10 Games Like Hollow Knight You Need to Play
Finished Hollow Knight and craving more? These 10 games capture what makes Team Cherry's masterpiece special, from atmospheric exploration to punishing boss fights.
Hollow Knight is one of those games that ruins other games for you. Team Cherry built an interconnected underground kingdom so vast, so dense with secrets, and so rewarding to explore that everything else feels shallow by comparison. Nine years and 30 million sales later, it remains the gold standard for metroidvanias.
And yes, Silksong is finally out. If you have not played it yet, go do that first. But if you have already cleared both Hollow Knight and Silksong and need your next fix, this list is for you.
Here are 10 games that capture different pieces of what makes Hollow Knight special. Some match its combat. Others nail the atmosphere. A few deliver that same feeling of stumbling into a hidden area you were never supposed to find this early.
1. Nine Sols
Developer: Red Candle Games | Released: 2024 | Steam Reviews: Overwhelmingly Positive (95%)
Nine Sols comes from Red Candle Games, the Taiwanese studio behind Detention and Devotion. This time they traded horror for a hand-drawn action platformer set in a “Taopunk” world that blends Eastern mythology with cyberpunk and science fiction. You play as Yi, a vengeful hero on a quest to kill the nine rulers of a forsaken realm.
The combat borrows from Sekiro rather than Hollow Knight. Deflection is everything. You parry incoming attacks to charge your talismans, then unleash devastating counterattacks. It is a fundamentally different rhythm than Hollow Knight’s nail-bouncing, but the same principle applies: you learn every boss’s patterns through repetition and punishment until the fight becomes a dance.
Where Nine Sols truly channels Hollow Knight is in its world design. The interconnected map is dense with lore, hidden passages, and environmental storytelling. The hand-drawn art is gorgeous. And the atmosphere is oppressive in the best way. If Hollow Knight’s Hallownest made you feel small, Nine Sols’ ancient alien civilization will do the same.
Why Hollow Knight fans will love it: Deep lore, interconnected world, punishing boss fights, and hand-drawn art that rivals Team Cherry’s.
2. Crypt Custodian
Developer: Kyle Thompson | Released: 2024 | Steam Reviews: Overwhelmingly Positive (97%)
Here is a game that should not work as well as it does. You play as Pluto, a mischievous cat sentenced to clean the afterlife forever. Your weapon is a broom. The perspective is top-down instead of side-scrolling. The tone is charming instead of bleak. On paper, this sounds nothing like Hollow Knight.
In practice, it captures the exact same feeling. Crypt Custodian is a massive metroidvania with ability-gated progression, a sprawling interconnected world, and the constant pull of “what is behind that locked door?” The map is enormous. New abilities open old areas in satisfying ways. And the sense of discovery, that feeling of finding a secret passage to a place you did not know existed, is as strong here as anything in Hallownest.
The 97% Steam rating is not an accident. Kyle Thompson, a solo developer, built something that stands alongside games made by teams ten times his size. The lighter tone makes it more approachable than Hollow Knight, but the depth of exploration is just as impressive.
Why Hollow Knight fans will love it: The same exploration-driven metroidvania design with a huge interconnected world, but from a top-down perspective with a charming tone.
3. Ori and the Will of the Wisps
Developer: Moon Studios | Released: 2020 | Steam Reviews: Overwhelmingly Positive (96%)
If Hollow Knight is the dark side of metroidvanias, Ori and the Will of the Wisps is the light. Moon Studios created what might be the most visually stunning 2D game ever made. Every screen looks like a painting in motion. The orchestral soundtrack will make you cry. And the platforming is so fluid it makes you feel like a speedrunner even on your first playthrough.
The sequel significantly improved combat compared to the first Ori game. A spirit shard system lets you customize your build, boss fights demand pattern recognition, and the spirit weapon variety gives you real choices in how to approach encounters. It is not as punishing as Hollow Knight, but it is far more demanding than its gentle appearance suggests.
The interconnected world, ability-gated exploration, and sense of wonder are all present. Where Hollow Knight made you feel like a tiny bug in a dying kingdom, Ori makes you feel like a small spark of hope in a world worth saving.
Why Hollow Knight fans will love it: Gorgeous metroidvania exploration with improved combat, and the same sense of wonder in a radically different tone.
