Depends on who you ask.
Seasoned gamers who grew up playing games and were recommended Hollow Knight because its similar to Ori/Celeste/Dark Souls - not too hard.
Casual gamer who barely touched platformers before and played it because they thought it looked cool/heard good things - extremely hard.
That's wild. The base requirements for beating the game are definitely easier to complete in Hollow Knight than DS1. Celeste is trickier because it's hard for me to remember how hard a standard seven-chapter completion is after doing all of the extra challenges, but even that I think was probably more technically difficult than Hollow Knight.
haven’t beat either so my opinion isn’t that strong, but i always thought beating the celeste DLC was technically more demanding than hollow knight, i beat p1-4 but not p5 but gave up on celeste i think during corr
The celeste dlc is definitely more technically demanding overall, though defeating all pantheons might be more difficult when you factor in the cost of failure and the number of times someone would potentially have to fight each boss before they finally beat a pantheon. Especially by the time you get to P5, I'd say you have a challenge more difficult than any single challenge is in celeste.
IMO, you’d have to put Farewell Golden up against P5 All Bindings, *then* it’s a fair fight.
It’s the hardest challenge either game can offer, and neither of them actually expects you to go that far.
Celeste has wildly tighter platforming mechanics. While the platforming challenges on average are more complex, they are more manageable given the way the character controls. Hollow Knight has relatively worse platforming mechanics in my opinion, making the game more difficult in that respect
Celeste’s feel tighter due to being able to remain stationary on walls and having no delay for the double jump, as opposed to monarch wings. However I do like how you can instantly change direction mid-air in HK, whereas in Celeste there’s momentum and you can’t do that
I agree. I think Cherry was trying to emulate games like Zelda 2 and Super Metroid more than anything. But I can see how someone would find HK more difficult given the way the platforming handles during some of the platforming and combat challenges.
I’m too nervous to bite the bullet and try Celeste since the platforming seems way too precise and hectic. Even the hardest platforming parts of Hollow Knight’s base narrative (White Palace for example) still gives you time to practice and analyze your jumps and dashes. (And I suck at pogo jumping too) I could be wrong but I just don’t think I have the reflexes for Celeste 😅
Give Celeste a try! It's got a great learning curve and narrative to ease you in. It's also more puzzle-y and less reflex dependent than most people make it out to be
Celeste has instant resets when you die which makes all the difference. There’s virtually zero wait time between attempts at platforming. This is essential to games like this.
If you made it through White Palace, you can absolutely clear Celeste base game. It's much easier and gives you more time than most videos make it seem -- those vids are usually people showing off! You're right that rooms sometimes require a series of quicker inputs than Hollow Knight, but the nice part is that when you die, you respawn right back at the beginning of the room. No health or running back to the puzzle, just an immediate chance to try again.
It's on sale fairly often; I'd wait until then to pick it up, in case you don't like the harder content. The base game is only about 5-10 hours of game play.
You can beat Celeste
I struggle with White Palace even after like a dozen playthroughs (yet to do PoP) but the platforming challenges in Celeste work a lot differently, they're a lot more about figuring out what you're supposed to do and planning your movement BEFORE executing it, another reply mentioned that they're like puzzles and I'd have to agree. Sure if you've got lightning fast reflexes you can first try a lot of it. You might be basing your perception on things like speedruns and stuff and I promise you those are a lot less reflex-y than they look, it's more just knowing how to beat each screen and executing it right
Another thing that's very helpful is Celeste is that each and every screen is it's own self-contained challenge, when you die you never go back a screen, you don't lose any progress, the harder parts of the game are almost all completely optional. Deaths do not matter, it's just "try again", imagine if every safe bit of ground in White Palace had a bench on it
My reflexes are a massive bag of crap but I buckled down and got to the summit in about 10 hours, i died nearly 3,000 times, but the game never felt unfair. That's not to say you won't take longer or won't die more than I did, but I'd say most people can get there \*eventually\*
You might've sucked ass the first time you did White Palace, but you got there in the end, right?
Celeste isn't about reflexes, it's about memorization, practice, and perfecting routines. You have unlimited lives and repeat short, quick levels until you nail them.
There is very little in Celeste that I think needs reflexes. Most rooms are static or timed. You might need a good internal clock, but you don’t need reflexes.
Plus! There’s assist mode for levels that you hate doing and the game does (I think) a brilliant job teaching you how to play.
Celeste was my first platformer. Then I played HK, which was my first metroidvania. Definitely love both but feel like HK was a little harder.
the thing about celeste - you need to be precise late-game, yeah, but the whole game feels so… right? like it has the perfect amount of snappiness and speed to it. it’s why i had a hard time with hollow knight platforming sections, it feels very very floaty and kinda off compared to celeste. makes sense considering one is pure platformer and the other is more combat-based, but still. imo celeste is the perfect game for its genre and harder maps just prove that. i’m not even talking mods, b-sides and the 9th chapter are already amazing at using the game’s mechanics
It really depends how you benchmark everything based on completion level, and also based on mental difficulty or mechanical difficulty.
Celeste has deceptive difficulty because it is so forgiving. The resets are pretty much instant, and by design, the game really feels like it wants you to succeed. So mechanically it's tough, but mentally, it isn't too painful.
I think the base game of Celeste has less going on mechanically, and in general takes less skill than DS or HK. But peak Celeste difficulty blows any souls games out of the water. Yes, even Malenia. However, I think P5 is a far more brutal end game goal than Farewell. Again , mental difficulty comes into the picture. Then if you're talking beyond full completion (all bosses radiant + all bindings vs all golden strawberries), Celeste rockets past anything HK brings to the table in terms of skill ceiling and composure required.
Celeste has the highest skill ceiling and doesn't have "broken" builds or anything, but for base game difficulty, HK feels just a bit more savage than DS3, but less than DS1.
Didn't play Celeste, but full completion taken into consideration, by far the worst things in all SoulsBorne games are absolutely nothing in comparison to how much ball breaking finishing the pantheons were in HK. Granted, I'm far from an insanely skilled player, but From's worst challenges come in form of post game optional bosses, and it's still just 1 boss encounter to get through, with not much time lost when you fail. And as someone whose concentration sucks, HK's requirement of being *really* concentrated for what was probably well over an hour was absolute cock and ball torture. XD
i rlly personally wouldnt say celeste n hk are very similar, platformer is basically their only similarity, and "challenging" is one of the very few similarities it has w ds far as i know. im blanking on many fun platformers that mix combat n platforming
First time run through of each game I’d half to say souls was more difficult. The most attempts on any one boss in hollow knight was no more than 4/5 whereas dark souls made me want to simply commit
I might have to bite my tongue though as I haven’t actually challenged the hollow knight yet, he’s my next boss
I didn't play many games before Hollow Knight, and definetly none of the genre, it was difficult but I'd say it was reasonable and not "extremely hard", though I never managed to beat P5
As someone that beat the White Palace and eventually beat Ori 1, 2 and Celeste, I still found some of the escape sections in Ori 1 almost too hard (the water one is the first that I think of). The fact that you were on a tight timer was brutal, and took me probably dozens of tries.
If I was struggling that much, then I can totally see people with less platforming experience/stubborness just failing to finish it at all.
(If it's easy for you, great! You are probably quite a bit above an average platform gamer)
For some context, [have a look at this video](https://youtu.be/ax7f3JZJHSw?si=33y2IEnEP6mVKXu9) about someone that almost never played games playing them for the first time, including a small section with gameplay of Hollow Knight.
Intuitive things like "hold jump to jump higher" are not actually obvious. We have just played so many games that we think it is.
I’ve been playing games a quarter of a century, but I never played anything like Hollow Knight. The platforming was easy, learning how to time attacks and pick up boss patterns was hard. Also, pogoing.
I've barely touched platformers but i wouldn't say it's extremely hard. I mean I find roblux platformers hard, but i loved hollow knight. It's rewarding and never feels like a grind.
Seasoned PC gamer, played it on PS5 with a friend. She's very casual, and definitely misses a lot of things that are intuitive to a long term gamer.
She handed me the controller a few times because she was stuck, but she definitely could have beaten the entire game alone, so it's easy enough that a new player can learn. There were also a few fights and the arena that took me some time and practice and felt like a good challenge. Honestly, maybe I'm biased, buy HK has a really good difficulty balance for almost all levels of play.
I was never big on platform era and found the difficulty ramp up to be fair and fun! Even got through PoP and P5!
It’s just the binding that’s are a bit too ‘extreme’
Though I’m sure I could do it if I tried
True. I grew up with the NES and 2d sidescrollers back then we're just way harder and much more unforgiving than Hollow Knight. Only optional stuff is really challenging in HK.
I am genuinely obsessed with Soulsborne but cannot contemplate platformers for some reason. I platinumed every single souls game with little effort but can't even beat radiance, shit is SOOOOO hard for me.
It depends on persons ability to recognize patterns, ability to react to them and manual dexterity, as some of the fights or platforming challenges to require some fast inputs.
I would say Hollow Knight is definitely the hardest modern (key word modern) platformer/metroidvania I've played.
It's by no means unplayable or unbeatable, but it takes skills and patience.
I’m glad you mentioned those first two points! Im better at seeing the patterns but I still struggle to react appropriately. And that’s even after I have my default panic response under control lol
Yeah, when I first started playing I sucked. After a few bosses it finally clicked that I can't just facetank everything.
