Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Gaming
  3. News

Hollow Knight: Silksong characters revealed through riddles

Matt Bassil
By

The Hollow Knight team has been drip-feeding fans information about its much-anticipated sequel, Silksong.

But rather than outlining the new details in blog posts or additional trailers, developer Team Cherry decided to have a little fun with its fanbase. Over the past four weeks, the developers have revealed new characters through cryptic riddles.

Recommended Videos

The original Hollow Knight was extremely well received, scoring 90 out of 100 on the review site Metacritic. Reviewers praised the title for its depth, challenge, and unique art style. So fans have been champing at the bit for information since the sequel was announced in February 2019.

Until a few weeks ago, all anyone really knew about Silksong was that it would star Hornet, who fought and aided the protagonist in the first game. Now, we’ve been introduced to four Silksong NPCs, both friend and foe.

What were the puzzles?

In early June, Matthew Griffin, a marketer for Team Cherry, left a series of coded riddles on the Hollow Knight Discord server alongside a locked ZIP file.

The riddles required extensive knowledge of Hollow Knight, so only the most dedicated fans had any hope of cracking them. The solution was the name of a new character, “Huntress,” which was the password for the ZIP file. Inside was a description, image, and a GIF of the character in action.

But it didn’t end there. Over June and early July, Team Cherry released three more riddles, and fans uncovered three more Silksong characters.

What have we learned?

Four characters were revealed in full. The first, as the name Huntress suggests, is a fearsome creature: “A towering old predator, awaiting her children to come.” In the released dialogue, she immediately asks Hornet to fetch her some organs, suggesting Silksong, like its predecessor, will have an element of horror.

The second NPC, Grindle, is a “snitchbug,” a burglar complete with a sack of swag. After being freed from prison by Hornet, he appears to serve the role of an information broker. The description states he will “take rosaries in exchange for snippets of information he has gathered, though his gossip is often of questionable value.”

A group of characters was revealed next: A tribe of surprisingly cute fleas known as Caravan. They aim to “gather the playful young fleas scattered across the kingdom” and will likely be asking Hornet to do the job for them, similar to Hollow Knight’s Grubfather.

This week, we were shown a shield-slinging boss character known as Seth. This NPC shares the name of its co-creator, Seth Goldman, a Hollow Knight fan who passed away in June. Seth met Team Cherry, which asked him to design a character for the new game. The result is a tough-looking opponent, an “eternal protector” who “guards a secret long forgotten and will attack any who stray too close.”

Despite these new details, Team Cherry has not yet provided any indication of a Silksong release date. When it does arrive, the game is slated for release on Switch and PC.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Matt Bassil
Matt Bassil
Gotham Knights character guide: Which hero should I pick?
All four Gotham Knights characters stand in front of Nightwing;'s logo.

While Gotham Knights is a superhero game set in Gotham City starring the Bat Family, you can't actually play as Batman. The caped crusader is dead, and it's up to players to save Gotham as one of Batman's four sidekicks: Nightwing, Reed Hood, Robin, or Batgirl. All four of them have very skills, Knighthood traversal abilities, and Momentum Abilities they can use to take on enemies they encounter while patrolling Gotham City. Players can switch characters anytime they want in the Belfry or go out on a multiplayer patrol with two of the same hero.

Still, you might be wondering which superhero best fits your playstyle. We've broken down the best ways to use and the best skills and momentum abilities of each hero so you can decide which one you'll use the most in your Gotham Knights adventure.

Read more
Gotham Knights resurrects Arkham Knight’s massive stuttering problems
gotham knights preview harley quinn missions

Gotham Knights isn't off to a good start, especially on PC. After the developer announced the game would be locked to 30 frames per second (fps) on console with no performance mode, I immediately saw visions of the infamous Arkham Knight PC port -- and my worst fears were confirmed.

Although Gotham Knights isn't as disastrous on PC as Arkham Knight was at launch, the game still has serious performance issues. It's demanding without much of a visual payoff, but the real issue comes down to how much the game stutters regardless of the hardware you're using.
Get ready to stutter

Read more
Gotham Knights lives up to Batman’s legacy much better than I expected
Nightwing prepares to fight enemies in Gotham Knights.

