Warning: Minor spoilers for Hollow Knight: Silksong follow.
At some point in your journey through Pharloom, the setting of Hollow Knight: Silksong, you may have the misfortune of running into a shrouded, wormlike bug called Greyroot. Hiding in a hole in Shellwood, an area located above The Marrow, she asks you to bring her a Twisted Bud – a “contorted mass of ashen vine” that “cries out incessantly,” as per its item description. When you give it to her, she tells you it’s weak, that it “must be nourished” before “the time of birth approaches.” Although she never mentioned a reward, previous fetch quests taught you to expect one. But to your surprise, Greyroot doesn’t hand you shards or rosaries. Instead, she wraps her body around you like an anaconda, pressing harder and harder until your neck snaps and everything goes dark. When you awake, you find yourself stuck inside a mysterious cave, only to learn you’ve been infected by a parasite that limits your moveset and prevents you from healing.
Does any of this sound vaguely familiar? If you’ve played Bloodborne, it should. In that game, tall, hooded enemies called Snatchers roam the streets of Yharnam carrying large bags. If they defeat you – which they will, especially on your first encounter – you don’t get the usual “You Died” screen, but are teleported to a dungeon in another, difficult-to-access part of the world. There are other déjà vu moments, too. The cries of the Twisted Bud evoke memories of Mergo, the invisible, infant Great One whose wailing can be heard throughout the Nightmare of Mensis, and Greyroot’s dialogue resembles that of Healing Church officials who – like her – anticipate the messy births of eldritch babies.
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Echoes of Bloodborne can be found throughout “Silksong”, from the game’s opening level to its secret endings. Team Cherry’s long-awaited follow-up to 2017’s Hollow Knight not only resembles FromSoftware’s gothic horror masterpiece in theming and visuals, but also in the way it shakes up gameplay mechanics introduced by its predecessor. By giving players control of a more agile character, and tweaking combat to favor bolder, more aggressive playstyles, Silksong builds on Hollow Knight in much the same way that Bloodborne built on Dark Souls, perfecting a blueprint its developers have stuck to ever since.
Connecting Silksong to Bloodborne is not as crazy as it sounds. Although Team Cherry has cited The Legend of Zelda as their primary source of inspiration, the original Hollow Knight shares a lot of its DNA with the Dark Souls games, from its corps run mechanic and oasis-like checkpoint system to its expansive roster of crushingly difficult boss fights, branching level layouts, emphasis on environmental storytelling, and narrative centered around gods, curses, and some kind of all-consuming abyss. Intentional or not, these features helped breathe new life into the tried and tested Metroidvania formula, turning Hollow Knight into an instant classic and Silksong, initially conceived as DLC, into one of the most anticipated games in recent memory.
Just as fans compared the original Hollow Knight to Dark Souls, so too are they comparing Silksong to other games in FromSoftware’s catalogue. Already, Reddit pages like this one display a variety of opinions. Some argue the game is like Dark Souls II – “much harder and more divisive.” Others say Hornet’s new running ability (more on that in a moment) reminds them of Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, while others still see the sequel’s explosion in popularity as analogous to the mainstream success of Elden Ring. While all of these arguments are valid, comparisons to Bloodborne – both in terms of surface-level presentation and underlying design philosophy – cut closest to the bone.
Visually, several levels in Silksong bear an uncanny resemblance to levels from Bloodborne. Shellwood, a booby-trapped forest filled with suspended cages, brings to mind the Forbidden Woods. Greymoor, a sprawling township whose inhabitants dress in ragged brown robes and wander the streets carrying lanterns and pointy objects, evokes Central Yharnam or the Fishing Hamlet. The Citadel, Pharloom’s beating heart and the destination of Hornet’s journey, is Team Cherry’s answer to the Healing Church: a labyrinthine headquarters of a mysterious religious and political order that attracts pilgrims from insect kingdoms far and wide.
Although the game’s story has yet to be fully digested by dedicated lore masters, it appears that Silksong explores many of the same themes Bloodborne did. Just as Yharnam is consumed by a beastly scourge, so are Pharloom’s denizens afflicted by a “thread sickness” that turns them into mindless monsters. In both games, these afflictions are tied to sources of great power, with the scourge originating from the Healing Church’s use of blood, and the sickness being somehow related to the Citadel’s silk production. Both games treat might as treacherous and corruptive – something you wield at the cost of losing yourself. “What’s this twitching inside of you?” an NPC called the Hermit says to Hornet after she’s been infected with Greyroot’s parasite. “A slave within a slave! Given over your shell to something greater?”
