Post
The three-person Australian studio that made the most-loved metroidvania of the 2010s — and disappeared for seven years building its sequel.
Founded in 2014 by Ari Gibson and William Pellen in Adelaide (Jack Vine joined as the third member), Team Cherry shipped Hollow Knight (2017) after a successful Kickstarter and grew it into one of the most-praised indie games of the decade — 15M+ sales by 2024 and a permanent reference point for the metroidvania genre. The follow-up Hollow Knight: Silksong was announced in 2019 and went into a multi-year development silence that became a meme of its own.
Example
Hollow Knight's content scope expanded enormously after launch — the team shipped four free major updates (Hidden Dreams, Lifeblood, The Grimm Troupe, Godmaster) that effectively doubled the original game. The team treated post-launch support as an extension of the original creative project rather than DLC.
Why it matters
Team Cherry is the proof that a three-person studio can ship a 30+ hour AAA-quality game and still feel like a single coherent vision. The Silksong wait has become a cultural test of how long an indie audience will stay interested without communication.
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