Like the Bat Family itself, Gotham Knights has the tall task of stepping into its predecessor's shoes. The Batman: Arkham games are considered some of the best superhero video games ever made and have gone on to influence countless other titles with their stories, world design, and combat. No matter who developed Gotham Knights, following those games up in a brand-new game in a different universe with changed combat mechanics and without Batman was going to be a tall order. As WB Games Montreal also hasn’t put out a game in nine years, this game is also the studio’s big chance to prove itself during a time when WB Discovery is going through heavy restructuring.
The cards are stacked against Gotham Knights, and early bits of gameplay highlighting significant changes to gameplay and incorporation of RPG mechanics seemed a bit questionable in the wake of the lackluster Marvel’s Avengers. Thankfully, after going hands-on with Gotham Knights for about two hours, the experience is shaping up to be an enjoyable superhero romp, even if it doesn't end up being quite as groundbreaking as the likes of Batman: Arkham Asylum was 13 years ago.
The Bat Family's feuds 
My Gotham Knights demo took me across four different parts of the game and allowed me to go hands-on with all four playable characters. To start, I took control of Nightwing as he investigated the death of Kirk Langstrom and is surprised by the sloppy work of the cops and the appearance of The Freaks, one of the gangs that roam Gotham in the wake of Batman’s death. This part of the game allowed me to get used to the investigation mechanics -- which have players scanning clues in the environment -- as well as combat. Nightwing felt like the most standard of the four characters, although this may be because I controlled him during an early, tutorial-heavy section of the game. 

Instead of the Batman: Arkham series’ highly influential single attack and counter system, Gotham Knights opts for more complicated combat that involves light and heavy attacks of the melee and ranged variety. Instead of dodging, players can counter. This might take some getting used to for longtime superhero games fans, but it works well enough as the fundamental backbone of combat. Players can also use special "momentum abilities" to deal extra damage, reminiscent of the Flow system in the latest Saints Row. After that, I jumped forward in the story and into Robin's shoes.
That mantle still belongs to Tim Drake in this game, which I appreciate as an early 2000s comics reader. I snuck into Blackgate Penitentiary to get intel from Harley Quinn, who winds up sending Robin on a wild goose chase of fighting enemies and gathering intel to get a book of leads Harley gathered for Batman. Tim’s a more stealth-focused character, although I didn’t find sneaking to ever be too effective during my time with Gotham Knights as enemies are clustered together and aerial takedown opportunities weren’t as common. Hopefully, other sections of the game are better tailored to that playstyle. 
Harley ultimately escaped, so next it was time for me to explore the open world and complete challenges connected to taking down Harley Quinn. I chose Red Hood for this task, who stands out as the most distinct (and my current favorite) character in the game. He uses mystical powers granted to him by the Lazurus Pit to jump around the skies of Gotham and is very effective at mowing down enemies with heavy hitter (but nonlethal) guns. Hopping around Gotham as Red Hood feels very distinct to this game. Gotham Knights' open-world exploration and crime-busting also feel more natural and enjoyable as a single-player experience than the War Zones in Marvel’s Avengers.
Gotham Knights - Official Red Hood Character Trailer
The Harley Quinn-related challenges are heightened versions of these dynamic open-world events, like one where I had to save three hostages strapped to bombs at a concert held by The Freaks. These types of missions will probably be the meat-and-bones of the Gotham Knights experience, and while they are not necessarily anything new to the genre, I didn’t have any major problems with them. After spending some time in the open world, it was time to jump forward later in the game so I could take down Harley Quinn.
Batgirl v. Harley: Dawn of Gotham Knights 
By this point in the game, Harley Quinn has enslaved many Gotham residents with a mind-control drug. Batgirl and Renee Montoya show up at Gotham’s hospital to take her down. I slowly made my way through room after room of enemies as Batgirl, taking them down with special momentum abilities that oftentimes electrified her opponents. Eventually, I made it to the showdown with Harley Quinn, who swings a heavy hammer that deals lots of damage if you don’t dodge properly.
This boss fight was probably my least favorite part of the demo, as my hits felt like they had little impact, and it was a bit too repetitive. Still, other bosses like Clayface have the potential to be much more exciting, and I hope there are some surprise bosses and scenarios that we don’t even know about yet. Still, I have a good idea of how the final game will be after going hands-on with Gotham Knights for this long, with the exception of two things: the gear system and co-op.

Read more