Silksong and Bloodborne also share similar level designs, especially in the opening hours. While Hollow Knight, similar to Demon’s Souls and the first two Dark Souls games, eases players into the experience with relatively slow-paced opening levels before gradually ramping up the difficulty curve, Silksong and Bloodborne hit the ground running. Compared to the beginner-friendly Forgotten Crossroads, the Marrow – much like Central Yharnam – is a trial by fire, confronting the player with platforming and combat challenges that pick up right where the end of the previous game left off.
Speaking of challenges, both games make small yet meaningful tweaks to the iconic healing systems of their predecessors. While Silksong doesn’t shake things up to the extent that Bloodborne did by replacing the Estus flask with blood vials, the changes Team Cherry did push through end up having a similar effect on how people play. Where the Knight could only regenerate one mask at a time, Hornet – who can heal both on the ground and in the air – is initially able to regenerate a maximum of three. The catch: you can only heal once your meter is completely full. Like Bloodborne’s rallying mechanic, which lets players recover health if they retaliate immediately after getting hit, Silksong’s new system encourages an offensive as opposed to a defensive playstyle. Due to the new rules, the player can no longer afford to play it safe and heal incrementally. If you want to win, you’ll have to go about it differently than you did in the original. As one Redditor put it:
“I find myself playing like in [Hollow Knight], but it doesn’t work as well. Getting hurt matters a lot more in [Silksong], since Hornet can only heal at full meter. In that regard, it’s a lot like Bloodborne, in that always attacking results in healing being online more frequently. That’s not at all how I play in [Hollow Knight], and I’m struggling to retrain myself. I wonder if players new to the series are actually having an easier time, since they don’t have to unlearn the muscle memory from Hollow Knight.”
All that said, Silksong is most similar to Bloodborne in how it cranks up the speed. Even by the standards of their time, the early Souls games were slow. Player characters moved as if they were stuck in mud, attacked with windup animations that are long enough to rival those of certain Elden Ring bosses, and seemed to fat roll regardless of their equip load. Sure, the slower pace gave you ample time to react to your opponents, but there was also something frustrating about it. Often, deaths weren’t due to lack of skill so much as the fact that your character couldn’t do what you wanted them to.
By introducing faster attack animations and replacing the dreaded roll with a consistently snappy sidestep, Bloodborne got rid of that frustration. In Yharnam, players have no one to blame for their deaths except themselves, as the game gives them all the tools they need to take on even the game’s toughest enemies. But that’s not all. By changing the speed, FromSoft also changed the game’s appeal. Previously, combat had been like games of chess – methodical, requiring players to think ahead. Now, it was more like – well – combat: scrappy, chaotic, with decisions made on the fly rather than in advance. From Bloodborne onwards, Soulsborne titles were no longer tests of patience, but tests of reflexes – and they’re more popular (and, dare one say, enjoyable) for it.
Just as the hunters of Yharnam outpace the undead knights of Lordran and Drangleic, so does Hornet run circles around the Knight. Right out of the gate, she can walk faster, jump higher, and attack with greater range. These baseline qualities are enhanced by her new abilities, the most versatile of which are acquired comparatively early on in the campaign. Like the Knight, Hornet acquires a quickstep ability. But unlike the Knight, this ability can be extended into a run, which can itself be chained into a super jump and – finally – another, mid-air dash. She also learns to grapple, slow her descent with her cloak, and fly up air vents like a tiny, pointy rocket.
These abilities are not only used for traversal; they also come in handy during combat. Hornet’s downward thrust or “pogo jump” can be used to strike and bounce off enemies, just like in the original, but – because its direction is diagonal as opposed to vertical – it’s also a great way to quickly reposition yourself on the ground after a jump. Meanwhile, her run can be chained into a super jump to get over large enemies, or chained into a long-range special attack. These new abilities alter gameplay to such an extent that Team Cherry designed several early-game bosses that become a cakewalk when they are put to use, but a nightmare when you control Hornet the way you would the Knight. (If you’re stuck at that purple, hulking, club-wielding, Skull Ant mini-boss in the Marrow, now you know why).
That’s not to say Hornet’s greater speed makes the game any easier. For one, her new abilities come with significant drawbacks: the diagonal pogo requires strategic positioning, while the super jump locks you into an inescapable arc. More importantly, as in Bloodborne, you’re not the only one who becomes faster, stronger, and more aggressive. Enemies in Silksong have more health, bigger move pools, and often deal two masks of damage as opposed to one. The difficulty hasn’t changed – on the contrary, the game has only gotten more difficult. But because you’re faster and stronger, it’s also more enjoyable and replayable. I’ve beaten Gwin and Nashandra, yet I haven’t picked up Dark Souls or Dark Souls II in ages. Meanwhile, I’ve never defeated Gehrman and the Moon Presence, yet I still play through Bloodborne every Christmas. I suspect the same will be true for Silksong.