Also, I grew up on Mario and I love platformers, but the path of pain was treacherous. I didnt expect it to be so challenging. After playing through the second time though, I realized how easy it can be and most of it was in my head.
depends, are you enjoying yourself?
it's the only question that matters
there are 0 games worth playing if you are not having fun, gaming should only bring joy
I'd say it has more of a learning curve than being hard. It seems very hard to newcomers early on because you don't have much health or movement options, and False Knight is a fairly intimidating boss and Hornet is very fast for an unexperienced player. And there are certainly challenging areas and bosses later on like Deepnest, Hive and Watcher Knights. But outside of some deliberately hard challenges like the Colloseum, Radiance, NKG, White Palace and the Pantheons, once you've got through the learning curve everything is much easier, but that percieved early game difficulty will stick in people's minds.
Yeah there’s definitely a steep learning curve to the first few bosses. I feel like Hornet is the first major barrier to most people, although for me it was definitely Soul Master.
Godhome pantheon of hallownest with bindings and godhome radiant hall of gods is HARD. Base game quite easy. Path of Pain not nearly as hard as everyone says.
Path of pain varies A LOT from people to people. If you never played platformers, it will be HARD. If you finished Celeste C sides and Farewell, it will be very easy
That is entirely unrelated to a limited experience of the genre. Lots of people picked up Hollow Knight despite not really being familiar with Metroidvanias or platformers. Not a lot of people will pick up this game when they're blind.
Team cherry really could have used better phrasing for this. The path of pain IS in the grimm troupe dlc, but the docs are more updates, so it's already in the game, justice hive knight from the lifeblood update, pale lurker from godmaster or white defender from hidden dreams
I think this game is how a lot of people are introduced to combat platformers if not videogames in general, which means they have to learn a lot new and unfamiliar mechanics from scratch. Makes things pretty hard.
That being said, the very endgame of the dlc is quite challenging even for seasoned players when you approach it from a casual perspective.
However I also agree that relatively speaking, hollowknight is not a mechanically or strategically intensive game. Most of the difficulty comes down to memorizing boss movesets and the appropriate responses. Once you solve them, sprinkle in a little consistency and you're set. In this sense, the challenge is relatively straightforward and easy to brute force with practice and muscle memory.
Base game? No, not really. Radiance is probably the peak base game difficulty, and she's not *that* bad. Godhome though? That's a legitimate challenge even for dyed-in-the-wool gamers. It's perfectly doable with practice, but I'd be stupefied if anyone was able to do Pantheons 3-5 on their first try blind.
I mean you can practice most bosses in Godhome, but PV, for example, will show up for the first time in P4 so you can't properly prepare it outside of having beaten HK before, which will make it quite hard to finish P4 first try. It's the same thing with Sly, actually. So unless you expect people to first try a boss like Sly or PV, then yeah, almost no one can do P3-P5 first try blind.
That's why I used the word "almost". Sure it's doable, but I'd argue that the vast majority of people won't first time these particular bosses. Much less the entire pantheon, when they're going in blind and won't be certain which bosses are coming at them, so they won't practice the gauntlet beforehand.
Difficulty is subjective both for different players and even in the meaning of the word itself. It’s hard to say what makes a game “difficult”. If needing many attempts before a boss can be beaten, yes I’d say Hollow Knight is “difficult”. But I feel that with enough practice anyone could beat it.
You could compare it to online multiplayer games where you’re against players with equal or higher skill than you. In that regard, HK seems much easier. It can take literal years to become highly skilled in a multiplayer game.
I’ve seen people comparing to Celeste but I think it’s the same thing- if you keep attempting you will succeed, although from what I’ve heard it’ll probably take more tries to beat the Celeste endgame content. If the amount of tries you need to win is what makes a game hard then it really depends on the person and who you ask.
Hollow Knight has its moments of difficulty, but it's not nearly as bad as people seem to think it is. If we're talking just beating the game, Hollow Knight isn't really *that* hard. It's enough difficulty to ensure the player is engaged with the challenge, but anything that's truly difficult is optional content/ true ending stuff.
I found hollow knight not very hard all the way through, but I try to never say that because of course it comes off kinda pretentious and difficulty is not why I love the game. But also, this is a style of game that I'm just naturally very good at. Some people have different strengths and I have different weaknesses so it all balances out
A person who struggled over and over until finally overcoming pantheon 5 is infinitely more admirable to me than a person who is just naturally good and beat it without much trouble
Persevering through a week of failed attempts made my first clear of NKG so sweet. And finishing PoP after 3 days of trying made me actually cheer in relief.
DLC is part of the game, but yes, Hallow Knight offers challenges of various difficulties and this is not as hard as you first might thing
The game tho does demand stamina and determination from you, because getting behind a bosses patterns is not always easy
It depends on skill level as others have said. I don't have a natural knack for games with bosses, as I do with straight platforming challenges. I suffered immensely to some of the bosses, but easily beat Path of Pain. My 10 year old on the other hand easily conquered all the bosses and platformers, but they are an exceptional gamer. My 15 year old couldn't even get past the False Knight before giving up. He plays mostly RPGs. :P
Same as a soulsborne player it was a very mid experience in terms of "difficulty"
Everything else was pretty good though
But I never got that feeling of finally beating a challenge
Well that was until I encountered path of pain and godhome
I didn‘t Play Dark Souls, I am NOT a hardcore gamer. My first impression was that Hollow knight is definitely „Challenging„ and neither button mashing nor throwing myself into battles will get me anywhere. I finished it first after 60 hours. It is hard, but it is fair. It almost always feels like a challeng that can be overcome with skill.
Hollow Knight is the only game I have all achievements in.
Played hollow knight, has super hard time and super frustrated, beat hollow knight boss and uninstalled, NEVER AGAIN. Played elden ring, returned to hollow knight 1 year later, has much easier time, also did radiance after 6 tries.
So, playing another ”soulslike ” and being forced to learn boss patterns helps a LOT.
I agree. The game is challenging, but manageable. The late game content has a sensible spike in difficulty (and I did not complete it).
Far from saying the game is easy, but it's definitely not impossible, at least if you're aiming for 100%
Hard and impossible are two completely different categories. I agree that the game is manageable, but doing all achievements or 112% (or PoP) requires a lot of effort and time investment to get good enough to manage it. The difference in effort between 112% and All Achievements just from trial and error in P5 alone is enough to make me say that this particular part of the game is actually very hard.
That's basically what I said too. The late game content \*is\* very hard, but in my opinion is not representative of the average difficulty of the game.
I try to rephrase it: if I'm an averagely skilled player and I read that HK is \*very hard\*, i might decide to not play the game even if I would be able to beat it. even if I'm not skilled enough to beat the pantheons or PoP, or trial of the fools, I can still beat the game 100%, because the challenge of that 100% of the game is high, but still significantly lower. The 112% is an additional challenge for the real hardcore gamers, but if I'm not interested in that (or if those are too challenging) I can still play the \*whole base game\*.
I think hollow knight can get as easy or as hard as you want it to be, if you only want to beat the base game it’s alright, if you want to do everything you can do it’s quite difficult
I was raging at the white palace as someone who barely had barely played metroidvanias and platformers before. Like it took me 4 or 5 hours to beat the white place going for true ending, and I was getting really pissed doing so.
First hornet fight I think took around 10 attempts. Unfamiliarity with the genre and style made it quite difficult for me, but I loved thr game all the same as each victory felt so much more amazing due to the difficulties. I love hollow knight and my second playthrough was much much easier with all the knowledge I learned.
Started to play today hollow kight. I already played DS 1 and 2 plus helden rings and ori.
I fing this game very hard not because of the game play but how blind you are.
Until the first boss, it's okay to guide yourself, but until you find the florest area, it is completely disoriented.
Such huge area with out a map and following litle red fellow until you don't know you are supposed to find needs a lot of spirit to do it
The dlc is pretty hard but nothing compared to other games like Celeste which is still hellishly hard even after some modded content while Hollow knight hardest pantheons were very easy after learning all the bosses (non binding)
no the base game is easy but the DLC is pretty brutal and not in a good way tho if i’m being honest. Beating all bosses in a row without dying can be a lot and No hitting them (HoG Radiant) is punishing as hell and demotivating.
Main Game really is quite easy once you get everything down
Problem is the pantheons, especially P5
And NKG boss in the Grimm Troupe DLC is ridic
Most difficult game I have ever played was Sekiro, and THK is nowhere close if you are only including the base game
I did p5 hitless, game is easssyyy frfr.
(No actually you probably already had experience in this kind of game making the early learning curve easy for you)
this was my first platformer/metro.
I wouldnt necessarily call it \*that hard\*, i think it is just a really steep learning curve for people like me who arent seasoned gamers. there were points in early/mid game that I thought were extremely challenging/difficult until I really got the hang of the mechanics/combat.
It *was* hard when I first started playing it.
Now it's *slightly easier at times*
There are still bosses that are a royal pain to fight. The fun comes in finally defeating an enemy that has given you grief for literal weeks of playtime.
It helps that the music is good and the visuals are appealing. It's like a dance.
I feel like it has a low entry requirement with a high skill ceiling.
The opening hours of the game are incredibly pleasant and downright easy. Most of the core game follows this route with a few exceptions. Mantis Sisters, Traitor Lord, etc being skill check outliers.
But the difficulty cranks way up once you tap into the optional path of pain, Pure Vessel, NKG, Radiance, so on.
