Silksong’s Update Doesn’t Change The Hardest Part Of The Game

Hollow Knight: Silksong is about to get its first-ever patch – it’s already available on PC via the public beta branch, and is expected to come to console versions sometime in the near future. One of the patch’s goals is to simplify certain aspects of gameplay, with difficulty reduction for a couple of early game bosses.

But this patch fails to address the most difficult parts of the game. One of Silksong‘s greatest strengths is in the way it manages to challenge the player even outside of combat, forcing you to adapt to a wide variety of situations. And in that regard, the hostile environment of Pharloom isn’t expected to change any time soon.

Silksong Enemies Are Tough, But Beatable

Bosses Are Scarcely Unfair

Sister Splinter Boss Fight Hollow Knight Silksong

The patch notes for version 1.0.28497 of Hollow Knight: Silksong (available in full on Steam) specifically mention a “slight difficulty reduction” for two early-game bosses. In other words, Moorwing and Sister Splinter are getting nerfed, for better or for worse.

I understand why Team Cherry felt the need to curtail Silksong‘s difficulty a bit. All reports indicate that it’s harder, on the whole, than Hollow Knight, and that’s driven some players away. Sister Splinter and Moorwing are among the hardest bosses in the game, and their names have often been invoked in Silksong’s surprisingly low Steam reviews.

But I’d argue that Silksong‘s bosses aren’t even that hard. And this isn’t just me bragging: they’re difficult, and those two bosses in particular have killed me more times than I can count.

But all the bosses have fairly recognizable attack patterns, and are rarely (if not never) unfair with their combo-building or their positioning. It may take you a few attempts to beat them, but that’s the point: you’re supposed to make mistakes, analyze your failures, learn to read the boss’ tells, and change up your strategy until you find something that works.

That’s a core facet of the gameplay loop, and part of why Silksong works – but I won’t complain too much if it’s just two early-game bosses being made more approachable for new players. The rest of Silksong – including its two hardest aspects – have been left untouched.

Silksong’s Traps Just Aren’t Fair

Spikes, Poison, Pressure Plates – You Name It

Hornet looking at a series of shriveled fruits in the Hunter's March area of Hollow Knight Silksong.

The real difficulty of Hollow Knight: Silksong, though, is the traps and environmental damage. I’ll easily win a 35th-try grudge match against one of the game’s most difficult enemies, only to walk directly into a trap I forgot about ten attempts ago, dying immediately and unceremoniously.

Traps are everywhere, and come in every shape and size. It might be a delayed-timing pressure plate that causes a massive, bony scythe to swing down at you. It might be an enemy that kidnaps you, steals all your gear, and transports you to a late-game area before your time. It might be the poison lagoons of Bilewater, or the spikes and pogo jumps of Hunter’s March.

One of my favorite uses of traps, though, exists in The Slab. There’s a room in this giant prison complex, which you must navigate without using weapons, that contains several pressure plates. One of them abruptly shuts a gate right in your face, then spawns a series of enemies whom you’re seemingly powerless to defeat.

In time, though, you learn that there are multiple other traps in the room, and you’re forced to use them to your advantage, luring your enemies into them and setting them off at exactly the right moment. It’s unfair, annoying, and quite possibly deadly the first time you encounter it, but it’s also exactly the kind of innovative design that Silksong excels at.

So, even though some of the early game bosses have been nerfed, I’m glad to see that this difficult aspect of Silksong remains untouched. Even environmental damage, which some players have complained is too high, hasn’t been changed by the recent patch.

Pharloom’s Economy Is Out Of Control

Not Enough Rosaries To Go Around

Hollow Knight Silksong Hornet resting on bench near Shakra NPC in Mount Fay area.

Another aspect of Silksong that makes it difficult, even outside of boss fights, hits a little too close to home: the economy. Although Rosary farming spots are plentiful, it’s too easy to lose everything you’ve gained too quickly. A single incomplete runback, and every Rosary you haven’t already strung into a necklace is gone forever.

This has unduly extended several of my farming runs – and because prices are so high, you actively need to farm Rosaries, or you’ll be left behind. Silksong finds ways to nickel-and-dime you for everything, charging you to unlock checkpoints, fast travel stations, even, in one case, the door to a merchant’s shop.

You often have to spend your last few Rosaries on unlocking an important resource, then are too broke to afford anything at the shops. Over time, that makes upgrading your gear prohibitively expensive, forcing you to consider and time your purchases carefully.

The Rosary economy has been slightly tweaked in Silksong‘s first patch: you’ll now get more Rosaries for completing certain tasks, including courier deliveries, relics, and psalm cylinders, and some bench and Bellway prices have been reduced. Even so, I suspect shop prices will remain high for the foreseeable future, so that facet of Silksong‘s calculated difficulty won’t be going anywhere.

To be clear, I don’t want the game to get too much easier. Although its difficulty can be crushing, Silksong is the realization of an uncompromised vision – it takes you on a journey of its own choosing, and any further difficulty reductions could detract from that. I’m glad Hollow Knight: Silksong‘s first patch doesn’t address its biggest difficulty hurdles; I only hope future patches follow suit.