Hollow Knight: Silksong

in combat with three enemies Hollow Knight: Silksongs gameplay is similar to its predecessor Hollow Knight, featuring 2D platforming and combat. Some changes are made from the original, such as the player character moving more acrobatically and healing faster. Side-quests (called "Wishes") are tracked in a journal. These quests are provided by non-player characters or found at quest boards. Equippable "Tools" are divided into three categories: blue and yellow Tools are passive and support-oriented, while red Tools are typically offensive weapons. Red Tools are manually activated and have a limited number of charges which must be replenished with Shell Shards, an in-game currency, at Benches. Hornet is limited in how many Tools of each colour she can equip, with her maximum capacity modified when changing between different gameplay styles, known as "Crests". In addition to their varying tool makeups, the speed and range of Hornet's attack move-set differs between Crests. Each Crest also possesses a unique mechanic, such as boosting damage dealt if hits are avoided or allowing for tools to be replenished without resting at a Bench. When attacking enemies or interacting with certain objects and locations, Hornet adds "Silk" to her reservoir. Silk can be used for healing, with three hit points (called "Masks") recovered in a single heal. Silk can also be expended to use "Silk Skills", additional attacks which are unlocked by locating remnants of the Weavers and their society when progressing through the game. Tools, Crests and Silk Skills can be adjusted when sitting at Benches, which also serve as a source of healing and act as respawn points after all hit points are lost. ==Plot==

Premise Silksong takes place after the events of Hollow Knight and continues the story of Hornet in the kingdom of Pharloom. Pharloom is a ruined religious kingdom afflicted by the "Haunting" – a madness that afflicts bugs and reanimates their corpses through Silk. Hornet, a descendant of the Weavers—an advanced Silk-manipulating species—is captured by a group of veiled bugs to be brought to Pharloom. There, she discovers her connections to the kingdom, travelling across the land, encountering its Haunted inhabitants, and helping other bugs that have escaped the Haunting to fulfill their wishes and restore the kingdom. Synopsis Hornet escapes her captors and falls into the Moss Grotto. She finds that her captors were adherents of the Citadel, a supposedly holy institution located at Pharloom's summit that attracts numerous pilgrims. Hornet decides to ascend to the Citadel to uncover the reason behind her capture. Throughout her journey, Hornet encounters the remnants of the Weavers and binds their power, while meeting pilgrims, Pharloom's residents, and travelers from other lands. She also encounters Lace, a being composed entirely of Silk who taunts Hornet throughout her journey. As the game progresses, it is revealed that the Weavers were spider-like bugs ascended by Grand Mother Silk, a godlike being. Initially believing her to be their mother, they served Grand Mother Silk before rebelling upon discovering the truth. The Weavers contained her within the Cradle—a structure atop the Citadel—but over time she was able to exert her influence on other bugs, causing the Haunting. Some of the Weavers left Pharloom for the kingdom of Hallownest, one of whom named Herrah eventually giving birth to Hornet. Hornet eventually gains access to the Citadel and reaches the Cradle, where she battles and defeats Lace. Lace is revealed to be another creation of Grand Mother Silk, and is disillusioned by her origins, believing her existence to be unnatural. After this encounter, Hornet faces Grand Mother Silk herself. The fight can either end with Hornet defeating the deity and binding her power, thus becoming Pharloom's new monarch, or a parasite within Hornet consuming both of them. Alternatively, if Hornet has fulfilled most wishes and completed various other key objectives, she may work with the Caretaker—the keeper of a shrine-turned sanctuary in the Citadel—to craft a Soul Snare, a trap capable of deposing Grand Mother Silk; this is the only way to access the final third Act of the game. After the Caretaker sets the trap, Hornet restrains Grand Mother Silk during the battle and activates it, only to discover it is a portal connected to the Void. The Void ensnares and drags Grand Mother Silk through the portal. The deity attempts to drag Hornet through with her, but Lace saves Hornet out of spite for her mother, and is dragged into the Void instead. After waking up, Hornet finds Pharloom to have been brought to an apocalyptic state. Grand Mother Silk and Lace were brought to the bottom of the Abyss, the deepest part of Pharloom, and are trapped in a cocoon beneath a sea of Void. Due to Grand Mother Silk's resistance, Void-corrupted threads have sprouted from the ground, infusing Haunted enemies with Void. Hornet deduces that the strain of these threads will soon cause Pharloom to collapse. She confers with the Caretaker, who is revealed to be part of a group of spellcasting bugs known as Snail Shamans, and theorises that Grand Mother Silk is resisting the Void to save Lace. To reach her, Hornet works with the Shamans to retrieve a Void-warding flower called the Everbloom from her memories by seizing the hearts of fallen rulers. Using the Everbloom, Hornet dives through the sea of Void to reach the cocoon and defeats the Void-corrupted Lace, purifying her. The severely weakened Grand Mother Silk grants Hornet the last of her power so she can escape with Lace, but they fail to reach the surface as the Everbloom disintegrates. The protagonist from the first game, the Knight, appears and rescues Hornet and Lace, carrying them from the Void. With Grand Mother Silk dead, the blackened threads fall away, freeing Pharloom from the Haunting and the Void being spread by it. ==Development==

