Mina the Hollower

Billionaire genius mouse philanthropist

Why

Why Not

Impressions

Mina the Hollower is a retro Zelda-like with combat inspiration from Bloodborne of all games. It's jam-packed with secrets and attention to detail, from the old-style in-game manual which is great as both a concept and source of extremely useful info to the many fun interactions/power ups you unlock through exploration.

And it's exploration that's the core mechanic here, despite the combat and platforming being brilliant (if a little tough to acclimate to). It solves every complaint I've seen in negative reviews by handing out persistent currency, permanent upgrades or trinkets which make a meaningful difference to gameplay. And that's in addition to sometimes unlocking additional story moments with a cast of weird and wonderful creatures or even a 'different' ending in one case. Some secrets are ability-gated Metroidvania style, but even those generally have multiple ways to access them if you get creative and you might be surprised what you can access with your base abilities.

Combat heavily rewards aggression and thoughtful positioning, since (without trinkets) you can only heal in proportion to the damage you deal and your 'dodge' (burrowing) requires you to leap into the air first. Both can be mitigated by learning enemy patterns and paying attention to the tells for their well-telegraphed attacks, but in general you're probably gonna mess up and get hit so you should be making an effort to hit back when you can.

You get 6 weapons to choose from, each of which has a distinct playstyle and 2 additional upgrades which expand on that theme. For example I stuck with Mina's trusty maul, which offers a nice balance of attack speed and range. Its first upgrade gives extra damage when hitting enemies with the tip at full extension, while the second allows for an electric shock after your initial attack then an additional follow up where you're finally free to flail around wildly in all directions. Weapons aren't the only way to approach combat either, you'll gradually gain access to an array of sidearms which can complement or completely change your playstyle, with plenty of ammo found on most screens so you feel like you can actually use them. The sidearms are also handy for traversal and can be used in multiple surprising ways, for example try fishing for an enemy or placing the teleport exit at the end of the long jump (sadly patched out).

The visuals are fantastic, low res but not low detail with great art direction, and the soundtrack has a bunch of bangers. Area themes are great fits for the biomes they represent, I was especially a fan of the Bayou tracks. The story is pretty decent as long as you keep in mind that Mina's a rich, sheltered inventor who's been friends with Lionel a long time, and managed to surprise me a bit at the end despite the incredibly obvious foreshadowing of the 'twist'. I really like the achievement design as well; lots of stuff that actually feels like an achievement to chase with only a few you're guaranteed to get by progressing the story. With the addition of the All Seeing Skull in late game, hunting for secrets and 100% items becomes much less frustrating without completely removing the challenge of finding their exact location or trigger.

Overall a fantastic game which I really enjoyed; I'll definitely be picking up Shovel Knight so I can play more by these devs. Apparently no DLC coming so they can start work on their next project, but I really hope they come back to this world for a sequel. Definitely give this a try if it catches your attention.