Play Ori and the Will of the Wisps on Steam
4. Ender Magnolia: Bloom in the Mist
Developer: Live Wire & Adglobe | Released: 2025 | Steam Reviews: Overwhelmingly Positive (95%)
The sequel to Ender Lilies takes the spirit-summoning formula and polishes every edge. You play as a young girl who recruits Homunculi (artificial life forms) as combat allies. Each defeated boss becomes a new ability in your arsenal. Think of it as Hollow Knight’s charm system crossed with Pokemon, where your collected spirits define both your combat style and traversal options.
The setting is post-apocalyptic dark fantasy with steampunk overtones. The atmosphere shares Hollow Knight’s melancholy. Ruined environments, haunting music, and environmental storytelling that rewards careful observation. The difficulty is firm but fair, with optional challenge content for players who want a harder fight.
At 35+ hours of content, this is one of the meatiest metroidvanias released in 2025. If you loved the interconnected world design and gloomy atmosphere of Hallownest but want a different combat system, Ender Magnolia delivers.
Why Hollow Knight fans will love it: Dark atmosphere, interconnected world, boss-as-ability progression, and the same melancholy beauty.
5. Blasphemous 2
Developer: The Game Kitchen | Released: 2023 | Steam Reviews: Very Positive (90%)
If Hollow Knight’s dark atmosphere hooked you, Blasphemous 2 cranks that dial to eleven. The Game Kitchen draws from Spanish Catholic iconography to create a world of grotesque beauty that is unlike anything else in gaming. Every environment looks like a Renaissance fresco painted by someone having a very bad dream.
The sequel fixed the original’s rough edges. Three starting weapons offer distinct playstyles. Movement abilities like mirror dashes, air dashes, and ring platforms open the map in satisfying ways. Combat punishes button mashing and rewards patience. It is slower and more deliberate than Hollow Knight, but the same principle of learning boss patterns through failure applies.
The world design is excellent. Branching paths, hidden areas, and shortcuts that connect distant regions give the map that same Hallownest quality of feeling like a real place. The religious horror aesthetic makes exploration feel transgressive in a way few games achieve. You keep pushing forward not just for upgrades, but because you need to see what blasphemy lies behind the next door.
Why Hollow Knight fans will love it: Atmospheric world exploration, challenging combat, and interconnected map design wrapped in one of gaming’s most distinctive visual styles.
6. Rain World
Developer: Videocult | Released: 2017 | Steam Reviews: Overwhelmingly Positive (95%)
A warning: Rain World is one of the most divisive games on this list. Critics were harsh at launch (Metacritic 66), but the community fell deeply in love with it. That 95% positive rating from nearly 28,000 reviews tells the real story.
You play as a slugcat. You are simultaneously predator and prey in a broken ecosystem. The world is massive (over 1,600 rooms across 12 regions) and hostile in a way that makes Hollow Knight feel welcoming. Every creature operates on an independent AI ecosystem. Predators hunt prey, prey hides from predators, and you are stuck in the middle trying to eat enough to survive.
The comparison to Hollow Knight is in the scale and hostility of the world. Both games make you feel tiny and vulnerable in a vast, uncaring environment. Both reward exploration with discovery. The difference is that Rain World has no upgrade treadmill to make you stronger. You survive by learning the world’s rhythms and staying out of the way of things that want to eat you. The Downpour DLC adds five new playable slugcats and massive new areas.
Why Hollow Knight fans will love it: The same scale and atmosphere of exploration, pushed to its most uncompromising extreme. A cult classic for a reason.
7. Tunic
Developer: TUNIC Team | Released: 2022 | Steam Reviews: Very Positive (91%)
Tunic is not a side-scrolling metroidvania. It is an isometric action adventure that looks like a cozy Zelda game. But the spirit of Hollow Knight runs through its entire design. This is a game about being dropped into a cryptic world with no hand-holding and figuring everything out on your own.
The central mechanic is brilliant. You find pages of an in-game instruction manual written in a fictional language. These pages contain maps, hints, and mechanics the game never explicitly tells you about. The world is full of secrets that hide in plain sight. Paths you walked past for hours turn out to have hidden entrances. Items you thought were decorative turn out to be keys.
The combat is challenging, with dodge-roll timing and stamina management that recalls both Hollow Knight and Dark Souls. But the real draw is the mystery. If the moment you found the Abyss in Hollow Knight and realized the game was three times bigger than you thought gave you chills, Tunic will give you that feeling repeatedly.
