Recent reviews by 󠁥⁧⁧ Wind

Just a quick reminder that you actually have no choices in this game, except to customize a choice that gives the same consequence in a cosmetic way.

Now that I played the entire game I can actually give a sensible review. You can read the summarized version here:

PRO
- The actors had a stunning performance, I genuinely loved all of them
- Camera work is well done
- The controls are easy to master and the game play elements are pretty alright
- Your decisions actually have consequences and it's really fun to see them play out
- It was a pretty immersive experience, I really did feel as if I was managing this broadcast and it does seem like the people who made this game had an experience on such things beforehand

MIXED

- The story felt like a mixed bag, on one hand there are the funny and silly segments of the game that you know not to take seriously and then on the other hand the joke drags on for too long and I can't be invested in the main conflict, I genuinely preferred knowing more about the side characters instead

CON
- Certain segments just dragged for too long in my opinion
- The family segments and other similar segments felt pretty boring and irrelevant, it doesn't feel like your choice on those really affects you much, especially game play-wise
- It was blatantly obvious that these people have no knowledge of how internal and external politics work and it's a big issue because it drags the entire story line down, and I couldn't help but cringe at a multitude of elements. (Now, the main problem is that a lot of information is hidden from us and it is a tad difficult to really judge the whole picture, I also did only play this game once, without seeing the other endings.)

In the end, if you want to play this game for its more political elements you won't find anything interesting, the story is not nuanced enough and it's obvious that these people haven't done their research, but if you want a fun experience in which you can just chill out in the back stage and look at some silly moments, then this game is for you.

Literally an Overwatch 2 copy but without the charm

I'm pretty disappointed by this game, if I could I would rate this as a mixed bag, but for now I will still narrowly recommend it to the people who played the previous game.

Here's a summary of what I think:

PROs
- The slavic mythology lore
- The improved graphics

Mixed
- The new mechanics, some work, while others just feel like they drag the game down
- Characters - even if they are the same mostly, some feel like they get absolutely no development while others are more panned out
- The story - while some parts are interesting and fleshed out I was also disappointed by how certain facts were forgotten

Cons
- Your choices don't matter no matter what you do or how fast you act
- Certain chapters feel like they drag down without anything too conclusive and it mostly feels boring to play through
- Repetitive mechanics

Firstly, YOUR CHOICES DON'T MATTER. And I genuinely mean it. You can't control anything major in this game, but you can control the minor events. I was really disappointed by this.

Anyways, I will unfortunately enter the spoiler territory from here on out. READS BEWARE.

1. You have no choice over whether you confront or not the Swans, nor whether they take over your castle or not. I tried everything and it genuinely doesn't change anything.

2. You have no choice over the fate of the lions, even if you managed to find more information about them early on. So whatever happens with Via Lyt she will consider you a liar no matter what and you can't find the lion faster even if you managed to gather all the clues as to where the lions were in the first chapter.

3. No matter how you manage the situations, the King will collapse and lose consciousness.

4. No matter what you do or say EVERYONE will hear about the son's tail and the Kingdom will be viewed more negatively but that happens at the end.

5. Your interactions with the lords or kings from the previous game did not add anything new to this game.

TL;DR
Honestly, I really loved playing through this game, it felt so short but fun nonetheless.
The art is gorgeous, the gameplay, although repetitive, is backed by the intriguing story and likeable characters.

As a kingdom managing sim it reminded me of a lot of games like the whole Kingdom series or Sort the Court also some games unrelated to this genre like Death and Taxes. The mechanics of this game are nothing impressive to be fair but what makes the game more intriguing is the story and how it actually changes the mechanics throughout the game.
I will try to explain this bit without spoiling too much. Certain parts push you to decide whether to support or help certain people, though certainly what sucks the most is that there are no backlashes for certain long-term decisions you might make towards supporting certain shady characters, the narrative plays almost the same and even if you get quick-time events they actually don't affect how the scenes play out in the end. And honestly I did see certain events coming from a mile away, but I still got awestruck by certain twists. I also do understand that certain events are out of the protagonist's control which explains why certain scenarios can't be managed.
What I will give this game credit for is how other decisions actually come biting you in the end, even if the narrative plays the same. What I liked the most was that at the end I was helped by those that I helped in return, the peasants and the people that came for an audience to ask for help since the beginning of the game.
Another thing that I liked were the characters, mostly the family.

