June 2025 Next Fest Demo Impressions [Part 2]: Super 10 Pin, Rogue Point, Mio, Rue Valley, Azaran, Mina the Hollower

Author's Note: This is part two of a two-part series in which I review the most notable demos I played during Steam's June 2025 Next Fest event. If you missed the first part in this series, a link is provided below. If you played a demo that I didn't play feel free to share. Also, you are more than welcomed to share alternate opinions about games and demos reviewed in this entry and the previous one.

Part 1:

• Danchi Days
• Cast n Chill
• Downhill
• Dispatch
• Thysiastery
• Bloodthief

Part 2 [THIS BLOG]:

• Super 10 Pin
• Rogue Point
• Mio Memories in Orbit
• Rue Valley
• Azaran: Islands of the Jinn
• Mina The Hollower

Super 10 Pin

What is it?

Every time Steam Next Fest rolls around, I try to check out at least one shitpost game. Last time it was "ROGUE LIGHT DECK BUILDER," and this season it was Super 10 Pin, a bowling game meant to evoke memories of N64 and PS1 shovelware. The game utilizes an incredibly rudimentary 3D look, and its audio design and sound effects are also "trope appropriate," so to speak. Likewise, the game is, at its heart, a bowling game, but with a sci-fi twist. While the first lane is pretty straightforward, with the only impediment being the unintuitive controls, the latter lanes feature twists, corkscrews, loops, and launch pads. All of these make the game nigh unplayable at times, all while inundating you with some of the most annoying sound effects. After releasing a bowling ball, you can adjust its spin and approach. Still, you can only adjust your bowling ball's path up to a certain point, as you are limited by a meter, and after it reaches zero, you are stuck with whatever direction or path the ball is presently facing or inching toward. There are plenty of unlockable rewards, and getting medals requires you to master and take advantage of specific environmental features with each level.

What's in the demo?

The demo gets you a handful of levels and unlocks. The unlockable bowling balls don't behave differently from one another, so the only unlocks that matter are the new levels. One quick note about that, however, is that level and ball unlocks are not tied to performing well on a level, and they trigger after attempting a previously unplayed level, regardless of how far you get into it. I discovered this because I entered into a new level, didn't realize I hadn't swapped my previous bowling ball for a new one, and upon exiting out of the level, without having thrown a single bowling ball, was greeted by the game's "CONGRATULATIONS FOR FINISHING A LEVEL!" screen. At the same time, it rattled off a series of level and item unlocks. I'd call this faulty programming, but it is CLEARLY intentional, as that was a common flaw or problem with the works of Titus Interactive, Kemco, or Acclaim, which Super 10 Pin is paying homage to. The game controls poorly, with all the bowling balls feeling frustratingly slippery, and the new environmental hazards often being fiddly; as a result, the special unlocks tied to using them feel utterly impossible.

So, this game is a shitpost. However, I respect the craft put into Super 10 Pin more than your usual shitpost game. It seems odd to point this out, but the font and aspect ratio used in Super 10 Pin "nailed it." The first time I punched the air while playing this game was when I saw the menu screen and basked in the poorly formatted game options. The new bowling balls might have fantastical names, but their patterns and paint schemes are cosmetic, and none of the new balls play tangibly different or have dissimilar stats or buffs. The trick shots are challenging and require a frustrating amount of trial and error, which contradicts the game's format—a half set of bowling, which isn't well-suited for experimentation. The game's mechanics and ideas seem to work against each other, which was a common issue with fifth-generation shovelware. In the case of Super 10 Pin, it features wild and wacky worlds that are grafted paradoxically onto a bowling game. It feels like something ripped directly out of a discarded pitch to Acclaim. The game's physics are also not well-considered, and you get stuck or watch your bowling ball stop dead in its tracks on many of the same obstacles that are meant to speed things up or unlock new features more often than you'd like. Every part of this game that is bad was intentional, because every single shortcoming or flaw was a mainstay of the era that Super 10 Pin seeks to remind us of. Whether or not you see something special in that is essentially what determines what value you find in it.

