I was lucky to get to play the sequel of my favorite game, Hollow Knight at this year E3 at the booth of Nintendo. I found out that this sequel with the name of Hollow Knight: Silksong is familiar and different at the same time with the original game. It is still Hollow Knight with all of the essences, but this new game has a much more speedy gameplay thanks to the new Hornet's nimble nature.
My demo play
It seems like her basic movements still at the old speed, but the abilities and attacks are much faster. They have replaced my mid-air downslash with a diagonal dive thrust ( dam that was my favorite move in the 1st game). And right from the start with this sequel, she will have the ability to grab onto the edges and hop on high platforms. So I felt that I needed to relearn this game with a was really familiar with, that was a bummer. However, once I did that, I started to like this game even more than the 1st one.
I played the demo from the midgame area, watch the above video. In that demo, Hornet already owns a bunch of unlocked abilities. There is a long-range throwing knife ability, which I have to refill using a special currency with the name of Shell Shards. She also has another proper sprint ability - no more dash spamming! This sprints can also bring us into hard stab or huge jump that will bring you right over the enemy that you attack.
We still don't know much, but Silksong could be better than the first game
The most significant change in this sequel is the heal of Hornet. Instead of using long charge that heals a hit point once like in the original game, heal of Hornet is instantaneous and regains 3 hits at a time in the sequel. That is a powerful upgrade, but it will use up all your magic and only can be used when your magic is full. That whole mechanic plays an important role in my strategy in this game, so I have to be more strategic than in the previous game.
That mechanic created a few moments of high tension where the only survival way is aggression. Sometimes it felt very desperate in the boss fights in the original game because you have to find a brief moment to heal and knowing that you are really vulnerable with low health. On the other hand, Silksong’s boss fights are more like duels. With the new ability to heal quickly means that those low-health instances are the key opportunities for you to come back into full swing. Still, you need to get hit to fill that bar up.
Faster gameplay
Thanks to all those changes you can playthrough Silksong as much faster speed. The whole thing feels like an upgrade over the less agile, slower original. That is a game that does not seem afraid of taking serious changes to surpass the limitations of its predecessor. On the topic of changes, in this new game, you won't drop money you die anymore, and there is also more nuance in your abilities.
This game also has a more rich and vibrant world than the previous one. There are red lava, light green bushes, and many more colors in the background of this game for you to discover. In brief, it is a very gorgeous game.
My claim
So from what I experienced with Silksong, I think it could be even better than the legendary Hollow Knight game that I loved so much. But still, there are a lot of unanswered questions that I could find out with just this demo play. We will have to wait for the full game then, but I am happy that Team Cherry hasn't taken the safe path with this sequel and that really so how much they are dedicated to this series.
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