Hollow Knight: Silksong

Silksong spins yarns of pain and freedom into a breathtaking Metroidvania fill of surprise and secrets.

“Silksong” is like a book written in the language of ancient gamers, and I am one of them.

Hollow Knight: Silksong manages to be a surprisingly great sequel to a title that was all-too difficult to follow up. If you're a fan of the series, you'll find no better way to feel back home than in this sequel, but newcomers should still stick to exploring Hallownest for their first venture.

Hollow Knight: Silksong won’t convert the non-believers but it’s a brilliant all-time entry in the Metroidvania genre. Some slight hiccups around grinding and platform jumping aside, it’s a thrilling diversion and, just about, worth the wait.

Pretty and charmingly mean-spirited, this is a game filled with revelations and genuine personality.

For many years, Hollow Knight held the crown of the indie scene, but its successor has arrived to improve on what was already unbeatable. Hollow Knight: Silksong stands as one of the most refined, creative, profound, and elevated works in the history of video games, presenting itself as a leading candidate for Best Game of the Year and clinging to its predecessor's scepter to establish itself as, if we can still define it that way, the best indie game in history. Team Cherry has created an adventure for posterity that excels in everything and languishes in nothing, ultimately making a statement in an industry whose blockbusters could only dream of achieving such a level of divinity.

Hollow Knight: Silksong is, quite simply, a video game that shouldn’t exist. No publisher on Earth would ever fund the production of a colossal two-dimensional Metroidvania over the span of seven years, and no independent developer could realistically afford to turn such an immense ambition into reality. And yet, Hollow Knight: Silksong does exist, and it exists solely because a group of creators - deeply in love with their own work but above all blessed with extraordinary talent and the resources to make it shine - chose to invest seven years of their lives in the project. There has never been a Metroidvania so vast in content and so profound in its systems, nor one that marries such sheer scale with such painstaking artistry. On one hand, it is an experience of staggering proportions; on the other, it is enriched with the kind of craft and care one usually finds only in artisanal workshops. In the industry, it’s often said that this genre carries a fragment of the medium’s very soul. Playing through Hornet’s adventure is a reminder, plain and simple, of how beautiful it is to experience a video game made with love.

Silksong is the purest form of a Metroidvania I've played in years.

In my nearly ten years here at Gamereactor, I have so far managed to award three perfect scores, and now it's time again. Hollow Knight: Silksong is a masterpiece, simply put. No question about it. Expectations were sky-high in advance, but with a lot of patience and even more skill, Team Cherry has managed to rise above the competition and cement its place in the starry sky as one of the brightest shining celestial bodies. If you like challenging video games in general and well-made Metroidvania titles in particular, I cannot recommend Hollow Knight: Silksong enough, because it's a game that enchants and challenges, dazzles and delights. And finally, for those of you who are wondering: Yes, it was definitely worth the wait.

Challenging, frustrating, invigorating, and oh-so fulfilling, Silksong is simply a masterpiece in almost every way.

Hollow Knight: Silksong will be a benchmark for metroidvania games, just like its predecessor. Its increased difficulty, combined with exploration and progressive endings, promise many hours of gameplay presented with high aesthetics and music. Because if nothing else, music is medicine for the soul, especially when the song is made of silk.

Hollow Knight: Silksong turned out to be a tad weaker than the original. Still, it is a metroidvania game on par with the most beloved classics of the genre and a worthy sequel. Productions of this calibre, containing so much great content and sold at such an affordable price, deserve all the praise they get. At the moment, despite extremely fierce competition, this is my game of the year.

Was the wait worth it? Absolutely. This is Hollow Knight — and then some. Playing as Hornet feels like an entirely new experience, offering a level of speed and finesse the Knight never had. Add in the wealth of new skills, tools, and traversal options, and the gameplay reaches incredible new heights. And once again, the world is as breathtakingly beautiful as it is haunting.

Team Cherry’s sequel delivers a sprawling, exquisitely detailed Metroidvania that hooks you from the first step in Farlum and doesn’t let go—even when it pushes your patience to the limit. With Lore-rich regions, hundreds of secrets, and orchestral soundscapes, Silksong is visually lush, mechanically deep, and brutally fair in its difficulty. The combat demands precision, the platforming challenges surprise you, and the game’s scale can easily consume 100 hours for full completion. While its economic system falters and the early side-quests feel undercooked, by the final act all the pieces click, rewarding the persistent with some of the best moments the genre has ever seen.

Silksong isn't the revolution of a decade like Breath of the Wild or possibly GTA 6. Its difficulty and universe make it a game still reserved for an audience that loves a demanding experience despite a notable effort in its accessibility. Still, in its category, it's a king who has by no means lost his crown. The title oozes the love of its developers from every pore of its skin. In addition to being undisputed in its field, Silksong is an example for all. An example that shows what can be delivered with time and love. Like a caterpillar, the developers of Team Cherry isolated themselves in their cocoon. And for 7 years, they were able to create a video game in the image of silk: light, soft, strong, which will undoubtedly stand the test of time.