Will I buy the full game when it's released?

No, but I don't blame anyone who does. When I played Rogue Light Deck Builder, I found myself constantly rolling my eyes in contempt. With Super 10 Pin, I had a giant smile on my face every second I played it. All of its problems are considered flaws or intentional design choices. The people behind Super 10 Pin sought to make a turd and by golly, they made one and there's no doubting that making this type of bad game warranted effort and craft beyond your usual shitpost. Yes, the game controls like shit and the worlds look like vomit, but the game nails a very particular type of fifth-generation shovelware that I, and many of you, remember all too well. Super 10 Pin might be a "modern" game, but I remember the games it pays homage to vividly. While my parents were busy searching for a movie at Blockbuster's for the weekend, I was in the video game section mulling over a cacophony of video game-based atrocities, and they all played and looked exactly like Super 10 Pin. So, you probably shouldn't buy this game unless you're a sick individual, but I'm not going to judge you if you do, because I'm just as twisted.

Rogue Point

What is it?

Rogue Point is a 4-player cooperative tactical shooter that plays similarly to the Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas games, despite presenting itself in a SWAT 4-like style. However, because the game relies on you working with a party of real-life partners, rather than AI-derived ones, the tactical side of the game comes from orders you verbally share, rather than through the inputting of physical commands. The structure and format of the game seem reactive to how well your team performs on your starting and subsequent missions, though the full extent of this mechanic is only partially shown in the demo. You fight on a map with diverging points across four possible locations, though what you do on each of these locations is dependent on your previous actions or RNG. Each map will reshape itself or cordon off certain parts, depending on the mission, and what the game's missions entail isn't always clear. In terms of how you play the game, you have a starting income that you then spend on weapons, gear, and items, whether it be guns, smoke grenades, ladders, or lockpicks. All of the tools from SWAT 4 and Rainbow Six are here, and your purchases from the start carry over with each subsequent mission in a run or playthrough; however, once a run is over or your team gets a "Game Over" after too many failures, your load-out resets.

What's in the demo?

The demo, which is no longer available with the expiration of Next Fest, featured a skeletal version of the game's reactive main campaign. The four locations in the demo are The Airport, The Mall, The Office, and The Oilrig, which are also the primary locations in the full release. The mission types in the demo were limited to just a handful of variants, and the reactiveness of the campaign was incredibly basic, with you and your party branching upwards or downwards on a map to different locations depending on whether you succeeded or failed in previous missions. The missions boiled down to either disarming bombs before they exploded, targeting and assassinating specific enemies, or rescuing hostages. As is the case with games of this type, objectives can be reached by taking a variety of different routes, many of which are only accessible if you have the appropriate load-outs. Additionally, the amount of currency you earn to spend in subsequent missions during a run depends on your actions in a mission. The game offers substantial rewards for taking down targets non-lethally, capturing laptops or data sources in an environment, or scoring headshots rather than bodyshots when using a sniper rifle. The levels and missions are purpose-built to encourage teamwork, and every level ends with a chokepoint mission where you either need to do a task collectively before a timer expires or hold a position while facing a wave of enemies. The game supports up to four players in a party, but I'm unsure how well it performs with smaller groups. I played it with a team of three people, including myself, and we got wrecked on even the starting mission.

To its credit, Rogue Point is a nostalgic game that speaks to the ideals of a genre of tactical shooter that seems practically extinct, and its promise of rekindling that fire makes it an interesting game to follow. However, there's no denying that the game is still a work in progress and rough in spots. First, there's a significant amount of balance work still needed on the missions, as I found the default starting office area to be cramped and tight, which led to quick and often lethal firefights. In contrast, the action on the airport and oil rig levels is much more spread out. Second, the game emphasizes the importance of approaching situations with a tactical or stealth-based lens, but that's often easier said than done, because playing the game covertly is almost impossible, given that the AI is nearly perfect at detecting you from a great distance. Finally, almost all of your required in-game actions are easier if you have specific tools in your load-out, but some of the risk-reward mechanics to help you try new things can ruin your experience or playthrough before it even starts. For example, instead of buying things à la carte, you can buy blind packs that doll out entire kits for almost your entire starting income. However, these packs range over a wide gamut, and on one occasion, I found myself with nothing but smoke grenades, a stun baton, and a non-lethal taser as my only armaments, and I was pretty much screwed. Curiously, the game doesn't allow you to use the guns of fallen enemies. So, you live and die by what you bring into a mission.

