Hollow Knight: Silksong is the highly anticipated sequel to Hollow Knight—a beloved, kickstarted indie game from 2017. It is undeniably one of the games for which hardcore fans are most excited. However, information about the game has been minimal since it was revealed in 2019. Too minimal.
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The Success of Hollow Knight
Fans and critics alike met Hollow Knight with critical acclaim. It has the intricacy of a true Metroidvania and the challenging but fair difficulty that comes with a Soulslike game. Hollow Knight meshed these two worlds perfectly to birth something magnificent.
Gamers exploded with love for this game when it was released—and even way before that. Hollow Knight was revealed on Kickstarter in 2014. Its initial goal was to reach $35,000. In the end, it garnered $57,000 from 2,158 backers. Hollow Knight fans were Hollow Knight fans before the game was even released.
Its beauty and raw excitement factor enamored everybody who played (and managed to finish) Hollow Knight. From its art direction, map design, and music, to its combat, challenging moments, and memorable bosses; everything about Hollow Knight simply worked. Fans loved it. They backed it, they helped make it happen, and they got what they deserved and wanted, if not more.
Now, Hollow Knight is slated to have a sequel.
Fans want it.
They want it bad.
They want it now!
Everyone who has supported Team Cherry (the team behind the game) since the beginning of the first game’s development greatly desires the sequel—or at the very least, they want to know when they can have it.
The Release Date of Hollow Knight: Silksong Is as Unclear as a Photo of Bigfoot
The late and great comedian Mitch Hedberg once said, “I think Bigfoot is blurry, that’s the problem. It’s not the photographer’s fault. Bigfoot is blurry, and that’s extra scary to me. There’s a large, out-of-focus monster roaming the countryside.”
Quite frankly, I feel the same way about the release date of Hollow Knight: Silksong. The details are as unclear as a Bigfoot photograph.
When Hollow Knight: Silksong Was Announced
Hollow Knight: Silksong was initially announced in February 2019. As of writing, it’s been almost five years since then, and over seven years since the first game was released. If you have just had a kid when Hollow Knight came out, that kid is now doing homework after dinner. That kid is now yelling profanities at other gamers while playing Fortnite or Call of Duty or yelling profanities at themself while playing Elden Ring.
Wasteland was an RPG by Interplay Productions. The game was released in 1988 to critical acclaim. Imagine the harrowing of its fans as they waited for its sequel to come out 26 years later. However, since you’re reading this ranty article right now, as a Hollow Knight fan, you may not have to imagine that at all! It may be our turn to wait that long, if not longer!
I am using hyperbole to emphasize my frustration regarding Silksong’s unclear release date. It was announced in 2019 via a trailer. The trailer revealed that Hornet would be the protagonist. It also showcased Hornet’s abilities (which are completely different from the Knight’s moves), and it presented new worlds, enemies, and so many more exciting things about the upcoming game. Everyone’s minds were blown.
Expectations Versus Reality
The trailer didn’t come with a release date, but that’s fine. First trailers and teasers sometimes don’t provide that information. It’s to set proper expectations. Game development is unpredictable and chaotic. Schedules are seldom met. A studio only sets itself up for failure if it announces a release date too early in development. It’s fine.
Three years later, after providing almost no updates and hints pertaining to the game’s development, Team Cherry announced via another trailer that the game would be available on Xbox Game Pass on launch day. How very promising! That must mean that the game is close to the launch date, right?
RIGHT!?
The Xbox team certainly thought so when they “confirmed” through a tweet that the game would be released within a year after the aforementioned trailer’s publication.
It is now January 2024—way past a year after that second official trailer’s launch. WHERE THE HECK IS SILKSONG, TEAM CHERRY!?
I Should Calm Down
Yes, I should. I really should calm down.
As a video game journalist, I am fully aware of the intricacies of video game development. Delays are a common occurrence; almost expected.