Hollow Knight: Silksong elevates the Metroidvania experience with a vast and intricate world, filled with unique biomes, hidden secrets, and clever backtracking that turns every step into discovery. Hornet, agile and versatile, tackles her ascent to Pharloom with dashes, diagonal pogos, and abilities that make for fluid and creative platforming. Exploration intertwines with intense combat against over 200 enemies and 40 bosses, each with deadly patterns that require study and precision due to their high difficulty. With hand-drawn environments that resemble living paintings and Christopher Larkin's soundtrack, capable of shifting from melancholic whisper to orchestral explosion, Silksong transforms every screen into a visual and aural spectacle of rare intensity.

Hollow Knight: Silksong refines everything that made the original a masterpiece. With smoother movement, deep customization through Crests and Tools, and a stunning hand-drawn world full of secrets, Team Cherry delivers a metroidvania that’s both brutal and beautiful.

A masterpiece - but one that can wear you down (sometimes for no reason at all).

Silksong is a game made with great care and quality, and it can appeal to almost any fan of genres like Metroidvania and Soulslike. Outside of that bubble, however, it might be a harder title to recommend than its predecessor, even though it improves on practically every element. I believe it’s less accessible, as it demands better reflexes, more skill in platforming sections, and a stronger sense of how to deal with regular enemies and bosses.

The year is 2025 and I get to say we're blessed to play Silksong right now after the long wait, it is very well made, looks amazing, plays well, and even if I didn't lose any rage playing it (yet), it is definitely far more challenging than it's predecessor.

Hollow Knight: Silksong is an audacious sequel that rebuilds rather than extends, pairing a vast, intricately interlinked world with Hornet’s precise, silken movement to turn exploration into a dance. The Emblems + Tools system trims the wild build creativity of Charms for cleaner, tighter combat—coherent, but sometimes limiting when arenas pile up and bosses lean on minions. Punishing yet mostly fair, its early-game severity gives way to a thrilling sense of growth, all wrapped in exquisite art direction. A new benchmark for the genre: cohesive, densely packed, rich, memorable.

There's a reason why Hollow Knight: Silksong is such a highly anticipated and hyped title. And rightly so. While the game is enjoyable, the difficulty level may be too high for some players, and the map can sometimes feel chaotic.

Despite issues here and there, Hollow Knight: Silksong is a game for the ages, focusing on engaging combat along with a world brimming with adventure. In true Metroidvania fashion, Hollow Knight: Silksong will have you coming back for more.

There may be dozens of indie metroidvania games released on Steam every month, but Hollow Knight: Silksong is the perfect reminder of why none of them ever got as big as this pair of games. Silksong pushes the genre to heights it has never known before, combining a fantastic aesthetic and narrative with extremely polished exploration and boss mechanics. While there are frustrations that can grate on you in those annoying moments, they quickly fade away when the game is viewed as a whole. It really does live up to the hype. I’d still like the next one in sooner than seven years though, Team Cherry.

Hollow Knight: Silksong impresses with the attention to detail in every aspect: Hornet's agility refreshes both combat and exploration in the meticulously crafted world. The impeccable setting brings Pharloom to life, making it a fascinating kingdom to explore, full of secrets and memorable moments. Despite this, some excesses and the punishing difficulty may turn fascination into frustration, requiring a bit of persistence. Even so, Silksong stands out as a memorable and grand experience, capable of both enchanting and challenging in equal measure.

Hollow Knight: Silksong has managed to live up to my high expectations, taking a game I absolutely adored and quite literally turning its dash into a full-on sprint. It’s bigger, more vibrant, and just as creative as the original sprawling epic, and it tweaks every system in largely smart ways. Some of its quests and an oddly structured finale do make small missteps, but Team Cherry has nailed the overall balance between satisfying 2D platforming challenges, enticing exploration of a beautiful and surprising world, and nail-biting combat with thrilling boss battles in a way few games do. It’s also unapologetically challenging in all of that, punishing you in a way that can occasionally sting but never feels unforgiving, giving you both huge obstacles to surmount and plenty of tools to figure out how to do so. It asks you to face down the unbeatable and overcome the things holding you back while still taking care of yourself and those around you, and to leave the world a better place than you found it in the end – no matter how impossible that might seem.

Hollow Knight: Silksong almost lives up to the community's insane expectations, which is quite an achievement in itself. Its production values are incredible for an indie game, and it's paired with solid gameplay and impressively rich content. Its main problem is its overly steep difficulty curve, combined with a few balancing issues and other clumsy design choices that are likely to frustrate players. Without these issues, it would be almost perfect. This is not a game for the mainstream audience, and in many ways, it proves to be more demanding and punishing than the titles that serve as benchmarks in this area, such as Dark Souls. Before you start playing, be prepared to spend several hours dying over and over again on a number of bosses.

