sylvie

Good read! I especially value a sense of exploration and surprise in games like these. Like you mention with Bobo the Cat, the best reward for satisfying your curiousity down side routes is always new puzzles, challenges or even just cool little locations.

I've not played a huge number of metroidvanias but my highlight would probably be Supraland - Very puzzle focused. Fairly linear overall but you move through wider areas, which themselves are dense and jam packed with secret areas and puzzles. The powerups are genuinely surprising and cool and recontextualise the world. By the end of the game your traversal options become entertainingly busted, well timed to not trivialise the game but to make cleaning up a lot of fun.

IIRC you played Hollow Knight but bounced off due to fairly barren level design? Apologies if I'm misremembering, but I broadly agree. I did really like the exploration in the game though - not really knowing the scope of the world, not always having a map at hand giving the actual possibility of getting a bit lost. I think with the various dlc included etc I probably didn't see a third of the game by the time I finished but in a way I'm always super happy when there's missable stuff in explory games like this, as it means there's stuff I might stumble upon in a future playthrough and be all Whoa! That's Cool.

I'm happy so many other people still also fondly remember Lyle in cube sector. I feel obligated to mention Nifflas's Uurnog Uurnlimited which feels like a spiritual successor (at least, intentially so in terms of mechanics and aesthetic), which has some really cool playful ideas. I dunno if it's quite a metroidvania but it's certainly a lot of branching interconnected areas, and is much about discovering what the various boxes, creatures and items in the world can do and using them to break puzzles.

lol i wrote another thing wanting to reply and only after recalled is unclear to say everything at once and magically. it's weird that is kinda what's asked in these replies? or no i should obviously have other outlets but still posting never really arrived on topic abandoned draft episode

i love the many biomes aspect like you say in bobo the cat. i was in a way of entering games with discarding wider context why creativity, and got stuck into play as linear procession format. thinking now can see the fun full of mountain caves plants area, some explore and fill a map to see domain of points interest, the extent wanting to balance 'what is out past there?' to backtracking and playgroundness. I'm not especially attached to that one thought of a context i may have preferred, and might worry it misses extents of suggested design that wanted to be shown. wonder auto see such experiences and all what is talking with and to and avoid away to one in a way where may get confused and scared. it is okay with sylvie context like cute and reach some experience to think about after. but yea i am missing something to play with such wide apart experience. thinks about sense of help from like a town part where can sleep and talk about play. maybe just looking to implementation of something usually granted anyway someway. i like the sleep idea as taking the game into part of your brain world more, or just a way of able to leave/switch at any point or what zen gameplay contentiousness. trying many biomes in the brain, vs implemented to be in a structure people can get from but not play in.

a bit late to the party here, but say, have you played la-mulana? this piece and "the designer's heart laid bare", together, described everything that i like about it, so i think you might find it interesting as well.

thank you for your thoughts. i'll definitely be trying bobo and lyle!