The highly anticipated game Hollow Knight: Silksong was released today at 10 AM ET, leading to technical difficulties for several major video game storefronts. Following the launch, platforms including Steam, the Nintendo eShop, Xbox, and PlayStation stores encountered error messages and failed to load properly. The demand for Silksong appears to have overwhelmed these services.
In addition to the immediate impact on storefronts, the excitement surrounding Silksong has positively influenced the original game, Hollow Knight. In the days leading up to this release, Hollow Knight saw a notable increase in its player base, reaching its highest concurrent player count since its launch in 2017. Current statistics indicate that Silksong has surpassed Hollow Knight in concurrent players, with over 100,000 users reported on SteamDB.
As players continue to log in and purchase Silksong, it is expected that the number of concurrent players will continue to rise once the storefronts are back to normal operation.
Source: https://www.theverge.com/games/771461/silksong-release-steam-nintendo-eshop-crash