod:
czcams.com/video/ZtIMC-6NA6k/video.html
@@Stizzl i know thats the last information you shared and thanks for responding but just wanna ask if you are ok with saying if you did anything after that and are you activly working on it if you cant say thats fine. All the best!
I think Souls Like as a genre only applies to games that intentionally try to replicate From Software's game design. Games like Lies of P, Remnant, etc.
I don't think a game can be a souls like accidentally, just because it has superficial similarities. Hollow Knight is a fundamentally very different game, and its similarities to dark souls are mostly surface level and present in non defining parts of the genre.
If you define it that way, that's fair. That also shows that "soulslike" as a genre is just not well defined at all, since if you ask 10 people where the boundaries of that genre are, you will probably get 10 different answers.
Which is why at the end I do say that HK is not a soulslike, but is a game *like Dark Souls*, since I believe the term "soulslike" to be a bit unclear, but believe the similarities to be more than just superficial, with e.g. the story/presentation/themes being extremely similar.
i guess all the hollow knight being soulslike deniers just gonna conveniently ignore that game literally has a SOUL meter and that i LIKE it???? 🙄
Case closed!
If game save game for you, that a souls like.
Nice video my german friend
game has souls drop at death
It's a soulslike. 😎✌️ 🦆🦆
That's the spirit 😎
Good video it points out how flawed video game genres are for describing some games.
I would say a souls-like should come down entirely on mechanics with complete disregard to aesthetics and tone. And while not all mechanics are needed to be a souls-like, more than one (preferably at least three) is. To begin:
1: A leveling system that doubles as the primary currency. Hollow Knight has a currency that can be used to purchase upgrades for the player character, but it is the leveling system specifically that is needed to make it a souls-like in this regard.
2: Losing all currency on death with a limited opportunity to regain it. While the "all" may be debatable I'd leave that for a game worth making it a debate, which Hollow Knight is not. Defeat your shade before you're defeated yourself or you'll lose all the money you lost when you died and spawned a shade. About as clear-cut as it gets.
3: Rest sites to regain health that respawn enemies, bonus points if you also use this spot to level up. I would say Hollow Knight does not qualify due to enemy respawns not being dependent on sitting at a bench.
4: Limited primary healing consumable that is replenished at rest sites. Hollow Knight obviously does not qualify for this.
5: A stamina mechanic that is consumed through both defending and attacking. Defense is one thing, but it's the need to manage your offense that separates souls from most of the pack. Even more so than with 4 Hollow Knight does not qualify.
6. Finally and most tenuous would be upgrade paths for weapons and armor via material requirements. I would say it has to be a variety of weapons and armor to choose from but honestly this is so universal that I'm only bringing it up because someone would probably think I should've. Hollow Knight does qualify on the weapon side, but like I said I don't really think this is much of a qualification in the first place.
So all things considersd, Hollow Knight is not a souls-like.
so where is silksong?
Not here, sadly
Didnt team cherry said that they havent even played any souls game and just liked the corpse mechanics?
Yep! That does not really matter though. Two different groups of people can come up with similar things independently of each other. Team Cherry does not have to study From's games from a mechanical or lore-perspective and be like "Yeah let's do something like this", they just did what they wanted to and it ended up being similar to Souls games in certain aspects.
Brain injury?
Funnily enough i make a brain-injury joke in the video
Oh hey, not-a-fan-of-Metroid-or-Darksouls-but-love-the-hell-out-of-Hollowknight squad. Thought I might be the only one.
I mean, Hollow Knight is very different from both Dark Souls and Metroid, so it’s not inconceivable that you might like it but not the others.
I *did* like Metroid Dread and I do loooove every Soulslike game apart from DS1 and DS2 (DS1, DS2 and Super Metroid are like 5 to 6.5/10s for me) buuut yeah it is funny to adore HK and not like the very very origins of most of its aspects
wrong the devs didnt play souls at all before the community kept saying it, so there was no inspiration in the base game. maybe the dlcs tho
I never made the claim that Team Cherry played the game.