Why Hollow Knight fans will love it: Cryptic world design that rewards curiosity, secrets hidden everywhere, and the same thrilling sense of discovery.
8. Dead Cells
Developer: Motion Twin | Released: 2018 | Steam Reviews: Overwhelmingly Positive (97%)
Dead Cells takes the metroidvania map structure and feeds it through a roguelite blender. Every run generates a different path through interconnected biomes. You keep unlocking new weapons, abilities, and routes between runs. Die, and you start over with new knowledge and permanent upgrades that open fresh possibilities.
The combat is where Dead Cells earns its spot on this list. It is brutally fast. Dodging, parrying, and chaining weapon combos feels incredible. Over 50 weapons and dozens of mutations mean no two runs play the same way. The difficulty scales aggressively with Boss Cell modifiers, and the hardest modes demand the same precision that Hollow Knight’s Pantheon of Hallownest requires.
The metroidvania DNA shows in the level design. Biomes connect through gates that require specific runes to access. Shortcuts reveal themselves as you explore. Hidden areas reward thorough players. It is not a traditional metroidvania (the procedural generation prevents that), but the exploration instincts Hollow Knight trained in you will serve you well here. We covered its legacy in our games like Dead Cells list.
Why Hollow Knight fans will love it: Lightning-fast 2D combat with metroidvania exploration instincts, wrapped in a roguelite loop that keeps every run fresh.
9. Salt and Sanctuary
Developer: Ska Studios | Released: 2016 | Steam Reviews: Very Positive (88%)
Before Hollow Knight existed, Salt and Sanctuary was the answer to “what if Dark Souls was a 2D game?” Ska Studios built a side-scrolling action RPG with an interconnected world, punishing combat, and a deep character build system that borrows directly from FromSoftware’s playbook.
The RPG depth here exceeds anything in Hollow Knight. Character classes, skill trees, weapon scaling, equipment weight, and a massive array of weapons and armor give you real build variety. Combat is stamina-based and demands precise spacing. The difficulty is brutal and fair. Bosses will kill you dozens of times before you learn their patterns.
The world design is the strongest connection to Hollow Knight. An interconnected map with shortcuts that loop back on themselves, hidden areas behind illusory walls, and a sense of oppressive isolation that permeates every area. It predates Hollow Knight by a year and helped prove that the souls-like formula works beautifully in 2D.
Why Hollow Knight fans will love it: The original 2D souls-like with deep RPG systems, interconnected world design, and punishing boss fights.
Play Salt and Sanctuary on Steam
10. MIO: Memories in Orbit
Developer: Douze Dixiemes | Released: 2026 | Steam Reviews: Very Positive (85%)
The freshest game on this list. MIO: Memories in Orbit launched in January 2026 and transplants metroidvania design to a derelict space station. You play as an android exploring the Vessel, an enormous technological ark overrun by rogue machines. The sci-fi setting gives it a completely different flavor than Hollow Knight’s bug kingdom, but the structure is pure metroidvania.
Fifteen guardian bosses guard different sections of the station. Component modification lets you customize your build. Grappling hooks, wall-clings, and dashes open previously inaccessible areas. The interconnected world loops back on itself in satisfying ways.
Published by Focus Entertainment, MIO has a level of polish that smaller indie teams struggle to match. The 85% positive rating reflects a game that is solid across the board rather than exceptional in one area. If you want a metroidvania with a modern sci-fi aesthetic and you have exhausted the fantasy options on this list, MIO fills that gap.
Why Hollow Knight fans will love it: Classic metroidvania structure with a fresh sci-fi setting and modern production values.
Play MIO: Memories in Orbit on Steam
What to Play First
If you loved Hollow Knight for its boss fights and combat, start with Nine Sols or Salt and Sanctuary. Both demand the same precision and pattern recognition.
If you are drawn to atmospheric exploration, Ori and the Will of the Wisps and Rain World represent opposite ends of the spectrum. One is beautiful and hopeful. The other is beautiful and hostile.
If you want the sense of discovery, Tunic and Crypt Custodian both deliver that “there is more here than I thought” feeling.
And if you want more list recommendations, check out our games like Dead Cells list for roguelite fans, the best roguelike indie games roundup, or the games like Slay the Spire 2 list for deckbuilder addicts.
Written by
Florian HuetiOS dev by day, indie game dev by night. Trying to give life to GameDō Studio.
Building games and talking about the ones I can't stop playing.
