Hollow Knight: Silksong needed to be as difficult as it is, sort of. Let me explain. 

The long-awaited sequel to Hollow Knight, Silksong, was finally released after a grueling 7-year long wait (along with it becoming a literal meme), and the discourse surrounding its controversial launch is starting to cool down a bit. Thousands of reviews are pouring in about the game being ‘too hard’, and thousands of reviews, on the other hand, are praising it for being a masterpiece, certainly raising eyebrows for many in the gaming community. So, what’s really going on here?

Silksong is not a conventional sequel in the modern gaming landscape; it picks off immediately where the previous Hollow Knight left off at its brutally difficult endgame. It wholeheartedly assumes you’ve completed Hollow Knight and its pinnacle challenges, which is very rare for sequels to do nowadays – especially one that’s been hyped up for 7 years now. Most sequels usually start at an accessible point so that newcomers to the franchise can pick it up without needing to play the first, in the hopes of expanding the franchise with a broader appeal. The humble indie developerTeam Cherry, on the other hand, clearly doesn’t seem to give much thought to market trends or making their game as broadly appealing as possible.

It can be argued that Silksong’s difficulty is wholly thematic and necessary for the game’s story. The characters cannot preach to you about the dangers of Pharloom, the long haunted kingdom, and have you waltz up and conquer the world so easily – it’d be a strange narrative dissonance. This is reflected by how the pilgrims are illustrated in the game, desperately clawing their way through the kingdom to reach the Holy Citadel at the very top. You, as the player, are meant to feel the same soul-crushing brutality of the ascent and have your jaw clutched as you barely eke out a victory over a brutally punishing boss or a gruelling enemy gauntlet. In the same sense, you are also meant to have that immense satisfaction of overcoming odds that once seemed stupidly stacked against you, and it’s in those moments where Silksong truly shines brilliantly. 

The more interesting topic that comes from this whole discourse is about accessibility in video games. It’s becoming increasingly common for people to consider video games nowadays as a medium for art and expression, which makes it all the odder that it has one of the highest barriers to entry of any of these mediums. Is it really fair that a lot of people who won’t get to experience Silksong and its awe-inspiring world properly because it was genuinely too difficult and frustrating for them? While demanding improvement and perfection is its own experience that the game demands from the player, is it necessary to alienate so many people on the insistence of that challenge? It’s hard to tell. Having no difficulty options in a game allows the developer to curate a universal experience, and that seems to be the point in these challenging games, where fewer emerge victorious through these games than the number that started them. That experience is so strong and rewarding that these games have harbored almost elitist, cult-like followings that demand the experience must remain the same at the cost of all those who could never finish these games. Silksong might just be another stepping stone in that conversation for changing how difficulty works in all games in the future. 

Silksong’s difficulty is still a contentious topic, but most still can’t resist the charm and excellent polish of the game we all waited so long for. Its difficulty is thematic to the game and definitely strengthens the immersion, but many would say it was taken too far this time. Only time will tell if Team Cherry were justified in making a game so anticipated so alienating to many players, and if it will contribute to the difficulty discourse for games following it in the future.