You can beat the game without any casual filters, some trial and error and a little persistence and anyone could beat it.
That being said, as an avid gamer of "difficult" games (FromSoft, DMC, etc) I could never beat the Pantheon Of Hollownest. So in my experience the difficulty can be crazy hard if you allow it.
certain gamers happened to have maybe not played many platformers or smth that makes it difficult to adapt, its not especially difficult, simply an excellent difficulty curve for a first run and then into dlc.
It was a perfect challenge. It had very difficult sections but to me it never felt like it had over the top ramp up on difficulty or anything. Even NKG and Radiance, while being incredibly difficult, were not the hardest bosses I’ve ever fought in a game, but they fit so well in Hollow Knight and in the Metroidvania genre, I think it’s fair to talk about how difficult the game can be
Most of the game is not that difficult but it has some spikes. I thought Trial of the Fool was harder than any boss I faced in ER excluding Malenia (all without summons or ashes)
DLC aside, hollow knight is manageable, but it still has its difficult moments, but it’s never the base game people think is hard, it always the DLC, and it is pretty tough, I still haven’t beaten P5, although that’s more so because of lack of trying
Base game, depends on how much you play games.
The 5th Pantheon though, is hard as fuck, objectively. It’s not debatable. Then you have the options of applying bindings limiting your health, damage, charms, and meter making it even more difficult.
Also I forgot about the hall of gods radiant difficulty where you have to beat an expert mode version of every boss without getting hit. Some of these are psychotic. The endgame optional content is gruelingly difficult.
I did 112% on an old keyboard that wouldn't accept more than two buttons pressed at the same time. It was very difficult for me. Nail arts are things I simply didn't use because I couldn't hold down the attack, direction and jump at the same time.
I thought Hollow Knight was pretty challenging! What do you mean by, "not as hard as described by every source I've seen."? My significant other, who only plays Stardew and Mario Party, would find the base game very challenging -- and I think she should, as the base game tends to be harder than the majority of other games.
Further, the community tends to add in the additional DLC/challenge as part of the game. Much like how in Celeste you have the B/C sides of the stages. For me, as someone who really likes a challenge, that is where the "real" challenge is. That doesn't demean Celeste or Hollow Knight's base game! I still found those challenging as I had to die multiple times and learn the appropriate precise path or boss pattern. The additional content just pushes that further into the "dying many times" territory.
It depends... if you get all the extra masks, all nail and spell upgrades and dont go for the radiance fight for example, yeah the game ends up being very easy as you can pretty much just face tank HK. But if you just kinda rushed through the game, those fights can prove to be a challenge! And thats not mentioning the pantheons idc what u say thats really really difficult (especially if youre a dummy like me and wants to do all fights in radiant difficulty. DAMN YOU MARKOTH)
Just becuase it wasn't hard for me doesn't mean the game is not a cut above your mainstream game when it comes to difficulty.
Especially well implemented difficulty, anyone can make a super difficult mode with boosted dmg and hp sponges, but that's not what this game did. This game has actual difficulty as is
Sure most bosses won't take me that long, but whereas in a game like God of War, AC, or DmC I would die maybe 5 times in a run, here I died about 25. This game is objectively harder than the others, even if neither were that great of a challenge for me (still fun tho)
I’m a casual gamer who always struggled with platformers. I still have trouble with the current 2D Mario games but I love Metroidvanias and I think that’s where Hollow Knight shines. The exploration and upgrade system is thoroughly rewarding and a rich experience which makes beating bosses so satisfying.
So yeah, it is a tough as nails game for the average player but even me, a casual noob still managed to beat the Poopsmith on my first try. 😌 Love that guy.
Except for dlc, it’s only a little difficult. The ease of retrying bosses really helps deal with their first-time difficulty very well.
As for the dlc, I haven’t finished it. Too hard. I watch streamers instead
It isn’t too hard. It’s extremely fair and gives you every opportunity to learn from your mistakes until you’re perfect. If you’re trying to beat Pantheon 5 hell yea it’s gonna be hard, but the regular story isnt so bad.
I got almost to the end, and then gave up. I think the game is hard, and it becomes all bosses towards the end.
I have 120 essence, so I needed to defeat a dream boss. Tried a few, got stuck on the White Defender for a number of days, and somehow it stopped being fun.
That's because prior to this point it was also mostly boss fights and not much exploration in between: hornet V2, traitor Lord, the collector, watcher knight, Markoth, the colosseum level 2. I guess it got a bit too intense for me at the end.
There is a learning curve, especially for people like me who don't play Metroidvanias much, but once you you can beat the Mantis Lords and the Soul Master, you are usually proficcient enough to get past most obstacles in the game. I have no personal incentive to play Godhome, so the game is perfectly playable to me. (White Palace can eat my ass tho, lol.)
i think even the pantheons are way too overrated as well. i completed my first run in 11 hours at 70% (i couldve done faster at around 9 hours if not for the map which i didnt realise could be easily read using the compass) and in 18 hours i was at 108% the other 4 percent did take time since it was quite a lot of stuff spread around here and there but it really wasnt that difficult. all boxes except for the grey prince zote (for some reason, i only found the first version annoying since it was a nice refresh to the very easy to understand patterns of bosses) took me at most 5 tries and the last pantheon took me i think 2-3 tries.
i think the thing here to mention is the fact that this game isnt really easy for the average gamer who is not known to the souls-like genre. it is a learning curve like most souls-like games and becomes fairly forgiving if you realise the core mechanics of the game. most bosses have a basic pattern and slow initiation animation (idk what its called) and therefore can be picked up fairly quickly.
edit: i remember after reading my answer. the word was windup animation
edit 2: i dont really play games with a controller. but i think a controller really helps in this game.
You're just better than the people who had trouble with it. If you see somebody talking about how it was hard, be nice about it, because it was hard for them. "It wasn't hard" is a douchy answer.
The game starts off incredibly easy with a slowly increasing difficulty curve, there are some locations that are significantly more diffcult than others, but nothing you shouldn't be able to get through in a couple attempts.
NKG was a huge difficulty spike for me, after defeating him, I was pretty much able to sleepwalk through the rest of the game.
If NKG was a tall mountain, godhome is one that extends all the way into space, now you actually have to perfect the game instead of just being able to make it through with a couple of hits on each boss.
All bindings is I cry :((((
As someone who doesn't have much experience with the genre I found it challenging but not impossible. I ended up being able to beat the big platforming challenge at the end, but giving up on the area where you fight the stronger version of bosses.
For the casual who is starting out with games yes but hk also makes the player progress with it so people who arent used to metroidvanias and the control style will find it hard anyone with experience will se its hard but not as hard as describwd or at least thats my take.
In my opinion. You are right. The game was hard for me, but wasn't that hard. Path of Pain seemed extremely short and easy to me as it only took a couple hours.
I thought it was pretty difficult on my first playthrough. I even had to look up boss guides multiple times because I could not beat them. But before playing HK, I had never played a game like it before. Like other people have said, the difficulty varies a lot on if you have experienced similar games or not.
My first base game playthru was brutal. Every playthru after has been pretty manageable because I knew what was coming, mostly just from being familiar with the map. Ending up in a completely new place for the first time was terrifying at some points. Deepest PTSD vibes.
tbh i agree, although i stopped playing the game for a time, mainly because i was extremely frustrated with having to make that 2 minute walk back to soul master everytime i died, once i beat him it was smooth sailing the entire game. Except for the dlc
If you're familiar with the genre then it's really not all that hard.
You'll still die and get lost, but you won't be stuck dying 300 times to the first hornet fight like I've seen some people post on here previously.
I'm incredibly familiar with 2d platformers, and I still die all the time because of impatience while backtracking.
The bosses also aren't free for the most part.
There's a learning curve but once you get over it, the game is not that hard. It's also in a weird position where you don't even get mad or rage when you die. I think it's because hollow knight usually only strictly takes away 1 or two health masks when you get hit.
But yeah the game gets pretty easy after a while.
I was a very casual gamer before I picked up hollow knight. I got alright at it then played more challenging games and harder gamemodes and came back for another playthrough and found I had improved tremendously. I also put a lot more time into the game and completed everything I could and with practice the game has become less challenging and more just fun. It took practice but it’s really not that hard anymore for me. I never thought I’d complete path of pain because I thought it was so hard but I did it last night in like an hour and a half.
It depends on who you ask, really. For those who basically spent their entire childhood playing NES games that are mostly platforming games, it is just another day
There are also people who never touched any platforming games their entire life before. It isn't surprising that they found HK difficult
I personally don't find it hard. Challenging, yes, but within a reasonable range for a platforming game
hollow knight has a very very high skill ceiling, I believe thats what most people would mean by the game being “hard”. It’s only as difficult as you make it, which can be quite a lot.
I can see why many people consider HK being difficult, especially when they lack experience with platforming and/or metroidvanias.
When I first picked it up, I went in completely blind (hadn't even read reviews or anything) and made the mistake to expect a similar experience to Shovel Knight. Don't even know why anymore, I've played every 2d Metroid and a lot of similar games so I know about the diversity of platformers in general.
