Shovel Knight

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

Shovel Knight is a sweeping classic action adventure game with awesome gameplay, memorable characters, and an 8-bit retro aesthetic created by Yacht Club Games. You play as the eponymous Shovel Knight, a small knight with a huge quest. Shovel Knight has come to The Valley with two goals: to defeat the evil Enchantress and her Order of No Quarter, and save his lost beloved and adventuring partner, Shield Knight. He wields a ShovelBlade; a multipurpose weapon whose techniques have now been lost to the ages. Always honest and helpful, Shovel Knight is a shining example of the code of Shovelry: Slash Mercilessly and Dig Tirelessly!

Starting life as a humble indie game developed for PC and Nintendo consoles (Wii U and 3DS at the time), Shovel Knight's crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter proved to be such a smashing success that it grew into a true juggernaut of a title that can rub shoulders with the big boys in the mainstream gaming world. Three DLC campaigns would be added as years passed, each starring a member of the Order of No Quarter. First came Plague of Shadows, a campaign that runs parallel to Shovel Knight's adventure where you play as Plague Knight as he betrays his fellow Knights in a mad bid to create the most powerful potion in history.

While that campaign was basically a reskin of the first game but with different gameplay and a unique story, the campaigns that followed would carve out more of a distinct identity for themselves. Specter of Torment and King of Cards feel like entirely different games with unique levels and bosses tailored to the gameplay of Specter Knight and King Knight respectively, with both campaigns being prequels detailing how both Knights fell in with the Enchantress to begin with while shedding new light on their simplistic personalities. And topping off the game's updates is the game's Battle Mode, a Super Smash Bros. clone that allows you to play as many of the game's significant characters in an intense, quirky four-player platform fighter!

Tropes used in Shovel Knight include:


  • Acrofatic: Mole Knight, whose tubby body doesn't get in the way of his speedy, highly acrobatic fighting style. The Sumo Goldarmors in King of Cards are also a hell of a lot faster and nimbler than you'd think, especially the red ones.
  • Affably Evil: Propeller Knight is a suave, classy fellow with impeccable manners and a love of friendly chit-chat. He's also a ruthless, murderous sky pirate who will gladly blast other ships out of the sky so he alone can rule it.
  • All the Worlds Are a Stage: The Tower of Fate, not in terms of appearance but in terms of gimmicks, since just about every stage gimmick makes a return here.
  • Ambiguously Gay: Gall, a skeletal NPC hanging around the hub in Specter of Torment. He'll passionately make out with Specter Knight against his will, though judging by his dialogue it seems that his intentions are to test out his Kiss of Death. Not that it makes things any less Squicky for poor Specter Knight, though.
  • Ambiguously Human: In a world where humans and Funny Animals live in harmony, there's no telling if most of the Knights are actually human or not. Shield, Polar, and Specter are all explicitly human, and King Knight is most likely one given that his mother's a human woman. But the jury's out on all the others, even Shovel Knight! The game seems to hint that he may or may not be a fish man thanks to a fish-headed copy of Shovel Knight you can run into as a rare NPC.
  • Anime Hair: The Dancer has big, bushy green hair styled in a 'do that makes it look like a giant hunk of broccoli.
  • Ax Crazy: Plague Knight isn't exactly a beacon of sanity, given his nonstop giggling, love of explosions, and tendency to abuse and terrorize his minions. With that being said, Plague of Shadows shows that he isn't without his Hidden Depths.
  • Badass: All four player characters are this. They're each One Man Armies in their own right, and tear their way through throngs of dangerous enemies and triumph over eccentric and dangerous foes, and the ending of their campaigns sees them defeating The Enchantress and some sort of ultra-powerful abomination before the credits roll. Of course, Shovel Knight is more of a badass than Plague, Specter, and King Knight since, being the original protagonist, he's the one who decisively puts an end to the threat that The Enchantress poses to the land. And it helps that he can kick Kratos' ass!