Will I buy the full game when it's released?

Maybe. You rarely see games like SWAT 4 or Rainbow Six Vegas these days. To me, Vegas 2 marked the last time a tactical shooter that wasn't open-world was allowed not to follow the mold of whatever was popular in the industry, whether it be Call of Duty, PUBG, or Fortnite. It was fast but still had that hard-edged Tom Clancy DNA, and that's what made it unique. It required you to work with a group of friends, or, if you were especially daring, with random people on the internet, and needed to collaborate on a common task that required regimented teamwork. Rogue Point might be one of those games that I purchase not because it's stellar or perfect, but because it's "good enough." It isn't great to look at, and the balance issues mean that you need to work it to get some of the magic of the tactical games of yesteryear, but there's no denying that Rogue Point has "juice." When the missions click and you and your friends start jiving with it and feel like you're making progress with fairly involved missions, it feels good. I hope the developers realize that focusing only on four environments limits the authenticity of their claims of almost endless replayability, and the demo they shared during Next Fest is just a working build that is a year or two away from a full commercial release.

Mio Memories in Orbit

What is it?

Mio Memories in Orbit is an atmospheric Metroidvania, but a specific type of Metroidvania that isn't your Hollow Knight, Axiom Verge, or Bloodstained variety. Mio Memories in Orbit, more than most games of this type, is structurally and mechanically more linked to the very first Metroid and Castlevania. The combat is basic, with you stuck mashing away at the same attack over and over again, without any of the quick combos or flashy special moves you usually employ in more modern games in this crease. The game places a greater emphasis on its atmosphere, allowing you to explore its levels and experience stark climate changes when shifting from one corridor to the next. Mio Memories in Orbit takes place on a robotic or automated planet after a cataclysm has occurred, where you must explore the cause of this disaster while helping other NPCs who are simply trying to survive. As expected, even in the demo, some of these NPCs have tasks that require you to open doors or explore far-off environments that are not immediately available to you and will not play out for a while until you pick up different keycards and upgrades later in the game. There are modules to equip, and these provide different abilities and tools for you to use during your journey.

What's in the demo?

I mentioned earlier that Mio feels like a modern take on the original Metroid or Castlevania, rather than where the Metroidvania genre stands today. Part of that stems from the fact that the combat doesn't rely on the quick reflexes that games like Hollow Knight or Bloodstained rely on. The nice part about that is that Mio feels more accessible than most of the Metroidvanias coming out presently, which have placed a growing emphasis on speed, parrying, precise platforming, and inputting complex combos to perform dazzling aerial maneuvers. The combat in Mio, on the other hand, is basic and somewhat of a placeholder for you to collect currency that you later spend to upgrade your robot protagonist. Still, the upgrades are steep enough that most of your ability to gain new stuff feels more locked behind beating bosses or meeting checkpoints in the story. The platforming is also somewhat floaty and unsteady, with a double jump that allows you to correct bad trajectories fairly generously. However, the platforming sequences that feature instant death-dolling traps feel especially gnarly, considering the game's controls don't feel tight enough to warrant them. The game's camera can be frustrating because objects and pieces of the foreground and background often completely obscure your character and their position in the frame, requiring you to take many more leaps of faith than you feel comfortable with. Luckily, the game looks and sounds stunning, and the cel-shaded graphics have a hand-painted look that makes exploring new locations in Mio a true highlight.

