by Ender Lilies: Quietus of the Knights is an Indie Metroidvania that I played a year ago and for some reason I forgot to do its analysis (I’m a bit of a dummy, what are we going to do about it I suppose) despite the fact that I liked it a lot, in fact I I passed it 100%.
It is a title that I highly recommend you play (especially if you like Metroidvanias) because in my opinion it is one of those games that do practically everything right; those that really cost a lot to get past. Of course, it doesn’t reach the levels of quality that Hollow Knight does (this game isn’t even half normal), since they have perfected the genre, but it seems to me a game that is very good anyway and I would say that perhaps it is my second preferred Metroidvania (the Hollow is a lot of Hollow).
I leave the trailer here in case you want to take a look and below you have my analysis:
But… the truth is that this game has something I don’t know what I love, and I think it’s the incredible setting they’ve achieved in it. But hey, I don’t wind up anymore, let’s go with your complete analysis!
WHAT IS ENDER LILIES ABOUT?
Here my Lily is at maximum corruption and you can see that she doesn’t look very good.
We will take the role of a girl named Lily who will have to advance through a world that is completely devastated to try to assume all the impurity of it (it has its deep lore ) to purify it and so that one day everything can return to its natural course. Along the way you will find other Lilies (hence the name I suppose) that have not made it, they will usually have some interesting object if you loot them .
In the process our character will be corrupted (something that only affects aesthetics); We will begin as a very Gandalf the White girl (she is so white that she even emits white light) and little by little this corruption will cause the character to lose her light, black locks appear in her hair and even some kind of tentacles of a reddish tone that do not look very good (or roots perhaps? I don’t know) to represent that corruption with which it is loading.
We will be unlocking new companions that will help us, new abilities (of those to be able to move better and that), we will face tremendous bosses… well, the typical thing in a Metroidvania, you know.
LILY DOES ALMOST NOTHING
We will be able to invoke powerful allies to help us in our difficult task. These are my favourites.
Lily herself does nothing, she is a poor defenseless girl who must carry out a terrible mission; Over time we will be unlocking skills for her, but they will be more of a movement or defensive nature. And we can also equip her with some Relics to improve her attributes and others.
Luckily she will not be alone since she can invoke the help of a kind of spirits of people who are no longer alive, it could be said that in addition to being able to absorb impurity, this is her other power. The first one we will have will be the powerful Black Knight , but as we progress we will be unlocking other companions to be able to make very interesting Builds and to adapt a bit to your favorite game mode.
The concept is really quite interesting and gives it a certain differentiating touch compared to other games. The truth is that it is an aspect that I really like about Ender Lilies.
A WORLD RAVAGED BY CORRUPTION
This is how beautiful the world was before impurity. Can you get him back to normal?
The mapping is quite extensive and the truth is that it is very well recreated. Everything is completely devastated by that impurity and that lonely and tremendously hostile atmosphere is felt anywhere we go. Especially as we go deeper into the areas closest to that enormous corruption that is buried underground (a very bad area, really, I’ll put a photo below).
All the areas are plagued with very bad-looking enemies due to the issue of corruption and others that of course will try to annihilate Lily, and Lily is the only one who can do something about it. The bosses are also very cool, there are some that are quite bad vibes and we have very epic battles (and together with the tremendous soundtrack well 10/10).
IT’S WORTH IT? TYPICAL ANALYSIS
A rather bad area, we are almost in the center of the focus of corruption.
Now let’s do the standard analysis of the typical aspects that are usually analyzed in games:
- Artistic Section : The game really looks fantastic, both characters and scenery; I don’t even tell you about the cinematics. They play very well with the different layers, lights and shadows. The truth is that I love how it looks and it has a very unique style in my opinion. I give it an S.
- Music : The music and sound effects are just amazing. I’m going to focus on music because the truth is that I love it, I’ve even played it in the background sometime while I was working. It has themes of all kinds, but the truth is that in general they are all tremendous. I recommend that you listen to, for example, the song « Harmonius » because it’s very good; that song is exaggeratedly catchy and every 2 x 3 I have it in my head. Even my girlfriend hums it from time to time. If you feel like listening to the full OST, that’s fantastic. I put another S.
- Gameplay : The gameplay seems tremendous to me, the combat system is very cool due to the fact that Lily itself does nothing and that we will have to constantly invoke the souls that help us. Anyway, despite looking great to me, it seems to me that she does not reach that level of fluency that Hollow Kinght reaches, for example, so in this case she will stay with an A .
- Setting : The setting that Ender Lilies has is simply on another level, somehow the mix of settings, gameplay, its lore and music in my opinion transmit a lot and that is something that is not so easy to achieve. I think that in fact this tremendous setting that this game has is that something that makes me like the title so much. It takes tremendous S.
- Duration : It has a correct duration for the type of game it is. Will you spend it in maybe 20h? although of course it will depend on your style of play (if you are a completionist or if you are going to sack). I’ll give it a B on this one.
- Overall : A+ . Nothing of the S Rank has remained and even the S+ due to its duration problem (which is not bad, B means just fine). In any case, what has been said, 100% recommended and also because it is Indie you have it at a very good price, which in my opinion always adds points even though I do not take it into account in the analysis.
I would also like to comment on an aspect of the game that I think other Metroidvanias do not have and that I think others should coin because I loved it. The map is colored in a blue color and when we get all the objects in an area it is colored in orange.
It will be a very silly detail, but it has encouraged me a lot to search better for the areas that I had in blue in order to obtain 100% and it seems to me a very good idea .
WHAT COULD BE IMPROVED
The bosses are very interesting. This is the first one and you will see what it becomes when it enters its second phase.
It is one of those games in which it is difficult to say what could be improved besides those aspects that I have already mentioned in the typical analysis, but in my opinion the best thing they could do to improve it and earn a powerful grade of S or S+ would be to make a DLC . May god hear me and do it because it would be incredible.
Because what could really improve this tremendous game the most is to add more content to be able to continue enjoying it and to correct the issue of simply decent duration a bit. I’ll be waiting to see if there’s luck and they release it one day, the truth is that I really want to continue playing this tremendous Metroidvania called Ender Lilies. And if they release an Ender Lilies 2 or something like that, I’ll play it right away and with all the hype in this world.
To finish I leave you the link of its Steam page (although I played it on the Switch) in case you want to keep an eye on it or buy it.