    • Shield Knight was a real ass-kicker herself, judging by the game's opening story blurb. We get proper confirmation of her badass credentials when she fights Donovan in Specter of Torment, and helps Shovel Knight kill The Remnant of Fate/The Enchantress' true form at the end of the main campaign.
  • Bad Boss: Played for laughs with Plague Knight during Plague of Shadows, where you can throw bombs at your loyal minions and send them flying while visiting the hub. The Enchantress in Specter of Torment, however, plays this for drama thanks to there being nothing even remotely funny about the way she abuses her minions. Whether it's imprisoning and starving the Dark Acolyte just because she found someone who could potentially be more useful than him or blackmailing Specter Knight into giving up his humanity and allowing her to enslave him on threat of turning Reize into her enthralled servant instead, she's a legitimately awful boss as opposed to the hilariously awful one that Plague Knight is.
  • Big Bad: The Enchantress, who serves as the ultimate threat of all four campaigns.
  • Big Boo's Haunt: The Lich Yard, Specter Knight's stage. It's an abandoned village with a vast cemetery and catacombs, and every square inch is haunted by ghosts, reanimated skeletons, and electric frog princes. It's also set at night for some extra-spooky flavor.
  • Big Creepy-Crawlies: The huge beetle in Mole Knight's stage. He's easily the size of a dragon, and his back serves as a moving platform while he treks through long stretches of lava.
  • Big Fancy Castle: Pridemoor Keep, King Knight's stage. It's a huge, opulent castle seemingly built of gold bricks. Specter of Torment reveals that they're actually more of an off-white, but were magically painted their current hue once King Knight took over.
  • Blade on a Stick: Wielded by the Mole Minions in the Lost City.
  • Bonus Boss: Quite a few of these are present. Occasionally, wandering travelers will pop up on the map, and if you cross paths with them you can get into a boss fight with one of three backer characters: Reize Seatlan, The Baz, or the Phantom Striker. There's also a fourth backer character named Mr. Hat, but he's in the Armor Outpost instead of wandering the land. The Hall of Champions also has a gigantic ghost haunting the place, and if you're playing on a Playstation or XBOX console? You get one of two crossover bosses: XBOX players get the Battletoads, but Playstation players? They get Kratos. Yes, THAT Kratos!
    • King of Cards gets a special one not encountered in any other campaign: Giga Cardia, who you fight after defeating every single Joustus opponent. Good luck with that, by the way.
  • Boss Rush: As a nod to the Mega Man series, you fight all 8 of the game's main bosses back-to-back during your assault on the Big Bad's castle.
  • Chekhov's Gunman: Remember the Birder from Specter of Torment, who does nothing aside from rocket all over the hub's dining room and say "I love being a Birder!" when talked to? He's King Birder, the Disc One Final Boss and one the Joustus Judges in King of Cards.
  • Chest Monster: Memmecs, catlike creatures who disguise themselves as treasure chests. They're fairly rare as far as enemies go (as in, they're only in Specter and King Knight's campaigns, and there's a grand total of one in the former), but you're still likely to be wary of any unopened chests you'll find going forward.
  • Classic Video Game "Screw You"s: It wouldn't be a proper send-up of classic gaming without these.
    • Auto-Scrolling Levels of the horizontal and vertical variety appear now and then.
    • Bottomless Pits.
    • Knockback, in conjunction with said Bottomless Pits. One purchasable suit of armor cancels out Knockback, but also causes you to move as though on ice. Speaking of ice...
    • Polar Knight's stage is a Slippy-Slidey Ice World.
    • Inconveniently-Placed Conveyor Belts are littered throughout Tinker Knight's stage, and make a brief reappearance in the Tower of Fate.
    • Spikes of Doom: Stationary spikes will instantly kill you with a prick, be they on the floors, walls, or ceiling. This can be an infuriating source of Fridge Logic, as Shovel Knight can weather far deadlier-looking attacks and obstacles and suffer at most two pips of damage.