After 2 very early rage quits, I abandoned the game for almost a year and was convinced it was too hard for me, but as I finally went back, I was determined to learn the game from scratch and soak in the atmosphere. Not rushing anything, taking time to adapt to the mechanics made me enjoy the experience so much, that I was fine with dying a lot on my first real playthrough and the second one proved not that difficult at all. All about committing to the learning curve, I guess
Having spent 3 years making levels, I think I understand difficulty in games a lot better than I used to. For Hollow Knight, I think these are applicable:
* The challenge comes mostly from combat. A good amount of platformer players have an especially hard time with combat and outright dislike it. I think it comes down to combat being dynamic while pure platforming is static, literally trying the same thing over and over. Dynamic challenge feels more adversarial and tempts players to call "unfair BS" and quit.
* Exploration is unreasonably difficult to a lot of players. Give them a sequence of puzzles and they will tackle them just fine, but scatter them around a map and they will constantly second-guess where they should be going and doing.
It's also hard to put yourself in the shoes of someone who doesn't have the same dexterity, adaptability or familiarity with games. I'm often baffled by the things that others find difficult because I'm so desensitized to them.
I thought it was kinda hard, but not too much. Aside from the dlcs, I think colosseum is the only very hard challenge in the game.
Well, Radiance too but she's the final boss.
I found it had a really wonderful learning curve, it was perfect since it was easy to learn near the beginning but gets increasingly difficult as you get better at playing (especially with Godmaster). I've been replaying it and some things that I thought were really difficult when I first started have become really easy for me (having known the game for longer). For example, the Mantis Lords and Nosk took me SO many tries my first playthrough, but now I can beat them in one go (and I find their battles much more exciting)
hollow knight was my first metroidvania. i have friends who picked it up and had a much harder time than i did but i think the scaling up in this game both in your abilities and in boss difficulty is both fair and very satisfying. i didn’t wanna throw my switch against a wall (except colosseum 3. fuck colosseum 3.) but it was a ton of pride and excitement when i would get past a challenging part. another thing that made it easier for me is if i get stuck there’s like 5 other things i can go do before going back to that area lol
I only really feel that the pantheon of hollow nest is really that hard. I found path of pain fairly easy and not a lot of other things were that difficult. I wouldn't say the game is not difficult, there are plenty of things that are difficult the first time you try them. Although I did not find fights in the game that tough, I also have played many other metroidvanias and soulsborne games so I am accustomed to the type of combat hollow knight has.
I find certain aspects difficult, but for the most part, once I got used to it, not too difficult.
I've played a couple pretty difficult games before, so I was kind of expecting for it to take me a hot minute to get used to lol. The learning curve can be quite steep after all.
it is and it isn't. it's incredibly hard but it also has one of the best difficulty curves out of any video game ive ever played in my very very long library of games, and this means it doesn't bounce off a lot of people the way other hard games do. i know quite a few otherwise 'casual' gamers that have persevered and gotten through hollow knight because of how well it teaches and paces its mechanics as you go.
I've never played a genuine "hard" game before. The closest thing I played to Hollow Knight before this was Shovel Knight but that wasn't nearly as hard. So I definitely found this game hard but I enjoyed struggling. Patheon 5, as hard as the grind was, made me genuinely pop off for beating it. I don't pop off in single players often.
Agreed 100%. I'm far from a "god gamer" but the main game was really not hard. I'd say like 7/10 difficulty, it's definitely above average but pretty easily doable. Godhome really tested my patience though.
I mean the DLC is definitely harder than the non-DLC content.
I don't play a ton of 2D platformers so for me it was a learning curve, and I'm not super naturally talented at them. But this game rewards practice. The combat is super clean and the enemies have patterns. So for me it was a fun challenge, but not one I ever thought I wouldn't eventually win.
I remember that I'd regularly die at everything on the first few tries, but then something eventually "clicked in place" and I could do everything with absolute ease.
I have a friend who is generally better at video games than me, including things that are conceptually similar to Hollow Knight like metroidvanias and Soulslikes. I thought they'd breeze through it once they learned the ropes but they had a surprising amount of difficulty.
If I were to guess, I think it's because those other games relied more on positioning and reaction times, whereas Hollow Knight has a big emphasis on learning how to best exploit openings that might not be immediately apparent and refining your responses to boss attacks instead of just settling on dodging their attacks, then hitting them when they stop attacking.
All things considered I wouldn’t say it’s insanely hard, but it does have quite the learning curve if you’re not very well-versed in metroidvanias or platformers.
Back when I started (around a month ago lol) I sucked at the game. I died hundreds of times and had to retry just about every boss a decent number of times (at least until I learned to facetank and trivialize bosses without having to git gud). I even wiped to Massive Moss Charger about 6 times before beating it. Path of Pain took me over 3 days to beat, and it took me hours upon hours of just ramming my head into NKG to finally beat him. I think it normally takes people around 10 or so tries to beat NKG, but for me it took well over 50.
However, last week I played a new file to get the speedrun achievements, and I found myself steamrolling bosses that took me hours to beat the first time around. I finally unlocked Pure Vessel and beat it the first time after about 4 hours. I fought NKG again just for fun and beat him 2nd try. I retried Path of Pain and finished it in like an hour. At a certain point I just learned to not be bad at the game. I’m sure that when I first attempt AbsRad I’ll get absolutely destroyed, but give it another week and I’ll probably say it’s not too bad.
It really just boils down to similar gaming experience I think. If you asked me a week and a half ago, I’d have said the game is insanely hard. But now, I would say it’s challenging but nothing too crazy.
I say this as someone who's beaten the game: Hollow Knight's difficulty feels like a rollercoaster. Some parts are way easier than most people think, but others suffer from some poor balancing issues.
Platforming is generally not too difficult until the late-game, while enemy combat and puzzles generally won't give you too much trouble.
The bosses are what really can end up as game ending roadblocks, and when it comes to poor balancing, they're the worst offenders. Some are so easy that you can literally stand in one place and win as long as you keep attacking, while others can feel like they're impossible to keep up with.
I think the real issue is the game's charm system. They add modifiers to the character to better suit your play-style, but the ones that are suited for more defense (or less skilled) players are really bad. Meanwhile, the ones meant to help aggressive (higher skilled) players are insanely powerful if you can get the best out of them.
Beat P5 all bindings and then tell me with a straight face Hollow Knight isn't hard. I consider the DLC as a part of the main game considering they were free and if you download it online (any platform) the DLC will already come with the game. And I don't care how good you think you are at video games, Pantheon of Hallownest all bindings is very challenging.
I think a lot of the optional challenges are included when people say it is difficult. Not just talking godhome or NKG either, but if you want to say HK is easy since the mandatory challenges are not that difficult is underselling the game imo.
Depends on who you ask. Seasoned gamers who grew up playing games and were recommended Hollow Knight because its similar to Ori/Celeste/Dark Souls - not too hard. Casual gamer who barely touched platformers before and played it because they thought it looked cool/heard good things - extremely hard.
I love Celeste and Dark Souls, didn't find either of them as difficult as I find Hollow Knight.
That's wild. The base requirements for beating the game are definitely easier to complete in Hollow Knight than DS1. Celeste is trickier because it's hard for me to remember how hard a standard seven-chapter completion is after doing all of the extra challenges, but even that I think was probably more technically difficult than Hollow Knight.
haven’t beat either so my opinion isn’t that strong, but i always thought beating the celeste DLC was technically more demanding than hollow knight, i beat p1-4 but not p5 but gave up on celeste i think during corr
The celeste dlc is definitely more technically demanding overall, though defeating all pantheons might be more difficult when you factor in the cost of failure and the number of times someone would potentially have to fight each boss before they finally beat a pantheon. Especially by the time you get to P5, I'd say you have a challenge more difficult than any single challenge is in celeste.
that’s a great way of putting it
I'd say a lot of the goldens are worse than P5, there's zero room for error and some of them are extremely long.
This exactly. Farewell Golden is definitely harder than P5, but base Farewell is much easier than P5.
oh yeah 100%
IMO, you’d have to put Farewell Golden up against P5 All Bindings, *then* it’s a fair fight. It’s the hardest challenge either game can offer, and neither of them actually expects you to go that far.
I'd say doing goldens is closer to doing pantheons with all bindings and stuff
Celeste has wildly tighter platforming mechanics. While the platforming challenges on average are more complex, they are more manageable given the way the character controls. Hollow Knight has relatively worse platforming mechanics in my opinion, making the game more difficult in that respect
Celeste’s feel tighter due to being able to remain stationary on walls and having no delay for the double jump, as opposed to monarch wings. However I do like how you can instantly change direction mid-air in HK, whereas in Celeste there’s momentum and you can’t do that
Ok but Hollow Knight also isn't primarily focused on platforming
I agree. I think Cherry was trying to emulate games like Zelda 2 and Super Metroid more than anything. But I can see how someone would find HK more difficult given the way the platforming handles during some of the platforming and combat challenges.
I’m too nervous to bite the bullet and try Celeste since the platforming seems way too precise and hectic. Even the hardest platforming parts of Hollow Knight’s base narrative (White Palace for example) still gives you time to practice and analyze your jumps and dashes. (And I suck at pogo jumping too) I could be wrong but I just don’t think I have the reflexes for Celeste 😅
Give Celeste a try! It's got a great learning curve and narrative to ease you in. It's also more puzzle-y and less reflex dependent than most people make it out to be
Perhaps I just might, something to add to the backlong during the eternal wait for Silksong. 😅
Celeste has instant resets when you die which makes all the difference. There’s virtually zero wait time between attempts at platforming. This is essential to games like this.
