Team Cherry takes home the indie hit of the year with Hollow Knight: Silksong
, by Quentin
After years of waiting, fans were finally able to embark on the adventure of Hollow Knight: Silksong. Released on September 4 on literally every platform, Team Cherry caused a real earthquake in the industry in just a few days. So let's take a look back at the game's incredible success in this review.
A franchise established since 2017
On February 24, 2017, a 2D adventure and exploration game made some waves on the press and gamers with Hollow Knight. Available on all consoles, the developers delivered a true ode to gaming, offering a polished and dreamlike experience with its own unique artistic direction and well-developed universe.
Despite fairly standard gameplay, drawing on the Metroidvania genre, Team Cherry focused on the atmosphere and overall ambiance to draw players into their world, and it worked wonders.
After such a success, it was no surprise to see Team Cherry working on a second installment, announced in February 2019 via a trailer titled Hollow Knight: Silksong. At the time, the project already seemed well advanced, and a demo was even playable at E3 2019 at the Nintendo booth.
At the time, we had no idea that we were dealing with a pipe dream that would take more than six years to come to fruition after its initial announcement. Yet that is sadly what happened. So much so that it became a running joke: at every conference, gamers would wait for it to reappear, often in vain.
It wasn't until an Xbox conference in 2022 that we saw it again. At that event, Microsoft promised to showcase only titles that would be released within 12 months of the announcement... which, as you might expect, wasn't the case.
However, the excitement was palpable. In May 2022, it even won the award for most anticipated game at the Unity Awards. Unfortunately, although the developers had planned its release for the first half of 2023, Hollow Knight: Silksong was postponed.
Of course, we can't imagine the pressure felt internally, where the small independent studio Team Cherry is working on a game that regularly appears on lists of the most anticipated titles of the year.
Despite everything, the teams are taking their time and not rushing their communications. We'll have to wait until Gamescom for a happy ending with a new announcement and a release date—which this time will be respected: September 4.
A resounding success for Hollow Knight: Silksong
Tidal wave: that's undoubtedly the best word to describe the release of Hollow Knight: Silksong on various platforms. Although it was undoubtedly one of the most eagerly awaited games of 2025, Team Cherry decided to make it available at no extra cost to Microsoft Game Pass subscribers and set its price at a very affordable €19.50.
This price drew praise from gamers around the world, who applauded the studio, which could easily have doubled the price. Especially since more than 5.2 million people had added it to their Steam wish list during its development.
Contrary to all expectations, this decision will strike a chord even with pirates, who will call for people not to download the game illegally in order to support this pricing policy and respect for gamers. This is rare enough to be worth mentioning.
Its release will attract such a flood of gamers that the Steam platform will be affected by malfunctions, displaying an error message to users when they try to access the store.
All in all, just a few days later, Hollow Knight: Silksong has attracted more than 5 million players and sold more than 3 million copies on Steam alone. Not to mention the peak number of simultaneous players, which has reached 587,000—all for approximately $50 million in revenue for Team Cherry.
The specialist press was not to be outdone, of course, with a Metacritic score of 92/100 and a user score of 9.0. This was therefore a completely successful venture for the developers, marking one of the greatest success stories of 2025 in the field of video games.
Have you been able to get your hands on Hollow Knight: Silksong? What did you think? Let us know in the comments!