  • Combat Pragmatist: King Knight takes this approach to the Joustus Tournament in King of Cards. Instead of taking on the three judges in the titular card game so he can win the Joustus Crown, he decides to simply kick their asses, which King Pridemoor admits isn't actually against the rules. He can also buy Cheat Cards from Chester to give himself in edge in actual Joustus matches, but nothing's stopping you from beating your opponents legitimately.
  • Cool Airship: The Flying Machine, Propeller Knight's airship, which is so damn big that it counts as a level in and of itself. It's also That One Level no matter the campaign thanks to being Platform Hell incarnate.
    • King Knight has one of his own in King of Cards, and it serves as his hub world.
  • Cute Witch: Female Plague Knight, courtesy of the game's Gender Flip mode. Mona, his love interest, is also a real cutie who doubles as a Hot Witch.
  • Dark Is Not Evil: The Phantom Striker, a mysterious and intimidating warrior who tends to favor traveling by night (and is even fought at the Lich Yard in Specter of Torment). Despite his foreboding appearance, he's a good man and an honorable fighter (albeit, not above launching a sneak attack when faced with a truly evil and dangerous opponent).
  • Darth Vader Clone: Specter Knight, though this isn't apparent until Specter of Torment. He's a hooded, masked knight working as the terrifying enforcer of the manipulative Evil Sorcerer Big Bad, who saved his life when she found him at death's door and Reforged Him Into a Minion. He's tormented by the loss of a loved one (Though in his case, said dead loved one is a friend that was practically his brother), turns against his mistress (unsuccessfully, in his case), and ultimately performs a (non-fatal) Heroic Sacrifice to save a young hero who is practically family to him (his friend's son as opposed to his own).
  • Defiant to the End: Specter Knight doesn't die (again, at least), but Specter of Torment ends with him submitting to The Enchantress and becoming her slave. However, he's no mindless peon, and in the Kneel Before Zod scene during the credits, he's the only member of the Order of No Quarter that refuses to bow to her.
  • Definitely Final Dungeon: The Tower of Fate, a dark and oppressive tower where the Enchantress lives. It's so tall that it reaches high into the sky... with said sky being a sickly green, which may or may not be a product of the acid rainstorm going on while you scale it.
  • Dem Bones: Skeletons serve as prominent enemies in Specter Knight's stage, with Specter Knight being a skeleton himself. Boneclangs, said skeleton enemies, are also frequently-seen friendly NPC's in the hub world of Specter of Torment. Red and Scarlet, a pair of friendly skeletons, are also important NPC's in the same DLC.
  • Disc One Final Boss: King Birder in King of Cards. He's the final Joustus Judge and the most dangerous of them all, but of course, The Enchantress has yet to make her mandatory "First Phase of the Final Boss" appearance...
  • Eternal Engine: The Clock Tower and The Iron Whale are different flavors of this, with the former being a climb up a tower full of Tinker Knight's many dangerous gadgets, and the latter being Treasure Knight's personal submarine.
  • Everything's Worse with Wolves: Purple wolves are enemies in The Stranded Ship. However, they're far from the worst enemies you'll encounter (at worst, they can catch you off-guard if one comes rocketing in from off-screen) and the hilarious way they slip and slide around the icy floors shows that you aren't alone in your struggle against annoying ice physics.
  • Evil Counterpart: Black Knight to Shovel Knight. He looks like a meaner, edgier version of the latter, and has both a nasty disposition and a signature Evil Laugh. He eventually mellows out, though.
    • Polar Knight also counts, due to being a shovel-wielding knight with a horned helmet of his own.
  • Evil Sorcerer: The Enchantress is a gender-flipped version. You can, however, turn her into a male example (The Enchanter) thanks to the game's Gender Bender options.
  • Fat Bastard: The Sumo Goldarmors introduced in King of Cards. They're big, fat, vicious, and are a total pain in the ass to fight. Mole Knight is also quite portly, but he's probably one of the least evil members of The Order of No Quarter.
  • Five Bad Band: The Enchantress and her Order of No Quarter form an unconventional one.
    • Big Bad: The Enchantress.
    • The Dragon: Specter Knight, her chief enforcer and the guy she sends out to recruit/discipline members of the Order.
