PC Gamer - UK (2021-12)

ShovelKnightisdifferent.It’slike
opening the toy box in your parents’
attic and discovering that no, you’re
not a slack-jawed buffoon for
revering the past; that somehow, the
April O’Neil figure you marriedasa
child is actually a
captivating, erudite
human being who
doesn’t even mind
being locked in a box
half her lifetime. You
were right to fear
change! The transition
to 3D games was
actually a mistake.
Subsurface scattering is the work of
Old Nick. The second thumbstick
should be viewed with the same
suspicion a Catholic inquisitor
examining a cutaneous horn.
The thing here, quite obviously, is
that this is curated nostalgia. Shovel
Knight is the work of selective minds,

pickingallthebestbitsofretro

games while discarding the chaff of

punitive difficulty and bullying save

points. All that remains is elegance:

the perfectly-balanced downward

plunge,liftedfrom the otherwise

unremarkable Duck

Tales; sine-wave enemy

movement from

Castlevania; boss

structure from Mega

Man 2. It makes for a

game that plays like

you think the games of

your youth did, even if

they didn’t. It’s an act

of George Lucas-alike revisionism,

albeit one where ‘Han shot first’ is

replaced by some checkpointing.

JUMP FORCE

Picking the juiciest fruits from the

entire history of 2D platformers gives

Shovel Knight a breadth of ideas that

feelsveryNintendo. I went into this

expectingtodothe same thing in a

varietyoflevelsthat looked different

butfeltsimilar.But each one is

distinct,easingyou into a method of

playthatactsasahidden tutorial for

theupcomingbossfight. Each one

couldbethecentral concept for a

standardplatformer, but Shovel

Knight throws ideas around like a

tragic billionaire offering yachts in

exchange for conversation.

And on the subject of cash: I’ve

rarely been hungrier for glistening

gems and mounds of riches than I am

playing Shovel Knight. Every pile of

stone has to be greedily dug. And

every death becomes a bargain.

Floating sacks of money hover where

you die, and it provokes an almost

animalistic response in me. And

anyway, if they didn’t want me to

waste hours and days scratching in

the dirt for coins, they shouldn’t have

calleditTreasureTrove.

90

Shovel Knight: Treasure

Trove is crisp, smart and

utterly moreish. So good

it’s changed how I feel

about shovelling.

VERDICT

S

ometimes, in the dark hours, I find myself Googling stuff I
owned as a kid, primarily as a means of clinging to the rain-slick
precipice of youth with shrivelled fingers. These toys are
universally shitter than I remembered: fire-damaged faces,
limited articulation, feeble accessories. The whole enterprise
feels like inventing a time machine just so I can travel back 30-ish years
and laugh at my own idiot self for ever thinking old things were good.

DIGGY BANK

Wallowing in my avarice in SHOVEL KNIGHT: TREASURE TROVE

The transition

to 3D

games was

actually a

mistake

NEEDTOKNOW

WHAT IS IT?

The Voltron of cool shit

from old games

EXPECT TO PAY

£31

DEVELOPER

Yacht Club Games

PUBLISHER

In-house

REVIEWED ON

Intel Core i7-7700 CUP

@ 3.60GHz, 16 GB RAM,

NVIDIA GeForce GTX

1070, Windows 10

MULTIPLAYER

Yes

LINK

store.steampowered.

com/app/250760/

Shovel_Knight_

Treasure_Trove

OLDGAMESREVISITEDby Matthew Elliott

THEY’RE BACK

Only thing harder than

this minigame? Trying

to screenshot it.