LogFAQs > #962441134

Metroidvania was never meant to be a genre. It's just SOTN, which is a Metroid-like Castlevania. Ever since then it's been used as a much more confusing synonym of Metroid-like, where you have to know it's not actually referring to Castlevania games, most of which aren't Metroid-like. But Metroid-like itself is fine and useful.

All the game-like genres are fine tbh. Rogue-like got stretched to mean any game where you die and restart, but that's ok since that's a core part of Rogue. Games on a grid like Necrodancer are much more Rogue-like, but that doesn't mean you can't describe Hades with it.

Souls-like is similar. It's stretched to apply to anything that has a bonfire, or a dodge roll, or item descriptions with lore, but you can't deny those are all Souls-like things.

The problem is people still think games can only have 1 genre. Let's just call those people dumb and move on.