Hollow Knight: Silksong is absolutely amazing, so long as you're not looking to play the Chinese language version. And while the boss battles themselves rule, they lack a simple element that would make them vastly more enjoyable.
The bosses in Hollow Knight Silksong don't have health bars
Is there even an older and more iconic video game mainstay than the huge health bar accompanying a major boss? Though the trend was fading a bit in the late '00s through massively successful series like Halo, Call of Duty, and the GTA series, which mostly did away with boss encounters entirely, it enjoyed a massive resurgence with the Souls series, and currently remains stronger than ever.
This bar of imposing size exists in large part to let players know sh*t is about to get real, sometimes seemingly to the point of trying to have them pee their pants. We know damn well that's at least what the Dark Souls developers want to happen.
But it also serves a different purpose. If the boss is a mountain to climb, one of the greatest hurdles a game's devs have crafted to challenge players, then its health bar is your friendly progression meter. It can fill players with determination and ensure they're getting better when they die ever closer to the final goal. So, unless it tricks players into biting off more than they can chew with "just one more hit" when the boss seemingly has only 1 HP left, then there's nothing bad about this specific kind of HUD.
Neither the bosses in the original Hollow Knight nor the ones in Hollow Knight Silksong feature health bars. This is fine for expert players doing reruns and speedruns because they always have a good sense of how much a boss can take, but it sucks for the mere mortals who aren't great yet, especially during their initial playthroughs. Dealing with a boss without knowing how close they are to taking it down is a missed opportunity that denies players the motivation that is both helpful and just feels great all around.
Silksong could do even better than boss health bars
Sure, there are mods because players have been begging, and the exclusion of these indicators isn't a problem per se. And while health bars certainly give us a sense of progression, there are other ways to convey boss progression, such as showing an enemy's armor breaking down, bruises, or bleeding.
Dark Souls has health bars for bosses, as everyone knows. Still, some of its bosses also feature visible tells, and these result in some of the most iconic moments in the series. How can anyone forget Sif struggling to even walk towards the player as he nears death?
Though a massive success, Silksong is an indie game made by just a handful of people. A wide array of animations and models to convey the bosses' health state is a big ask, but, well, a simple health bar that would help everyone really isn't. Although I think modern games can achieve the same effect as a boss health bar in more immersive manners, it still beats what Silksong currently has.
Currently, Silksong asks players to perform multiple leaps of faith until the boss dies, which could lead some players to ragequit forever, unaware they truly were just one hit away from victory. That could prove problematic going forward, as Silksong isn't a walk in the park, and player review scores have been declining as the less adept newcomers are finding it too challenging for their liking.
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