Summary

• Hidden gem Metroidvanias like The Last Case of Benedict Fox deserve more hype for their unique Lovecraftian twists.
• Engage in eerie combat and dark fantasy exploration in games like The Last Faith that offer a Gothic 2D Soulslike experience.
• Experience stunning hand-drawn graphics and unique body horror gameplay in Metroidvanias like Afterimage for a visually striking adventure.

The 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Metroidvania genre is always receiving a steady influ꧋x of video games that seek to stand out from the rest while being heavily inspired by the greats. There are plenty of extremely well-liked and popular Metroidvanias that are shouted from the rooftops, like the Ori series, Dead Cells, and Hollow Knight, but most launches don't get to bask in that same glory.

When you have hundreds upon hundreds of Metroidvania games to choose from, the choices are understandably overwhelming, and it becomes very easy to overlook some of the more hidden gems in the category. Below are the Met💖roidvania games that absolutely deserve more hype and attention.

10 The Last Case Of Benedict Fox: Defin☂itive Edition

Lovecraftian stories 1♚68澳洲幸运5开奖网:typically have a detective as th♔eir protagonist, like Alone in the Dark, The Sinking City, and Call of Cthulhu. But what if you were to take this concept and translate it into a Metroidvania-style game? That's the magic of The Last Case of Benedict Fox. It's a Lovecraft-in🌠spired atmospheric mystery-vania, with gorgeous 3D graphics, environments, and voice acting.

The areas and colors are beautifully evocative of Lovecraft, there's 168澳⭕洲幸运5开奖网:a 20th-century jazz-inspireꦐd soundtrack, the Lovecraftian creature d♏esigns are spot-on and original, and you're bound to an entity that helps you in combat. Ever since its launch in 2𒉰023, the developers have continued to make improvements and add story content, which is all included in the 2024 Definitive Edition.

9 🌸 The Last Faith ♍

With still no hope of Bloodborne being out on PC, The Last Faith is probably the closest 2D Soulslike to it that you'll get. 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:The game is a Gothic dark fantasy Metr𒊎oidva🍸nia that's a combination of Catlevania, Bloodborne, and Resident Evil Village, with pixel graphic environment design and enemies jus🎶t as eerie and well-executed as Blasphemous.

Like most Metroidvania setups, you're thrown into this world and left to regain the pieces of your character's past and discover the secrets that lie within the lore. The added twist here is that you can use long-range guns in addition to traditional melee weapons for combat, and 168澳𒈔洲幸运5开奖网🗹:you can select from a variety of classes.

8 𒀰 ꦯ Ghost Song

If you got into the Metroidvania genre 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:by playing classics like Metroid, don't skip pꦍast Ghost Song, because this little indie hidden gem is the most inspired by Samus and the Metroid series. Your character is what's known🅷 as a Deadsuit, who emerges from sleep on the alien moon of Lorian, armed and ready to take on the alien threat lurking underneath the surface.

The art style and atmosphere of Lorian will draw you in immediately. The foggy purplish glow and biolumin🌺escent underground side-scroller landscapes evoke that cosmic horror 'Color Out of Space' feeling. The enemies and alien creatures are both fascinating and disturbing, with a larger story looming about what's really taking place on Lorian.

7 💯 Afterimag🍷e

Whi💦le most Metroidvanias are dark and gloomy and dressed with a tinge of horror, Afterimage is a lighter, more stunning, and gorgeous fantasy Metroidvania that arguably has some of the best hand-drawn graphics in the genre. Every side-scrolling location in the world of Engardin is an absolute marvel and breathtaking to take in.

In Afterimage, the protagonist 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:is also having a bout of amnesia while setting off on a journey to find her mentor, Aros, after a violent struggle in Engardin between the humans and the Goliaths ended with a catastrophic event. The game boasts an abundant variety of bosses, enemies, collectibles, and equipment, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:along with having multiple endings.