Another thing that I would criticize is the worldbuilding but I will argue further in the suggestions part.

Suggestions - for future sequels (including the ones after the second game)

So how can the developers improve the game?

I know that they've made a sequel, I also feel like this piece of advice can apply to both the sequel and any other future sequels.

Firstly, try giving the players the illusion that they don't have a choice in certain matters and outside matters could also affect their actions, but also throw them a bone by giving them more small choices that affect more small outcomes, for example the behavior on other characters.
I think this worked well for the sequel actually, although for certain matters the sequel also failed.
Why did it succeed? Because there were certain events in the sequel that felt a lot more impactful than the ones in the sequel than in the first game and there was a certain matter of urgency.
Why did it fail? Giving up on certain mechanics for other mechanics in the sequel was actually a bad idea in my humble opinion. Having a prosperity bar in which you could mechanically add Happiness really eliminated that sense of worry on whether or not my decision on helping certain people mattered. Also, eliminating the army meter was also pretty disappointing. Although even in the first game it did not have that big of an importance until later on, or for certain events, it still gave a certain urgency. |
Also, using the resource part for other matters, I feel like it was a two-edged sword. I like the idea of being able to explore using the resource tab, but at the same time it's also weird because you can no longer help the people that come for your aid with actual resources. Instead, you have to use items or you have to appoint an agent, which just seems odd to me. What even are "resources" at this point? It ruins the immersion for me at least, they don't feel like resources at this point but mostly some brownie points that I can buy using Prosperity. It's also funny that later on you have to make up certain crates using items, what is the point of having a "resources" part if the crates don't really add up to that.
The agent mechanic from the second game is alright, it makes everything feel a lot more simplistic, also having certain points for them instead of making them go away for weeks feels a bit more unrealistic compared to the first game.

What I would do is keep the mechanics from the first game but also add or keep certain elements from the second game. What I would add would be the exploration map, I would also keep the agents but I would scrap entirely the gauge mechanic when trying to help someone or do an action. What I mean by that is that bar that you need to fill up with certain items or points from agents. I would instead add back the weeks mechanic, so in that case an agent would be gone for a week or two. I do understand that this wouldn't work for the second game but I think it could work for a future sequel.
What I would also do is expand on the worldbuilding. What I disliked the most about the first and the second game was the fact that aside from Atana and Radovia, we barely know anything about the other Kingdoms and we never hear from the other kings or Kingdoms. It is really odd honestly, especially in the sequel, perhaps the other kings could've helped for example. I think this is the weakest point really. I can't imagine how important outside relations are in general. Trade, with other kingdoms, also affects the internal economy, one can tax the other kingdoms and other kingdoms can also interact back. Rumors and other views of other kingdoms on you, not just Atana, could affect the kingdom a lot. Security, the interactions and relations with other kingdoms is very important.
I think the focus was intentionally put only on internal relations and I totally understand that to some extent but external relations also affect internal relations and without the existence of other kingdoms that interact as well and affect our kingdom then things don't make much sense. Radovia is mostly absent in the second game and in the first one it felt more like a foreign force that we were left intentionally without any information on it,
Another thing that I would add on top of expanding on external relations and other kingdoms is adding Prestige as another mechanic instead of the Influence tab from the second game. Prestige will determine the importance of the Kingdom in the international relations, mostly from the view of neutral kingdoms. This can affect trading, taxes and resources gained as well. The worse the prestige the less likely are foreigners to visit the kingdom, trade, pay taxes inside our kingdom or just visit the kingdom.
Also a diplomacy tab, in which a pigeon or a person could be send to contact outside kingdoms and to form relationships with other kingdoms, either of enmity or friendship. It would be nice to be able to communicate with certain kings through correspondence, by sending letters, replying to them, choosing how to reply to them.

