10 Similarities (and Differences) Between Mina the Hollower and Shovel Knight

Yacht Club Games was founded in 2011 and successfully funded its first game, Shovel Knight, through crowdfunding in 2015. Since then, aside from publishing other games like Azure Striker Gunvolt and Cyber Shadow, the studio has primarily focused on expanding the Shovel Knight universe with updates and new installments. Mina the Hollower represents Yacht Club’s first completely original game idea since its creation. While different from Shovel Knight, it shares some design elements, which is common for a developer’s key projects.

Shovel Knight is a classic action platformer, and Mina the Hollower is an open-world action RPG. Both games draw inspiration from retro titles – Shovel Knight from Mega Man, and Mina the Hollower from The Legend of Zelda. Yacht Club Games learned a lot while making Shovel Knight, their first game, and applied those lessons when creating Mina the Hollower. While you’ll see similarities, the two games are still very different and offer unique experiences.

We’re focusing our comparison on Mina the Hollower and the very first Shovel Knight game, Shovel of Hope. We’re not including any of the later expansions or side stories.

10. Similarity: Hub Areas

Safe Havens

Both Mina the Hollower and Shovel Knight feature challenging worlds filled with hazards and enemies, making safe spaces to rest and upgrade essential. Each game offers a central hub area where players can do just that, as well as discover secrets and unlock new options.

As a fan, I’ve noticed something cool about both Mina and Shovel Knight! In Mina’s world, Ossex is the place to go – it’s this central city where you can beef up your stats, grab new weapons, and just chat with people to get clues about the island. Shovel Knight has a similar setup. After the first level, he hits up this unnamed Village to do the same thing. It doesn’t have everything Ossex does at first, but later on, the Armor Outpost fills in all the gaps. It’s funny though, both games are packed with regular people just wandering around, and you can talk to them for tips or just some funny conversations!

9. Difference: Open World

Mina Goes Where She Wants

Shovel Knight takes a lot of inspiration from classic games like Mega Man and the NES DuckTales game, both of which were divided into distinct stages. Like those games, Shovel Knight is structured around levels that you access from a world map. You can go back and replay levels whenever you want and move between areas you’ve already visited pretty easily, but it’s not quite an open-world game.

Mina the Hollower draws inspiration from classic Game Boy Zelda games, known for their expansive, interconnected worlds. Like those games, Ossex allows you to explore in almost any direction, though you’ll occasionally need new abilities or items to progress. While there’s a general path through the game’s main areas, you can usually return to Ossex from anywhere, especially if you’ve unlocked shortcuts along the way.

8. Similarity: Subweapons

Knights and Hollowers Share Tools

Both Shovel Knight and Mina the Hollower are clearly inspired by the Castlevania series, as both main characters use special secondary weapons alongside their main attacks. While Mina’s weapons have a unique gothic steampunk style, they share some similar ideas with those found in Shovel Knight.

Both Shovel Knight and Mina share several similarities in their gameplay. They each have a vehicle – the Mobile Gear and the Iron Steed – that helps them move around levels, and an item – the Phase Locket and the Mist Jar – that lets them pass through enemies. Interestingly, both heroes can even go fishing with their own Fishing Rods, finding useful items and money in unexpected places like puddles or cliffsides. While both games limit subweapon use with a shared energy system, there’s a difference: Mina loses her subweapons if she dies, but Shovel Knight can switch between them without penalty.

7. Difference: Weapons

…But Not All Tools

Both Shovel Knight and Mina use extra gear, but Shovel Knight relies more heavily on his signature weapon, the Shovel Blade. It’s central to his identity – he wouldn’t be Shovel Knight without it! He can improve the shovel with different abilities, but it always remains his main way to fight.

Even though Mina is often shown with her spiked flail, the Nightstar, she actually has five different main weapons to choose from: a large hammer, quick daggers, and an electric arm cannon, among others. You can unlock and improve each weapon separately, and switch between them at any Underlab. This lets you constantly adjust your fighting style. Unlike the Shovel Blade, where you have to master a single weapon, if one of Mina’s weapons isn’t clicking, you can simply try another.

6. Similarity: Traversal Abilities

Bounce it Here, Dig it There

It’s interesting that both Shovel Knight and Mina the Hollower focus on digging – I suspect it wasn’t accidental. But even if it was a coincidence, digging is a useful ability, so it makes sense for both characters!

