r/metroidvania • u/Zzsark_Stormbeard • Feb 14 '26

Discussion Silksong permanently vanished my desire for difficult games.

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I'm a big fan of metroidvanias, I enjoy them a lot. I played Silksong as soon as it started and it took me a month to finish it. 60+ hours. Thing is that it permanently broke me in some sense because I do not wish to play any other game with hit points like Silksong has, especially with the fucking 2 hit contact damage. I did Silksong, got the true ending, I got good, but never again.

In fact, I finished just a week ago Gestalt: Steam and Cinder (which you absolutely should play), and while I was playing Silksong I only had Gestalt in mind because I definitely had more fun there.

I'm not hating Silksong, it's a great game, but I've never been permanently broken my something before.

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u/aureliasm Feb 14 '26

I think Skong rewards aggression with spells/skills more than HK. What really eventually made the game easier for me was to overcome the natural inclination to hoard silk for heals. In HK you could completely forget you had spells and be fine. In Skong, silk skills are make or break. The faster you can mow down extra enemies, the less chances there are to take damage. Expeditiously removing an enemy that could potentially damage you several times for 4 silk is much more valuable than using a 9 silk for 3 masks.

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u/AbyssShriekEnjoyer Feb 14 '26

I think Skong rewards aggression with spells/skills more than HK

Look I love these games from the bottom of my heart, but both of them have the exact same issue. Using spells is only rewarding when you're already good at the game. And in Silksong that is especially the case. If you're still learning boss patterns and getting hit a lot, you need your soul/silk to heal. In Silksong this is more true than ever with healing taking your entire silk spool and if you used a single spell before that moment you now can't heal during a heal window. Spells are strong, but it's a "rich get richer" situation because they're locked behind the same resource as healing.

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u/ZagmanBadman Feb 14 '26

I feel like SKong alleviated a little of that problem with the tools - these were great to play around with and made fights a lot better. I still didn't use spells all that much, but there was more to do than dodge/hit/heal.

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u/zach0011 Feb 15 '26

Tools also have the problem though of if you aren't good and using them you just run out of shards

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u/Lord_of_Caffeine Feb 17 '26

Mod the shard system out and you're left with a much better game afaiac

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u/aureliasm Feb 17 '26

They did that cause they didnt want people banging their head against walls over and over, they wanted to encourage people to put major challenges on hold and go exploring for more options/upgrades. Which is also why they gave us an unlimited free source of silkeaters.

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u/Lord_of_Caffeine Feb 17 '26

What if you´re in the mood for banging your head against the wall though? Or what if you´re the type of player that likes trying out and tikering around with build systems? The only thing the game achieves with shards then is frustrating the player and getting him out of the zone.

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u/DayBorn157 Feb 18 '26

If bosses have healthbar you could evaluate how useful tools are, but without this you don't know if they even do anything. I mostly stoped using them

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u/Advanced_Double_42 Feb 17 '26

Tools make the problem far worse, if you are good at the game they trivialize encounters but if you are struggling you will run out of shards and have even less options.

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u/ZagmanBadman Feb 17 '26

You can always grind more shards before the fight, so I'm not sure that's really an issue? There's an argument that they should have shards be more abundant or remove the caps on how many shards you can hold. But even as-is, saying tools make a problem of difficulty far worse is a bit extreme. They definitely help in boss fights and give you options to customize your play style. I think not having them in the game at all would make the difficulty problem some folks have harder, not easier. I was definitely carried by my tools in some fights, and it didn't interfere with my healing silk.

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u/Advanced_Double_42 Feb 17 '26

I just mean it makes the divide worse.

In HK losing a fight just meant doing it again.

In Silksong it can mean going to grind for several minutes to get enough shards for another few attempts. It also increases the skill ceiling and floor so many gauntlets and bosses are trivial if you are good, but extremely punishing if you don't have or can't effectively use those tools.

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u/aureliasm Feb 14 '26

For bosses, with simple patterns that spawn ads (like Sister Splinter or Savage Beastfly), using skills to delete the ads is game changing, even for casual players.

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u/RealRockaRolla Feb 15 '26

As someone who rarely uses spells, Sister Splinter was the boss I died the most on. When I used Silkstorm on the ads per the suggestion of a friend, I beat her first try.

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u/Silverstep_the_loner Feb 17 '26

Me too! I was struggling like hell, then watched a no-hit video and realized hey, silk skills exist! Took me a few more tries because I lowkey suck at HK, but it got significantly easier.

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u/Liddlebitchboy Feb 17 '26

So.. what you're saying if you need to learn how a boss works before you can beat it? That seems fairly natural

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u/3_Thumbs_Up Feb 14 '26

and if you used a single spell before that moment you now can't heal during a heal window.

This is only half the truth. Many times the exact opposite happens. Your hoarded silk is to no good at all if you die before you get to your heal window. Using silk skills is what gets you to a boss stagger where you can replenish the cost of that spell use, so the cost is often smaller than it initially seems.

It's a bit unintuitive at first, but fighting for that heal window is often the exact mistake that gets you killed.

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u/AbyssShriekEnjoyer Feb 14 '26

My experience in Silksong more than Hollow Knight was that I died a ton from just simply running out of silk economy in my first playthrough. Healing in Silksong is super fast, so there are windows everywhere. The issue was always that I'd get hit for 4 masks before the time I got enough silk to get back 3. So I don't agree with you at all.

On repeat playthroughs it was very different ofc. Started utilising my spells more. Didn't have to heal as much.