Silksong can be ruthless, but it's hard to pry yourself away from its haunted little world that never seems to end.

It's not perfect, but it doesn't need to be. The small development team from Australia has done a great job and, after its mega-sales success, has absolutely no reason to worry about its future. And no matter how much we cursed while playing, we know for sure that we'll be sitting in front of the PC again tonight and immersing ourselves in the world of Pharloom once again.

The sequel surpassed the original - Silksong achieves what’s often deemed impossible. In story, action, and presentation, it embodies everything a sequel should. However, its heightened difficulty may frustrate, feeling unforgiving to anyone who hasn’t mastered the first game’s toughest challenges.

For fans of the original Hollow Knight, this will feel like a perfect ten - but for everyone else, it’s a game that demands rolled-up sleeves and endless patience, rewarding nothing less than perfection. A phenomenally crafted experience, destined to be remembered as one of the greatest 2D metroidvania platformers of all time.

Hollow Knight: Silksong is an incredible game, only held back by a couple questionable decisions. When the game is at its best, it's far beyond any game I've ever played, near-perfect in its design, and a masterpiece that I can't put down. The combat feels incredible, the visuals are stunning, the story is engaging, and the soundtrack is lovely. At its worst, though, it is extremely punishing, forces you into repetitive segments, and feels occasionally purposefully irritating. I love it with all my heart, but if you aren't willing to put up with intense difficulty, it may not be for you.

Silksong can be considered an excellent and even exemplary Metroidvania. It is damn nice to play while exploring every picturesque corner of the teeming world. It is gorgeously structured, the modified role-playing system, although it has become a little less diverse, is still pleasant. And the rebalanced battles of the sequel, each duel in which resembles a rhythmic dance, cause an influx of adrenaline. However, the game is not without its flaws.

Silksong is a unique, fantastic gaming experience - though it may not be suitable for everyone.

Hollow Knight: Silksong may well become a landmark, but its uncompromising design has led to polarized reactions among players. Rather than undermining its significance, this contrast only makes it feel more authentic, more complete, and ultimately more memorable.

Silksong felt like a potent spirit, distilled from the souls of moths who love to dive into death. Its color and aroma are beautiful and alluring, but it's a hard liquor you can't recommend to just anyone. It would have been impeccable if, on that fine line of taste and temperament, the game had distinguished its audience solely through lucid design rather than frustrating design. As it stands, however, it seems Silksong has fallen short.

Without a doubt, the developers at Team Cherry didn’t waste these years. They poured an immense amount of work into creating the most ambitious and visually stunning Metroidvania to date—one truly worthy of standing at the very peak of the genre. Hollow Knight: Silksong lives up to the expectations of its devoted fans in every way. Yet, like any work of art, it isn’t entirely free of objective shortcomings and debatable design choices—particularly in terms of balance—that may push away less prepared players.

There is not a world in which Silksong would reach its expectations. After 7 years of waiting, the game is still an amazing adventure, but it's hard to not think that some moments are overthought. Team Cherry have a hard time figuring out what's frustrating and what's challengingly engaging.

Silksong won me over. As someone who didn't have strong feelings towards Hollow Knight, I'm glad I gave the sequel a chance. It's easy to label Silksong as brutal, but it's much more than that. Pharloom may be hostile, but fittingly so and makes for an incredibly rich and rewarding place to explore. Hornet is a delight to play as, and even though the game made me work hard, I never lost my motivation to progress.

We're not sure it's entirely wise to save a game's best material for its back half, when the climb to reach it is so steep. It's hard to judge, even, whether it was all worth it - from the top of the mountain, those struggles at its base tend to seem so small and far away. But as we approach that third act, a game that at times we were struggling to find the motivation to pick back up has become one we cannot put down. As a payoff to dozens of hours of struggle - not to mention eight years of waiting before that - it's undeniable. [Issue#416, p.98]

Despite Hollow Knight Silksong’s relentless difficulty, it’s one of the most rewarding games this year. Pharloom is a lively world with surprises waiting in every corner, and the suspenseful combat and exploration makes Hornet’s arduous journey memorable. Silksong can feel a bit unfair at times, but its challenging nature forces players to adapt and learn to be patient.

Hollow Knight: Silksong is quite the thorny case, because you can easily be disappointed in the face of its numerous hardships. By shipping a much more difficult experience, Team Cherry may lose some players. A daring choice we could praise if it was more slickly executed. Team Cherry had a real treasure but lost pearls along the way. But Silksong is no bad game. It remains a singular poetic experience, different from 8 years ago. Sceptics will need to accept the game has real qualities, from its univers to its improved combat mechanics. So then, we remember Silksong was born as a DLC. And it could have been an excellent DLC.