Hollow Knight: Silksong was originally planned as downloadable content for Hollow Knight. In a Bloomberg article in August 2025, Gibson and Pellen gave further detail on the game's development. They stated that their original vision for Silksong involved a smaller world than that of Hollow Knight and a quest system to encourage revisiting areas, but that they progressively expanded the game's map as development proceeded. The team decided to limit their communication about the game's progress during development, explaining that they wanted to focus their energies on the development process itself and that they wanted to avoid revealing too many of Silksong secrets before release. Bloomberg hypothesized that reasons for Silksong lengthy development process included the small size of Team Cherry, as well as the developers' focus on delivering a finely tuned experience—Pellen was paraphrased as saying that "the last year or two [of development]" was focused on adding polish and additional detail. Additionally, a zine released on the exhibit's opening date which included quotes from Gibson and Pellen. Pellen was quoted saying "we have a plan... but the plan is never so calcified that it can't bear a change of course two weeks later, or two months later, or two years later." They also addressed the game's high difficulty, with Gibson stating that "Hornet is inherently faster and more skillful than the Knight—so even the base level enemy had to be more complicated, more intelligent" ==Release and marketing ==

Hollow Knight: Silksong was announced on 14 February 2019 in a trailer, with a developer diary video sharing more information. After the announcement, per GameSpot, "updates [were] sporadic and infrequent". The developers released an update in March 2019, sharing descriptions and images of characters who will appear in Silksong. They thanked the game's fans for supporting them regarding the announcement of the sequel. Silksong was playable during E3 2019, at the Nintendo booth, and a Nintendo Treehouse livestream additionally showed off the game. Team Cherry released a new blog post soon after this, which mentioned that the area "Greymoor" is one of the biggest they have ever created; the post also explained further gameplay details. In December 2019, Team Cherry posted another blog post, containing a two-track preview of the soundtrack, composed by Christopher Larkin, as well as an update on the total number of enemies developed (which was 165 at the time), with a focus on a trio, described as "members of a scholarly suite." In June 2020, Team Cherry began a series of riddles that revealed non-player characters and short videos of Silksong once solved; these riddles continued into July. One of the characters revealed was "Seth", created by a fan named Seth Goldman who was battling terminal cancer and had wished to meet Team Cherry. In December 2020, an issue of Edge revealed details about Silksong, with multiple screenshots and quotes from Gibson and Pellen. In May 2021, Team Cherry marketing and publishing director Matthew Griffin stated that Team Cherry was still working on the game, and had no plans for announcements at E3 2021 and its general period. A new trailer was revealed at the Xbox & Bethesda Games Showcase in June 2022, revealing that Silksong would be released on Xbox Game Pass at launch, with the game being available through the service for PC and Xbox Series X/S. While no release date or window was announced in the trailer, president Sarah Bond and the Xbox Twitter account stated in a tweet that all games in the showcase will be released within twelve months, implying they expected a release by 12 June 2023, which the account later confirmed in a reply. In September 2022, Sony confirmed in a tweet that the game would come to PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5. Griffin declared on 10 May 2023 that the game was delayed, stating "We had planned to release in the first half of 2023, but development is still continuing", that the game has "gotten quite big", and to "expect more details from us once we get closer to release." On 14 February 2024, which marked five years since the game's announcement, Griffin posted on Discord that Team Cherry was "...still hard at work on the game." After nearly a year of silence, in January 2025, in response to rumors online, Griffin said that Silksong was still in active development, was progressing, and was still planned for release. During the Nintendo Direct on the then-upcoming Nintendo Switch 2 system, which aired on 2 April 2025, Silksong was presented in a sizzle reel, where it was given a 2025 release date, alongside some new footage. Soon after, Nintendo sent new screenshots of the game to press. On 1 May, IGN announced that Silksong would appear at ACMI's then-upcoming Game Worlds showcase, which opened on 18 September 2025. The exhibit was confirmed to include sprites from the game, information on boss fights, and the ability to play Silksong. They also shared a partial spritesheet of Hornet. On 8 June, Silksong appeared at the 2025 Xbox Games Showcase, as part of the reveal trailer for the ROG Xbox Ally. It was confirmed to be available on the console day one; the console was planned to release in Holiday 2025. Soon after this announcement, Griffin clarified that the game would release before Christmas 2025, and that it is "...not tied to a console release." On 28 July, a new Silksong demo was announced to be playable at the Xbox booth during Gamescom 2025, which started on 20 August; the demo was later confirmed to be playable at the Nintendo booth as well, on 7 August. On 19 August, Team Cherry—breaking their radio silence—announced that they would have a "special announcement" on 21 August. A Bloomberg interview with Gibson and Pellen was also announced to release on that day; it was stated to "explore why Silksong has taken seven years to develop." Also on 19 August, Silksong appeared at Gamescom Opening Night Live, where it received new footage. Two days later, the Bloomberg interview was published, and the "special announcement" aired on YouTube; it was the game's release trailer, which ended by revealing that the game would release on 4 September 2025. The announcement of the game's release date just two weeks prior to its release caused several other indie games originally set to release around the same time to be delayed for fear of being overshadowed by Silksong, while others, such as Hell Is Us, Daemon X Machina: Titanic Scion and Cronos: The New Dawn, kept their release dates as intended. Team Cherry did not send out review codes for Silksong, with Bloomberg journalist Jason Schreier stating that they told him this was due to the difficulty of organizing them as a small team and the view that it would be unfair for critics to play it before Kickstarter backers and other players. When the game released on 4 September, Steam, the Nintendo eShop, the Microsoft Store, and the PlayStation Store all experienced errors. Steam was taken down temporarily, making the platform inaccessible to purchase the game or download it for many users. During the first three days of its release, Silksong had over five million players, including one million playing via Xbox Game Pass and three million via Steam. Downloadable content On 15 December 2025, the first free downloadable content (DLC), titled Sea of Sorrow, was announced in an animated teaser trailer. It is scheduled for release in 2026, and will feature Hornet's "voyage across and beneath the salt-stricken seas", with "new areas, bosses, tools, and more" being added upon release. The trailer and descriptions led to speculation that the DLC would bring the return of certain cut Silksong content. ==Reception==