6 Grime

The best way to describe Grime is Metroidvania body horror personified. 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:You'🌸re literal꧟ly a faceless and nameless vessel forged of rock that can evolve and use living weapons that are like aliens t🐭hemselves, and upgrade skills from alien body parts. The꧙n, your head is also a mini black hole vortex that can parry attacks and absorb all the rock fragments from enemies.

From the very first cutscene, it's a very unusual and disturbing Metroidvania. The bosses and NPC designs are fittingly weird, the alien sci-fi environment is wonderfully atmospheric and once again reminiscent of a Lovecraftian landscape (especially the cult-like beings), and 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:the ♛absorption upgrade and checkpoint system is very unique for the genre.

5 Islets

For a game to be considered a Metroidvania, it has to have a sprawling interconnected platforming world and layout, but what if there's a game that turns the genr𝓡e norm into its own mechanic? That's where you have Islets, a Metroidvania where the map is made up of a broken chain of islands in the sky that your protagonist has to reconnect.

♛The task sounds simple enough, but it also wouldn't be a Metroidvania without many enemies and bosses posing as obsta♌cles along your journey.

Islets is an overall cute and whimsical take on the genre, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:though it can be creepy at times, and it's all impressively design💖ed by a sole developer – Kyle 🅠Thompson.

4 ཧ Pseudoregalia

While🦋 it looks and plays like a classic N64 or PS1 3D game, Pseudoregalia was impressively made with Unreal Engine 5. The developer strives for those nostalgic retro aesthetics while infusing them into a more modern 3D platforming Metroidvania, all set within a Gothic castle landscape called Castle Sansa.

This project started as a submission for the Metroidvania Month 19 Game Jam and has now evolved into a far more expansive game with excellent platforming mechanics, including wall-running and majestic air-dashing. You'll also find the protagonist's design to be very striking and d🔯ifferent, as well as the choice of the enemy designs, which include some playing musical instruments.

3 F.I.S.T.: Forged In Shadow✃ Torch ꧟

Not only is F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch a highly underrated Metroidvania, it might be one o💝f the most overlooked games of the 21st century, and th💦at needs to be remedied. You have yet another brilliant 3D Metroidvania world, this one inspired by a dystopian dieselpunk aesthetic and populated with anthropomorphic animal💛 citizens.

It's a very grit🦂ty Ratchet & Clank-style game with your robot companion being the large mechanical fist that's attached to the shoulder of your character's suit. The 3D graphics are phenomen☂al, and you'd think the game was created on Unreal Engine 5, even though it still runs on UE4.

2 Nine Sols

Developer RedCandleGames is most well-known for its Taiwan-set White Terror psychological horror game Detention, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:largely inspired by Silent Hill. Now, the studio has switched genres and delivered a knockout Metroidvania game that's inspired by the combat of Sekiro and comes with hand-drawn art and a cute cat protagon𒊎is🌼t that should be as iconic as Hollow Knight's.

The game has a very unique premise of combining cyberpunk aesthetics with Taoism and absolutely sticks the landing with the world design of New Kunlun. Your protagonist, Yi, is 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:inspired by the Chines🅘e mythological figure, Hou Yi, here turned into a fic🌟tional Solarian species and hunting down the Nine Sols as depicted in the tale.

1 🍌 Tales Of Kenzera: Zau 🎀

When you want to find games that are 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:based on grief and dealing with loss, the Metroidvania genre is probably the last place you'd look. That's what's so significant about Tales of Kenzera: Zau. It's a story told from the heart, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:rooted in African culture, and created from the personal experience of actor Abubakar Salim's grief o𒊎ver the passing of his father.

Abubakar Salim is an actor-turned-video game developer and founder of Surgent Studios, who you may know as the voice of Bayek from AC Origins, Alyn of Hull from House of the Dragon, and Father from HBO's Raised by Wolves. Salim is the game's creative director and voice actor of the narrator and titular protagonist, who are going through a journey of loss in an emotional Bantu-inspired Me🐼troidvania setting.