As a gamer, I’ve noticed something cool about Shovel Knight and Mina. Both characters have moves that are all about getting under things – Shovel Knight bounces to break up the ground and reveal hidden areas, and Mina can actually burrow horizontally to sneak under obstacles and grab stuff. It’s interesting because both games really encourage you to bounce off stuff to get around levels. They both use bouncing to help you navigate tricky terrain, like pits. But there’s a big difference: if I fall into a pit as Mina, I just lose a little health, but with Shovel Knight, it’s game over instantly! So, similar ideas, but totally different consequences.

5. Difference: Perspective

From the Top-Down

Shovel Knight is a classic 2D platformer where you move left and right, and sometimes jump. While levels might have paths going up or down, going down usually means instant failure. The main goal is simply to reach the end of each stage, though you can find hidden areas with treasures along the way. The gameplay is straightforward and focuses on getting from start to finish.

Mina the Hollower is an open-world adventure game viewed from above, letting you move freely in any direction. Though the main story progresses in a set order, each area feels like a maze with lots of shortcuts and interconnected paths – a design that wouldn’t work as well in a traditional 2D game. This layout also lets the game hide secrets cleverly, placing entrances far away and requiring you to solve puzzles or find hidden weaknesses to unlock new passages.

4. Similarity: Currency

It Makes the World Go ‘Round

One thing that really stands out to me about both Shovel Knight and Mina the Hollower is how much treasure you find. It seems Yacht Club Games understands that players have always enjoyed collecting things and watching those numbers increase, going all the way back to the classic retro games that inspire their style.

Both Shovel Knight and Mina the Hollower feature plenty of chances to collect treasure (or Bones, in Mina’s case) and spend it on helpful items and upgrades. Both games also punish repeated deaths by making you lose your collected currency. In Shovel Knight, you drop treasure sacks that vanish if you die again before collecting them. Mina, on the other hand, keeps her Bones safe until she dies without any Sparks, at which point they’re all lost.

3. Difference: Leveling

Mina Invests in Herself

Both Shovel Knight and Mina the Hollower have plenty of items you can buy, but Mina the Hollower has a unique feature: you can use your earnings to directly improve your character. In Mina the Hollower, the currency, called Bones, also acts as experience points. When you collect enough Bones, Mina automatically levels up, increasing her attack, defense, and subweapon strength, and fully restores her health. This system isn’t present in Shovel Knight.

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In Shovel Knight, you can spend treasure to improve your abilities, but only by visiting certain shopkeepers in the Village and Armor Outpost, and even then, the upgrades are limited. In the Village, you can increase your health and magic. At the Armor Outpost, you can buy new armor that provides special effects and unlock new shovel techniques. Importantly, you can’t directly make Shovel Knight stronger or more durable using treasure; success depends more on skillful gameplay than on increasing stats.

2. Similarity: Music

Jake Kaufman Never Misses

Jake Kaufman, known as Virt, is a highly respected name in chiptune music. He’s worked closely with Wayforward for years and is famous for composing the acclaimed soundtrack for Shovel Knight – a major highlight of the game. So it’s no surprise he returned to create the music for Mina the Hollower, bringing his signature chiptune style back to the forefront.

Like Shovel Knight, Mina the Hollower boasts a detailed chiptune soundtrack for each main area, alongside shorter tunes for cutscenes and special moments. Both games also share a cool feature: an in-game music player. In Shovel Knight, you’d find music sheets for the bard to play, and in Mina the Hollower, you can buy a phonograph to listen to records you’ve found.

1. Difference: Recovery

Troupple Chalices Aren’t Economical

Shovel Knight recovers health in two main ways: by finding food scattered throughout levels or by using special healing potions from Troupple Chalices. However, the potions need to be refilled by visiting the Troupple King, so they aren’t a reliable long-term solution. Therefore, it’s best to keep an eye out for food and focus on avoiding damage whenever possible.

Mina the Hollower borrows some ideas from challenging action games like Bloodborne, specifically with how it handles health recovery. Mina carries a limited number of Vials that can restore her health instantly, and she refills them at special locations called Underlabs. But she can’t just use them whenever she wants. First, she needs to fill a Plasma meter by attacking enemies or collecting Plasma Roses. This makes Mina more durable than the player character in Shovel Knight, but it also pushes players to fight aggressively and get close to enemies, creating a risk-versus-reward style of gameplay.

2026-05-29 07:31