Another thing that I would improve is adding more small choices, mostly directed towards the people that we helped. I liked that some returned and thanked us for helping them and such but I wish there could be more impact, I wish there were more recurring characters that return with requests. I liked the small things in the first game, the fact that we could interact with objects and do certain things that are not possible in the second game.
The second game felt more lackluster in this sense, there wasn't much intrigue on this front and most of the gameplay felt mostly repetitive. Adding more small things like these or recurring characters with interesting requests or with outcomes that actually come back later. For example, in the first game helping people actually mattered because they could join our army in the end, in the second game it doesn't matter, and even if you fall for a person who is a scammer in the second game, it does not matter, because in the end you just lose happiness but no one will remember that you got scammed, you can always use Prosperity to buy back happiness.

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I haven't finished the game so far but I just wanted to say some quick thoughts, I might edit this review.

I definitely recommend the game to any Hollow Knight fan who would like to finally get the thrill of playing HK like it's the first time again.


MINOR SPOILERS
(I will not talk explicitly about the bosses or anything too specific though)

Firstly, I think the game really excels as a sequel. It picked up right where it left and it really delivered.

It improved on certain aspects of Hollow Knight.

UI
The UI feels familiar, yet it's obvious that they revamped certain things.
I honestly liked what they did with the side quests, the new UI which tracks your progress and shows you clearly what you need to do is nice.

WORLDBUILDING
The world building is captivating, leaving some aspects ambiguous, yet at the same time it does leave enough clues so that we could piece together a coherent story.
The areas that we get to explore are nicely packed with pieces of lore and certain characters that illuminate certain situations. I think the visuals build an even better picture of the world as a whole and it's the strongest suit for both Silksong and Hollow Knight.


CHARACTERS
The new characters are also nice. I like the Hornet gets the chance to talk with the peaceful ones and certain exchanges were really satisfying to read but I won't spoil anything.

BOSSES AND ENEMIES
The bosses from the beginning of the game feel really easy to beat. Of course it makes sense to make them easy, after all some players haven't touched Hollow Knight in years, so you need to get them back on track. But at the same time the difficulty doesn't really intensify on them as much as it used to in Hollow Knight which surprised me a little. Also some mini-bosses felt harder than the bosses themselves which speaks volume.

Also, certain random enemies that are not so important deal double damage. In Hollow Knight this case is rare, but in Silksong it's a lot more common and I genuinely don't like it. It feels like a half-assed way to make the game more difficult without actually giving the player a satisfying challenge.

Another thing that was added was getting past certain challenges that feel like a mini Colosseum of Fools. You get stuck in an area and certain enemies spawn and you have to defeat them to escape.

It's an interesting choice but to me it feels like a mixed bag.
It can work to make the game more challenging but it can also be a pain in the ass especially if we didn't expect it at all.
Another thing is that you barely get any rewards that are worth it after defeating the enemies from that situation. It's extremely high risk and low reward compared to Hollow Knight.

MUSIC
The music is absolutely amazing, nothing unexpected here. But, a critique would be the lack of music for certain mini-bosses. Maybe this only applies at the beginning and middle.
Maybe it was also a bug from my side perhaps, because on certain mini-bosses I wouldn't hear any sound at all and it felt really boring to beat them.

VISUALS
The visuals remain strong as always and they get even better. I might be just bold enough to say that the visuals in Silksong are better than the ones from Hollow Knight.

GAMEPLAY
The game itself doesn't feel fairly balanced for certain enemies, I did explain my points above so I will not repeat myself.

The overall gameplay is pretty satisfying with one exception which can be later fixed.
I genuinely hated the vertical pogo jump, it feels so unpredictable at times. But we will later get certain upgrades which can modify this.

Except for what I said before, I like the the new addictions that Silksong brought on the table.


What I also liked the most was

SPOILER

THE 1 HOUR SESBIAN LEX SCENE WITH ACTUAL SCISSORS BETWEEN 2 VERY POPULAR CHARACTERS WAS INSANE.

The delicate flower specifically made me uninstall this game again.

I played this game like a week or 2 ago and at first I didn't want to because I saw the reviews on it.
I noticed that most people complained about the first chapter, specifically about how everything revolves around the brother's trans identity. To which I have to say, yeah it was pretty 'in your face' and it was a bit annoying but then and I think depending on your choices that's no longer the central theme of the whole thing and there's a pretty interesting twist in all of it and I genuinely enjoyed this game so don't get discouraged by the reviews and give it a try.

10/10 this game is so nice despite its short playtime