In my younger years when I was asked about my favourite types of games, I’d always answer in the same way: listing a few of my favourite Nintendo games. Pokémon, Animal Crossing, Mario Sunshine, etc. This was always met with a confused expression. I’d then have it explained to me that the person was hoping to learn what my favourite video game genre was. That was a question I found far more difficult to answer because I didn’t really understand what genres were.

Screenshot of Animal Crossing New Horizon.

My general lack of understanding video game genres continued for several years, and proved particularly problematic when I left Nintendo’s walled garden. That’s when I ran into a problem: how do you find new games you want to play when you don’t even know how to describe what you’re looking for? That’s typically where we use genres: each is associated with a commonly understood subset of mechanics, and design tropes. However, I’m a blockhead, so I took on the impossible task of searching without this information.

As you might imagine, not knowing genres made tracking down new games that I would be interested in playing quite difficult. Don’t believe me? Here’s an example of the nonsense I had to work through: how would you find a game like Metroid, when you don’t know the genre Metroidvania? You could search for games about jumping, but that’d return results for Platformers like Celeste, and Super Meat Boy. Games with puzzles? Well, that’d return an avalanche of puzzlers from Portal to Cosmic Express. What about games where you explore? Adventure, and Survival titles.

GAAAAAAAH!

Eventually, I just gave up, and googled “games like Metroid.” It was then that I finally learned the term Metroidvania.

Screenshot of Metroidvania title 9 Years of Shadows.

It’s been a decade since I first discovered what a Metroidvania was. According to Steam I’ve played 49 different titles within the genre. That said, I recently discovered something about myself, and think I can declare the following with a reasonable degree of certainty: I don’t really like Metroidvanias. That’s not to say I dislike all of those aforementioned 49 games – some of them were great. No – for me the issue is that what many people understand to be the core of a Metroidvania is completely at odds with why I originally fell in love with Metroid.

That begs the question: why did I fall in love with Metroid? What exactly am I looking for from these titles? The ability to feel lost. A setting where I can fully immerse myself in a world that feels completely alien. A space where my natural curiosity, and sense of discovery act as my guide. I wasn’t looking for specific mechanics – I was looking for a feeling.

To that end, there have only been a handful of titles which have really delivered on that feeling of being lost. It’s not an easy thing to do either – most developers don’t actually want their players to get lost. Heck, even in the games where I was able to lose myself, there was still sign-posting. It just wasn’t as intrusive as all of the chatter you hear in modern AAA titles, or the narrow, and restrictive world design of most Metroidvanias.

Screenshot of Hollow Knight.

The easiest example of a Metroidvania that actually let me feel lost was Hollow Knight. After about 2 hours of linear segments that teach players all the basics, the entire game opens up, and players can tackle the remainder of Hollow Knight in whatever order they please. There are numerous routes into each zone, the order you collect new abilities is largely irrelevant, and half the time you won’t even have a map. It’s so easy to get lost as you venture around Hallownest, yet that’s an intended part of the experience. You really get a sense that you’re exploring a decaying kingdom that had been forgotten to the annals of history.

It’s also worth noting, that I’ve experienced this feeling of being lost while playing games that aren’t Metroidvanias. examples include Breath of the Wild, Dark Souls, and Valheim. This is largely thanks to how players are able to explore with little to no guidance. They also feature multiple valid paths to the end of the game, some of which allow you to skip entire sections of the game. If most games are an amusement park, these titles are being dead dropped into buttfuck nowhere with 3 days of food, a flint, and a pocket knife. I love them all the more for it.

Screenshot of Valheim.

You have to understand though, for years now I’ve erroneously associated this feeling with Metroidvanias. That’s not what they’re about though. They’re games where the map gradually opens up as you accumulate more abilities, and eventually overpower everything you come across. They’re more like stat grinding RPGs than anything else.

Has this happened to anyone else, or is this another in a growing list of “me problems”? Sound off below if it has. I’ll feel far less dumb if at least one other person has been bamboozled in a similar fashion.