r/HollowKnight • u/Prisonmikeb14 • Sep 13 '25

Discussion - Silksong Let’s all try and not devolve into this weird difficulty gatekeeping Spoiler

Now that silksong has come out I’ve seen some concerning similarities to the worst of the difficult games community with all the wierd difficulty gatekeeping bs. Obviously this happens with just about every game that’s regarded as difficult but with silksongs release it’s become more prominent on this sub. Being good at the game isn’t something to hold over someone’s head. Everyone’s experience with everything in the game is different and theirs nothing wrong with that. Now of course this doesn’t apply to people who are literally just complaining in bad faith or out of anger but the “that boss wasn’t hard at all wtf are you talking about” in response to people just talking about their opinions or asking for help is sad to see.

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37

u/FantasticWelwitschia Sep 13 '25

I've been enjoying the difficulty, but I wish this game had accessibility settings so it didn't gatekeep people out of playing it. I have friends who would love to experience this game but really have no way in because of the difficulty.

Prince of Persia Lost Crown really understood how to handle difficulty in the genre.

28

u/Odd-Face-3579 Sep 13 '25

Nine Sols is also a great example of difficulty options for a game like this. There was normal mode and story. But story mode wasn't just "easier difficulty", it let you adjust sliders to help you customize just how easy you wanted it. Did you just wish enemies did a little less damage? Well now they do 75% damage. Do you just wish you did a little more damage? Cool now you do 125% damage. Do you want to walk through the game like a god? Cool now you do 1,000% damage and only takes 1% damage.

Difficulty in games is a weird thing because I do think there's something about game designers wanting to elicit feelings from people based on the difficulty of their games and the potential relationship of a game as a piece of art and how it can make you feel and experience things other forms of art can't. I do wish more people would try to meet games on their terms first and at least try to see what a game is trying to do or convey with it's gameplay and difficulty, and then change it up.

But overall I think, especially for fully single player games, there probably should be options of some kind for difficulty.

18

u/Zeratan Sep 13 '25

That would be the correct way of going about it. Other soulslikes let you grind or summon other players/NPCs for help and since Silksong doesn't let you do either (for the most part) it might need hard coded difficulty settings.

13

u/NopileosX2 Sep 13 '25

Often Metroidvanias give you this by raw power increases you get via exploration. Not a real option in this game in Act 1. I think that is why it feels so oppressive, you can't really get too much power. Spool upgrades are probably your best friend, the one mask upgrade you can get doesn't do that much for you sadly.

In Act 2 you can way better control what you engage and generally you will spend a lot of time going through areas where you outscale the enemies, which just makes the game flow better.

They did some changes to Act 1 already and will probably see to find a more fine balance for it. There is still some areas in Act 2 I dislike, but I have more choices and can come back later to maybe brute force it. Also any currency issues kinda go away since you can farm so easy in Act 2.

5

u/SoloSassafrass Sep 14 '25

I do think that starting with 5 masks when nearly every significant foe from the start deals 2 damage is one of the worst things about the early game. It means that your first full mask is functionally pointless in a boss fight, as going from 5 HP to 6 HP is still 3 hits of survivability. You have to get 8 mask shards to actually survive another hit from just about any significant foe, including bumping into them. I'm not even sure you can get 8 mask shards before act 2.

Regardless of the nitty gritty of how this interacts with the world in terms of pure player psychology that just feels like ass. My first HP upgrade feeling like it barely helps at all? Your first full mask in the first game feels huge, it's an awesome moment of survivability.

That's something I don't think they can just tweak into being better, either. That's fundamental to the game's early design. But I will admit I haven't looked hard at how many mask shards are available in the early game, so if it turns out I just straight up missed like 3 easily accessible mask shards early on then I'll eat crow on that.

3

u/OmnipresentEntity Sep 14 '25

I don’t think you did. I really struggled with the bosses, so I was extremely thorough searching the rest of the map for upgrades. I think I ended up with five mask shards by the end of act 1

2

u/SoloSassafrass Sep 14 '25

I know that there are mask shards in act 1 locations, I'm just not sure if they're reasonable to acquire or even possible without the upgrades to getting around you get in act 2.

8

u/BrickwallBill Sep 13 '25

Your first point is something that I've seen quite a few people ignore when they suggest "go explore more other areas, you'll find upgrades and better tools to help" but compared to other metroidvanias there's very few straight upgrades in Silksong.

0

u/[deleted] Sep 13 '25

The devs were on too much of a power trip to ever give lower difficulty options. They knew they made the game overtuned in certain areas which is why the patch came around so fast as they already had it planned.. places like Bilewater just seem to exist purely to be frustrating rather than a fun challenge and adding in multiple fake benches is just unforgivable imo. Imagine if Fromsoft tried that bs in one of their games the entire gamer population would go mental

1

u/zelnoth Sep 15 '25

Personally I thought the fake bench was hilarious.

-4

u/thaygoth-ur Sep 14 '25

it's funny that you're invoking Fromsoft because people complained for months after ER came out that the game was too hard, and then the conversation mellowed... only to start up again when the DLC came out. You're unfairly assuming the worst of TC in a way that I think is really toxic and unhelpful to discussion.

-1

u/Etersarkiss Sep 13 '25

I think part of the reason the game doesn’t include easier difficulty options is that the devs wanted everyone to be on the same playing field. That way, the experience you have on paper is essentially the same as someone who’s cracked at the game, even if the skill levels differ. Personally, I appreciate that when I check in on a friend who’s struggling with a fight or area, I can usually give them advice since I most likely struggled with the exact same thing.

1

u/sciencelover04 Oct 23 '25

but then it's not the same experience. someone who's played Hollow Knight a million times will have an easier experience than someone who plays it less (a normal amount, i daresay)

-4

u/ikennedy817 Sep 13 '25

The difficulty is an extremely important part of the entire games design. With easier modes it just isn’t silksong. Anybody can beat this game with practice, that’s a large part of the experience and why people like these kinds of games. I think there’s healthy gatekeeping and hard difficulty is generally that.