After months of anticipation, the 2021 Game Awards have finally come and gone. The show was packed with gaming news and accolades this year. Starting as early as the pre-show, and even earlier if a viewer had caught The MIX Picks, tons of games were revealed, re-revealed, and given new details. It was an impressive show, doubly so considering that it was the industry’s return to in-person events with a live audience. Many games were celebrated with awards and nominations, and the evening seemed to go off without a hitch.

Not everyone got everything they wanted out of the show, however. A number of games and companies were absent from the event. Rumored games like a major Sony remake and a Chrono Cross remaster never showed, and Nintendo was almost entirely absent aside from a brief look at some indies coming to the Switch. Among those was an even more conspicuous absence: Hollow Knight: Silksong, the upcoming Hollow Knight sequel from Team Cherry. This action-platformer with Soulslike elements hasn’t been shown for a while, and it seems to be taking the in-attendance Elden Ring’s spot as the Soulslike community’s white whale.

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Recapping Hollow Knight: Silksong’s Development History

The story of Hollow Knight: Silksong began with Hollow Knight’s original Kickstarter, which included a stretch goal to make the rival character Hornet playable. Despite how many updates Hollow Knight got post-launch, this feature never came, though fans were content with what they had. Suddenly, in February 2019, a trailer and developer diary were released for Silksong, the sequel to Hollow Knight featuring the more agile Hornet exploring the kingdom of Pharloom. The initial reveal had a huge amount of information, and a miniature update came a few months later detailing some of the characters. The fanbase was hyped, but it was made clear that the game wouldn’t be done for a while.

Fortunately, there was still plenty of information to share. Hollow Knight: Silksong was featured at the Nintendo Treehouse E3 2019 livestream, and a post-E3 wrap-up also contained plenty of information. A holiday sign-off from Team Cherry came in December 2019, showing off some late-game enemies and detailing the Hollow Knight: Silksong soundtrack by Christopher Larkin. The game then went silent for a full year, only to suddenly return on the last day of 2020. EDGE Magazine had released a huge exclusive article detailing many features and information about Silksong, with the level of detail bordering on excessive. Unfortunately, it seems like another silent year was in the cards.

Hollow Knight: Silksong’s Wait Feels like Elden Ring's

Hollow Knight Silksong Elden Ring E3

It has now been over one thousand days, or almost three years, since Hollow Knight: Silksong was first revealed, and fans are getting desperate. Despite Team Cherry indicating that the game was nearing completion in January of 2021, Silksong’s release date is still unknown. Throughout the past year, fans have made a habit of getting Hollow Knight or Silksong to trend on Twitter every time a Nintendo Indie World presentation happens due to sheer excitement. It isn’t unlike how anxious FromSoftware fans became when Elden Ring was first announced at E3 2019, and didn’t have any further updates until E3 2021.

Unfortunately, with what might be December’s biggest gaming event now concluded, the hope for Hollow Knight: Silksong to appear in 2021 is fading. An Nvidia GeForce Now leak from a few months ago suggested that Silksong could release as soon as February 2022, but the time to announce that grows short. It would be poetic (and more than a little unfortunate) to have Hollow Knight and Elden Ring come out in the same month, but there’s no telling yet if this window is accurate. Fans are left waiting for Hollow Knight: Silksong news much like another community waited for Elden Ring, and hopefully their wait will end in the same joyful way.

Hollow Knight: Silksong is in development for PC and Switch.

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