Now, let's not bury the lead here with Mio. The game is artistic and "artsy," even though I shudder upon even using the latter of those two terms in jest. Nonetheless, Mio is another textural vibe piece with minimalistic game design baked into its DNA. As such, the game is sans many of your modern quality-of-life Metroidvania trappings, at least from the onset. Being able to consult a world map is an upgrade path that requires you to spend a significant amount of in-game currency with an NPC. Even then, it can only be used by consulting them at static locations, at least initially. For at least the opening hours, quest-givers and notable landmarks are things the game expects you to commit to memory. Being able to see enemy health bars, for goodness' sake, is an upgrade module you need to find and equip as well! Look, I get it, the designers want you to absorb the game's atmosphere because they are the real highlight, but deliberately stunting the unlock on a key modern game design feature for the sake of art and mise en scene set pieces isn't impressive, especially when the game has issues with directing you where you need to go. Because of how sparse the game's mechanics are implemented and unlocked, you do spend most of the demo wandering about, waiting for things to happen. The signposting is skeletal, and I found myself spending minutes on end in an ice biome, asking myself "Why am I here?" over and over again.

Will I buy the full game when it's released?

No. Something feels "off" about Mio. Maybe games like Bloodstained and Hollow Knight have spoiled me, but while I'm fine with a more slow-paced Metroidvania, lacking all the modern trappings of the genre makes Mio a hard sell. The combat in Mio feels too rudimentary, at least what they showcase in the demo, to maintain my interest throughout an entire Metroidvania experience, even if it has jaw-dropping art design and levels. Animal Well did a much better job of striking a middle ground between having strong visuals and atmosphere while still having combat that didn't feel like a placeholder. Likewise, the hitboxes on enemies aren't tight, with what I thought would be hits often missing repeatedly. Additionally, I'm not fond of how Mio's jumps feel. With the game utilizing traps and pits of spikes that instantly kill you, the imperfection of its core jump drove me up the wall. The game's pace also feels too loose. I either was overwhelmed by a bunch of enemies in a combat arena or running around in circles with nary a risk to report. And again, there's a lot of aimless wandering involved that yields no progress to report. It's a bummer because the game is visually and thematically intriguing, but the Spartan-like design ultimately hurts the game more than anything else, and the demo left a rather sour taste in my mouth.

Rue Valley

What is it?

Rue Valley is a narrative-driven RPG with adventure game exploration and a character-based skill-check system. The game employs a cell-shaded, stop-motion-inspired art style similar to the Spider-Verse films, and its story features a protagonist struggling with anxiety. Your player character is seeking treatment from a therapist who has instructed them to remove themselves from their outside stressors and instead live at a motel on the outskirts of a desert. Mechanically, all of your interactions in the game are dealt with based on skill checks that depend heavily on how you have allocated skill points on a character sheet at the start of the game. One of the demo's major demonstrations of this mechanic involves your character interacting with a motel clerk and your struggles to get them to hand over the keys to your room. If your character isn't maxed to be extroverted, the clerk will ignore them as they have a phone conversation, and you will thus need to burn hours of in-game time before they notice you. However, being introverted will be beneficial in different settings or scenarios. Likewise, to reflect your character's compromised mental state, depending on what you do, you'll be inflicted with a bevy of status effects like "Leg Cramps," "Apathy," "Total Lack of Motivation," or "Anxious Apprehension," and these too will limit what you can accomplish.

What's in the demo?

Rue Valley's Next Fest demo features the game's prologue largely unedited. In it, you experience the game's opening and early trials, utilizing its skill check system. I will say this about Rue Valley: while I agree that the start of the game is the only part of it you can reasonably use for a demo, its introduction is undeniably a slow burn. The story doesn't sink in the time loop aspect for a majority of the demo, which is about forty to fifty minutes, depending on how much of the world and environment you decide to explore. And before we continue, no, saying the game revolves around you investigating or resolving a time loop isn't a spoiler because the game's Steam page says as much in the first sentence of its sales pitch. While it isn't fully explored in the demo, the game challenges you to explore ways to rip certain characters from vicious cycles in hopes of unlocking new ways to stop the time loop entirely. This narrative trapping allows you to explore how different approaches or dialogue choices can influence how specific characters react to your protagonist. The game also has intuition or brain map puzzles, which caught me slightly by surprise. After collecting groupings of clues or character interactions, your character will be prompted to draw a conclusion or inference by drawing or sketching connections between plots.

