Mina the Hollower Review: A Gothic 2D Zelda That’s Already an Instant Classic

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It’s rare for a game to feel both instantly recognizable and completely new, but Yacht Club Games – the creators of the beloved Shovel Knight – have done it again. They’ve crafted another game with the potential to become a classic.

I’ve been playing Mina the Hollower, and it’s a really cool 2D adventure game. It reminds me of classics like Zelda, Castlevania, and even a little bit of Dark Souls with its top-down perspective. But it’s not just a copycat – it has its own unique vibe that honestly makes me feel like I’m a kid again, glued to the TV on a Saturday morning. It’s a really nostalgic experience!

A Puddle Deeper Than It Looks

Mina the Hollower is set in a fantastical world brimming with goblins, talking skeletons, and all sorts of incredible magic. The story revolves around Ossex, a city governed by Baron Lionel and sustained by six powerful generators. Suddenly, Thorne, a trusted advisor to Lionel, betrays him and sabotages the generators, threatening the safety of the entire area.

We join the story with Mina, a Hollower – one of a special team of warriors who can tunnel through the earth. She’s tasked with a huge challenge: fixing the generators and uncovering the identity of a traitor.

Mina the Hollower is a new 2D adventure game, played from a top-down perspective. It takes inspiration from classic games like The Legend of Zelda, Castlevania, and Dark Souls.

The basic idea behind the game is straightforward and feels like a traditional adventure. However, once you begin playing, you’ll discover the story is much more complex and layered than it initially appears.

It’s difficult to talk about the story’s details without giving anything away, but surprising and unpredictable events are constantly happening, both in the main story and in smaller side quests. The writing is fantastic and often very funny – I frequently found myself laughing at the actions of characters or how the world reacted to my choices. For example, you might end up using a skeleton’s head as money, since bones are the local currency, or accidentally crush an entire family by stepping on what you thought was just a leaf.

Beyond everything else, I think Mina as the main character is a huge part of what makes the story so shocking and interesting. She’s easily become one of the most compelling female characters in games we’ve seen lately.

Unlike most adventure game heroes, she’s not a newcomer. She’s already a famous and skilled hero – a powerful ‘Hollower’ and the brilliant scientist who created the generators driving the story’s conflict. This immediately creates a compelling situation that impacts both the story and how the game is played, and we’ll be taking a closer look at that next.

It’s Hollowing Time

Mina starts out quite powerful in Mina the Hollower, allowing players to tackle challenges early on. However, the game doesn’t explain this directly, instead offering a simple, minimal tutorial to teach the basic controls.

This means the game focuses on skill and creativity, not finding better items. You’re given everything you need to explore and beat the game right from the beginning – it’s up to you to learn how to use those tools and find your own way forward.

Mina’s design means players have access to all her key abilities – like digging, swimming, high jumps, carrying bombs, and dealing with fire – right from the beginning. The game doesn’t hold your hand; instead, it encourages you to explore, figure out how everything works, and master those skills yourself.

Mina starts out surprisingly powerful in Mina the Hollower, letting you tackle challenges early on. The game doesn’t explain this, though – you’ll have to discover it yourself.

It often feels like you can only accomplish things when you’re far into the game, but looking back, you’ll realize many of those things were actually possible much earlier. It’s surprising, and it really highlights how connected all the different parts of the game are.

The game offers a huge range of abilities and equipment. You can choose from powerful weapons like hammers and daggers, or even a whip similar to the one in Castlevania (it’s my personal favorite!). In addition to your main weapon, you’ll find Subweapons – secondary items for combat – and Trinkets, which give you constant passive benefits. There are tons of these to collect, each serving a unique purpose, from increasing your strength and defense to making healing easier or adding new moves. Some even let you summon allies! What’s really clever is that the Subweapons aren’t just for fighting. They also provide useful abilities like higher jumps or even let you fish, giving them a fantastic dual purpose.

