Why is this so popular?

[Idlemind]

And I don't mean that in a trolling kind of way.. I see the videos.. I don't get it! The gameplay is really that good?

[Ser Cartoon of House Head]

It is a standard platformer. It is not revolutionary in anyway, it is just really good at what it does. If you are not a platforer fan, then you probably will not enjoy it. Not much else to say really.

[Idlemind]

Originally posted by Aguamoose:

It is a standard platformer. It is not revolutionary in anyway, it is just really good at what it does. If you are not a platforer fan, then you probably will not enjoy it. Not much else to say really.

Fair enough! I had an Atari / NES / SNES.. so obviously platformers are a huge part of that experience when I was a kid.

Pass for now, but when I'm depressed over christmas maybe I'll get drunk and play this, it'll be the perfect storm.

[Serris]

Originally posted by Scootis79:

And I don't mean that in a trolling kind of way.. I see the videos.. I don't get it! The gameplay is really that good?

This is one of the most charming games in years. It plays great, it feels great. It's a world that's fun to be in. It's tightly designed and marries some of the best elements of good old platformers. This is the kind of game that would make somebody a fan of platformers, I disagree that only existing fans would enjoy it.

[robomagon]

Originally posted by Scootis79:

And I don't mean that in a trolling kind of way.. I see the videos.. I don't get it! The gameplay is really that good?

Q:Why is this so popular?
A:It's not.

This peaked at about 1,800 players and it's already down to an average of 120 players after just three months. Compare that to something that really was popular, like say, Binding of Isaac. Which peaked at over 12K players and is still averaging over 2,500 more than two years after it released. At least that's the situation on Steam. It's a whole 'nother story on consoles where players don't have many good games to choose from and pretty much have to play whatever they're given and try to like it. Over in console land, anything that's even remotely good gets praised like it was the second coming.

[Kartoffelsuppe]

BeCaUsE iT iS aWeSoMe :D

[Hapleap]

Originally posted by robomagon:

Originally posted by Scootis79:

And I don't mean that in a trolling kind of way.. I see the videos.. I don't get it! The gameplay is really that good?

Q:Why is this so popular?
A:It's not.

This peaked at about 1,800 players and it's already down to an average of 120 players after just three months. Compare that to something that really was popular, like say, Binding of Isaac. Which peaked at over 12K players and is still averaging over 2,500 more than two years after it released. At least that's the situation on Steam. It's a whole 'nother story on consoles where players don't have many good games to choose from and pretty much have to play whatever they're given and try to like it. Over in console land, anything that's even remotely good gets praised like it was the second coming.

You're comparing a roguelike shooter vs a platformer, it's entirely different in terms of replayability and gameplay itself, to try to do this kind of comparisons would be similar to compare Bioshock 1 to Guild Wars 2, they are totally different, game length or playerbase does not correlate with a good game at all (ps: both binding of isaac and shovel knight are exceptionally good)

On the issue of "why it's so popular" you tried to remark a game that has replayability as it's main mechanic/charm and a game that on it's own it's a "linear" platformer, the question and the answer themselves are not nicely presented nor well argumented, the game is good, the game got a ton of popularity, it's current playerbase doesn't mean shovel knight is a bad game due to it not being "popular" as of today, hell, even look at games like Wing Commander, are they popular? ♥♥♥♥ yeah, are they good? you bet, are they played today? barely anyone still has the cd's intact (origin gifted WC3 tho).

The main point of shovel knight is that it's a "masterpiece of the classic NES era", it does pretty much everything megaman/ducktales/mario did right and amps it up giving it a nice feeling of uniqueness, if you played NES and have fond memories of your classic gaming sessions then this game will not disappoint, as a matter of fact i barely played the NES (I always was more into PC) but the game even if you dont have those nostalgia goggles on works tight on it's now, the gameplay is smooth and in no way you'll feel that the death you took was a cheap mechanic or a badly designed fight.

Only console players praised this game? Even totalbiscuit who mostly dislikes consoles and retro style games praised the game for it's tight gameplay.

[Kelsey]

Short answer: Because it's a good game.

