Mina the Hollower Review – LadiesGamers

Game: Mina the Hollower
Genre: Action, Adventure
System: Steam (Windows) (Also on Xbox, PlayStation and Nintendo Switch)
Developer|Publisher: Yacht Club Games
Controller Support: Yes
Steam Deck: Verified
Price: US $19.99  | UK £17.75  | EU € 19.99
Release Date: May 29th, 2026

Review code provided with many thanks to Guillotine Agency. 

Mina the Hollower – A Mouse With A Mission

Ever since I first played Shovel Knight years ago on the 3DS, I’ve had a huge amount of respect for Yacht Club Games. They are one of those developers who just seem to understand retro games on a deeper level. Not just recreating them visually, but understanding why those older games felt so memorable in the first place.

So naturally, I was extremely excited for Mina the Hollower. This time around, the studio trades the side-scrolling platforming of Shovel Knight for something much more inspired by classic top-down adventures. Think old-school Zelda with a gothic horror twist, then sprinkle in some modern Soulslike design choices, and you’ve got a rough idea of what Mina the Hollower is aiming for. For the most part, it absolutely succeeds.

This is a fantastic game. A beautifully crafted adventure packed with charm, clever mechanics and some absolutely stunning presentation. But it’s also a game that frustrated me more than I expected, especially during its tougher early hours.

Digging Into Darkness

You play as Mina, an adorable mouse Hollower sent to a cursed island to reactivate powerful generators and uncover what exactly has gone horribly wrong. The setup itself is fairly straightforward, but the world surrounding it is wonderfully strange and memorable.

One thing Yacht Club Games consistently nails is character design. Everywhere you go there’s somebody bizarre to meet. One moment you’re chatting to gloomy graveyard residents, the next you’re speaking to strange giraffe scholars hiding away in libraries.

The dialogue has that same quirky wit that fans of Shovel Knight will instantly recognise. It’s playful without becoming annoying, funny without trying too hard. Importantly, the game never overwhelms you with endless exposition either. The lore is there if you want to engage with it, but it trusts players to explore and discover things naturally.

The opening of the game immediately hooked me. Starting aboard a ship before being thrown into a dramatic boss encounter gives Mina the Hollower a surprisingly epic feel straight away. 

No Hand Holding Here

Now this is where things may divide people a little. Mina the Hollower takes a very old-school approach to exploration. There’s no convenient map constantly pointing you where to go. You’re expected to talk to characters, read signs, experiment and simply wander. Some players will absolutely love this.

Others may occasionally end up grumbling while wandering around the same graveyard for twenty minutes, wondering where the correct path actually is. Sadly, I fell into the second category more than once.

I admire the commitment to classic design philosophy, but there were definitely moments where I wished the game would just nudge me gently in the right direction. Even older Zelda games often gave subtle hints about where to head next. Here, the lack of guidance can sometimes turn exploration into tedious backtracking instead of exciting discovery. That said, when you do uncover a new area or secret naturally, it feels incredibly rewarding.

Burrowing Into Battle

Combat is excellent. At the beginning, you choose from several weapons, all with distinct playstyles. I personally became very attached to the whip-like chain weapon because it gave me some lovely Castlevania energy with its longer reach and satisfying strikes. 

The standout mechanic, though, is Mina’s burrowing ability. At almost any moment, you can dive underground, move quickly beneath enemies or hazards, then burst back out again. It works as a traversal, combat utility, and essentially a dodge mechanic all rolled into one. It gives the game a genuinely unique rhythm compared to many other retro-inspired adventures.

Boss fights are also wonderfully dramatic. Huge, intimidating and packed with attack patterns to learn. Unfortunately… they are also brutally difficult.

The Soulslike Problem

Now, admittedly, this is partly a “me†problem. I’ve said before that I’m not the biggest fan of Soulslike mechanics. Mina the Hollower absolutely borrows from that design philosophy. If you die, you drop your collected Bones currency and must return to reclaim it. Healing items recharge at checkpoints. Enemies hit extremely hard early on. Personally, I found some of this a little exhausting.

Especially in the opening hours, it sometimes felt like the game punished experimentation too heavily. I was still learning the mechanics while regular enemies were flattening me with alarming efficiency. The good news, however, is that the game does become far more manageable once everything clicks. As you level up Mina, improve your abilities and understand enemy patterns better, the flow improves significantly.

Even better, Yacht Club Games deserves enormous praise for the sheer amount of accessibility options included here. And I mean a lot. You can tweak difficulty settings, platforming assistance, combat modifiers and even enable invincibility if needed. There are pages upon pages of options allowing players to tailor the experience however they want.

I genuinely respect that enormously, even if I slightly dislike how achievements become disabled when assists are activated. Still, the effort to make the game approachable to different skill levels is commendable.

Pixel Perfect Presentation

Visually, Mina the Hollower is absolutely gorgeous. The Game Boy Color-inspired art style is phenomenal. Yacht Club somehow captures that retro aesthetic while still making the world feel incredibly expressive and detailed. Every area has its own personality despite the limited colour palette.

The animation work is especially fantastic. Mina herself feels lively and responsive while enemies and NPCs all ooze charm or menace, depending on what the game needs from them.

And the soundtrack? Absolutely brilliant. The music constantly elevates the atmosphere, whether you’re exploring eerie ruins or battling terrifying bosses. The audio design throughout the game is exceptional, and honestly, some of the best work Yacht Club Games has done yet.

Conclusion: Hardly Hollow But Heartfelt

I feel slightly conflicted writing this review because there is so much about Mina the Hollower that I absolutely adore.

The world design is excellent. The atmosphere is superb. Combat is satisfying. The soundtrack is phenomenal. The burrowing mechanic is genuinely clever. And the sheer passion behind the project shines constantly. At the same time, the heavy emphasis on Soulslike difficulty stopped me from loving it quite as much as I expected to. I personally would have preferred something a little closer to classic Zelda adventure design and slightly less punishing overall. Still, even with those frustrations, this is a fantastic game.

Yacht Club Games once again proves they are masters of modern retro design. Mina the Hollower may not fully dethrone Shovel Knight for me personally, but it absolutely deserves to stand proudly beside it.

Final Verdict: I Like it a Lot

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