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Shovel Knight Treasure Trove Review (Switch)

Game: Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove
Genre: Action/ Adventure/ Platform
System: Nintendo Switch (also on Steam and Console)
Publishers| Developers : Yacht Club Games.
Age Rating: EU 7+| US E
Price:  £35.99|€ 39,99 | US $39.99|AU $ 57.99|CA $ 52.49
Release Date: 3 March 2017/ 17th September 2015/10th December 2019

Review Code Used Many Thanks Yacht Club Games

There have been several Shovel Knight titles in the past years. Treasure Trove is the complete package, and adds some new games into the mix. Let’s look at all the elements!

Shovel Knight: Shovel of Hope

Funded on Kickstarter in March 2013 and smashing their campaign goal gave developers Yacht Club games the opportunity to develop Shovel Knight: Shovel of Hope, an 8 Bit retro platformer/adventure game. Shovel of Hope is the original campaign mode’s story and features Shovel Knight on a quest to rescue his lost partner Shield Knight from the Tower of Fate. Along the way he must defeat the Enchantress who is protected by the Order of No Quarter.

Shovel Knight is accompanied by his shinny shovel, which he uses to dig up dirt patches to uncover hidden gems and flip enemies over. Bouncing on the shovel ( much like a pogo stick) is the way to go when controlling Shovel Knight as it allows you to dispatch enemies without putting your self in harms way and also lets you cross gaps by chaining head stomps together.

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It wouldn’t be a platform game without secrets to find and there are plenty hidden in all the levels, along with mini games. Various optional tools called Relics are the most valuable treasures to find. Relics such as the Dust Knuckles that let you dash through dirt and enemies or the Propeller Dagger which lets Shovel Knight soar through the sky blade first cutting down anything in his path. If you don’t find some of the Relics hidden in the levels there are of course various NPC’s who will sell relics for a price, gotta have somewhere to spend all that treasure you have collected!

Outside of the main objectives you can collect Music scores and complete Feats, Shovel knights equivalent to achievements which will certainly test your platforming skills.

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Shovel Knight: Plague of Shadows

A few years later Yacht Club games released Shovel Knight: Plague of Shadows which runs parallel to the first Shovel Knights’ story. This time players take control of Plague Knight who is one of the bosses from Shovel of Hope. He is a villainous master of alchemy in a quest all of his own. With his maniacal scientific mind Plague Knight sets out to concoct an ultimate potion Serum Supernus. To find the ingredients to make the potion he must extract them from his former associates the Knights of the Order of No Quarter.

By rehashing Shovel Knights previous levels from the main game and making changes to them Yacht Club games also added a completely different move set and abilities for Plague Knight. Gone is the shovel that Shovel Knight used as weapon and this is replaced by bombs and potions for Plague Knight to use.

Doing this completely changes the movement and the combat for the player when playing as Plague Knight. Without the shovel to pogo bounce on, Plague Knight uses Bombs dropped beneath him to propel him upwards and using bomb chains to traverse larger caps in the levels. Potions can be mixed with ingredients you find along the way which adds various effects to Plague Knights’ bombs with options to change the trajectory of a bomb or stronger bombs with a wider blast radius.

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Shovel Knight: Specter of Torment

Yacht Club games next expansion was the release of Shovel Knight: Specter of Torment and also the first standalone expansion, a prequel to Shovel Knight, in this game Specter Knight must slash and dash his way through redesigned levels by climbing walls and mastering new weapons. Discover his past and recruit the Order of No Quarter.

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Specter Knights’ weapon of choice is a scythe and he plays significantly different from the other two knights. There are some tweaks to the familiar levels of the previous games and the addition of Lanterns. These Lanterns Specter Knight uses to preform an upward or downward slash with his scythe that propels him towards his target.

Specter Knight, unlike Shovel and Plague Knight who use magic to power the relics he find’s, relies on his inner darkness to power his relics or curios and he is kept alive by his will which replaces the normal health bar.

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Shovel Knight: King of Cards

Finally, to complete the package on the 10th December 2019 Shovel Knight Treasure Trove received the final two instalments, which are both standalone games. Shovel Knight: King of Cards, where players take control of King Knight as you leap and shoulder bash across 4 new worlds on your way to become king of cards. This game also has a collectible card game called Joustus to play against NPC’s found in the game.

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Kings of Cards brings a refreshing change to King Knight move set again, giving the player some slick moves to undertake as you play through the levels. King Knight can jump, shoulder bash and twirl his way through the levels with his movements feeling fluid and smooth to the player.

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King Knights’ aim throughout King of Cards is to become the Joustus champions. To do this he must beat tree champions of the House of Joustus. The card game is a nice break from the platforming as you play cards with various NPC’s. You use a deck of 16 cards to strategically move cards you’ve placed on a board onto green gems. Once the board is full of cards or a player can not make any more moves, the player with the most cards covering the gems wins the game.

Your deck of cards can be rearranged and there are various vendors to buy them from. The enemies you have beaten will reward King Knight with new cards for his deck and they can also found along with treasure in the levels.

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Shovel Knight: Showdown

Shovel knight Showdown, released at the same time as King of Cards, is a platform arena fighting game where you take control of your favourite character in this local 4 player and chase after gems or play the single player story mode.

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Basically this is Yacht Club’s take of Super Smash Bros. In the single player mode you start off with access to a few characters but as you complete the fighting courses you can unlock new character’s and new stages. Each character has a different move set much like in the other games but they stay true to their particular moves. For example, Shovel Knight can pogo his opponent and Spector Knight can use his Dash Slash move to gain height. The requirements to win a stage differ from collecting the most gems to reducing your opponents life to zero or breaking a set number of targets within a time limit.

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As with all the Shovel Knight games the difficulty of the levels increases as you play through the game and I found this most noticeable in the Boss levels in Shovel Knight Showdown.

A local multiplayer co-op mode is available for 4 players unfortunately for me and this review I don’t have any gaming friends nearby that would play the mode and give me the opportunity to try it out….☹️

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Each individual game gives you a short opening tutorial. It’s usually a few button presses to remember the controls as they are simple and functional.

The graphics are in 8 Bit style and suit the game perfectly along with its brilliant music score.

There is plenty of great replay ability in Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove as each game has its own feats to complete. The addition of Body Swap, which lets the player select the gender of all the main characters in the game. That means for all the games, from Shovel Knight to the Order of No Quarter including the final Boss. It adds extra play through’s for those that are completists.

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Conclusion

While the original game is a solid platform game reminiscent of a mixture of 8-bit titles from the days of the NES and the expansions following suit the whole package. As it now stands in Treasure Trove it is a brilliant retro platform romp that is full of charm and humour with characters who each have their own personalities and different moves.

Personally platform games are not my go to genre. However Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove has been an exception to the rule. While writing this review I wanted to check something in the game so I picked my Switch up to check something and a while later after completing a level or two I remembered I was meant to be writing and not playing the game. A sure sign of a great game if it sucks you into it and you totally forget what you were meant to be doing.

Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove  is now the complete edition of the game. Three of the expansions can be bought individually on the Nintendo eShop and played as stand alone games. However my advice is: don’t buy them separately, invest in the full game in Shovel Treasure Trove as you wont be disappointed!

Final Verdict: Two Thumbs Up 

Two Thumbs Up Rating

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