Long answer: Because it's just pure fun. The game itself doesn't really get dull unless it's literally all you play, the story is charming and nice, and the controls are super tight and intuitive for a platformer. Also, to be perfectly honest, you might be seeing a lot of videos of it on YouTube because a large number of YouTubers grew up in the 80's and 90's, when platformer games like this were still a huge deal, so it's a bit of a blast from the past for them. Not to say that this is exclusive to this age group though, as I was born in '95 (I'm 19) and I still think this is my favourite game of all time, but then again, I did grow up with systems like the NES and SNES...

[Bawb]

Originally posted by robomagon:

Originally posted by Scootis79:

And I don't mean that in a trolling kind of way.. I see the videos.. I don't get it! The gameplay is really that good?

Q:Why is this so popular?
A:It's not.

This peaked at about 1,800 players and it's already down to an average of 120 players after just three months. Compare that to something that really was popular, like say, Binding of Isaac. Which peaked at over 12K players and is still averaging over 2,500 more than two years after it released. At least that's the situation on Steam. It's a whole 'nother story on consoles where players don't have many good games to choose from and pretty much have to play whatever they're given and try to like it. Over in console land, anything that's even remotely good gets praised like it was the second coming.

Well...you have to take into account a few things in this. Yacht club's only game currently....is Shovel Knight. Meanwhile, Edmund Mcmillen has these beauties under his belt.

Carious Weltling
Gish
Blast Miner
Triachnid
Cereus Peashy
Host
Guppy
Coil
Meat Boy
(CENSORED)
Aether
Grey-Matter
Spewer
Time Fcuk
Super Meat Boy
The Binding of Isaac
The Basement Collection
Facist
Mew-Genics

19. That's 19 games he made, as compared to Yacht Club's 1. So right off the bat, you have people from his other games, or even the original TBoI who would likely show thier support. To add on to that, Shovel Knight is a linear platformer...where you pretty much unlock all the content on the first playthrough. Isaac is a roguelike. A game genre based entirely upon endless replayability through use of hundreds of unlocks, secrets, hidden content, new characters...and dozens of other things.

So...Yea, no duh Isaac has more players, both current and at the peak. That doesn't mean it's not popular, just less popular.

[Beanstalk]

Amazing soundtrack sold me

And butt mode

[mrrogers]

How many quality 2d platformers get made anymore? This is one of the only ones I can think of that came out recently. Its not like there are hundreds of great quality games like this coming out. I would take an nes or preferably snes quality 2d game over AAA crap anyday if its quality
They just dont make games like this anymore its very rare. Although I still think they should be 16 bit or higher quality artwork
Its one of the reasons I still play my snes more than most recent games with few exceptions like borderlands 2 or maybe gta 5

[RogueSpyke]

Originally posted by robomagon:

Originally posted by Scootis79:

And I don't mean that in a trolling kind of way.. I see the videos.. I don't get it! The gameplay is really that good?

Q:Why is this so popular?
A:It's not.

This peaked at about 1,800 players and it's already down to an average of 120 players after just three months. Compare that to something that really was popular, like say, Binding of Isaac. Which peaked at over 12K players and is still averaging over 2,500 more than two years after it released. At least that's the situation on Steam. It's a whole 'nother story on consoles where players don't have many good games to choose from and pretty much have to play whatever they're given and try to like it. Over in console land, anything that's even remotely good gets praised like it was the second coming.

As a person who plays on consoles more than PC, I'm gonna have to disagree with you when you say that console gamers will praise anything that's remotely good because they have nothing better to play. There are plenty of games on console that have never come to PC or have terrible PC ports. Games like Dead Or Alive, SoulCalibur, Tekken, Heavy Rain, MadWorld, Klonoa, Red Steel 2, have never appeared on PC. Games like Sonic Adventure 2, Final Fantasy XIII, Dark Souls, and Dead Rising 3 have appeared on PC but are horrible ports. And then you've got Sony and Nintendo's first-party games that will never be ported to PC.

Shovel Knight deserves its praise. It's a really good platformer that takes everything that was good about the best NES platformers and reminds everyone that you don't need fancy graphics or deep plots to make a fun game. Shovel Knight also isn't the kind of game that you're meant to replay over and over again like Binding of Isaac. The two aren't even in the same genre so it's really unfair to compare the two since they're aimed at completely different audiences. That would be like comparing Skyrim to Need for Speed, or comparing Crash Bandicoot to Ace Combat.