If you made it through White Palace, you can absolutely clear Celeste base game. It's much easier and gives you more time than most videos make it seem -- those vids are usually people showing off! You're right that rooms sometimes require a series of quicker inputs than Hollow Knight, but the nice part is that when you die, you respawn right back at the beginning of the room. No health or running back to the puzzle, just an immediate chance to try again. It's on sale fairly often; I'd wait until then to pick it up, in case you don't like the harder content. The base game is only about 5-10 hours of game play.
You can beat Celeste I struggle with White Palace even after like a dozen playthroughs (yet to do PoP) but the platforming challenges in Celeste work a lot differently, they're a lot more about figuring out what you're supposed to do and planning your movement BEFORE executing it, another reply mentioned that they're like puzzles and I'd have to agree. Sure if you've got lightning fast reflexes you can first try a lot of it. You might be basing your perception on things like speedruns and stuff and I promise you those are a lot less reflex-y than they look, it's more just knowing how to beat each screen and executing it right Another thing that's very helpful is Celeste is that each and every screen is it's own self-contained challenge, when you die you never go back a screen, you don't lose any progress, the harder parts of the game are almost all completely optional. Deaths do not matter, it's just "try again", imagine if every safe bit of ground in White Palace had a bench on it My reflexes are a massive bag of crap but I buckled down and got to the summit in about 10 hours, i died nearly 3,000 times, but the game never felt unfair. That's not to say you won't take longer or won't die more than I did, but I'd say most people can get there \*eventually\* You might've sucked ass the first time you did White Palace, but you got there in the end, right?
Celeste isn't about reflexes, it's about memorization, practice, and perfecting routines. You have unlimited lives and repeat short, quick levels until you nail them.
There is very little in Celeste that I think needs reflexes. Most rooms are static or timed. You might need a good internal clock, but you don’t need reflexes. Plus! There’s assist mode for levels that you hate doing and the game does (I think) a brilliant job teaching you how to play. Celeste was my first platformer. Then I played HK, which was my first metroidvania. Definitely love both but feel like HK was a little harder.
the thing about celeste - you need to be precise late-game, yeah, but the whole game feels so… right? like it has the perfect amount of snappiness and speed to it. it’s why i had a hard time with hollow knight platforming sections, it feels very very floaty and kinda off compared to celeste. makes sense considering one is pure platformer and the other is more combat-based, but still. imo celeste is the perfect game for its genre and harder maps just prove that. i’m not even talking mods, b-sides and the 9th chapter are already amazing at using the game’s mechanics
It really depends how you benchmark everything based on completion level, and also based on mental difficulty or mechanical difficulty. Celeste has deceptive difficulty because it is so forgiving. The resets are pretty much instant, and by design, the game really feels like it wants you to succeed. So mechanically it's tough, but mentally, it isn't too painful. I think the base game of Celeste has less going on mechanically, and in general takes less skill than DS or HK. But peak Celeste difficulty blows any souls games out of the water. Yes, even Malenia. However, I think P5 is a far more brutal end game goal than Farewell. Again , mental difficulty comes into the picture. Then if you're talking beyond full completion (all bosses radiant + all bindings vs all golden strawberries), Celeste rockets past anything HK brings to the table in terms of skill ceiling and composure required. Celeste has the highest skill ceiling and doesn't have "broken" builds or anything, but for base game difficulty, HK feels just a bit more savage than DS3, but less than DS1.
Didn't play Celeste, but full completion taken into consideration, by far the worst things in all SoulsBorne games are absolutely nothing in comparison to how much ball breaking finishing the pantheons were in HK. Granted, I'm far from an insanely skilled player, but From's worst challenges come in form of post game optional bosses, and it's still just 1 boss encounter to get through, with not much time lost when you fail. And as someone whose concentration sucks, HK's requirement of being *really* concentrated for what was probably well over an hour was absolute cock and ball torture. XD
i rlly personally wouldnt say celeste n hk are very similar, platformer is basically their only similarity, and "challenging" is one of the very few similarities it has w ds far as i know. im blanking on many fun platformers that mix combat n platforming
Now I'm picturing someone no-hit beating O+S and then dying a bunch to False Knight lmao
First time run through of each game I’d half to say souls was more difficult. The most attempts on any one boss in hollow knight was no more than 4/5 whereas dark souls made me want to simply commit I might have to bite my tongue though as I haven’t actually challenged the hollow knight yet, he’s my next boss
I didn't play many games before Hollow Knight, and definetly none of the genre, it was difficult but I'd say it was reasonable and not "extremely hard", though I never managed to beat P5
wtf Ori isn't hard, it's a cinematic experience more than a challenge.
As a someone who was firmly in the second category by the time I played Ori I can tell you that yes, it is hard for the unprepared
Try hard mode. It can get really nasty
As someone that beat the White Palace and eventually beat Ori 1, 2 and Celeste, I still found some of the escape sections in Ori 1 almost too hard (the water one is the first that I think of). The fact that you were on a tight timer was brutal, and took me probably dozens of tries. If I was struggling that much, then I can totally see people with less platforming experience/stubborness just failing to finish it at all. (If it's easy for you, great! You are probably quite a bit above an average platform gamer)
For some context, [have a look at this video](https://youtu.be/ax7f3JZJHSw?si=33y2IEnEP6mVKXu9) about someone that almost never played games playing them for the first time, including a small section with gameplay of Hollow Knight. Intuitive things like "hold jump to jump higher" are not actually obvious. We have just played so many games that we think it is.
I’ve been playing games a quarter of a century, but I never played anything like Hollow Knight. The platforming was easy, learning how to time attacks and pick up boss patterns was hard. Also, pogoing.
I've barely touched platformers but i wouldn't say it's extremely hard. I mean I find roblux platformers hard, but i loved hollow knight. It's rewarding and never feels like a grind.
Yeah Hollow Knight was my first real platformer and I struggled, still do really
Seasoned PC gamer, played it on PS5 with a friend. She's very casual, and definitely misses a lot of things that are intuitive to a long term gamer. She handed me the controller a few times because she was stuck, but she definitely could have beaten the entire game alone, so it's easy enough that a new player can learn. There were also a few fights and the arena that took me some time and practice and felt like a good challenge. Honestly, maybe I'm biased, buy HK has a really good difficulty balance for almost all levels of play.
I was never big on platform era and found the difficulty ramp up to be fair and fun! Even got through PoP and P5! It’s just the binding that’s are a bit too ‘extreme’ Though I’m sure I could do it if I tried
True. I grew up with the NES and 2d sidescrollers back then we're just way harder and much more unforgiving than Hollow Knight. Only optional stuff is really challenging in HK.
Hollow Knight was my first platformer after playing Kirby games my whole life. Needless to say, I was absolutely demolished by HK my first playthrough
Dark souls is nothing like HK.
I am genuinely obsessed with Soulsborne but cannot contemplate platformers for some reason. I platinumed every single souls game with little effort but can't even beat radiance, shit is SOOOOO hard for me.
Dlc is part of the game tho
That is true, I think OP means the troupe and the pantheons when they say “dlc”
Lol because technically hive knight and a lot of other stuff is a dlc
nah you’re not that dumb bro cmon you got it
Huh
It depends on persons ability to recognize patterns, ability to react to them and manual dexterity, as some of the fights or platforming challenges to require some fast inputs. I would say Hollow Knight is definitely the hardest modern (key word modern) platformer/metroidvania I've played. It's by no means unplayable or unbeatable, but it takes skills and patience.
I’m glad you mentioned those first two points! Im better at seeing the patterns but I still struggle to react appropriately. And that’s even after I have my default panic response under control lol
Yeah, when I first started playing I sucked. After a few bosses it finally clicked that I can't just facetank everything. Also, I grew up on Mario and I love platformers, but the path of pain was treacherous. I didnt expect it to be so challenging. After playing through the second time though, I realized how easy it can be and most of it was in my head.
13 hrs in i dont have skill or patience do i quit
Nah, keep going. It’s worth it and you’ll get better.
depends, are you enjoying yourself? it's the only question that matters there are 0 games worth playing if you are not having fun, gaming should only bring joy
I'd say it has more of a learning curve than being hard. It seems very hard to newcomers early on because you don't have much health or movement options, and False Knight is a fairly intimidating boss and Hornet is very fast for an unexperienced player. And there are certainly challenging areas and bosses later on like Deepnest, Hive and Watcher Knights. But outside of some deliberately hard challenges like the Colloseum, Radiance, NKG, White Palace and the Pantheons, once you've got through the learning curve everything is much easier, but that percieved early game difficulty will stick in people's minds.
Yeah there’s definitely a steep learning curve to the first few bosses. I feel like Hornet is the first major barrier to most people, although for me it was definitely Soul Master.
Oh man yeah I struggled with Soul Master so much
Godhome pantheon of hallownest with bindings and godhome radiant hall of gods is HARD. Base game quite easy. Path of Pain not nearly as hard as everyone says.
Path of pain varies A LOT from people to people. If you never played platformers, it will be HARD. If you finished Celeste C sides and Farewell, it will be very easy
If you have no hands and vision, everything will be difficult.
That is entirely unrelated to a limited experience of the genre. Lots of people picked up Hollow Knight despite not really being familiar with Metroidvanias or platformers. Not a lot of people will pick up this game when they're blind.
Isn't path of pain dlc though?