There are some immediate concerns I have with Rue Valley, based on what I've played in the demo. With the game only utilizing three tiers of stats, which impact your decisional, social, and emotional responses, it will be interesting to see how/if the game allows you to gain new skill points to allocate as you progress the story. There aren't that many ways for you to continue to "improve" your character's skills in the demo, but not having any character progression in the full release seems unlikely and unrecommended, considering the game is a role-playing game at its heart. Nonetheless, how this will work long term will require a tightrope act from the makers of Rue Valley. The inference system is interesting, but I can't help but wonder how dynamic it is or if, regardless of how you build or skew your character, you are destined to draw the same inferences in the same chapters, ad infinitum. If that's the case, it defeats the purpose of the game being about breaking a character out of a time loop. And again, while the game is presentationally solid, I have my doubts about how well it can maintain repeating some scenes, yes, with narrative justifications, without making its players weary. Even when the game sped through my second interaction with the hotel clerk, I still felt a little exhausted with needing to talk to her a second time in the first place.

Will I buy the full game when it's released?

Maybe, but I'm erring toward "yes." Rue Valley's stop-motion and comic-book-inspired graphical style is flashy, but its slow-burning narrative is more rooted in the noir detective film genre. Given that the game openly admits to revolving around a time loop, only time will tell how much it leans towards science fiction rather than noir; however, based on the demo, I was sold on its premise. What continues to be my concern is whether the skill-check system is open or authentic, especially as you progress through the story. I can only imagine that, with time, you gain the ability to allocate more points, and this allows your character to get past impediments that previously blocked whole parts of the world from them. It makes sense, especially considering the game starts as a journey to the boonies to help resolve a person amid an intense bout of anxiety. There is a way for the game to blend RPG stats growth into an authentic sense of tangible character growth. Furthermore, the game's atmosphere is impeccable, and that's doubly so when things get more intense, like when the protagonist faces the time loop for the first time. It's a demo that leaves you with more questions than answers, but in a good way.

Azaran: Islands of the Jinn

What is it?

Come on, just look at the screenshots of this game! If Super 10 Pin is a joke game that pays tribute to N64 shovelware, Azaran is a clear paean to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. It's not precisely a connection that Azaran and its developers deny. Still, as a tribute to a bygone era of Zelda games, it's also a throwback to classic action-adventure game design. The game begins with you in media res in a dungeon that you must explore, triggering pressure points and levers to unlock doors that lead to further levels. Your starting equipment is unexpectedly sparse, and you are accompanied by a floating companion that speaks of a legendary treasure that many before you have been seeking for ages. Azaran makes all of the production overtures to make its source of inspiration as explicit as possible, with panning shots and location title cards whenever you enter new locations and audio effects that sound EXACTLY LIKE YOU THINK! It's important to highlight the small things Azaran does to get your nostalgia Spidey Senses tingling because the game itself plays as you'd expect of a game trying to emulate the "magic" of Ocarina of Time. You can lock onto targets to attack them, and it functions much like the Z-targeting in Ocarina of Time. Certain puzzles require you to place objects on things and race toward a door or entryway before a timer expires.

What's in the demo?