Honestly, one of the things I loved most about this game is how much it rewards you for just… wandering around. The levels aren’t just pretty, they’re brilliantly designed. Everything feels connected, and it’s not just a straight line from point A to point B. There are tons of shortcuts and hidden paths to find, and discovering them is so satisfying. It’s awesome when you finally realize a place you thought was miles away actually loops right back to the main hub – Ossex – with a quick and easy route. It just makes exploring feel really worthwhile.

Almost every area in the game contains hidden secrets, like secret paths, treasure chests, and optional bosses. You’ll need to carefully examine your surroundings for these hidden locations and items. The game cleverly uses the environment itself to give you clues – sometimes with subtle hints like a cracked stone or a strangely placed object, and other times with more obvious signs like a noticeable coffin or an ‘X’ marking a hole in the ground.

The game’s focus on rewarding player curiosity is clear in its level design, which is both clever and detailed.

The game is visually stunning, with a beautiful, dark gothic style brought to life by its pixel art. Each area feels unique and fully realized, boasting its own atmosphere, decorations, enemies, and backstory. These details create a rich and immersive world that truly draws you in.

The game is visually stunning, and its carefully crafted levels mean you’re always discovering something engaging, no matter where you go. It keeps you entertained from beginning to end.

A Delightful Dose of Gothic Punishment

Adding to its other strengths, Mina the Hollower includes a challenging difficulty that makes playing it incredibly rewarding. It constantly tests your skills, a design choice commonly seen in recent ‘Souls-like’ games.

It’s not just the challenging boss fights or tough enemies that make this game stand out. It’s the unique abilities and mechanics connected to the main character, Mina, that really set it apart.

To understand the game’s mechanics, let’s first look at how you improve. In this game, experience and currency are combined into a single resource: Bones. You’ll use Bones to both strengthen Mina’s abilities, like her attack and defense, and to buy new items and resources from merchants. Because Bones serve both purposes, careful resource management is key.

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You collect Bones by exploring, defeating enemies, and finding chests full of diamonds, which give you a large amount of currency quickly. However, there’s a risk: when you die, your character, Mina, drops a “Spark” containing all the Bones she was carrying. If you die again before retrieving that Spark, you permanently lose all those Bones – a classic challenge that the game’s creator, Hidetaka Miyazaki, would likely appreciate.

To make things more challenging, healing potions (called Plasma Vials) are refilled at checkpoints, but they won’t automatically restore all your health. You can only heal up to a certain point, marked by an orange line on your health bar. To raise that limit, you need to continuously attack enemies to fill a Plasma meter, or find special orange flowers hidden throughout the game. This adds a unique twist to how you heal.

Ultimately, the game’s variety of options creates a challenging but fair experience in Mina the Hollower. You can customize your approach with different weapons, sub-weapons, and trinkets, and discover upgrades that offer helpful second chances, like recovering lost money. These tools aren’t given to you easily, though – you have to work for them! This means the game is demanding, but never feels unfairly punishing; it consistently keeps you engaged and ready for anything.

Even after thoroughly dissecting Mina the Hollower – its story, how it plays, and what makes it tick – I still feel like I can’t fully express just how enjoyable, captivating, fast-paced, and brilliantly made this game truly is.

Even after thoroughly dissecting Mina the Hollower – its story, gameplay, and design – I still struggle to fully express just how enjoyable, captivating, fast-paced, and brilliantly made this game truly is.

This game is truly special – the kind of experience where hours fly by feeling like mere minutes. It’s so engaging you’ll want to take notes on everything, from character locations to hidden secrets. It’s gaming at its finest, and most importantly, it recaptures that feeling of childhood wonder.

Closing Comments

Yacht Club Games’ Mina the Hollower brilliantly blends the best parts of classic games like Zelda, Castlevania, and Dark Souls into something completely new and captivating. It’s a game I didn’t know I wanted, but now can’t get enough of! If you enjoy classic adventure games, dark settings, or well-crafted gameplay, you absolutely should play it.

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2026-05-27 16:11