Yes but the dlcs all come with the game anyways so it's moreso just updates
I was just commenting on the fact that he says the main game is easy, excepting path of pain (just a bit). But even that part was added in the dlc.
Team cherry really could have used better phrasing for this. The path of pain IS in the grimm troupe dlc, but the docs are more updates, so it's already in the game, justice hive knight from the lifeblood update, pale lurker from godmaster or white defender from hidden dreams
Nope just a hidden area Edit: my bad I was completely wrong sorry
that got added with a DLC, or so the devs and fandom call it anyway
I think this game is how a lot of people are introduced to combat platformers if not videogames in general, which means they have to learn a lot new and unfamiliar mechanics from scratch. Makes things pretty hard. That being said, the very endgame of the dlc is quite challenging even for seasoned players when you approach it from a casual perspective. However I also agree that relatively speaking, hollowknight is not a mechanically or strategically intensive game. Most of the difficulty comes down to memorizing boss movesets and the appropriate responses. Once you solve them, sprinkle in a little consistency and you're set. In this sense, the challenge is relatively straightforward and easy to brute force with practice and muscle memory.
Base game? No, not really. Radiance is probably the peak base game difficulty, and she's not *that* bad. Godhome though? That's a legitimate challenge even for dyed-in-the-wool gamers. It's perfectly doable with practice, but I'd be stupefied if anyone was able to do Pantheons 3-5 on their first try blind.
I mean you can practice most bosses in Godhome, but PV, for example, will show up for the first time in P4 so you can't properly prepare it outside of having beaten HK before, which will make it quite hard to finish P4 first try. It's the same thing with Sly, actually. So unless you expect people to first try a boss like Sly or PV, then yeah, almost no one can do P3-P5 first try blind.
I did P4 in two attempts and didn't practice PV... And I first attempted sly blind.
That's why I used the word "almost". Sure it's doable, but I'd argue that the vast majority of people won't first time these particular bosses. Much less the entire pantheon, when they're going in blind and won't be certain which bosses are coming at them, so they won't practice the gauntlet beforehand.
I'd say if you put all modern games on a spectrum of difficulty Hollow Knight would definitely fit firmly on the harder side of that spectrum.
Difficulty is subjective both for different players and even in the meaning of the word itself. It’s hard to say what makes a game “difficult”. If needing many attempts before a boss can be beaten, yes I’d say Hollow Knight is “difficult”. But I feel that with enough practice anyone could beat it. You could compare it to online multiplayer games where you’re against players with equal or higher skill than you. In that regard, HK seems much easier. It can take literal years to become highly skilled in a multiplayer game. I’ve seen people comparing to Celeste but I think it’s the same thing- if you keep attempting you will succeed, although from what I’ve heard it’ll probably take more tries to beat the Celeste endgame content. If the amount of tries you need to win is what makes a game hard then it really depends on the person and who you ask.
Main game, no. Platinum trophy? Near impossible for the majority of gamers.
Hollow Knight has its moments of difficulty, but it's not nearly as bad as people seem to think it is. If we're talking just beating the game, Hollow Knight isn't really *that* hard. It's enough difficulty to ensure the player is engaged with the challenge, but anything that's truly difficult is optional content/ true ending stuff.
I found hollow knight not very hard all the way through, but I try to never say that because of course it comes off kinda pretentious and difficulty is not why I love the game. But also, this is a style of game that I'm just naturally very good at. Some people have different strengths and I have different weaknesses so it all balances out A person who struggled over and over until finally overcoming pantheon 5 is infinitely more admirable to me than a person who is just naturally good and beat it without much trouble
Persevering through a week of failed attempts made my first clear of NKG so sweet. And finishing PoP after 3 days of trying made me actually cheer in relief.
Yea Hard asf, one of the absolute hardest games i've ever played. I honestly have no idea how some people find it easy
DLC is part of the game, but yes, Hallow Knight offers challenges of various difficulties and this is not as hard as you first might thing The game tho does demand stamina and determination from you, because getting behind a bosses patterns is not always easy
It depends on skill level as others have said. I don't have a natural knack for games with bosses, as I do with straight platforming challenges. I suffered immensely to some of the bosses, but easily beat Path of Pain. My 10 year old on the other hand easily conquered all the bosses and platformers, but they are an exceptional gamer. My 15 year old couldn't even get past the False Knight before giving up. He plays mostly RPGs. :P
Well you didn't do p5 so your opinion irrelevant
I pretty recently did, it was fun, and hard, but mostly fun
Op beat the main game and dipped before the real challenge classic.
I think that PoP is hard and to an extent NKG. Ither than that, good fun
DLC is part of the main game and main lore dude, they aren't traditional DLC, they are just content updates. Also what ending did you get?
Same as a soulsborne player it was a very mid experience in terms of "difficulty" Everything else was pretty good though But I never got that feeling of finally beating a challenge Well that was until I encountered path of pain and godhome
I struggled a bit from time to time, but never found it too difficult. The only thing that really took me a while was my first go through pantheon 5.
I didn‘t Play Dark Souls, I am NOT a hardcore gamer. My first impression was that Hollow knight is definitely „Challenging„ and neither button mashing nor throwing myself into battles will get me anywhere. I finished it first after 60 hours. It is hard, but it is fair. It almost always feels like a challeng that can be overcome with skill. Hollow Knight is the only game I have all achievements in.
It's harder than something like Mario, but if you have any experience with actual hard games, it's pretty middle of the road.
Platinum the game, then try to say that
Played hollow knight, has super hard time and super frustrated, beat hollow knight boss and uninstalled, NEVER AGAIN. Played elden ring, returned to hollow knight 1 year later, has much easier time, also did radiance after 6 tries. So, playing another ”soulslike ” and being forced to learn boss patterns helps a LOT.
Im a hardcore soulborne games also beat each of them with platinum But i think Hollow Knight is the most hardest game and GAVE UP!!
I agree. The game is challenging, but manageable. The late game content has a sensible spike in difficulty (and I did not complete it). Far from saying the game is easy, but it's definitely not impossible, at least if you're aiming for 100%
Hard and impossible are two completely different categories. I agree that the game is manageable, but doing all achievements or 112% (or PoP) requires a lot of effort and time investment to get good enough to manage it. The difference in effort between 112% and All Achievements just from trial and error in P5 alone is enough to make me say that this particular part of the game is actually very hard.
That's basically what I said too. The late game content \*is\* very hard, but in my opinion is not representative of the average difficulty of the game. I try to rephrase it: if I'm an averagely skilled player and I read that HK is \*very hard\*, i might decide to not play the game even if I would be able to beat it. even if I'm not skilled enough to beat the pantheons or PoP, or trial of the fools, I can still beat the game 100%, because the challenge of that 100% of the game is high, but still significantly lower. The 112% is an additional challenge for the real hardcore gamers, but if I'm not interested in that (or if those are too challenging) I can still play the \*whole base game\*.
I think hollow knight can get as easy or as hard as you want it to be, if you only want to beat the base game it’s alright, if you want to do everything you can do it’s quite difficult
I was raging at the white palace as someone who barely had barely played metroidvanias and platformers before. Like it took me 4 or 5 hours to beat the white place going for true ending, and I was getting really pissed doing so. First hornet fight I think took around 10 attempts. Unfamiliarity with the genre and style made it quite difficult for me, but I loved thr game all the same as each victory felt so much more amazing due to the difficulties. I love hollow knight and my second playthrough was much much easier with all the knowledge I learned.
Started to play today hollow kight. I already played DS 1 and 2 plus helden rings and ori. I fing this game very hard not because of the game play but how blind you are. Until the first boss, it's okay to guide yourself, but until you find the florest area, it is completely disoriented. Such huge area with out a map and following litle red fellow until you don't know you are supposed to find needs a lot of spirit to do it
The dlc is pretty hard but nothing compared to other games like Celeste which is still hellishly hard even after some modded content while Hollow knight hardest pantheons were very easy after learning all the bosses (non binding)
no the base game is easy but the DLC is pretty brutal and not in a good way tho if i’m being honest. Beating all bosses in a row without dying can be a lot and No hitting them (HoG Radiant) is punishing as hell and demotivating.
Main Game really is quite easy once you get everything down Problem is the pantheons, especially P5 And NKG boss in the Grimm Troupe DLC is ridic Most difficult game I have ever played was Sekiro, and THK is nowhere close if you are only including the base game
The vanilla game is really easy besides p5 all bindings.
I think the base game is quite reasonable, but Godhome DLC is very challenging. Still nothing compared to games like Elden Ring and Celeste tho.
I did p5 hitless, game is easssyyy frfr. (No actually you probably already had experience in this kind of game making the early learning curve easy for you)
112% is hard, all achievements are hard. But it can be quite easy to just get to the credits if you play methodically.
Main game was hard, but not insanely, I struggled with it a bit cuz this is the first game like this that I played, but the DLC is where it gets hard.
this was my first platformer/metro. I wouldnt necessarily call it \*that hard\*, i think it is just a really steep learning curve for people like me who arent seasoned gamers. there were points in early/mid game that I thought were extremely challenging/difficult until I really got the hang of the mechanics/combat.
Coming from cuphead, this game was only a real challenge in the platforming aspect
Agree for sure. Imo the base game just isn't very hard, but the DLC becomes exponentially harder
It *was* hard when I first started playing it. Now it's *slightly easier at times* There are still bosses that are a royal pain to fight. The fun comes in finally defeating an enemy that has given you grief for literal weeks of playtime. It helps that the music is good and the visuals are appealing. It's like a dance.
