‘Hollow Knight: Silksong’ Will Be Ready When It’s Ready, and I Like That 

We’re almost at the end of 2024. It’s been five years since Team Cherry announced Hollow Knight: Silksong, and one question has been on everyone’s minds: “Where the hell is it?” A Silksong appearance has become a running joke at every gaming event for what seems like the last three years.  

Team Cherry has been notoriously quiet throughout development — minus a few updates here and there and a delay in 2023. We know it’s still coming, they just don’t talk much about it. And you know what? I’m fine with that.  

‘HOLLOW KNIGHT’ IS STILL ON THE WAY

Hollow Knight is a classic, and the promise of a new game in that universe is exciting. But how much can you possibly know about a game in development that will ease the wait? Any trickle of information would just exacerbate the wait and make every day feel like a Monday at work.

Team Cherry could pop out once a year and say, “It’s still coming,” and I’d be fine with that. I don’t need a trailer or a breakdown of the development progress. I like the radio silence. It reminds me of how some of my favorite recording artists move. 

Games, like music, are art. And I prefer to simply know some music is coming. And when it gets here, it gets here. When my favorite artist says they’re dropping an album and goes quiet, I just know they’re working on it. And when it’s time to roll that thing out, I enjoy the rollout. The same should apply to games.

MANAGING EXPECTATIONS IS TOUGH

I get it, we all don’t want Hollow Knight: Silksong to fall into that Duke Nukem Forever trap. But, there’s no evidence that’ll be the case. Indie games take just as much work as the AAAs. I like knowing that this was meant to be a DLC for the first game, and Team Cherry found themselves with more coming out of it and decided to make a whole new game.

It tells me they care about it. They could have just dropped sections of it as DLC over time and moved on. With that change comes new expectations. If the scope of the game really is what’s been said over these last few years, then a long development cycle excites me.  

Team Cherry wants to deliver something worthy of the first Hollow Knight. And we all want to feel like it lives up to that. It’s gonna take some time, and may even necessitate some silence on their part. That’s not a bad thing. As Gabe Newell once said, “’Late’ is just for a little while, ‘suck’ is forever.”