Take a look at Cyberpunk 2077, for example. It was announced in 2012 and gamers only got their hands on it in the last month of 2020. Even then, the game we got was unfinished, plagued with technical issues, and (at launch) was an utter disappointment. It’s amazing now, of course. It’s what the game should have been when it was released that matters in hindsight…but I digress.
The point is that release date changes are common in the game industry. The time between a game’s actual announcement and a real release date is often a long wait.
On the Other Hand…
As someone who has almost platinumed Hollow Knight (damn you, Pantheon of Hallownest), as someone who yearns for more Hollow Knight, and as a massive die-hard fan of this magnificent game, I am livid.
I am enraged at the fact that I was informed that the game would be released within a year after February 2022, and it’s already January 2024 and I AM STILL TRYING TO BEAT THE PANTHEON OF HALLOWNEST.
Pardon me for that. Where was I? Oh yes, Silksong and my frustrations about its ambiguous release date. I am livid (did I say that?). I am so very angry whenever there is a large video game event, whether a game fest or an awards show, and Silksong is yet another no-show.
I’m not the only one who feels this way. Many in the community have to don clown makeup before these events because we know that’s who we will be at the end of them. We call for Silksong to a hushed response; a nonexistent reply.
I am ABSOLUTELY FURIOUS at Team Cherry’s lack of transparency of the game’s status. Hollow Knight happened because of the fans, damn it! The fans deserve to know when the sequel is going to be released! At least give us a clear timeframe!
Does this sound entitled? YES! I am a gamer and it comes naturally to me to be entitled. I WANT MY GAME AND I WANT IT NOW!
Justified Passion
Sarcasm and a miss at humor aside, I want to calm down about Silksong. I really do.
But as someone who has loved the first game since 2017, has known about its existence since 2019, and has expected it to come out since 2023, as a raging fan of the world of Hollow Knight, so much so that I wrote an entire wiki about it, I am losing my mind.
Team Cherry’s Silence
If there’s one thing Team Cherry and the Knight (the first game’s protagonist) have in common, IT’S THAT THEY’RE BOTH SILENT!
Let’s get serious for a moment. Team Cherry’s lack of update about this whole thing has been incredibly disappointing. Team Cherry has not made an official statement about the game’s development or release date since 2019—when it released the game’s first trailer.
That is insane! The closest thing we got to an update was through Xbox’s Twitter account when they insinuated that the game would be out within a year after February 2022. Xbox did that, not Team Cherry.
You would think that a studio that made its first game because it was backed by fans would be more communicative towards them. They certainly were during Hollow Knight’s development. Now that they have huge funding due to the first game’s success, which was made possible by fans and backers, they have not bothered to provide even the most minute update of Silksong.
While games get delayed and release dates get pushed a lot in the video game industry, at least many developers provide an update to their player base regarding development status. Team Cherry is above that, it seems. They’ve chosen to remain silent while we as fans clamor for an update and have our faces drip with clown makeup during every video game event.
To be delayed is one thing, to be dead silent about it is another—especially when you’re a studio that saw success in the first place because of your fans.
Putting Faith in Team Cherry
In all fairness to Team Cherry, aside from their silence, the studio has given us no reason not to bet on them. They made one of the best indie games in the past decade with a limited budget. Imagine what they can do now with considerably more financial resources and the freedom of time.
I get it. At this point, we have fun with our gripes, make memes about Silksong’s lack of updates, and fool around whenever a video game event or awards show is right around the corner. Many fanbases in the gaming community are like this, after all.
We show our passion for a game and the studio behind it by expressing our excitement for their next releases. Do we get impatient at times? Yes, indeed we do. However, we will support those studios for as long as they continue providing us with amazing titles such as Hollow Knight.
It is highly unlikely we’ll have to wait one more year for Silksong. Let 2025 be another fanbase’s plight or pleasure. We will most likely finally have our hands on the game this year. Otherwise, I will have more than enough time to finally overcome one of the toughest challenges I’ve ever faced in gaming: the Pantheon of Hallownest.
