Metroidvania - No "Final Act" or "Dracula's Castle" should be hidden behind SECRET WALLS

[budwolves]

spoilers ahead for Castlevania: Order of Eccelesia and a certain very popular recent metroidvania
that rhymes with bilkbong



It's in the name, "Secret" wall - if you want to hide extra items or upgrades or even a level behind a secret wall (or TWO secret walls, looking at you Dark Souls) - but blocking off the last third of a game because you didn't hit enough random walls throughout your game and find the essential things for story progression, thats just not right.

I bring this up as I recently finished Hollow Knight Silksong, and I found it shocking that you had to find a certain % of lost fleas, almost all of which were behind secret breakable walls, in order to progress to the end of the game. If the game had had even SOMEWHAT of an enjoyable ending without those things, I would have been fine, but you can't introduce a THREE ACT STRUCTURE, and then just be like "oh sorry you dont get act 3 cause you didnt hit enough hidden breakable walls". you can't end on an unsatifying 2 act story, and then act like its my fault for not hitting EVERY SINGLE WALL IN THE GAME.

Similarly, just playing through Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia again, and its the same thing here. You get a rubbish ending, and don't get to even get to go to the actual metroidvania part of the game, Dracula's Castle, without having hit a bunch of random walls to get villagers to unlock the proper finale to the game.

I'm all for secret endings, im all for BAD ENDINGS, but locking out a massive portion of the game (the finale, the climax of your adventure) because you didn't hit enough walls randomly (and i hit a lot of walls randomly still anyway) is, in my opinion, poor game design. just had to get that off my chest.

 

[PSVitaForever]

For me the most complicated "best" ending, from what I remember, was in one of Neptunia games, I have followed a guide for the many requirements and missable events.
Never played these games you mentioned, but your comment does not push me toward them! In the only playthrough I do, I want to achieve the most (side quests, best ending, etc), and things like hidden wall you must hit randomly sounds quite frustrating.

 

[budwolves]

Maybe i'm being a bit harsh, I like secrets and secret endings and secret parts of games a lot, I just find that not getting the finale of your adventure because you didnt hit walls to be boring.

I like a good hidden ending, even a convoluted one where you have to do a bunch of stuff to get it, but I just think it needs to be more impactful than "did you hit all the walls or not?"

Maybe if the secret walls were developed as a large part of the games lore, secret "enemy" walls that need vanquished in order to restore peace to the world (lol). but simply just being hidden walls (a pretty tired and overused trope in metroidvanis as it is) is so...dull.

I mean, if you've never even played a metroidvania before, you might not even realise that secret walls are a common element of those games. it just seems very restrictive and uncreative. May as well hide the "real" ending behind 100% completion. hiding an ending I get, hiding a large part of the game behind hidden walls is just so uninspiring IMO

 

[Efreet]

If you look at the predecessor Aria games those also had rather harsh info requirement for the best ending, Ecclesia just kept following that formula because people were expecting it.
As for Silksong, well a lot of people complained about the fleas, but we live in the modern gaming world where guides are out before the game releases so devs plan on that.
There are quite a few games which even harsher requirement, i remember when Tunic releases, the dev had to organize a private discord for the reviewers.
In that game even if you figure out the main final puzzle yourself you might end up screwed up regardless because the solution is an 100 button input code.

 

[Graw]

I didn't mind Order of Ecclessia or Hollow Knight hiding things but the one that really bugged me was Death's Gambit. It's another metroidvania that wants to be a soulslike. But the game has a will system that decreases when you die and can only be increased by defeating bosses. If your will is too low by the end of the game you're locked out of the final area. It was one of those ones that just felt disheartening because the majority of the time you'd go to try and raise your will on a boss and end up losing more than you gain. I really didn't like the system. It punished you for dying in a genre where you're expected to die repeatedly to learn boss patterns. Obviously the dev expected players to play through the game twice. There's no way a casual player who wasn't already aware of how the system worked would be able to make it to the end of the game with enough will to get to the true ending and the real final area.

 

[bombatomba77]

In modern game design? I do see your point, but it really reminds me of the Fami-jank of years past, were oftentimes massive gameplay elements were obscured from the player. I admit I do have some nostalgia for that kind of thing, though as an aging person only when watching other people experience it. GrandPooBear playing Legacy of the Wizard for the first time is my recent favorite.

 

[Majora Fi]

I think that's what walkthroughs are for, right?

 

[budwolves]

Hey thanks for the replies folks, nice to see some conversation on this topic!

Just on the subject on Guides and Walkthroughs, I really try not to ever look anything up, and I always feel disappointed when I have to. I just feel that maybe the requirement of doing all those hidden walls, was a bit unintuitive maybe, and I wouldnt like to think the devs intended for me to have to look it up. I maybe think more hints towards that would have been better. But really whats moving the bug caravan got to do with anything, its so unrelated I think is my problem. Same with hidden walls, its just unrelated to anything important. I just couldnt see the correlation between finding more fleas, and then getting the final act of the game.

