Is Shovel Knight Now A Retro Gaming Icon? (2024)

Shovel Knight is the very definition of an indie darling. Bursting onto the scene in 2014, Yacht Club Games’ slick, throwback platformer caught the imagination of gamers both old and new. Its stunning aesthetic, tight controls, and humorous writing made it a must-play, while its ample secrets, tough but never punishing difficulty, and cheat codes added that crucial replayability factor. The game seemed to hit all the right notes. But that was just the tip of the iceberg. A treasure trove followed – and what a haul it was.

Three campaigns starring three distinct and equally charming characters from the core cast, as well as a wonderful and woefully overlooked platform fighter. And that’s not even mentioning the amiibo line! If you don’t include Smash Bros. Ultimate fighters, only a handful of other companies' characters have been granted the honour of amiibo representation (Monster Hunter, Dark Souls, and Diablo, if you're wondering), and none that carry the prestige of a gold version. Each character is a thing of beauty in miniature, plastic form. We would’ve bought the whole Order of No Quarter if we could.

Two run-based spinoffs followed – the superbly manic puzzle game Shovel Knight Pocket Dungeon and addictive platformer Shovel Knight Dig. Top this all off with DLC for both spinoffs incoming, the recent announcement of Shovel Knight Shovel of Hope DX — billed as the definitive version of the original — plus finally confirmation of a direct sequel taking Shovel Knight into an “entirely new dimension”. No one can refute fans of shovelry have been well and truly spoiled.

So, with Shovel Knight’s 10th anniversary here and year of celebration ahead of us, we can’t help but ponder the question – has the Hedge Farmer entered the pantheon of retro icons from which he spawned?

Rewind!

Yacht Club Games made no secret of the kind of game it wanted to make when launching the Kickstarter in 2013:

“Our serious and solemn goal is to make really awesome original games that fuse modern and retro sensibilities […] we want to give everyone the same collective types of game experiences that have defined our generation.”

Lofty ambitions. And Shovel Knight certainly isn’t shy about the gaming experiences it pulls from. From the smack-in-your-face obvious examples, such as its Super Mario Bros. 3 style map with enemy encounters, to the subtler nods – his anchor item operating almost identically to Simon Belmont’s axe, for example.

Though it’s clear Yacht Club Games wanted to make a game in a retro 8-bit style – the wording they used is very specific and very clever. “Fuse modern and retro." The devs set the rules. They planned to take what works from a menagerie of iconic games and mash them together, while giving themselves enough wiggle room to break the rules when it suited them. Many of these deviations are well documented: parallax scrolling, greater colour palettes. But the result of these side-steps is a game more convenient and accessible than its forebears, capturing that elusive quality that games of this ilk strive for – a perfect mix of convenient, modern game design wrapped in nostalgia. Shovel Knight looks, sounds, and runs better than the games we remember - but crucially is reflective of how we remember them.

Alchemy at its finest. Plague Knight would be proud.

Sharpen Thy Shovel

By this point it should be clear that we love this collection of games. But we’re not here just to spout off about that. We have a question to answer. And to do that we need to be a little more scientific. What we need to discover, ultimately, is what makes a retro star ‘iconic’? Well, dear reader, we think we’ve devised one simple question to answer this. Are they TRIM?

No, we're not talking about their weight. Our favourite portly plumber can attest to that. TRIM is our handy little acronym and a metric by which to measure retro icon status. There are plenty of retro gaming stars, both alive and thriving or dusty and forgotten, but we believe only those that fill each of the following criteria can be considered a true video gaming icon.

Time

How long has the character been in the public consciousness, and do they (and their games) hold up?

A stern test right off the bat in our icon metric, and a twofer at that. If we’re comparing Shovel Knight to those that his games seek to emulate, he is a relative pup. Some of the icons he borrowed from (and those that he didn’t) have 20+ years on the kid. Mario, Pac-Man, Sonic, Mega Man. All timeless characters whose games still stand up to this day. Well, most of them. The originals, at least. We don’t talk about Sonic 2006.

