How Hollow Knight: Silksong’s release took Steam by storm, beating Battlefield 6’s record — not to mention Xbox Game Pass numbers

The anticipation for Hollow Knight: Silksong, which has been deafening and stirred up quite a storm online for several months now, certainly didn’t disappoint upon its launch on September 4. What is indeed surprising, though, is the immense response it received at its release – it even managed to temporarily crash the Steam store.

According to SteamDB statistics, Hollow Knight: Silksong quickly surged past 500,000 simultaneous players on Valve’s gaming platform, Steam, upon release, and it hasn’t dropped below 300,000 since then, not even during the quietest hours of the night. At this moment, it’s hovering around 480,000, and earlier today it reached an incredible high of 562,814 players.

On Friday, [Hollow Knight: Silksong] reached an incredible height of 562,814 concurrent players, placing it as the 18th most-played game on Steam all time. This surpassed the peak player count of 521,079 achieved during the Battlefield 6 Open Beta in August.

The game has now been played 18 times more than any other in Steam’s history, surpassing even the peak player count of August’s Battlefield 6 Open Beta, which had reached 521,079 players. The beta’s performance was particularly impressive, with Electronic Arts and DICE’s playtest outperforming Call of Duty on Steam and suggesting a strong resurgence for the Battlefield series.

In this paraphrased version, I tried to maintain the original meaning while using more natural and easy-to-read language. I also clarified that the “beta” referred to was for Battlefield 6, and added some additional context about the impressive performance of the beta and its potential implications for the future of the Battlefield series.

It’s truly impressive that Silksong, developed by the independent studio Team Cherry, has managed to surpass 40,000 concurrent players – a feat that’s particularly noteworthy given they don’t have the same level of resources and personnel as larger AAA studios. In simpler terms, it’s remarkable for such a small team to achieve this high player count, making Silksong a significant success story.

It’s worth mentioning that these figures only represent Steam users. In reality, a substantial number of additional players are getting engrossed in the highly anticipated Metroidvania sequel across various platforms such as Xbox, PC, PlayStation, Switch, Linux, and macOS. On Xbox and PC specifically, it can also be played via Xbox Game Pass.

As a researcher, I’ve observed that an overwhelming number of fans are opting for Steam over Game Pass to play Silksong, even when both platforms offer the game. This suggests a strong commitment from fans who eagerly anticipate a new game and are willing to seek it out directly. It also underscores the impact a low cost-entry point can have on a title’s success. Silksong is priced affordably at $19.99 across all its platforms, making it more accessible to a larger audience.

For quite some time now, Silksong has held an eager anticipation among gamers within the industry, as they anxiously await the opportunity to finally play it, following years of patience.

Apart from that, Silksong has been eagerly anticipated by many within the gaming industry for quite some time. Fans are eager to finally play it after years of waiting, following its initial announcement as DLC for Hollow Knight in 2019. However, it quickly expanded in size and was later reintroduced as a full sequel. Team Cherry has been working on this project for approximately half a decade now.

Undeniably, the anticipation for Silksong has been quite prolonged, largely due to the fact that its creators have revealed minimal information about the game during its production process.

As a tech enthusiast, I can attest that holding back and waiting for the official release was definitely worth it! The critical consensus isn’t set yet due to the lack of early copies sent out, but there’s no denying the overwhelmingly positive feedback on Steam. Out of nearly 20,000 user reviews, a whopping 95% have been nothing but praise for this sequel!

It’s striking how reminiscent of Elden Ring in certain aspects the release of FromSoftware’s 2022 open-world take on their Soulsborne formula feels, given its meteoric rise to fame following a relatively low-key build-up to launch. Once more, the old saying rings true: if you construct an exceptional game that meets expectations, people will flock to it.

Instead of saying “the lack of trailers and pre-release details for Silksong actually helped the game,” you could rephrase it as “The scarcity of trailers and pre-release information for Silksong surprisingly contributed to the game’s success.” When a much-anticipated title reveals only limited marketing materials, its fanbase becomes insatiably curious about any updates they can gather – which explains the enormous excitement generated when Team Cherry unexpectedly disclosed Silksong’s release date just two weeks before launch.

To some extent, it could be argued that the scarcity of trailers and pre-release information about Silksong was beneficial to the game itself. It leaves me curious and speculating whether Silksong will reach even greater peaks upon its release.

Over the upcoming weekend, it’s hard not to ponder if Hollow Knight: Silksong might reach even greater success. Given the positive anticipation surrounding it, it seems plausible that it could soar higher still. Despite my personal preference for other game genres and me probably not jumping into the game right away, I’m eager to witness just how high this critically acclaimed indie title will ascend.

You can now purchase Hollow Knight: Silksong for $19.99 on various platforms, including Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Windows PC, PS5, PS4, Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch, Linux, and macOS. If you have an active Game Pass subscription, you can play it via PC Game Pass (Xbox on PC) or Xbox Game Pass Ultimate (console and PC). Plus, with Xbox Play Anywhere supported between Xbox and PC, you can switch seamlessly between the two.

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2025-09-05 22:10