Anyway, this source disproves your point, since in it, TC says they played Dark Souls before:
github.com/NebuPookins/DarkSoulsAndHollowKnight
And they do aknowledge the similarities here: mcvuk.com/development-news/when-we-made-hollow-knight/
They themselves dont say DS was their *main* inspiration, and I believe them. But they were still inspired in part by Dark Souls and the end product ended up being very similar to DS in many aspects
Here’s my hot take: “video game-like” genres are terrible. A comparison only works if both compared things are alike *and* the person you’re comparing things to has experienced one of the two things being compared.
If, as you conclude in the video, a game can *not* be a Soulslike but *can* be like Dark Souls, then the game genre falls apart. Using comparisons to dictate game mechanics doesn’t work, because nobody can agree on which mechanics of the original game are important to the genre and which mechanics aren’t.
Finally, the average consumer has not played Rogue, or Dark Souls, or Metroid, or Castlevana. If you tell someone that x game is a “metroidvania” or a “soulslike” they’re going to ask you what the hell that even means, and you’ll have to proceed to *actually describe the game to them,* defeating the purpose of a genre in the first place.
Genres like “First Person Shooter” and “Turn-Based” work because they describe what the game is and how it’s played. Comparison genres don’t work because they don’t do this - the only person who knows what a “Metroidvania” is probably already knows and has played most of the games in the genre.
I definitely agree with what you are saying here. Maybe some genres, like FPS, are just inherently easier to "name" than genres like "metroidvania" etc. And as you said, that defeats a main purpose of the name, since then you will have to describe it anyway. I guess once one has played a metroidvania, the genre itself should be quite well defined for that person, but that is an entry barrier that other genres dont have
I had to do corpse runs in EverQuest, which came out 10 years before 2009's Demon's Souls. So is that a souls-like? Are Souls games MMORPGs?
I've never played a FromSoft game, but what I think of from their games is a slow, methodical combat usually coupled with a stamina system and limited, reusable healing. Given how snappy HK's movement and animations are, I don't regard it as a souls-like. Contrast that with Blasphemous which moves much more like I regard Souls games, which has very dark themes and twisted characters, and which loves to hide its cryptic lore in item descriptions. If you want to call Blasphemous a souls-like, I'm here for it, but Hollow Knight? No.
I do see where your coming from, but there are a few things I wanna point out.
1. As I say in the video, the corpse-run mechanic is only a small part of a bigger picture and not at all the most important piece here.
2. As you say, you never played a From game, so I wanna explain: Only DS1 and DS2 are so slow, Elden Ring, Dark Souls 3 and especially Sekiro and Bloodborne are MUCH faster. And Sekiro for example does not feature a stamina bar, but has other ways to make sure you don't move endlessly, like hidden cooldowns to combos/dashes. The Shade Cloak in HK is very similar to this since you also gotta wait to use it. Similarily, the healing in HK is reuseable/rechargable, since the soul meter works that way. Contrast that with Demons' Souls for example, where there is no reusable healing item whatsoever. So there are quite a few distinctions and differences even among FromSoft's soulslikes
3. I would also call Blasphemous a soulslike, especially gameplaywise (even more so than HK). When it comes to story and presentation though, I am gonna give the nod to HK for reasons explained in the video, although Blasphemous comes in as a close second, maybe even tied. The world and leveldesign goes to HK in my book however, when it comes to how much it feels like a souls game
as a fan of both i can say it is not, there is no roll button
Aka: When no roll, then no soul
@@Stizzl exactly
Tru & based
Common haer W
@@Stizzl 🫡
You said about mechanics that we know were inspired by from software but Team Cherry said, iirc, that they haven't even played the souls games. So saying it was inspired is just kinda wrong.
Nope, not really. Yes, they did not play the souls games. But one can still be inspired by something you haven't played yourself, as they could have seen videos about the game. The following source has them state that Dark Souls inspired their game:
mcvuk.com/development-news/when-we-made-hollow-knight/#:~:text=Gibson%20mentions%20Dark%20Souls'%20%E2%80%9Cgloomy,Faxanadu%2C%E2%80%9D%20Pellen%20starts%20explaining.
i hope i die listening to your voice it's awesome
That is an oddly nice compliment, thank you!! But please don't die
sry but the souls titles are NOT souls likes. they are souls bornes