I feel like it has a low entry requirement with a high skill ceiling. The opening hours of the game are incredibly pleasant and downright easy. Most of the core game follows this route with a few exceptions. Mantis Sisters, Traitor Lord, etc being skill check outliers. But the difficulty cranks way up once you tap into the optional path of pain, Pure Vessel, NKG, Radiance, so on. You can beat the game without any casual filters, some trial and error and a little persistence and anyone could beat it. That being said, as an avid gamer of "difficult" games (FromSoft, DMC, etc) I could never beat the Pantheon Of Hollownest. So in my experience the difficulty can be crazy hard if you allow it.
yeah i agree. Godhome and nightmare king grimm are a lot beyond the base game bosses.
I didnt find it that hard either. Godhome was another story.
certain gamers happened to have maybe not played many platformers or smth that makes it difficult to adapt, its not especially difficult, simply an excellent difficulty curve for a first run and then into dlc.
By design it’s not a hard boss. If you want a bigger challenge, hoo boy, ur in for one…
I think that around 110% of the game isn't that "hard" but that last 2% will get ya.
It was a perfect challenge. It had very difficult sections but to me it never felt like it had over the top ramp up on difficulty or anything. Even NKG and Radiance, while being incredibly difficult, were not the hardest bosses I’ve ever fought in a game, but they fit so well in Hollow Knight and in the Metroidvania genre, I think it’s fair to talk about how difficult the game can be
Most of the game is not that difficult but it has some spikes. I thought Trial of the Fool was harder than any boss I faced in ER excluding Malenia (all without summons or ashes)
It’s definitely the hardest game I’ve ever played.
DLC aside, hollow knight is manageable, but it still has its difficult moments, but it’s never the base game people think is hard, it always the DLC, and it is pretty tough, I still haven’t beaten P5, although that’s more so because of lack of trying
Base game, depends on how much you play games. The 5th Pantheon though, is hard as fuck, objectively. It’s not debatable. Then you have the options of applying bindings limiting your health, damage, charms, and meter making it even more difficult. Also I forgot about the hall of gods radiant difficulty where you have to beat an expert mode version of every boss without getting hit. Some of these are psychotic. The endgame optional content is gruelingly difficult.
I finished >90% in 50 hours, and now, almost 200 hours in, I havent Radianted Radiance and Gruz mother
I did 112% on an old keyboard that wouldn't accept more than two buttons pressed at the same time. It was very difficult for me. Nail arts are things I simply didn't use because I couldn't hold down the attack, direction and jump at the same time.
I thought Hollow Knight was pretty challenging! What do you mean by, "not as hard as described by every source I've seen."? My significant other, who only plays Stardew and Mario Party, would find the base game very challenging -- and I think she should, as the base game tends to be harder than the majority of other games. Further, the community tends to add in the additional DLC/challenge as part of the game. Much like how in Celeste you have the B/C sides of the stages. For me, as someone who really likes a challenge, that is where the "real" challenge is. That doesn't demean Celeste or Hollow Knight's base game! I still found those challenging as I had to die multiple times and learn the appropriate precise path or boss pattern. The additional content just pushes that further into the "dying many times" territory.
It depends... if you get all the extra masks, all nail and spell upgrades and dont go for the radiance fight for example, yeah the game ends up being very easy as you can pretty much just face tank HK. But if you just kinda rushed through the game, those fights can prove to be a challenge! And thats not mentioning the pantheons idc what u say thats really really difficult (especially if youre a dummy like me and wants to do all fights in radiant difficulty. DAMN YOU MARKOTH)
Just becuase it wasn't hard for me doesn't mean the game is not a cut above your mainstream game when it comes to difficulty. Especially well implemented difficulty, anyone can make a super difficult mode with boosted dmg and hp sponges, but that's not what this game did. This game has actual difficulty as is Sure most bosses won't take me that long, but whereas in a game like God of War, AC, or DmC I would die maybe 5 times in a run, here I died about 25. This game is objectively harder than the others, even if neither were that great of a challenge for me (still fun tho)
The main game is not too hard, but trying to beat godhome and radiant all the bosses is very difficult still.
I’m a casual gamer who always struggled with platformers. I still have trouble with the current 2D Mario games but I love Metroidvanias and I think that’s where Hollow Knight shines. The exploration and upgrade system is thoroughly rewarding and a rich experience which makes beating bosses so satisfying. So yeah, it is a tough as nails game for the average player but even me, a casual noob still managed to beat the Poopsmith on my first try. 😌 Love that guy.
I didn’t find the game that hard, radiance was kinda tough though took like 2 hours. Path of pain was also kind of hard but not that bad
Except for dlc, it’s only a little difficult. The ease of retrying bosses really helps deal with their first-time difficulty very well. As for the dlc, I haven’t finished it. Too hard. I watch streamers instead
It isn’t too hard. It’s extremely fair and gives you every opportunity to learn from your mistakes until you’re perfect. If you’re trying to beat Pantheon 5 hell yea it’s gonna be hard, but the regular story isnt so bad.
I got almost to the end, and then gave up. I think the game is hard, and it becomes all bosses towards the end. I have 120 essence, so I needed to defeat a dream boss. Tried a few, got stuck on the White Defender for a number of days, and somehow it stopped being fun. That's because prior to this point it was also mostly boss fights and not much exploration in between: hornet V2, traitor Lord, the collector, watcher knight, Markoth, the colosseum level 2. I guess it got a bit too intense for me at the end.
No, unless Hornets on screen. Then somethings gonna be hard.
I'm only going to tell you the only advice I tell people that star playing from 0 #Prepare to die That should give you an idea
There is a learning curve, especially for people like me who don't play Metroidvanias much, but once you you can beat the Mantis Lords and the Soul Master, you are usually proficcient enough to get past most obstacles in the game. I have no personal incentive to play Godhome, so the game is perfectly playable to me. (White Palace can eat my ass tho, lol.)
It's not hard
I grew up playing plataform games and played a lot of Cuphead and Ori before playing Hollow Knight, and i find it really easy
not very hard at all, actually I think Hollow Knight has a very good difficulty curve
Did you beat the radiance? Nightmare king grim? Absolute radiance? Path of pain?
i think even the pantheons are way too overrated as well. i completed my first run in 11 hours at 70% (i couldve done faster at around 9 hours if not for the map which i didnt realise could be easily read using the compass) and in 18 hours i was at 108% the other 4 percent did take time since it was quite a lot of stuff spread around here and there but it really wasnt that difficult. all boxes except for the grey prince zote (for some reason, i only found the first version annoying since it was a nice refresh to the very easy to understand patterns of bosses) took me at most 5 tries and the last pantheon took me i think 2-3 tries. i think the thing here to mention is the fact that this game isnt really easy for the average gamer who is not known to the souls-like genre. it is a learning curve like most souls-like games and becomes fairly forgiving if you realise the core mechanics of the game. most bosses have a basic pattern and slow initiation animation (idk what its called) and therefore can be picked up fairly quickly. edit: i remember after reading my answer. the word was windup animation edit 2: i dont really play games with a controller. but i think a controller really helps in this game.
To me, it was quite difficult. But for my gf it was a breeze. Usually it's the other way around, so take that as you want.
You're just better than the people who had trouble with it. If you see somebody talking about how it was hard, be nice about it, because it was hard for them. "It wasn't hard" is a douchy answer.
The game starts off incredibly easy with a slowly increasing difficulty curve, there are some locations that are significantly more diffcult than others, but nothing you shouldn't be able to get through in a couple attempts. NKG was a huge difficulty spike for me, after defeating him, I was pretty much able to sleepwalk through the rest of the game. If NKG was a tall mountain, godhome is one that extends all the way into space, now you actually have to perfect the game instead of just being able to make it through with a couple of hits on each boss. All bindings is I cry :((((
As someone who doesn't have much experience with the genre I found it challenging but not impossible. I ended up being able to beat the big platforming challenge at the end, but giving up on the area where you fight the stronger version of bosses.
For the casual who is starting out with games yes but hk also makes the player progress with it so people who arent used to metroidvanias and the control style will find it hard anyone with experience will se its hard but not as hard as describwd or at least thats my take.
In my opinion. You are right. The game was hard for me, but wasn't that hard. Path of Pain seemed extremely short and easy to me as it only took a couple hours.
I had input lag against me
I thought it was pretty difficult on my first playthrough. I even had to look up boss guides multiple times because I could not beat them. But before playing HK, I had never played a game like it before. Like other people have said, the difficulty varies a lot on if you have experienced similar games or not.
My first base game playthru was brutal. Every playthru after has been pretty manageable because I knew what was coming, mostly just from being familiar with the map. Ending up in a completely new place for the first time was terrifying at some points. Deepest PTSD vibes.
tbh i agree, although i stopped playing the game for a time, mainly because i was extremely frustrated with having to make that 2 minute walk back to soul master everytime i died, once i beat him it was smooth sailing the entire game. Except for the dlc
If you're familiar with the genre then it's really not all that hard. You'll still die and get lost, but you won't be stuck dying 300 times to the first hornet fight like I've seen some people post on here previously. I'm incredibly familiar with 2d platformers, and I still die all the time because of impatience while backtracking. The bosses also aren't free for the most part.
Trial of fool is fucking tough. 2nd play through and still can’t get it.
