Hollow Knight: Silksong community crosses 4 weeks of cheering a mad lad fighting Savage Beastfly with ungodly custom rules, like doing the infamous Groal runback with every attempt

Last month, I spoke to a Hollow Knight: Silksong player who'd begun a quest to beat a version of the Savage Beastfly boss that had been warped by ridiculous mods and rules voted on by Redditors in the Silksong community. As of today, that player, SuddenlySpoons, is up to 28 Beastfly changes, and the deviations are only getting stranger.

"Day 28 of fighting Savage Beastfly everyday until I can't beat it anymore, but the most upvoted comment on this post decides how I make tomorrow's fight harder," our hero's latest post reads.

Yesterday, Reddit extended an olive branch, voting to let SuddenlySpoons regenerate one health every three seconds.

Day 28 of fighting Savage Beastfly everyday until I can't beat it anymore, but the most upvoted comment on this post decides how I make tomorrow's fight harder from r/Silksong

"This felt like a huge breath of fresh air," SuddenlySpoons says in his post. "Now when things go wrong it feels like I actually have a chance to make a comeback. However I will admit I beat this run relatively fast, so I'm expecting something evil for today."

At the time of writing, the top comment on the post proposes adding a random Beastfly to Bilewater, which SuddenlySpoons is now forced to run through with every attempt thanks to the day 24 modifier: "Groal runback." Yes, the most-hated boss runback in the entire game, normally found leagues away from the Savage Beastfly, is now merely the preamble to one of the most chaotic things I've ever seen in a Hollow Knight game.

It is sometimes hard to make out what's happening in this fight anymore. Random enemies float around the screen, characters like Shakra watch from the sidelines, lava falls from the sky. "PILBY HAS DIED," one day's modification insists. "Ass Jim DVD screensaver," reads day 16, as if that's a normal thing to say.

Reddit was less kind on day 27, giving the Savage Beastfly a rotating and regenerating ring of mini-Beastflies. The day before that, the Silksong community demanded SuddenlySpoons complete each day's Silksongdle puzzles. On day 17, video of Family Guy funny moments and footage of Subway Surfers was added to the background. It's getting weird out here, but SuddenlySpoons is still at it four weeks later. He previously told me day 30 would be a tough milestone. At this point, I want to see how far we can push this crap.

I was ready to take a break from Metroidvanias after Silksong, but this beautiful indie rekindled my obsession.