Do you ever feel that Hollow Knight: Silksong is never coming out? I do. It has been six years since Team Cherry announced that their beloved Metroidvania project would be getting a standalone sequel, following the life of Hornet in a new, explorable map.
Six years. Six years without an update from the developers, so there’s probably something going on internally with Team Cherry. They simply have nothing to share yet. Still, it would be great if they could provide assurance to their dedicated fanbase.
Right now, I’m here to say that despite Hollow Knight: Silksong's absence for half a decade, more and more Metroidvanias have risen to take their place as genre leaders. For some, it’s the new Ender Magnolia or Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown. For me, it’s Red Candle Games’ (Detention, Devotion) Nine Sols.
It was a game I never expected to become immersed in until I entered its fantastic world. If you haven’t played Nine Sols yet, I highly recommend going in blind. As a warning, there may be slight spoilers ahead.
The Metroidvania Genre Keeps Moving
With Nine Sols, I’ve realized that we no longer need Silksong. The long gap between Silksong's announcement and its lack of a release schedule has allowed other developers to craft unique takes on the Metroidvania genre. These games now rival Hollow Knight in quality and creativity.
Titles like Blasphemous and Videogamedunkey’s ANIMAL WELL have cemented themselves as strong IPs in a saturated market. And then we have Nine Sols, who has steadily proven that the Metroidvania genre is evolving.
Meanwhile, Silksong's prolonged development time has caused fans to lose interest.
The Parrying Is Addicting
Nine Sols' combat shares the same flair and responsiveness as Hollow Knight, but with one key difference: a parry system similar to Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice by FromSoftware.
It’s the best integration of a parry mechanic I’ve seen in a 2D game. Each fight in Nine Sols demands careful thinking and perfect timing with the parry buttons. From simple enemies to bosses with fifty different movesets, mastering the parry system turns you into a deflection expert.
It’s honestly impressive how fluid the combat feels. Once I rolled the credits, I felt like a god returning to face the bosses in the game’s built-in ‘Boss Replay’ feature.
Cyberpunk Meets Taoism
What drew me into Hollow Knight was the mysterious nature of Hallownest — a bug-infested realm filled with dead carcasses and bug silk scattered everywhere. The deeper I ventured, the more intricate the lore became.
Nine Sols achieves this as well. While its storytelling is more linear than Hollow Knight's branching paths, I was drawn to Nine Sols' narrative because of its impressive science-fiction setting. Dubbed “Taopunk” by the developers, Nine Sols blends East Asian aesthetics with a bleak cyberpunk dystopia. Set on a distant planet far from Earth, the story follows our characters venturing into the stars.
The first few hours ultimately drew me in, and I wasn’t expecting the game to lean so heavily into science fiction. From that point on, I was fully immersed.
Fantastic Boss Fights
Like any other Metroidvania, Nine Sols boasts an impressive roster of bosses that will make you want to throw your controller. I spent nearly an entire day battling one boss later in the game, and the frustration was real. But I learned its moves, improved, and pushed through, only to be met with an even tougher challenge.
The difficulty spike is one of the things I appreciate most about the game. As someone who loves a challenge, Nine Sols' unforgiving combat system forces you to master parrying and dodging, unlike Hollow Knight's simpler dodge mechanics.
There’s so much I loved about Nine Sols. I clocked in about 30 hours on my standard playthrough and still missed some side quests. Regardless, it was a fantastic experience that made me forget the hype surrounding Silksong.
Team Cherry is working hard on the sequel to their award-winning game, and they deserve credit for that. But isn’t it high time fans get anything as reassurance?
Nine Sols has filled the void that Silksong's absence created. And I can’t wait to see more Metroidvanias that push the genre forward, even as we wait for Silksong.