What Would You Say the Biggest Flaw or Weakest Aspect of Hollow Knight Was?

[Akane]

Haha, long title there. I wanted to ask others what they thought the was the most disappointing part of Hollow Knight was in their own personal opinions. Now lots of people love Hollow Knight, it's a great game, but no work of art is without its flaws. So what would you say the biggest flaw or weakness of Hollow Knight is? And, if Team Cherry ever made a game with a similar structure to Hollow Knight, what would your best advice be to help them improve?

My Answer: The main villain and how her role was handled. The Radiance is a cool concept, an all-enveloping light that smites those who forgot her. However, if we look at her role in the story, she's always presented as more of a force of nature than a real character. Maybe that works best for a character of godly heights, but if so we need a character with more emotion, depth, and relatability that we can face off against along the way. Hornet could have been a good candidate, but at the end of the day she was never really a villain, just another victim of Hallownest's fall who we got the chance to fight against. Next time around I would want more work put into the villains of the story, and also more story in general. There was great work on the lore in this game, but the story of the Knight and his journey was extremely lacking.

[Mossfruit]

Some of the boss AIs really could use improvement, I feel that some bosses (Grey Prince Zote and The Radiance), shouldn't be able to use certain attacks in combination with others. This creates some impossible or almost impossible to dodge situations (Volatile Zotelings + Any unluckily positioned attack / Radiant Judgement + Floor spikes + Any unluckily timed attack) that leave you feeling frusterated, especially on the later Zote fights. Sure, you can say "git gud" and I'm certainly no perfect player, but I feel like some tweaking could definitely make the experience a little less rage inducing.

[Akane]

Originally posted by WNTR:

Some of the boss AIs really could use improvement, I feel that some bosses (Grey Prince Zote and The Radiance), shouldn't be able to use certain attacks in combination with others. This creates some impossible or almost impossible to dodge situations (Volatile Zotelings + Any unluckily positioned attack / Radiant Judgement + Floor spikes + Any unluckily timed attack) that leave you feeling frusterated, especially on the later Zote fights. Sure, you can say "git gud" and I'm certainly no perfect player, but I feel like some tweaking could definitely make the experience a little less rage inducing.

AI improvements, nice call!

[Eklipser]

I honestly didn't like only one thing in entire game: Trial of Fool. It was just irritating and not fun. Concept is nice of course but how it was executed... It just felt like annoying task to do.

Other than that I wished Team Cherry would share with us more story from Pale King, Radiance, Hornet and void side but it probably will come anyway with Gods and Glory and DLC.

+ All small improvements like not getting instant hit by spider or any other enemy when you come from one zone to another. Actions being executed when animation begins, not after 1/4 of it where it can be completly cancelled by getting hit even when there's sound and image implying that you did that specific action.

[Akane]

Originally posted by Eklipser:

I honestly didn't like only one thing in entire game: Trial of Fool. It was just irritating and not fun. Concept is nice of course but how it was executed... It just felt like annoying task to do.

Other than that I wished Team Cherry would share with us more story from Pale King, Radiance, Hornet and void side but it probably will come anyway with Gods and Glory and DLC.

+ All small improvements like not getting instant hit by spider or any other enemy when you come from one zone to another. Actions being executed when animation begins, not after 1/4 of it where it can be completly cancelled by getting hit even when there's sound and image implying that you did that specific action.

I also wish there was a real reward for beating the ToF beyond a little extra Geo. It's not even like a mind-blowing ammount of Geo like 10,000 Geo. It'd be nice if there was something like... a fourth spell or... an upgraded badge that we could get for beating the ToF.

[Eklipser]

Or just make it less frustrating.
Even if it actually accurate. You have to be a true fool to try this thing.

[RocketPotatoL62]

The white palace, because it doesn't fit in with the rest of this game.

There is absolutely nothing that prepares you for the white palace in the whole game, it feels kind of like a kaizo game almost. Though I've played my fair share of similar platformers, this just doesn't fit in with the rest of the game.

