Differences and New Features

As a follow-up to Hollow Knight, Silksong shares much of the same DNA as its predecessor, as it was originally envisioned as a DLC expansion. Now that it's taken on a life of its own and with a lengthy development time, returning players will find a lot of new differences and features that set both the world of Silksong and its protagonist Hornet apart from Hollow Knight. Below you can find a list of all known features that are new to this sequel.

Where the Hollow Knight's protagonist was a short and stocky fellow that could eventually learn dashes and double jumps, Hornet is a more graceful fighter that will already have a few extra platforming moves new to Silksong.

Chief among these is the ability to mantle ledges and walls. Simply by jumping up to the edge of a platform, Hornet can automatically grab the ledge and climb up, making platforming and jumping a lot more forgiving. When running along the ground, she'll even automatically mantle over low changes in terrain without requiring manual jumps!

Speaking of running, Hornet also has the ability to sprint to a much faster degree (once a certain Weaver Technique is learned), instead of having only one default movement not tied to dashes or special abilities. She will also backpedal when moving backward for a moment, rather than doing a full turn in the first moment.

Hornet's varied movement also ties into her attacks. While she retains the same style of standard slashes with her weapon as in Hollow Knight, she can also utilize a lot more agile movement, including better dashes, flips, and aerial dives. Because of this, combat in Silksong is a lot more fast-paced, and even enemies have more robust moves compared to the previous game to account for this new speed of fighting.

Many of Hornet's attacks can also be altered in how they behave, the angle of the attack and their animations depending on Crests you equipped (more on that later). This can change a dash, dive, or pogo attack to work differently and give you new outlets in how you move during a fight.

Healing in Silksong

In Hollow Knight, attacking enemies would build a white meter of magic in a Soul Vessel that could be used for certain abilities, chief among them the Heal. This would force the Knight to stand still and charge up for a moment before using up some of the Soul Vessel to heal a single point of life.

In Silksong, a lot has changed. Hornet is able to use her Bind ability in much the same way, only she can use it while moving (though it slows her), and can even heal in mid-air.

Instead of a Soul Vessel, attacking will fill a spool of silk that can be used up when using certain Tools or the healing Bind. However, you'll need to fill up nine notches of silk on the spool, shown below your health icons. Filling the meter will also light up the front-facing spool on the top left corner above the smaller side-view, showing a full charge from another angle. The trade-off for having to use up all this silk just to heal is that Hornet's Bind can heal 3 life points instead of just one.

The amount of Silk you can hold in a spool can also be upgraded beyond the initial nine notches, allowing you to bank your heal (a notch in the side view will show a visual of how much is needed to heal), while building up extra Silk for other abilities.

Much of Hollow Knight's strategy and combat revolved around finding and equipping different Charms, and extending the amount of equippable Charms through finding extra Notches.

This system has been replaced with Crests and Tools in Hollow Knight: Silksong, allowing Hornet to equip only one central Crest that can vastly change up how you fight and explore.

Each Crest can be equipped or swapped out when resting at a Bench (much like Charms) and will have color-coded slots within them for Tools to be placed, and usually only 1 special Weaver Skill. Tools are collectible, and come in various types to solve particular problems or fit playstyles:

• Red Tools are active skills that can be used by pressing an indicated button, and can aid you in battle with aggressive projectiles, mines, and other traps. Most Red Tools also have a limited number of uses that must be replenished by finding and collecting Shell Shards from defeated enemies, and refilling your count while resting at a bench.

• Blue and Yellow Tools have more passive effects that are closer to Charms, and do not need to be activated with a button press. These can alter things like your Spool Length, reinforcing Hornet's Life Points, or make you resistant or invulnerable to certain elements.

• Weaver Skills are similar to the Magic Spells or Nail Arts that the Knight learned in the first game, only it seems you will have to choose which one to use, rather than having access to all of them. Some Weaver Skills however, like the sprint, do not need to be equipped.

Equipping new Crests not only give you different combinations of Tool Slots to fill, they'll also visibly change Silksong's HUD in the top left corner to give you a visual indicator of which Crest you are using. Along with being able to equip different amounts of types of Tools, certain Crests will also offer utility changes that can change the way Hornet plays, including:

• Hornet's Basic Attack Animations
• Hornet's Dash Attack Animations
• The Angle and Style of Hornet's Dive or "Pogo" Attacks
• Hornet's Silk Meter and Silk Spool Size
• Amount of Silk Needed to Heal

By customizing your Crests, you'll be able to mix and match to find a style of attacks that work best for you -- focusing on either better offensive slashes or reduced costs for healing and skills -- as well as customizing your Tool loadout.

In Hollow Knight, your journey of exploring a forgotten kingdom began on the surface, in a sad dusty town called Dirtmouth. As you explored more of Hallownest, you would frequently return to the singular town, find new residents, and learn more from its people.

The kingdom of Pharloom in Silksong is still very much active, though extremely perilous and haunted by its more fearsome residents. However, it is also a site of pilgrimage, and you'll actually be able to come upon multiple towns spread across the different distinct regions of Pharloom.

Not only do these towns have more residents, shopkeepers, and other points of interest, you'll also be able to take on structured side quest tasks. These can be found on bulletin boards in certain towns, and are categorized in three types:

• Gather (Green) - Tasks Hornet with finding specific items in the world to gather and bring back to town.
• Wayfarer (Yellow) - Tasks Hornet with uncovering secrets and locating special areas.
• Hunt/Grand Hunt (Red) - Tasks Hornet with stalking and defeating minibosses or other specific types of enemies.

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