It would be unfair to suggest Shovel Knight requires a 30-year career to fulfil this criteria. We would say that a decade is a fair old time, and his presence has been pretty enduring throughout – from his steady stream of games released in this period to his cavalcade of cameos (something we will touch on a little more later).

Before its confirmation, speculation about a mainline sequel would do the rounds every so often – and whenever it did, the hype it generated was palpable. The fact that sequel rumours persisted even while Yacht Club Games were beavering away on their second titular hero, Mina The Hollower, is an indicator of Shovel Knight’s enduring success and popularity.

And do we really need to ask if his debut stands up? It's not every game that could get away with a DX version a mere ten years after launch. Whether or not this release is justified is a different matter (we have mixed feelings about it - but that's another article), what we do know is that we are always happy to return to The Valley because playing through Shovel Knight always feels special. It's a game that can stand shoulder to shoulder with modern indie releases, and some triple-As for that matter, without feeling creaky or archaic. It's stood the test of time.

Recognisability

Is the character instantly recognisable?

A slightly harder one to quantify, this. Though he certainly isn’t Pokémon levels of pop-culture-integrated, he is certainly a character that gets around. So much so that Yacht Club Games has an official list of his appearances – some of which are bonkers. Though his guise can vary wildly, from his doughy Fall Guys getup to the menacing figure he cuts in Blade Strangers, whenever Shovel Knight does pop up, it is impossible to mistake him for anyone else.

This is truly a testament to his design. It’s predominantly one big, bold colour, has striking features (who could miss those horns and, you know, his shovel) but most importantly - it’s simple. He consists of big, chunky shapes that you recognise a mile off and he’s simple enough to draw, no matter what age or how skilled you are. We spent hours on end drawing Mario and Sonic during the '90s console wars – we don’t doubt that there are fridges all across the world adorned with Shovel Knight scribblings.

Impact

What kind of impact did the character and their game(s) have on the gaming space?

Shovel Knight’s a big deal. From his modest origins as a product of six former WayForward employees, his Kickstarter success and explosion onto the gaming scene proved that a new way of funding games was not only viable, but could produce stunning results.

It paved the way for other indies to follow. And although some of those that followed have fallen short (*shakes fist* Mighty No. 9!), it demonstrated that a talented team could produce a winner in the gaming space through crowdfunding. Shovel Knight did that.

The team at Yacht Club Games has more than tripled since its inception and the company shows no sign of slowing down. Though we still didn’t get a release date for Mina in the update last week (boooo), the positive reaction to both that game and the recent news of a direct Shovel Knight sequel, plus the continued keen interest in Yacht Club Games itself, demonstrates just what an impact the Blue Burrower has had over the past decade.

Mascot

Would the character be suitable as a mascot?

Maybe the broadest of the questions, this. It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to argue that Samus isn’t necessarily a Nintendo ‘mascot’ in the truest sense of the word, but she is (arguably) a mascot for the entire Metroidvania genre - and is therefore iconic.

That’s academic, though, because Shovel Knight certainly is Yacht Club Games' mascot. And in the same sense as Samus, he stands for something greater than just his game or the company that birthed him: he is a symbol for the indie gaming scene as a whole. A mascot for collaborative work. A mascot for the power of striking out on your own. A mascot for more things than we can mas-tot up.

Oof. That’s as bad as one of Croaker’s jokes.

Justice in Spades

So, is Shovel Knight TRIM? We certainly think so. He is a timeless, recognisable, impactful mascot for Yacht Club Games, and a titan of the indie gaming space. Shovel Knight is still the gold standard for retro reimagining done right and has more than earned the right to stand shoulder to shoulder with the assemblage of gaming greats as a true, blue, retro icon.

But what do you think? Is Shovel Knight a retro icon or is there still work to do for him to obtain that honorific? Maybe King Knight deserves it more? Not a bad thought, that. We’ll work on an acronym for ‘DANDY’ and in the meantime cast your vote and sound off in the comments below!