Pre-release The playable Silksong demo at E3 2019 received critical praise. IGN writer Tom Marks liked "its combat and movement even more than the original", and said "Silksong has the potential to be even better than the original." Ozzie Mejia of Shacknews praised the "tremendous amount of detail in the environments and in the backgrounds". Nintendo World Report writer Melanie Zawodniak praised the speed in which Hornet could traverse vertically, as she believed such movement was "a bit too sluggish in Hollow Knight." Despite the short play-time, the demo made her certain that "Team Cherry [is] putting just as much of their skill and passion into the project as [in] their debut title". The demo at Gamescom 2025 was given similar praise. Writing for Destructoid, Adam Newell called the demo "stunningly beautiful with its lush visuals and animations", and stated that he was "hooked from the start." GamesRadar+ writer Josh West stated "there's an attention to detail in its visual and audio design that's scintillating to experience. The play itself is smooth, Hollow Knight occasional sharp edges sanded down to ensure that movement and motion is the star." Writing for Game Informer, Wesley LeBlanc stated "if what I played today is any indication, Silksong will follow in [Hollow Knights] steps – I really enjoyed what I played." As of late August 2025, Silksong was on roughly 5.2 million Steam users' wishlists, by far the most-wishlisted game on the service at the time. Fan culture Due to its lengthy development, fans would often hope for Silksong news to appear at game showcases. After repeated no-shows, the fans eventually would consider this hope illogical, and used clown imagery to signify this, with the most popular images being edited screenshots and fan art of Hollow Knight, showing its protagonist wearing a clown wig and nose. However, Silksong did appear in the Nintendo Direct, where it was given a 2025 release window, which led some to believe that the changes were hints by Pellen. Since Silksong often received minimal news for lengthy periods of time, users on the r/Silksong subreddit—often called "Skongers"—developed a meta culture of jokes, memes and factions. These included the creation of elaborate fake posts, known as "Silkposts", to trick readers into thinking there had been Silksong news. Post-release Critical reception Hollow Knight: Silksong received "universal acclaim" according to review aggregator website Metacritic. OpenCritic reported that 97% of critics recommended the game. The increased difficulty of Silksong compared to its predecessor received polarised reactions from players. Various mods to make the game easier were created a few days after release. The game initially received negative reviews from Chinese players on Steam, owing to significant quality concerns with the game's Simplified Chinese localisation. Following a still-criticized update to the translation, Team Cherry released a public beta that implemented a fan translation by "Team Cart Fix". Similar to its predecessor, the game immediately spawned a significant speedrunning community after its launch, with a speedrun completing the game in under an hour being performed less than a month after its release. Awards ==Notes==