Hollow Knight: Silksong - Another Indie Trumph
The AAA video game studios love to pretend they control gaming. They strut around like peacocks, doling out approval and enforcing lock-step conformity.
It’s popular to reference “The Emperor’s New Clothes” when megacorps stumble. But what everybody misses about the original story is that only kids can get away with pointing out the emperor has no clothes. For grownups, bucking the crowd is the best way to get ostracized.
Unless the upstart shows up in finery so dazzling as to be unignorable. In gaming, such a feat takes a rare combination of talent, vision, and craft.
Case in point: Hollow Knight: Silksong.
Image: Team Cherry
A three-person team from Adelaide: Ari Gibson, William Pellen, and Jack Vine, backed by music from Christopher Larkin; just outshone the big guys. The release of their long-awaited sequel on Friday didn’t just sell out, it crashed Steam, the PlayStation Store, the Nintendo eShop, the Microsoft Store, and even Humble Bundle.
The crash left thousands of gamers unable to complete purchases. Error codes flooded social media, and digital storefronts were forced to admit that their platforms were unprepared for the demand.
That’s right. It wasn’t manufactured hype or a nine-figure marketing budget that crashed the system. Distribution channels designed to ration the masses’ attention collapsed under monumental demand for art people actually care about.
Related: The Great Flattening Comes for AAA Gaming
The original Hollow Knight, a hand-drawn Metroidvania that celebrated old-school gameplay while still feeling fresh, had already achieved cult phenomenon status. Now Silksong has reinforced the fact that independent creators unfettered by corporate dictates, can produce instant classics.
Within thirty minutes of launch, Steam alone reported over 100,000 active players. That’s what happens in the market when a true work of art finds its audience.
For years, AAA has trudged on under the assumption that games are products, not artowrks. But Silksong shows what happens when you stop slavishly following the rules and start making your own. When creators prioritize customers over shareholders, the system becomes secondary. And when it collapses under the weight of genuine demand, it’s not a tragedy. It’s proof that the model was broken all along.
Related: Earthion: Proof 2D Never Had to Die
Gibson, Pellen, and Vine weren’t trying to engineer a viral moment. Silksong’s seven-year development cycle was their creative choice; a deliberate refusal to compromise.
They made the game they wanted to make.
And that decision; that stubborn insistence on quality, is why the world responded with a goodwill tsunami that broke the digital bank.
This is a white-pill story for anyone weary of corporatized culture. It’s a reminder that the collapse of old cultural organs like Hollywood, New York publishing, and yes, AAA, is no cause for despair. Instead, it’s a sign of opportunity.
Now we know the audience will follow substance over flash.
The legacy gatekeepers knew they couldn’g survive authenticity they can’t control. That’s why they tried to bury it.
But now that the walls they were guarding have been leveled, the 20th century mass media regime’s days are numbered.
Team Cherry’s success provides a victory for gamers and a lesson for creators everywhere: Your work matters, and audiences will trample downt he gates for authentic entertainment. Art made with care, vision, and heart will find its way to those who value it.
And when it does, everybody sees how vulnerable and frail the old pretenders are.
For a authentic action-adventure that breaks through the dead end of twentieth-century mecha by merging the best of East and West, read my military SF epic Combat Frame XSeed!
Brian Niemeier is a best-selling novelist, editor, and Dragon Award winner with over a decade in newpub. For direct, in-person writing and editing insights, join his Patreon.