🐛 Hollow Knight's Soul Meter

Jan 09, 2023

I’m currently playing the game Hollow Knight.

This is an action-adventure game similar to Metroid.

But Hollow Knight has something Metroid doesn’t.

The “Soul Meter.”

What Is The Soul Meter?

It’s the circular meter in the upper left corner of the screen.

It fills up with “Soul” as you defeat enemies.

If the Soul Meter is filled (even partially), you can hold down a button making the knight tap into the meter.

Soul is depleted, but the Knight will regain health (represented by the 5 “masks” beside the meter).

Cool.

But what’s the point?

Well, it lets you heal at any time.

But the Soul Meter also affects things on a macro level.

It incentivizes you.

It makes you want to defeat enemies.

In a lot of games, combat will take a backseat to the adventure.

Or worse, you might find yourself actively avoiding it.

For example:

In Pokemon Scarlet, once your Pokemon reach a high level, you have zero reason to engage this group of low-level Cufant.

You’ll quickly hit a point when the EXP yield is trivial and not worth the time it takes to complete a battle.

Maybe you haven’t caught a Cufant yet? So, that might be a reason to engage.

They might also yield certain EVs you might be looking for.

But both of these scenarios are super niche. 99.9 percent of the time, you are running away, or avoiding the Cufant altogether.

In Paper Mario The Origami King, all battles are done in this ring-shaped arena.

Spinning and cycling through rows on the ring makes each battle a puzzle.

These take quite awhile to complete.

The rewards are minimal. And even the smallest bad guys trigger a full-fledged ring battle.

It’s just not worth it.

Unless you intrinsically enjoy these battles, you’re going to want to avoid them at all costs.

Hollow Knight’s Soul Meter is constantly being filled by the little enemies you’ll dispose of as you explore the caverns.

This should make it so you have a filled meter for when things get dicey.

And once you use it up, you’ll soon be looking for little enemies to beat up so you can fill the meter again.

Soul gain makes even the smallest enemy skirmishes “worth it” in the long run.