Hollow Knight: Silksong (2025)

Hollow Knight: Silksong (Switch) La verdad que ya pasó la época en la que tenía ganas hace tiempo, y no esperaba demasiado. Sin embargo tengo opiniones. Es un juego precioso en lo visual, con muchas ideas buenas y otras no tanto. El tema es que las que no tanto pesan mucho. La OST no brilla igual, las oleadas de bosses ya estarían, las maratones para llegar a los bosses pues tal y las misiones con estructura de 1997 pues no son muy estimulantes. Las herramientas me han dado igual, y que dependan de consumibles me parece una idea de diseño cuestionable, pero el control sigue siendo igual de preciso que siempre, y los bosses una delicia. Y la historia me ha vuelto a dar exactamente igual. Un tema.

Gotta say, as much as I'm liking the feeling of movement, combat and exploration, the bosses have been a bit of a letdown. So far I've fought the first tutorial boss (Moss Mother), the Bell Beast, Lace in the deep roads (she obviously returns later), Fourth Chorus and Savage Beastfly. They all felt somewhat limited in their attacks patterns; few of them, very distinct and with very obvious and repetitive counters.

Fouth Chorus was maybe the more interesting one, since it played with the environment, but even still, it only had 3 attacks (swipe with the hand, slam with the hand, falling rocks)

The Beasfly was particularly crappy. Just two lame attacks (charge and slam). The main difficulty was the trashmobs it would summon. It was cool that its attacks would kill the adds, but it was disappointing that it didn't damage the boss too.

Granted, this is all early game, so it might get better

I do like that the random enemies are more complex than the original. A lot of them do have attack patterns that trip you up and force you to strategise more. Although they are a bit on the tanky side. Even the most basic throwaway enemy takes like 3 hits and some of the more elite ones seem to take forever.

Roll Credits?: Yes!

Surprised/Let Down/As Expected: Surprised

Favorite Mechanic or Narrative Moment: The worldbuilding (in both the lore and mechanical sense) is unmatched here. The world is massive - constantly expanding from areas you thought had to be the edge of map. Each new zone adds to the history of what happened in Pharloom, and the designers delight in hiding important things that you might never see without a guide in a way that few do in this era of streamlined, intentional game moments. All of this culminates in a modern day retelling of the inverted castle which doesn't disappoint in the slightest.

Least Favorite Thing: The only negative I really felt while playing was in regards to some of the obtuseness or ease of overlooking hidden items/npcs and their importance in progressing certain content. But even then, some of that I would chalk up to my own impatient tendencies, and thinking back on the experience I know that it was more memorable because of this design.

Anyone here already theorizing on the lore of the game?

If so, any theories on why is Fourth Chorus in the Deep Docks? He has a pin on their head so it suggests someone defeated them and throw them from the Citadel. Who was it and why?

Edit: as soon as I click on 'post' I realized it was probably the seamstress that lives nearby.

Silksong expands on the world of Hollow Knight, as well as the movement and combat. I loved Hollow Knight for the exploration, the rich and interesting world, and the comfortable movement mechanics when exploring that world. So, being in a new kingdom with new enemies, bosses, areas, music, items, and mechanics is very refreshing and was an incredible experience.

I think that, in expanding on these things, Silksong is technically a better game than Hollow Knight, though I prefer Hollow Knight. I will spend the rest of this review explaining why I prefer the first game over this sequel. It may sound negative, but I want to be clear that I do think Silksong is an amazing game for the same reasons that Hollow Knight is.

I played Hollow Knight a couple of years ago, when it already had its status as a legendary indie game, and after all of its DLC content was released. This means my experience with Hollow Knight was an experience of a fully polished and updated game. Silksong was just released and has no DLC content. Maybe my opinion of Silksong is skewed because it was such a highly anticipated game and I went into it with lots of expectations. Mostly, these expectations were met, some were exceeded, and others were not. Overall, I just didn't enjoy Silksong as much as I did Hollow Knight.

I loved Act I, because I was dropped into a whole new world and had so much to anticipate. each new area and ability was fresh and exciting, and I couldn't wait to uncover more. I didn't have a problem with the difficulty, though I had heard how others were struggling. The boss fight at the end of Act I was difficult but doable, but Act II was where I started to understand the difficulty complaints.

Pretty much any enemy, as well as each of their individual attacks deals two masks of damage in Act II. It made exploration difficult and annoying. Every boss became a hassle, rather than a fun combat challenge. I'm not fully against high-difficulty games, but I hated the high density of this high difficulty. Every enemy is annoying. Every area is annoying. Every boss is annoying. It is fine for a game to be hard, but it is also fine for me to be annoyed by this.

Like I said, I love these games for the exploration, the rich and interesting world, and the comfortable mechanics of exploring that world. But the exploration was also worse in Silksong than in Hollow Knight. Everything is hidden behind a secret wall and I felt a lot more lost when exploring. I couldn't figure out how to get into the "Cauldron" area of The Citadel because the part of my map that I needed to explore showed that I had already explored it. This same issue happened multiple times, which I don't recall happening at all in Hollow Knight.

I completed Act II without even getting the double jump and having left at least 5 areas unexplored (because I didn't even know they were there). I was shocked when I completed the game because I thought there was more to do. It turned out that there was more optional content and a third act, which I wouldn't have known if I hadn't looked it up. I wanted to get to Act III because I wanted to explore more and was unsatisfied by the abrupt ending. It took me 20 hours to beat Act II initially. Now, I am at 35 hours without even having entered Act III. I'm not going to keep playing because I'm just not enjoying exploring. And by "exploring", I mean following a guide.

Again, Silksong is a great game and these are all problems that affected my personal enjoyment. It reminds me of Jedi: Survivor as the sequel to Jedi: Fallen Order. I think the sequel is technically better, but I didn't enjoy it as much. this is why neither Silksong nor Jedi: Survivor is in my "When The Sequel Is Better" list. But Ori and the Will of the Wisps is in that list because it expands on the world and introduces new mechanics while still being a delight to play.

The game expands on what the original in a delightful way.

It is pretty much the perfect metroidvania experience.

I feel there isn't much to say as this is almost overtalked about all over the web.

The one thing I think is worth mentioning is tha exploration feels extra-rewarding in this one, and that is one of my favorite aspects of the genre.

Even if I had a great time with it, I can't shake the feeling that it didn't hit me as hard as Nine Sols did.