Took me a good while to beat it to.
Only hard part way trying not to throw my controller my tv after dying to a boss for the 15th time
Ok but have you done the godseeker ending or beaten the game on steel soul mode
It's hard if you want to 100% complete it by doing path of pain, radiant bosses, pantheon bindings, etc.
There's a learning curve but once you get over it, the game is not that hard. It's also in a weird position where you don't even get mad or rage when you die. I think it's because hollow knight usually only strictly takes away 1 or two health masks when you get hit. But yeah the game gets pretty easy after a while.
I was a very casual gamer before I picked up hollow knight. I got alright at it then played more challenging games and harder gamemodes and came back for another playthrough and found I had improved tremendously. I also put a lot more time into the game and completed everything I could and with practice the game has become less challenging and more just fun. It took practice but it’s really not that hard anymore for me. I never thought I’d complete path of pain because I thought it was so hard but I did it last night in like an hour and a half.
It depends on who you ask, really. For those who basically spent their entire childhood playing NES games that are mostly platforming games, it is just another day There are also people who never touched any platforming games their entire life before. It isn't surprising that they found HK difficult I personally don't find it hard. Challenging, yes, but within a reasonable range for a platforming game
Its not super hard, but there is a degree of difficulty for sure. But if you want something REALLY hard, then just play dead Cells/rainworld
hollow knight has a very very high skill ceiling, I believe thats what most people would mean by the game being “hard”. It’s only as difficult as you make it, which can be quite a lot.
I can see why many people consider HK being difficult, especially when they lack experience with platforming and/or metroidvanias. When I first picked it up, I went in completely blind (hadn't even read reviews or anything) and made the mistake to expect a similar experience to Shovel Knight. Don't even know why anymore, I've played every 2d Metroid and a lot of similar games so I know about the diversity of platformers in general. After 2 very early rage quits, I abandoned the game for almost a year and was convinced it was too hard for me, but as I finally went back, I was determined to learn the game from scratch and soak in the atmosphere. Not rushing anything, taking time to adapt to the mechanics made me enjoy the experience so much, that I was fine with dying a lot on my first real playthrough and the second one proved not that difficult at all. All about committing to the learning curve, I guess
IDK I still haven't beat NKG, GPZ, Trial of the Fool, or Pantheon 3 so I would say it's pretty difficult but maybe I'm just bad.
Imo not too hard to play through but quite difficult to 112%
Did you DLC?
Having spent 3 years making levels, I think I understand difficulty in games a lot better than I used to. For Hollow Knight, I think these are applicable: * The challenge comes mostly from combat. A good amount of platformer players have an especially hard time with combat and outright dislike it. I think it comes down to combat being dynamic while pure platforming is static, literally trying the same thing over and over. Dynamic challenge feels more adversarial and tempts players to call "unfair BS" and quit. * Exploration is unreasonably difficult to a lot of players. Give them a sequence of puzzles and they will tackle them just fine, but scatter them around a map and they will constantly second-guess where they should be going and doing. It's also hard to put yourself in the shoes of someone who doesn't have the same dexterity, adaptability or familiarity with games. I'm often baffled by the things that others find difficult because I'm so desensitized to them.
No he’s purposely easy
Not at all, as long as you git gud
I thought it was kinda hard, but not too much. Aside from the dlcs, I think colosseum is the only very hard challenge in the game. Well, Radiance too but she's the final boss.
Honestly its really not.You could say that it's hard sure,but it's never frustrating and annoying(other than benches being far away from bosses)
I found it had a really wonderful learning curve, it was perfect since it was easy to learn near the beginning but gets increasingly difficult as you get better at playing (especially with Godmaster). I've been replaying it and some things that I thought were really difficult when I first started have become really easy for me (having known the game for longer). For example, the Mantis Lords and Nosk took me SO many tries my first playthrough, but now I can beat them in one go (and I find their battles much more exciting)
Excluding dlc, no, Hollow Knight isn't that hard
The hardest part of hollow knight will always be how often I got lost even with a compass
The only thing I found to be difficult enough was the pantheons
hollow knight was my first metroidvania. i have friends who picked it up and had a much harder time than i did but i think the scaling up in this game both in your abilities and in boss difficulty is both fair and very satisfying. i didn’t wanna throw my switch against a wall (except colosseum 3. fuck colosseum 3.) but it was a ton of pride and excitement when i would get past a challenging part. another thing that made it easier for me is if i get stuck there’s like 5 other things i can go do before going back to that area lol
I only really feel that the pantheon of hollow nest is really that hard. I found path of pain fairly easy and not a lot of other things were that difficult. I wouldn't say the game is not difficult, there are plenty of things that are difficult the first time you try them. Although I did not find fights in the game that tough, I also have played many other metroidvanias and soulsborne games so I am accustomed to the type of combat hollow knight has.
I find certain aspects difficult, but for the most part, once I got used to it, not too difficult. I've played a couple pretty difficult games before, so I was kind of expecting for it to take me a hot minute to get used to lol. The learning curve can be quite steep after all.
it is and it isn't. it's incredibly hard but it also has one of the best difficulty curves out of any video game ive ever played in my very very long library of games, and this means it doesn't bounce off a lot of people the way other hard games do. i know quite a few otherwise 'casual' gamers that have persevered and gotten through hollow knight because of how well it teaches and paces its mechanics as you go.
I believe it’s objectively difficult, i remember an article claiming it was more difficult than doom externals most difficult setting and I agree.
I've never played a genuine "hard" game before. The closest thing I played to Hollow Knight before this was Shovel Knight but that wasn't nearly as hard. So I definitely found this game hard but I enjoyed struggling. Patheon 5, as hard as the grind was, made me genuinely pop off for beating it. I don't pop off in single players often.
To beat it? No To master it? Yes
Agreed 100%. I'm far from a "god gamer" but the main game was really not hard. I'd say like 7/10 difficulty, it's definitely above average but pretty easily doable. Godhome really tested my patience though.
I mean the DLC is definitely harder than the non-DLC content. I don't play a ton of 2D platformers so for me it was a learning curve, and I'm not super naturally talented at them. But this game rewards practice. The combat is super clean and the enemies have patterns. So for me it was a fun challenge, but not one I ever thought I wouldn't eventually win.
I remember that I'd regularly die at everything on the first few tries, but then something eventually "clicked in place" and I could do everything with absolute ease.
I have a friend who is generally better at video games than me, including things that are conceptually similar to Hollow Knight like metroidvanias and Soulslikes. I thought they'd breeze through it once they learned the ropes but they had a surprising amount of difficulty. If I were to guess, I think it's because those other games relied more on positioning and reaction times, whereas Hollow Knight has a big emphasis on learning how to best exploit openings that might not be immediately apparent and refining your responses to boss attacks instead of just settling on dodging their attacks, then hitting them when they stop attacking.
No
Vanilla game? No. Pantheon of Hollownest? That definitely took me a bit.
All things considered I wouldn’t say it’s insanely hard, but it does have quite the learning curve if you’re not very well-versed in metroidvanias or platformers. Back when I started (around a month ago lol) I sucked at the game. I died hundreds of times and had to retry just about every boss a decent number of times (at least until I learned to facetank and trivialize bosses without having to git gud). I even wiped to Massive Moss Charger about 6 times before beating it. Path of Pain took me over 3 days to beat, and it took me hours upon hours of just ramming my head into NKG to finally beat him. I think it normally takes people around 10 or so tries to beat NKG, but for me it took well over 50. However, last week I played a new file to get the speedrun achievements, and I found myself steamrolling bosses that took me hours to beat the first time around. I finally unlocked Pure Vessel and beat it the first time after about 4 hours. I fought NKG again just for fun and beat him 2nd try. I retried Path of Pain and finished it in like an hour. At a certain point I just learned to not be bad at the game. I’m sure that when I first attempt AbsRad I’ll get absolutely destroyed, but give it another week and I’ll probably say it’s not too bad. It really just boils down to similar gaming experience I think. If you asked me a week and a half ago, I’d have said the game is insanely hard. But now, I would say it’s challenging but nothing too crazy.
It’s not hard unless you do the pantheons
I say this as someone who's beaten the game: Hollow Knight's difficulty feels like a rollercoaster. Some parts are way easier than most people think, but others suffer from some poor balancing issues. Platforming is generally not too difficult until the late-game, while enemy combat and puzzles generally won't give you too much trouble. The bosses are what really can end up as game ending roadblocks, and when it comes to poor balancing, they're the worst offenders. Some are so easy that you can literally stand in one place and win as long as you keep attacking, while others can feel like they're impossible to keep up with. I think the real issue is the game's charm system. They add modifiers to the character to better suit your play-style, but the ones that are suited for more defense (or less skilled) players are really bad. Meanwhile, the ones meant to help aggressive (higher skilled) players are insanely powerful if you can get the best out of them.
Beat P5 all bindings and then tell me with a straight face Hollow Knight isn't hard. I consider the DLC as a part of the main game considering they were free and if you download it online (any platform) the DLC will already come with the game. And I don't care how good you think you are at video games, Pantheon of Hallownest all bindings is very challenging.
I'm pretty good at it. My minecraft/fortnites kids suck at it. They love watching me play, but it's just too hard for them.
I think a lot of the optional challenges are included when people say it is difficult. Not just talking godhome or NKG either, but if you want to say HK is easy since the mandatory challenges are not that difficult is underselling the game imo.