    • The Brute: Polar Knight and Mole Knight, mainly in terms of their aggressive, highly physical fighting styles and bulky physiques.
    • The Evil Genius: Tinker Knight, Plague Knight, and Treasure Knight are a trifecta that specialize in different areas of this trope: Tinker Knight with weapons development, Plague Knight with explosives and alchemy, and Treasure Knight with financing.
    • The Dark Chick: King Knight and Propeller Knight, who are a lot more comedic and lighthearted than their comrades thanks to the former's extravagant narcissism and the latter's flamboyance.
  • Funny Animal: Many can be seen among the game's townsfolk. You've got deer, peacocks, horses, chickens, and even the odd fishman here and there.
  • God Save Us From the Queen: Done with Queen Knight, the gender-flipped version of King Knight.
  • The Good King: King Pridemoor. King of Cards shows that he's a bonafide Nice Guy and is incredibly generous, wise, and respects the commonfolk. Or in other words, he's nothing like King Knight. The endings of the first two campaigns also show that he's very merciful: despite being a member of The Order of No Quarter, he knights Plague Knight for destroying the Tower of Fate and forgives him for his crimes. And after everything he pulled in King of Cards, King Knight being merely forced to scrub the floors of his castle at the end of the main game is, by all means, a very light punishment compared to what he could have given him for high treason.
  • Goomba Springboard: Shovel Knight is capable of doing this with his pogo jump attack.
  • Greed: Treasure Knight's vice, which Shovel Knight takes him to task for during their pre-fight dialogue.
  • Green Hill Zone: The Plains of Passage, a pleasant grassland full of easy platforming challenges and rather weak enemies. It's where Shovel and Plague Knight's campaigns begin, though both Specter and King Knight get their own takes on this trope as well.
  • Grim Up North: The Stranded Ship is one of the bleaker levels, considering that it's one of the three situated closest to the Tower of Fate. The skies are dark, the music is foreboding, and it's definitely one of the harder levels overall.
  • Hard Levels, Easy Bosses: For the most part, the biggest source of stress in a 'no-deaths recorded' run are the levels proper, as instant-death Bottomless Pits and Spikes of Doom can set you back by as much as 15 minutes of play. Meanwhile, most bosses lack instant-death attacks, and can be beaten with brute force and Ichors. The exceptions to this are Polar Knight (who can turn the floor into Spikes of Doom), Propeller Knight (whose arena features bottomless pits), and The Enchantress (whose fighting style revolves around breaking the ground of her arena so she can drop you into the bottomless pit below).
  • Heart Container: Every protagonist has their own special pickup that permanently increases their health. Shovel Knight has platters of delicious food cooked up by the Gastronomer, Plague Knight has Health Potions brewed up by Mona or Percy, Specter Knight has Willful Wisps that he can find in certain stages, and King Knight has Hearty Meat Pies baked by his mother.
  • The Hero: Shovel Knight. It's in the title! Plague, Specter, and King Knight are this in their respective campaigns, but they're each a different flavor of Villain Protagonist.
  • Hidden Depths: The DLC campaigns give the playable Knights a more faceted characterization that wasn't readily apparent in the main campaign.
    • Violent lunatic he may be, Plague Knight still struggles with his self-esteem. He's also madly in love with Mona, his partner in crime, but is too afraid to let his true feelings be known out of fear that he isn't strong enough for her, and intends to brew the Ultimate Potion out of hope that he'll meet what he assumes to be her lofty, nigh-unreachable standards.
    • Specter Knight is tormented by the death of his friend Luan and spends a lot of time brooding while looking at his locket. The ending also sheds new light on his insistence that you will never beat The Enchantress in the main game, since his failure to free himself from her grasp and defeat her has led him to believe that she is genuinely impossible to stop.
    • King Knight turns out to be exactly as vain and shallow as he seems to be, to the point that he sells out to The Enchantress and betrays all the friends he had made for personal power. However, the ending shows that he seems to be genuinely hurt by his mother turning his back on him after seeing the monster he's become, but Shovel Knight comes in and kicks his ass before any kind of Heel Realization can truly set in.