The Next Fest demo, which you can still play, is the game's first dungeon. You have a basic hub area with several doors, all located on multiple levels or tiers of the environment, and many of which will only open after you have collected specific weapons or trinkets in earlier rooms. I don't want to call the level design "aimless" because Azaran is deliberately playing its cards close to its chest, and this is kind of how Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask operated. However, while there is a "correct" order in which you can enter and explore rooms in the dungeon, that order isn't exactly clear to you. If you play it blindly, you will butt up against dead ends or puzzles that you understand the gist upon finding them, but don't have the tools to perform the expected actions. Likewise, there are more than a few rooms with no communicated expectations that took me a while to figure out.

This next point might be a case of the demo only being the game's first dungeon, but the exploratory aspects of the early 3D Zeldas feel like a greater focus in Azaran than the combat-oriented ones. There is an end boss that is entirely pattern-focused, but most of your combat encounters are glorified puzzles for you to solve to give way to ladders or doors that were previously unlocked. The most common enemy is thorny flowers, which you often need to find level-specific ways to prune or kill. On one screen, it might be a simple sword swipe, and on another, you'll need to find an intricate process to funnel an explosive plant underneath it. Some rooms require you to perform weapon-specific moves or techniques, especially the ones that require you to be accurate with your bow. Nonetheless, Azaran doesn't exactly shake the boat with what it expects out of you.

Nevertheless, the game can get frustrating. I even found myself staring at walls and locked doors, not knowing what I needed to achieve or do to move forward. Even then, this game was refreshing. It's not just that the game is an homage to Ocarina of Time; it's more that it's a Zelda-like that rarely gets made these days. Remember when Zelda was expressly linear, with an overworld that allowed you to explore things at your own pace, but even then, the story missions and levels were very much not open-world? Man, I miss those days. Look, I love Breath of the Wild as much as everyone else, but I'm done with open-world action-adventure games. I'm tired of massive worlds that inundate you with fetch quests as you make simple walks from one story location to the next. I'm tired of every action-adventure game overwhelming me with hundreds of UI icons whenever I open the map. And I'm tired of every action-adventure game having hundreds of crafting options that funnel you down boring collectathons to gather lumber, ore, and tidbits to make one sword or axe. I just want to explore dungeons and beat up bosses while the Zelda sounds fill my ears! And you know what? Azaran kind of gets me, even if it isn't perfect itself, and I appreciate that.

Will I buy the full game when it's released?

Yeah. As I already laid out, this game is my jam at this junction in my life. It's simple to a fault, and it lacks effective signposting, which can be a drawback. Nonetheless, Azaran is a game I jived with, and it's no secret as to why. The game presents a fifth-generation action-adventure game world that doesn't have the feature bloat or endless scope that seems to be in every action-adventure game these days. Azaran benefits from addition through subtraction, and I'm not ashamed to say that. The heart of what got many of us to fall in love with Zelda in the first place is here. Exploring environments that exude atmosphere? That's here. Finding fun ways to use new items or weapons to solve environmental puzzles? That's here. Placing boxes to press down on pressure points so a door will stay open? That's here. The team behind Azaran has almost everything that was groundbreaking when Ocarina of Time first came out, all in a single neat package. The few modern stylings present are basic quality-of-life enhancements. For example, there are spawning points, which the game justifies narratively, allowing you to respawn when you run out of health and die. Accessing the map is quick and painless, and swapping weapons isn't bound to give you RSI like it did on the N64 controller. It's just a good time for 90s kids like myself and those who yearn for a simpler era of Zelda games.

Mina The Hollower

What is it?

Mina the Hollower is, without a doubt, the most hyped indie darling from Steam's June 2025 Next Fest. The game is the latest title from the Shovel Knight team and has been in development since it was successfully Kickstarted in 2022. It features Mina the mouse, who is a "Hollower," meaning she has a drill that allows her to burrow underground to avoid projectiles and navigate around walls or specific roadblocks. The game's world features gothic horror-inspired architecture and is populated by anthropomorphic animals. The game is presented in an isometric perspective and visually resembles Game Boy Color games, especially The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons and Oracle of Ages. As Mina, you need to investigate why Spark Generators near her have gone out, and you have a trusty whip at your disposal to unleash attacks in four directions. Much like the side-scrolling Castlevania games, you can also equip side arms like a hatchet or throwing daggers, and these function like special abilities, but you can only hold one of these at a time.