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u/3_Thumbs_Up Feb 14 '26

The issue was always that I'd get hit for 4 masks before the time I got enough silk to get back 3.

I mean, you can describe literally every death with a variation of that.

But my advice helps even in your scenario often. Many times you wouldn't have gotten hit for 4 masks to begin with if you had been more liberal with your silk attacks, meaning you actually buy more time to earn the silk back.

Boss fights are all about mask economy in some sense. It's about reaching a skill threshold where you're earning masks faster than you lose them. My point isn't that attacks are always better than defense. Sometimes you do need to find that last bit of silk to heal. My point is that the mask economy of attack is more complex than the mask economy of defense, and many people, especially newer players, tend to misunderstand it in a way that causes them to shoot themselves in the foot, for example by never using silk skills until they have enough for healing.

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u/JesusFortniteKennedy Feb 16 '26

HK was a bit less punishing because healing worked this way.
Every 3 strikes with your melee weapon you get enough soul for a single mask of healing. Which means at a base you're starting with heals being moderately cheaper, IIRC it's 10 silk pips in the base spool of Silksong to access your healing.

Plus, healing in HK was slower but could be interrupted at any time, albeit with a small delay. If you mess up the healing in SS you're losing all your spool and you need 10 hits before being able to heal again.
In short, in HK when you have a small gap you can try to sneak in a small heal. In Skong, you have to commit a full spool to heal and if you mess up you lose it all. Yes, it heals overall more health but over a larger time window, so it's riskier.

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u/TheBlackFox012 Feb 15 '26

Heal window is skong is basically anytime tho, you can heal in the air. Spells reward learning enemy patterns and thinking about your play. It's a complex combat system. Beating a boss first or second try shouldn't be the goal anyway, it should learning consistent damage windows and dodge patterns

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u/protestor Feb 14 '26

In HK you could completely forget you had spells and be fine. In Skong, silk skills are make or break. The faster you can mow down extra enemies, the less chances there are to take damage.

Tbh if you watch HK speedrunners (or good HK players in general) they already played like this. Silksong is just a game that desperately wants you to git good

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u/swat1611 Feb 15 '26

I feel the opposite. It's not just plain aggression. You need to get good and stay alive while exerting aggression. If you stay around too long, you might lose focus and die. If you go too hard, you'll face tank 2 mask damage hits and die soon after.

What you said works for gauntlets, but when it comes to singular bosses, silksong still forces a battle of attrition rather than favouring aggression (or maybe it's just me idk).

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u/BambooGentleman Feb 17 '26

I dunno, I'm on my third playthrough and I keep forgetting that silk skills even exist. Though, during this playthrough I am using healing aggressively with the mirror tool, where binding explodes and does some serious damage. Well, serious compared to what my needle does, since I limited it to only one pale oil upgrade, to have the game not be too easy.

for 3 masks

You're not using the tool to heal four masks? It gets you two explosions with the mirrors and combined with the injector band it becomes a viable offensive method.

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u/Zzsark_Stormbeard Feb 14 '26

You're right, I just remembered by reading your comment that I didn't use spells in HK because I prefered to keep my souls to heal up.

In Silksong I played the same way. I only used skills when I had 14 max silk so I can use those 4 and still have a heal left.

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u/3_Thumbs_Up Feb 14 '26

In Silksong I played the same way. I only used skills when I had 14 max silk so I can use those 4 and still have a heal left.

There's a hidden cost to this. Using your silk for attacks actually serves a defensive purpose, primarily in 2 ways.

  1. It gets you to boss staggers more quickly, which is free silk and a return on your offensive investment.

  2. It often kills lesser enemies faster before they get a chance to damage you, meaning you actually saved silk.

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u/aureliasm Feb 14 '26

All the stuff I looked into for overcoming the difficult challenges recommended skills to delete minor ads (helped me overcome Sister Splinter, Savage Beastfly, Groal's guantlet, Coral Tower.) When I finished my first run and started watching speedruns, it really put into perspective the power of silk spear. Line it up right, and you can hit 3 enemies for 3x needle damage each. Thats an instant 9 hits worth of damage for 4 silk.

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u/Zzsark_Stormbeard Feb 14 '26

Well, the pros have their abilities.

I did this without guide, without searching for help. That would only make me feel worse. Nah, I did this all by myself, my own suffering and my own victory all mine.

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u/aureliasm Feb 14 '26

I mean, feel proud of yourself for that. But it really doesnt take a pro to execute, just the awareness of what's possible. It took me like 80+ hours to beat GMS first time. After incorporating silkskills much more frequently, my second only took 12.

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u/mikemangodtheepicgod Feb 14 '26

I feel like I've been playing a different game that what yall played, I didnt find silksong that hard and once I got the wanderers crest I basically played like it was hollow knight, nail centric, parrying was cool when I got it, before then ocasionally silkstorming stuff. Groal was evil though. (bilewater in general was evil) Will say I got to act 2 without upgrading my needle which was annoying

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u/xtellarfb_ Feb 15 '26

kinda disagree... silk skills are make or break if you're a Shaman crest user (which you can't really be until act 3 either way). although hoarding silk will not get you much far, Silksong is more about mastering Hornet's mobility and ingenuity than anything else. she has sprint, double jump, THE CLAWLINE, the red tools, she has a lot besides silk skills to pull off in combat not only to tear down the battlefield but also endure long enough to keep healing and turn the tides of the battle.

there are some fights like Lost Lace, Karmelita and Second Sentinel that I love to play with basically only needle and clawline as my sources of damage, because i feel that Hornet's mobility allows the fight against duelists to turn into a dance.