No Silksong Was The Least Of Indie World's Problems

Summary

Indie World doesn't deserve the pressure of the eyes of the world, but the latest one was still a miss.
Silksong has become more of a meme than a game people actually want to see.
Silksong will be here eventually. Probably. Maybe.

Most people who tuned into 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Nintendo's Indie World showcase this week were there for one thing - 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Hollow Knight: Silksong. Previously slated for early 2023, we're still yet to see anything of the anticipated sequel, and after being rated in Korea and seeing 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:a page momentarily appear on the Xಌbox stor🍬e, plus 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:being dunked on at Triple-I, many thought this was the moment Silksong would make its debut. But once more, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:it shirked the spotlight.

Silksong might be the most a game has ever lived by the rule of 'it's ready when it's ready', and in a world of tight deadlines and games broken at launch, we should be grateful for it. The game also 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:feels like the end of an era, the last game where delays and hype still feel like a big deal in this era of teaser trailers seven years out from launch. I felt this way when 168澳洲幸运5开奖ღ网:the Smash Fighters Pass dr🦹ew to a close - once it's over, what will we have to care about?

Silksong Hype Can Derail Game Showcases

Silksong key art with character jumping with needle

To be honest though, I wasn't really there for Silksong. I'll play Silksong and likely enjoy it, because that was my experience with Hollow Knight, but I never got above 'enjoy'. My hopes and dreams don't hinge on the next one. Of course, I've been in hype cycles before, and at every showcase I cross everything twice for 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Tomb Raider. I understand craving information on a game and being left empty handed each time. Silksong just doesn't do it for me.

That makes these showcases a little odd - especially for Indie World, which has typically had very small titles that lack the big capital-g Gamer appeal of the hits shown off at Nintendo Directs, or those put on by 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:PlayStation, Xbox, or Geoff Keighley. You're not supposed to watch Indie World with any expectations other than the vague hope that you might see something cool.

It's not Silksong's fault, of course. It has never teased its imminent arrival and is not responsible for conclusions jumped to from it being rated or whatever error caused it to appear prematurely on the Xbox store. But simply by existing and having created outsized expectations (Team Cherry is not the sort of studio typically associated with this sort of longing), I can't get over the feeling that Silksong makes things like Indie World a little worse.

Indie World Needs A Bigger Range Of Games

Even judged against past Indie Worlds, I thought the most recent one was fairly poor. There was an overabundance of cutesiness, several games that are already out on mobile, and the most interesting thing there was Lorelei and the Laser Eyes, which showed us a trailer we'd already seen. I was hoping for Ete (which I realise is also very cute), 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Time Flies, Despelote, Henry Halfhead, Tracks of Thought, or Hauntii, as well as just the chance to be surprised by something new. Even without caring that Silksong was missing, I didn't leave Indie World with much excitement.

On the one hand, these showcases are entirely commercial entities that screen advertisements directly to consumers. They dress these adve🌜rts up as presentations with developers talking into the camera, but they are promot🌼ional, and in many cases, the showcase host charges for the privilege. Knowing this, it seems fair to be critical of them if they fail to arouse much interest.

On the other, it feels overly cynical to look at indie devs earnestly putting forward their games that approach the industry differently to the standard violence and bloodshed and dismiss it as boring. I'd much rather have a wide range of Indie World-style games getting prominence in the industry than the same triple-A tropes being churned over again and again.

Or, on my apparently existent third hand, have I just been conned into thinking I'm being mean by calling cute games boring because of how endlessly wholesomeness is pushed as a necessity for bouncy fun indie games that exist in a different ecosystem to the rest of the industry? Or on the fourth hand (maybe I'm just being helped by a friend), does that way of thinking lead to these games being siphoned off into Games 🦩for Impact as their own specialꦯ thing that is not to be confused with real bang bang you're dead games?

All this to say Silksong should not be the be all and end all of these showcases, especially since we don't actually know if it will be any good. That goes double for Indie World, as we're only supposed to be watching because we're interested in seeing neat new things, not in the hopes of seeing one of the most anticipated titles in gaming shadowdrop that very instant. But I'd also like to see Nintendo embrace a wider range of indies to promote, and not get so caught up in the cosiness it has cultivated. Now onto the next one, where Tomb Raider is definitely gonna be there.