Path of Pain is even worse, but I actually liked that one more due to the focus on the pogo technique.

Another factor that I dislike about the white palace is that it doesn't make any sense. The spike hazards we've seen through out hallownest mostly make sense and blend in with the environment. Obviously, the palace makes an exception.

Another thing I disliked was the enemies seem to hover just out of reach. This is probably part of their fighting style, but it doesn't stop it from being extremely annoying. Enemies like this encourage just skipping the combat because they're simply not fun to deal with.

Enemies that rely too much on teleportation are annoying too, No Eyes is the perfect example of this. Now that thing was easily my least favorite part of the game, even if it was just a brief fight.

Even with that said, I liked the spell twisters. How much trouble you have with them really depends on the surrounding area for the most part. Speaking of which, sometimes the level design just doesn't agree with the enemy placement, what's up with that place full of spikes with a great hopper in kingdom's edge?

There's also the fetch quest you have to do before you can fight grimm, that's the only part of the game that I would consider filler.

Now this one is a minor complaint, but the way infected crossroads blocks off a few routes seems completely unnescessary and seems to only serve the purpose of being inconvenient.

On another note, I actually liked the trial of fools, ignoring those god awful soul knights.

[Hawk]

Samey bosses to be honest, practically every single one of them reuses the ground wave, some more then others. I mean really guys, originality is a good thing, just saying. On the subject of the bosses being really similar across all of them, they all have jumping attacks, they all move at least 10 times faster then you do, I mean looking back and several older games of this type I felt there were far more original bosses and each fight was for the most part different. In Hollow Knight, boss fights are nothing more then a boring chore to go through.

Also all enemies read your input, get with the times boys and girls that stuff was cheap back in the '90s. This is blatantly obvious during boss fights and also obvious during normal level combat. I mean really, the game input reads so hard you could supplement this game’s reading for erectile dysfunction treatment that’s how hard hollow knight reads controller and keystrokes.

Also body damage, get rid of it. In this game it is probably the single most broken aspect of your combat, every enemy is faster and more agile then the knight is 90% of the time. More then half of the bosses body block you so that all you can do is take contact damage. There's simply no valid gameplay reason for it, it's not balanced, you can't parry a strike you can shove them away almost no enemy stagers so again what is the point and where is the balance?

[RocketPotatoL62]

Originally posted by Hawk:

Samey bosses to be honest, practically every single one of them reuses the ground wave, some more then others. I mean really guys, originality is a good thing, just saying. On the subject of the bosses being really similar across all of them, they all have jumping attacks, they all move at least 10 times faster then you do, I mean looking back and several older games of this type I felt there were far more original bosses and each fight was for the most part different. In Hollow Knight, boss fights are nothing more then a boring chore to go through.

Also all enemies read your input, get with the times boys and girls that stuff was cheap back in the '90s. This is blatantly obvious during boss fights and also obvious during normal level combat. I mean really, the game input reads so hard you could supplement this game’s reading for erectile dysfunction treatment that’s how hard hollow knight reads controller and keystrokes.

Also body damage, get rid of it. In this game it is probably the single most broken aspect of your combat, every enemy is faster and more agile then the knight is 90% of the time. More then half of the bosses body block you so that all you can do is take contact damage. There's simply no valid gameplay reason for it, it's not balanced, you can't parry a strike you can shove them away almost no enemy stagers so again what is the point and where is the balance?

Only a minority of the bosses have the false knight's ground wave, that is fact.

Also, almost no enemy in the game is more agile than the knight except maybe nightmare king grimm, that guy is fast. But this is coming from someone who mains the dashmaster charm, so take that with a grain of salt.

[Akane]

Originally posted by Hawk:

Samey bosses to be honest, practically every single one of them reuses the ground wave, some more then others. I mean really guys, originality is a good thing, just saying. On the subject of the bosses being really similar across all of them, they all have jumping attacks, they all move at least 10 times faster then you do, I mean looking back and several older games of this type I felt there were far more original bosses and each fight was for the most part different. In Hollow Knight, boss fights are nothing more then a boring chore to go through.

