Hollow Knight: Silksong is without a doubt one of this year’s biggest game releases. The long-awaited sequel from Australian indie studio Team Cherry was met with praise from both critics and fans. It earned top ratings on review sites and quickly climbed into the ranks of the most popular titles on streaming platforms. It outperformed titles such as Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Mario Kart World, and Assassin’s Creed Shadows. In this article, Streams Charts takes a closer look at Silksong’s livestreaming success during its first week after launch.
Hollow Knight: Silksong is a metroidvania game that serves as the spiritual successor to the cult hit Hollow Knight (2017). The story takes players to a decaying kingdom inhabited by insects, where they step into the role of Hornet — an insectoid warrior who wields a needle as her weapon. Fans of the series will remember Hornet as the sister of one of the original game’s protagonists, as well as a formidable boss in the first title.
Hollow Knight: Silksong quickly struck a chord with fans of soulslike games, as mastering Hornet’s controls and combat demands sharp skill and focus. It’s without question one of the most challenging platformers out there, pushing many players to their limits. In fact, shortly after launch, the developers released a patch to slightly tone down the difficulty.
Hollow Knight: Silksong launched on September 4 and racked up over 17.1М Hours Watched in its first week. That performance placed it third among all game categories on Twitch, ahead of titles like Fortnite, Counter-Strike, and Path of Exile 2.
All week long, Hollow Knight: Silksong dominated Twitch in terms of unique streaming channels. The game peaked at 13.2K channels and averaged 4.3K, making it the clear leader on the platform by both metrics.
Top content creators were quick to jump on the Hollow Knight: Silksong hype train. Many of Twitch and YouTube’s biggest streamers took on the challenge of the hardcore platformer.
Brazilian streamer Rafael “Cellbit” Lange led the way in watch hours, with his Hollow Knight: Silksong streams pulling in more than 657K HW over the week. Interestingly, his YouTube channel also ranked in the top 10 for this metric.
Other major streamers such as Alejandro "Alexelcapo" Fernández, Distortion2, and Alan “alanzoka” Ferreira also streamed Hollow Knight: Silksong extensively. Alexelcapo led Twitch in peak viewership, with one of his broadcasts reaching 41.8K concurrent viewers. Among female streamers, Emily Beth “Emiru” Schunk topped the charts with 21.2K Peak Viewers, while Koseki Bijou Ch. drew the largest audience among VTubers.
Hollow Knight: Silksong ranked among the most popular game releases of the year, generating a total of 17.1M HW in its first week. That performance secured it the 5th spot on the list of 2025’s biggest new releases, right alongside The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered and Mario Kart World.
The rest of the year promises plenty of big game releases, including Battlefield 6, Little Nightmares III, Ninja Gaiden 4, and The Outer Worlds 2. You can follow all the latest launches on Streams Charts’ dedicated page.
