Silksong's nearly here—a trailer has finally announced the fated day, courtesy of Team Cherry, and now it's time for us to pack up all our silkposts, our fake screenshots, our memes, our hallucinated analog horror monsters. Get back in the box, Nosk.
As I tucked away my own portmanteaus, I wondered how the eternal vigil-keeper, Araraura, was doing. In case you're unfamiliar, Ara is the creator of "Daily Silksong News", a YouTube channel that's been putting out daily updates for over 1,685 days at the time of writing. 1,692 when this all ends.
I pondered how he was taking it, and whether the Sisyphean task had weighed down on him, whether he felt free or fearful that it was all about to be over soon—and then I remembered oh yeah, I can just ask him.
Araraura tells me over Discord call that the whole thing is downright surreal, but he's had time to prepare: "When we got the announcement that, like, Silksong would release in 2025, I already started feeling like 'I don't know if I want this to end'. I kind of got used to this cycle, just uploading a video every day. But I think now some time has passed, I think I'm ready. "
He is, of course, referring to April saw a Nintendo Direct confirm that Silksong was in fact coming out in 2025, like, for real this time. This prepared him emotionally, but logistically? It's been a bit of a whirlwind. After all, he's got a series finale to plan—when Silksong comes out, the DSN lights shut down, at least, for now.
"It was a lot of stuff. It's not just like one small emotion, right? It's just like what you said: excitement, fear, knowing that there are only two weeks … I was just kind of scrambling, like okay, what's the plan now? … It's still kind of overwhelming, but I think now I've kinda got it down, the stuff that I need to do."
When it came to the release date announcement itself, Araraura tells me that the anticipation was thick: "We already kind of knew that this had to be it, right? It had to be released before October, maybe even before September 18 … It was kinda scary, like a big feeling of anticipation and not knowing what's gonna come.
"The day before it was revealed, I just sat down like half of the night, and I just made a release date news video … and all I had to do was to wait."
A well-deserved rest
I also figured I'd ask Araraura about the revelation that Team Cherry's lack of communique and ever-shifting release date was because, hey, they were all having fun and didn't want to bother anybody. "Honestly? Fucking respect," he tells me. "I think developers should learn a thing or two from that."
There's a big however, though: "I am kind of conflicted at the part when it said [that] they won't have anything to share, and that they [were] working at the game. And yeah, that's fine, respect. But like—six years and hardly any updates? People were going insane trying to think or figure out what was going on."
I think, if anybody has a right to feel that way, it's the guy who spent nearly 1,700 consecutive days wondering if there was any news to share.
"I get the feeling of wanting to preserve and not reveal too much of the game, and not just come and say 'Hey, we're still working, we're still working.' [But] I kind of wish there could've been a middle ground for that, definitely."
I wonder out loud if that's because of the fact we're all being conditioned to watch for danger signs—after all, radio silence has preceded a lot of doomed studios and development hells before, to which Ara agrees: "It's not even the industry [sometimes], like players will assume that's the case." However, he adds, "We're finally here, and I think it'll be worth it."
I also asked Sisyphus—sorry, I mean, Araraura—how he managed to stay clear-headed while rolling the boulder up the mountain for four and a half calendar years. Turns out, it was the boulder itself that kept him sane.
It got to the point where it just became another thing that you do every day, like brushing your teeth."
"I get this question a lot. Like, 'what keeps you motivated to do this every single day? How do you not go insane from that?' I think the answer is actually the opposite. Daily Silksong News helps me get through it, just making videos and all the people that I met in the community, all my friends and the cool stuff we've got to do together.
"That helps me stay sane, basically. It got to the point where it just became another thing that you do every day, like brushing your teeth. You don't think about it much—to me, it kinda helped. It made the experience better."
As to what he plans to do afterwards? Hang his hat up and finally enjoy a well-earned rest with his favourite upcoming videogame. "We plan to upload the final episode, and after that … I'm not planning to make a playthrough or a stream of Silksong, because it's not my thing to sit down, give commentary, record playthroughs, and watch the pacing of how I play.
"I want to just sit down, completely on my own, just focus on Silksong. Just play Silksong in peace, however I want. I could redirect people to my personal channel, that's not about Silksong … [But] I think that's just the plan. I'm gonna enjoy Silksong in peace. On my own." He does add, however, that "it's gonna feel kinda weird, turning off the Silksong news 'upload time' alarm. Not uploading DSN might feel kinda weird."
I joke about that one scene in Avengers: Endgame where the gang finds Thanos just, like, on a farm somewhere—and he laughs: "Just sitting down, looking at the sunset, I can finally rest."
I ask him if he has any final parting words for the community, but it's not time yet—there's still one last handful of videos to make. "I wrote down a full script of stuff that I want to say to all the viewers of the channel. But, well, it truly has been my 'waiting for Hollow Knight: Silksong.' That's all I can say." Hear, hear.
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Razer Blade 16 (2025)
2. Best budget:
Gigabyte G6X
3. Best 14-inch:
Razer Blade 14 (2025)
4. Best mid-range:
MSI Vector 16 HX AI
5. Best high-performance:
Lenovo Legion Pro 7i Gen 10
6. Best 17-inch:
Gigabyte Aorus 17X
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