  • Horny Vikings: Polar Knight and his lackeys, who are scruffy-chinned barbarians that wear horned helmets and make their home in the frozen north.
  • Hot Amazon: Female Polar Knight is a hulking mass of muscle, but she's still surprisingly pretty. She's also a silver vixen due to her advanced age.
  • Hot Mom: It's not apparent in her spritework, but King Knight's mom has definitely got it going on. As butthurt as King Knight is over King Pridemoor flirting with her, it's not hard to see where the guy is coming from.
  • Hot Scientist: Mona, the perpetually bored and attractive alchemist hanging out in the local tavern. Plague Knight certainly thinks so.
  • Hot Witch: Mona again, but also The Enchantress, who combines her shapely figure with very flattering form-fitting robes. Fitting, since she's possessing the body of an attractive young lady knight.
  • Idiot Hero: Reize, who looks and acts the part of a stereotypical shonen hero, complete with rushing headfirst into bad situations without stopping to think. Luan, his dad, claims that he was just like him back when he was his son's age.
  • Instant Awesome, Just Add Dragons: Dragon enemies make the odd appearance here and there, as expected for a game set in a medieval setting.
  • It's Up to You: While King Knight's traveling party in King of Cards is made up of people from all kinds of backgrounds, adventurers and formidable fighters included, he's the one who always has to stick his neck out and do all the heavy lifting during his journey. The Enchantress is able to sway him to her side partially by pointing this out to him.
  • Jerkass: Black Knight is a cantankerous dickhead with a nasty attitude, especially towards Plague Knight. Near the climax of Plague of Shadows, he sabotages his budding romantic relationship with Mona purely For the Evulz. He gets better, thankfully.
    • Plague of Shadows shows that Shovel Knight himself is a lot meaner than he lets on. When you defeat him during his boss fight, he'll sneak up on Plague Knight during his victory dance and clock him over the head, knocking him out cold and unfairly stealing his victory. He'll also happily leave the Order of No Quarter to dangle off the edge of the Tower of Fate after defeating them instead of helping them up. Considering that this is only a semi-canon version of the story told through Plague Knight's perspective, though, Unreliable Narrator could certainly be in effect.
  • Latin Lover: Red, a passionate red skeleton whose Badass Spaniard outfit and drive to be reunited with the love of his life (whose skull resembles that of a Calaca) make him out to be the setting's equivalent to this. When he's finally reunited with Scarlet, they even perform a Mexican folk dance together!
  • Mad Bomber: Plague Knight, who cackles like a loon as he tosses his hand-crafted bombs all over the place.
  • Mad Scientist: Plague Knight again, whose love of violence is eclipsed by his love of alchemy.
  • Manchild: King Knight. He's a grown man who lives with his mom and collects Merit Medals (literal good boy points) that he gives her so she'll bake him pies that will increase his health. He's also petty, selfish, and immature in a way that's bound to remind you of a spoiled little kid.
  • Mercy Invincibility: Taking damage grants you temporary immunity to all damage, including the instant-death spikes.
  • Mini Boss: Seen in a few stages, but not all of them.
    • The Alchemeister is the miniboss of the Explodatorium, and fights by hurling potions at you before drinking one and turning into a rampaging yeti-like monster for a few seconds.
    • The Iron Whale has Teethalon, a gigantic angler fish who lures you in with the treasure chest he uses as a lure. Before you actually fight him though, you have to let him chase you across an autoscrolling stretch of platforms above a bottomless pit.
    • The Dingy Dropper is fought midway through The Flying Machine, and is a small battleship piloted by a trio of Hoverhafts that pelt you with bombs while trying to crush you under its weight.
    • Fought exclusively in Specter of Torment is Hurlsvelgr, a frost-blue eagle monster who pukes up streams of rainbow energy that you can use as platforms while kicking his ass.
  • Mole Men: Mole Knight, maybe. His armor gives off the impression of being a humanoid mole and allows him to burrow like one. The fact that he lives in a world populated by humans and Funny Animals certainly makes it possible.