Also all enemies read your input, get with the times boys and girls that stuff was cheap back in the '90s. This is blatantly obvious during boss fights and also obvious during normal level combat. I mean really, the game input reads so hard you could supplement this game’s reading for erectile dysfunction treatment that’s how hard hollow knight reads controller and keystrokes.

Also body damage, get rid of it. In this game it is probably the single most broken aspect of your combat, every enemy is faster and more agile then the knight is 90% of the time. More then half of the bosses body block you so that all you can do is take contact damage. There's simply no valid gameplay reason for it, it's not balanced, you can't parry a strike you can shove them away almost no enemy stagers so again what is the point and where is the balance?

If you want each boss to be fought differently then, in my opinion, probably the best bet is to ask Team Cherry to borrow a particular element from the Legend of Zelda series; new abilities. In lots of games we get our basic abilities in the beginning of the game and either stick with them the entire time or merely build on those abilities, yet in Zelda we usually get completely different abilities throughout the entire game and each of those different powers is used to help us defeat the next boss in some manner. This gives even the most boring and uninteresting bosses at least a little something special to spice up our battles with them. In Hollow Knight we get lots of new abilities, but most abilities are either used solely for combat (dealing damage) or solely for exploration (overcoming an obstacle), with very little middle ground techniques like the Desolate Dive.

[RocketPotatoL62]

I do agree the types of attacks bosses have could use a bit more variety, Soul master was probably my favorite boss and yet there aren't really many other bosses like it. I feel the most underwhelming one for me personally is traitor lord, his moveset is almost a carbon copy of the one the mantis traitor has.

I don't want "ability bosses", while there is a right way to execute that type of boss, it's really easy to screw that up. Just look at the adult baldurs. I feel every boss being designed around your basic moveset allows for quite a few options as to how you wish to fight the boss in question.

I think my absolute least favorite boss, if not "No Eyes", is uumuu. While fighting it the first time is pretty cool since we finally get to see quirrel in action n' all that, it's ultimately a tedious waiting game.

[Bankai9212]

Honestly getting the wall jump amd dash sooner. Game feels slow until you have those abilities. Also Hawk there isn't a single boss that moves faster then hollow knight you have a jump and dash for a reason. Also contact damage is a standard for metroidvania games so how is that a problem simply dodge or upgrade the nail range.

[Akane]

Originally posted by Bankai9212:

Honestly getting the wall jump amd dash sooner. Game feels slow until you have those abilities. Also Hawk there isn't a single boss that moves faster then hollow knight you have a jump and dash for a reason. Also contact damage is a standard for metroidvania games so how is that a problem simply dodge or upgrade the nail range.

You can't upgrade the Nail Range directly, you have to collect charms that upgrade the range and even they don't do much. Some people have talked about how Longnail does almost nothing yet it's a 2 notch charm instead of a 1 notch, spite its insignificant effect. There's also the Grub charm that lets us shoot projectiles, but plenty of people have talked about all the flaws with it and how extremely underwhelming it is so I won't go into that too much.

[Eklipser]

Originally posted by Akane:

You can't upgrade the Nail Range directly, you have to collect charms that upgrade the range and even they don't do much. Some people have talked about how Longnail does almost nothing yet it's a 2 notch charm instead of a 1 notch, spite its insignificant effect. There's also the Grub charm that lets us shoot projectiles, but plenty of people have talked about all the flaws with it and how extremely underwhelming it is so I won't go into that too much.

Somehow I found Long Pride combo very useful. It fels like my range doubles every time I use it.

[arejang]

Who said the nail range charms were useless? Just try using mark of pride for a boss and then do it without the charm. You'll whiff so many times you'll feel dumb.

[RocketPotatoL62]

Grubberfly's elegy is situational at best. However, It is extremely useful for the grey mourner quest.

Personally nail range charms are my second favorite, behind quick slash. They are far from useless, especially when combined.

If they make more charms, I want to see more things that directly affect the nail.