What's in the demo?

The demo is the game's opening prologue, followed by Mina navigating the first portion of the game, culminating in a battle against a boss named Thorne. There are three bosses in the demo: Nether Kraken, Hulk Trooper, and Thorne, and they each have patterns and gimmicks you need to observe to beat them. I found some of these boss patterns a bit too basic. The second boss is a lot like a Punch-Out opponent in that they have a specific window for you to attack, and any other time, you need to hide and avoid them at all costs. The third boss sold me on the idea that Mina the Hollower is essentially complete, and the full release is going to have a lot of surprises up its sleeve. I was expecting good things, but the demo was not just more fun, but far larger in scope and sequence than I had expected. Exploring the opening gothic town and cityscape is a blast, with you able to bask in the retro visuals and their accompanying sounds while performing 2D Zelda tasks like triggering gates and using your whip much like a hookshot. Dying in the game is fast and furious at times, and falling down gaps in platforms or floors sure is a pain. Considering how unusual the burrowing mechanic works, I'm surprised at how immediate the game is in throwing you into an environment that straight up can kill you almost instantly, but then again, that's kind of how Shovel Knight worked.

The controls, especially the hollowing mechanic, took some getting used to. Even in the demo, there are sequences when you need to be careful as to when you pop back to the surface. Some of your environmental tasks, such as opening gates or triggers, require trial and error as well. The game is also not completely transparent about the usefulness of your sidearms and the pros and cons of equipping one over another. Some are coded to be more effective at beating specific enemies over your standard whip attack, but you have to figure that out on your own. And much like Shovel Knight, you are probably going to die in this game more than a few times, especially as you try to suss out what new environments or screens are expecting out of you. There are a few screens from time to time that act as "safe zones" that allow you to catch your breath, but for the most part, Mina the Hollower forces you to jump into the action, and it never lets up. You need to problem-solve on the fly, as your screen sometimes gets littered with projectiles or enemies spinning around, hoping to kill you. Luckily, there are trinkets to collect as you explore the levels, and these can provide permanent boosts to Mina's stats or combat abilities.

Nonetheless, this game is still functioning under the same ruleset, so to speak, as Shovel Knight, so you have to approach it with that in mind. And much like Shovel Knight, Yacht Club Games' production values are off the charts. The music features an endless stream of synth-driven bops, which perfectly match the frenetic pace of the game, especially during the boss battles. The pixel-based graphics are gorgeous, but modern embellishments, such as particle effects and artifacting, make it a visual tour de force. It's still about as hard as Shovel Knight. Still, the game's visual and audio variety keeps you motivated to trudge on through some of its more formidable challenges because you want to see what's right around the corner.

Will I buy the full game when it's released?

Yes, absolutely. Despite some of my relayed misgivings and concerns, this game feels good, and even the demo has plenty of game juice. The controls took some adjusting, but again, I'm not going to sit here and act like I didn't have to do the same with Shovel Knight. Yacht Club has a unique way of taking genres that feel like they have codified rulesets on how they control and feel, and doing a few things that go against that grain. And much like the other games I praised in this write-up, the game has an evocative and strong aesthetic. The Gothic visuals, paired with a limited color palette, work well, largely thanks to the heavy shading employed by the game's artists. There are also graphical glitches, such as VHS tape-like skipping and feedback glitches, that remind you that this is definitely a modern game as well.

The wild card that won't be known until after the game's release is what Mina the Hollower's post-release content will be like. Will it have a long burn like Shovel Knight, or will Yacht Club Games move on to a new project more quickly? Personally, I think Mina the Hollower feels like a case study on why I don't want them to commit to a single title for more than a few years, as they did with Shovel Knight, because I want to see what new and interesting things they can come up with. However, considering they are already busy working on Shovel Knight 2, we won't know entirely until Mina the Hollower is released.