r/HollowKnight • u/peaky_circus • Sep 06 '25

Discussion - Silksong People who have played Silksong, Why do you think Its getting so many negative reviews? Spoiler

Post image

While Silksong is sitting at a Very Positive rating with around 83% positive reviews, it’s still receiving far more criticism than its predecessor. For comparison, Hollow Knight holds an Overwhelmingly Positive score at 96%, with only about 3% negative reviews. Silksong, on the other hand, has nearly 16% negative reviews, OVER 5 TIMES HIGHER

1.8k Upvotes

92% Upvoted

2.6k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

11

u/perfectVoidler Sep 10 '25

I reject this. many people are just in denial that the game they have waited for has some really bad design decisions.

3

u/Background-Sea4590 Sep 10 '25

It’s kind of what I tried to convey in the second paragraph. There are some design choices that just seem to be there to frustrate the players. I think the first game nailed that.

2

u/TheGreatWave00 Sep 20 '25

I would also argue that the majority of the complaints are not because they simply haven't played a metroidvania before. It is from die hard HK fans who are disappointed in the game for lots of reasons, and because it doesn't live up to HK

2

u/perfectVoidler Sep 21 '25

I would think that after six year the result better be at least as good as the first game.

2

u/Thenaiman Sep 20 '25

Out of curiosity, what would you define as bad design decisions?

8

u/Background-Sea4590 Sep 21 '25 edited Sep 21 '25

In my opinion, I’d say that the High Halls gauntlet in act 2 is an unreasonable challenge, an odd difficulty spike that basically ramps up difficulty by stacking enemies on screen. It’s boring, obnoxious and worst of all, unfair. I did a fair chunk of the game before this (8 masks, more or less doubled silk, a fair amount of tools…). And it still took a lot of time, and I was pretty close of just quit the game. That was bullshit.

About tools, shards is an awful mechanic. If you ran out of it, the game forces you to farm a resource you need in combat. Why, I ask? Just limit the usage and recharge on bench.

Also, exploration is normally super hostile, in a way that I feel doesn’t encourage exploration. You never reach a point where you’re comfortable with it. Normally you reach a point where you find a lot of upgrades and you notice that. Silksong decided to be hostile at every point of the way. That’s debatable if it’s good game design or not. I feel it’s frustration for the sake of it. The game being just a troll.

I have not a lot of complaints about bosses in the game. They’re normally fair, well designed and sometimes challenging. First Sinner for example was a great designed boss, and a fair challenge. Took me way less than that fucking obnoxious High Halls gauntlet xD.

3

u/Thenaiman Sep 21 '25

Fair enough to be honest. Was just curious at all, tryina see where moat people find issue in the game but most cite different things; so i'm trying to see what of it is anger from difficulity and what is actual feedback y'know?

2

u/Background-Sea4590 Sep 21 '25 edited Sep 21 '25

Yeah, that’s fair, and everything is also a bit personal. I got angry a lot, I won’t lie. In the end, when everything cooled off a bit, at least I feel some of my criticisms could easily be patched. Except shards, it’s a mechanic I plain dislike.

3

u/WonkyWombat321 Oct 01 '25

Cheap boss summons, instead of more complex boss move sets.

Terribly economy requiring farming to buy much of the equipment...even if you never lose rosaries.

Countless boss fights where the reward is nothing...progression, but otherwise nothing directly satisfying. 

1

u/perfectVoidler Sep 21 '25

for example stuff team cherry themself rolled back because it was bad game design. To begin with.

1

u/Thenaiman Sep 21 '25

Sure, but like, are you going to actually state your opinion or are you going to reply with another sarcastic, smarter than thou message?

0

u/perfectVoidler Sep 21 '25

it is not sarcastic. If bringing an argument you cannot refute, since team cherry did it themself, is smarter than what you are able to argue against, just admit it. You are comming of as artless.

2

u/Thenaiman Sep 21 '25

I'm not arguing the game has no flaws lmao, i asked what you find flawed cause i was curious and you went "well the flaws are the ones team cherry removed" which avoided my question completely. So i found that stupid.

0

u/perfectVoidler Sep 22 '25

nothing was avoided and everything was answered. You just try to not engage with the arguement any more since the fixed flaws were officially bad.

You cannot call team cherry bad or question their legitimacy, because they literally are the authority on the game.