  • Narcissist: King Knight, a vain and obnoxious Jerkass who cares for nothing other than himself. His only motivation for being a king is to make everyone bow down to him, leading to him betraying all his friends and family so he can take a seat at the Enchantress' table. The only thing keeping him from crossing into sociopath territory is his genuine love for his mom and his rat minions.
  • Not-So-Harmless Villain: Tinker Knight. You're bound to laugh at the way he ineffectively runs around and tries to pelt you with wrenches during his boss fight, but the sight of him summoning a gigantic combat mech ought to shut you right up... at least until you realize that it looks scarier than it actually is. This is only the case in the main story and Plague of Shadows, though. His boss fights in Specter of Torment and King of Cards are a whole different story.
  • Our Monsters Are Weird: Oolong from Specter of Torment is a big, green... thing with a weird appendage jutting off his head that can be played like a musical instrument. Feeding him sheet music will cause him to learn and perfectly replicate the songs transcribed on it, while feeding him bombs will cause him to belch up clouds of explosive gas that are the same color as the powder within the bombs.
  • Planimal: Trouples, which are half-fish and half-apple.
  • Power Gives You Wings: The final fight with Black Knight has him sprout a pair of wings to go with the power boost The Enchantress gives him.
  • Retraux: Unlike most modern games in the 8-bit style, which use the simple art style to cover up a lack of artistic talent, Shovel Knight's design is centered around the limitations of the consoles of the era.
    • Sprites are grid-locked to maintain the illusion of low-resolution gameplay.
    • Music and ambient sound was composed on the NES in order to maintain audio authenticity.
    • The fade-ins and fade-outs of the intro sequence are done via palette swaps, rather than simply adjusting the transparency.
  • Shovel Strike: This is, naturally, Shovel Knight's main method of attack. The same goes with Black Knight and Polar Knight, his brothers in Shovelry.
  • Shovelware: Actually, quite the opposite.
  • Slippy-Slidey Ice World: The Stranded Ship, where Polar Knight resides.
  • The Sociopath: The Enchantress. While Shovel Knight and Plague Knight's campaigns portray her as your stereotypical Evil Overlord, Plague of Shadows and King of Cards show that she's a Manipulative Bitch who knows exactly how to get people to do what she wants, a sadist who enjoys making people suffer, and has absolutely zero empathy for anyone she hurts.
  • The Starscream: Plague Knight, who Plague of Shadows reveals isn't loyal to The Order of No Quarter at all, and is planning to betray and attack his comrades so he can steal their essences for The Ultimate Potion. However, his motives are actually a lot less selfish and dangerous than you're led to believe.
  • Turtle Power: Black Knight fights you alongside Terrorpin, his faithful steed, in Specter of Torment. As the name would suggest, he's a giant, intimidating, black-and-red snapping turtle-looking monster, and he can fly around in the air Gamera-style.
  • Underground Level: The Lost City, Mole Knight's turf, combines this with Lethal Lava Land.
  • Video Game Cruelty Potential:
    • When you beat The Baz, you can attack him while he's throwing his little temper tantrum. It causes him to pound his fists faster, and cry out several tiny blue gems for you to collect.
    • During the endgame, You can choose to help the Order of No Quarter when they're left dangling from the edge of the Tower of Fate, or you can leave them there to hang.
    • As mentioned above under Bad Boss, you can throw bombs at Plague Knight's minions in Plague of Shadows, which sends them comedically hurtling off the stage.
  • Villain Protagonist: Plague Knight, Specter Knight, and King Knight, who are the stars of their own DLC campaigns.
  • You Don't Look Like You: In their respective campaigns, Plauge, Specter, and King Knight all look different compared to how they look in the main story. Mainly they're scaled down to around Shovel Knight's height for the sake of consistency among playable characters, but Specter Knight in particular looks nothing like the wraithlike Death-wannabe he is in the other campaigns, instead opting for more of a ninja design. His boss form appears at the end of Specter of Torment, however, and seems to be the result of him powering himself up with The Enchantress' magic.
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