Mina the Hollower Interview – Modifiers and More

Earlier this week, we posted my review of Mina the Hollower. While I enjoyed my time with Mina overall, I had a few questions in mind that caught my attention. Luckily for me, one of the folks from Yacht Club Games who worked on Mina the Hollower, Sean Velasco (Director, Game Designer, Level Designer, and Writer), was willing to answer some of those questions. Here is what he provided us with:

Q: What was the inspiration behind the Modifiers?

The Modifiers grew out of the cheat system we had in Shovel Knight. In that game, we had a bunch of cheat codes that could do everything from giving you invincibility to changing how much treasure you lost, to letting you play things out of order, to adding Moon Jumps and other strange effects.

For Mina, we wanted to take that same spirit and make it a more official, fleshed-out system. Instead of hidden codes only, we wanted a full menu with descriptions, unlocks, and the ability to turn multiple options on at once.

A broader goal was to make Mina highly customizable. The Modifiers let players tune the game in more specific ways while preserving the core design.

Q: Did you work with an accessibility consultant? Or were these just things the team brainstormed together?

The Modifiers were designed internally by the team. They came out of playtesting, iteration, and our own desire to give players more control over the experience. We approached them as both accessibility tools and gameplay variants.

Q: What was the thought process behind locking Feats away after using certain Modifiers?

Feats are intended to represent specific accomplishments under specific conditions. When certain Modifiers substantially change the rules of the game, those conditions change too, so the original decision was to keep Feats tied to the default challenge structure.

That said, we are looking at how Feats, achievements, and Modifiers interact. There may be a better way to separate accessibility-focused options from challenge-altering options, or to communicate the system more clearly.

Q: Are there plans to adjust the Modifiers, add more, or shift how they can be used?

We are reviewing feedback and looking at possible updates. That could mean adding more options or changing up existing ones.

Q: What led to the creation of the Plasma mechanic?

Plasma exists because we wanted healing to be part of the game’s tension as opposed to a freebie. Forcing Mina to battle enemies to earn health is just one more decision that the player can make when deciding to push ahead or fall back, which adds to the gameplay we’re trying to craft.

Q: What was the most difficult part of developing Mina the Hollower?

Mina was a difficult project for a lot of reasons. One of the biggest challenges was the tumult around the project itself. We were making the game during COVID, we were trying to work on two projects at once, and we had split the team in a way that did not work out as well as we had hoped.

Once we focused entirely on Mina, we had to do a major rework. That was difficult because we had already been working on the game for a long time, and it is never easy to step back and rework something at that scale.

Creatively, one tough part was balancing: RPG progression, weapons, sidearms, trinkets, currency, enemy levels, and world structure. Shovel Knight was a much simpler game!

Q: What was the part that made you feel, “Oh yeah, we’ve got the sauce on this one?”

The early PAX demos were a big moment for me. Watching people play the game in person, you could see that they were really enjoying it. They were getting the controls, reacting to the danger, finding secrets, and understanding the overall feeling of the game.

The Kickstarter also helped sell the vision of the game. A good Kickstarter presentation has to make the game feel clear and exciting even when it is still much earlier than people realize. Seeing players respond to that version of Mina gave us a lot of confidence!

Q: Was there something you cut because it was too punishing, or because it didn’t fit?

Plenty! We cut and changed a lot of content because it was too hard or too confusing. A huge amount of development time was spent making the game easier, clearer, and more readable. Mina is still challenging, but earlier versions were much harsher. The Astral Orrery in particular used to be pretty crazy!

Q: Do you have an element or idea you wish you had been able to implement, but didn’t have time?

I feel like we implemented almost everything that we thought would make Mina the Hollower a great game.

Of course, we always have plenty of ideas for next steps!

Q: Can you talk about what’s ahead for Mina and her world?

For now, our focus is supporting the launch, fixing issues, and improving the game through updates. I don’t think we’re even ready to think about Mina’s next adventure!

With those questions answered, I’m sure I’m not the only one who has a better view of why certain things in Mina the Hollower are the way they are. As someone with a focus on Accessibility when it comes to conversations like these, I’m very glad that the team is looking at the Accessibility features to see how they can better serve players, etc. Thanks to Sean for answering these questions, and thanks to Yacht Club Games for letting us experience Mina’s adventure for our coverage.