i lean more towards the metroid side of the metroidvania genre and i spent around 15 or so hours in hollow knight. it has beautiful design and very deep lore. the map goes on forever. the platforming is tough, but not exceedingly difficult. what made me give up is partially that the combat is too fast and goes on for too long, and partially that it has a corpse run mechanic, which i despise.
at least for a while you can get away with exploring somewhere else when an area seems too daunting, but after a while you hit combat roadblocks which means every failure requires a dash back with half health.
i lean more towards the metroid side of the metroidvania genre and i spent around 15 or so hours in hollow knight. it has beautiful design and very deep lore. the map goes on forever. the platforming is tough, but not exceedingly difficult. what made me give up is partially that the combat is too fast and goes on for too long, and partially that it has a corpse run mechanic, which i despise.
at least for a while you can get away with exploring somewhere else when an area seems too daunting, but after a while you hit combat roadblocks which means every failure requires a dash back with half health.