As for Order of Ecclesia, I just found this whole end game "find the walls" subquest to be a bit much.

But in the end, I am actually for obtuse and confusing mechanics in games really, let's not let things get too stale in the secret mechanics department. Yeah maybe its better Order of Ecclesia didn't have had a little robot buddy that Calls you everytime you're lost and tells you what to do, like a modern game would.

 

[Picketinny_Railgun]

I'm always a fan of super secret swathes of content in games. I recently played through Salt & Sanctuary again and came to the realization that just about 70-80% of that game is straight up optional or secret. The progression is tied to these Brands you get and there's like 5 of them, so 5 Brands +2 or 3 bosses you need to beat to get to the Brand bosses and you've got your game. There's 20 bosses total, meaning about half of them are required to beat the game. Add up to 4 or 5 optional areas, + 3 secret covenants (Dark Souls style) and a bunch of other secret shit, and you've got a pretty robust experience if you're willing to look for it.

I think that kind of stuff is not only super immersive, but it also adds a higher barrier to entry to enjoying a game's content. You can only get the full experience of playing S&S by dedicating yourself to it, being curious, explorative and willing to take on difficult side paths. None of it's ever stated directly, it just happens naturally. The game says "if you want me, you have to work for me", and I respect that a lot.

I have a similar opinion on Noita, a game that's legendary for its obtuse meta puzzles and the fact that the base roguelike aspect of the game is only maybe 30% of its actual content. Noita takes it even further than S&S does and I've had that game for years without ever even scratching the surface.

Another example that's similar but slightly different to me is the NG+ of Blasphemous 1. Blasphemous 1 is a game that's pretty similar to others in its "2d soulslike" genre of being secretive about certain things, but one thing I really appreciate is that its NG+ is very thorough and robust.
Notably, the game's best bosses and areas are all hidden behing NG+ requirements, which means that you not only have to be willing to do difficult secret hunts, but you also have to be willing to play the game twice in a more difficult fashion, which I like a lot. It adds a huge amount of flavor and fun to a replay, basically like making it a completely different experience. Your first time through you're just trying to beat the game, but your second time through you're trying to find and complete the superboss side quest using all of the knowledge and skill you've gained so far. Another example of a game demanding investment from the player to experience all of its best content.

Of course, these things only work when the stuff these games are hiding from the player is GOOD. If a game is hiding dumb bullshit and stupid nonsense behind these kinds of secret gateways, then it's just pointless and egotistical.

 

[budwolves]

I might just need to replay Salt & Santuary now!!

I think secrets are great, and are actually my favourite thing about video games in general.

I just think it doesn't really count as a secret, when the "normal" or "bad" ending you get is SO unfufilling that your like "right ok obviously theres more, the story is completely unresolved" - so really getting the fleas in silksong, or walls in Ecclesia, just felt like I HAD to do it, rather than it actually being "optional" or a secret.

 

[Picketinny_Railgun]

so really getting the fleas in silksong, or walls in Ecclesia, just felt like I HAD to do it, rather than it actually being "optional" or a secret.

I really feel like this is a consequence of simply bad games having bad executions of good concepts. To me, it feels completely obvious that both of these games would have weirdly obtuse and unnecessary requirements to get the "real" ending. Secret content like that is always at its best when it's hidden behind creative, outside the box puzzles and secrets, rather than just breakable walls or collectibles like you've mentioned here. When these sorts of things are lame and uncreative, they become dull chores rather than expressions of player skill and intelligence.
Think the meta progression puzzles of Void Stranger vs. the collectibles in something like Crash Bandicoot 4.

 

[budwolves]

Thanks for engaging with this topic!

I agree completely, I think a "real" ending should include doing almost, if not everything, a game has to offer.

However, I just think there's a difference between a secret ending, and a secret end part of a game. Like its Dracula's Castle, its Castlevania, how are you gonna hide that behind hidden breakable walls?

I'm not really ok with leaving me on an unsatisfying ending, because I didn't do all the secrets. it has to be a satisfying ending regardless, and then a sort of fun, congratulatory ending if you get the real one.

BUt hey look secrets are secrets, if the game wants to hide a large portion of itself behind a secret, im into that. I just think hidden breakable walls is a bit stale for a secret ending, let alone an entire resolution to a story.

 

[Ikagura]

That reminds me of Cave Story locking its true ending path behind purposefully skipping a specific NPC dialogue (which is hard to do so with a precise jump), having to get an item you could easily miss in an area you cannot return to until much later in the game (and then it will be too late to go back to that path), getting to do a platforming to attain a specific area you shouldn't miss to enable another even and finally not forgetting to talk to NPCs.

Thankfully there's no "hidden wall" but that's not far from it.

Another example is how in Wind Waker you have charts needed to find the Triforce parts so you need to be careful about obtaining them.