The wait for Hollow Knight: Silksong continues, with fans doing their best to remain patient even after the 5-year anniversary of its announcement. Following up one of the most popular indie metroidvanias to date, Hollow Knight: Silksong is expected to be another 2D action-platformer hit by Australian developer Team Cherry. Featuring the rival character Hornet from the first Hollow Knight, Silksong will deliver more of the charming artwork and satisfying combat that propelled the original game to success in 2017.

One of Hollow Knight’s biggest attractions is how easily players can get lost in its world. This can be literal, causing frustration when Hollow Knight’s map proves uncooperative, but is also an apt metaphor for the depths of Hollow Knight’s setting and characters. Many NPC questlines dot the Kingdom of Hallownest, and Silksong’s Pharloom is expected to include even more. Players can't expect to hear every insect’s secret as they help or fight them, however, and that's where a certain mechanic from the first game could prove useful.

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The World of Hollow Knight Explained

The world of Hollow Knight: Silksong is a cold, dark one, but Hallownest used to be a bustling, vibrant city full of life and hope.

The Dream Nail Is One of Hollow Knight's Most Versatile Tools

At some point while adventuring through Hollow Knight, players will come across a sequence at the Resting Grounds that establishes their main quest objectives, providing them with the Dream Nail in the process. It's with this talisman that they can wake the Dreamers and unseal the final boss, but that is only one of the Dream Nail’s many functions. The Dream Nail takes up an entire button on the controller for a reason, as it is the focus of certain Charms, part of a game-spanning side quest that is necessary to see all of Hollow Knight’s endings, and the key to a wealth of lore that players can't see any other way.

Hollow Knight’s Dream Nail Grants A Different Perspective

Essentially, the Dream Nail permits access to the Dream Realm, whether that involves initiating Dream Boss fights, accessing certain areas, or the inner thoughts of the living and the dead. Nearly every NPC, enemy, and visible corpse in the environment, as well as some objects, can be struck with the Dream Nail to read their mind, and some characters will have multiple thoughts depending on the current state of Hollow Knight’s quests. Reading these isn't essential for progress or understanding the basics of Hollow Knight's story, but it adds details, motivations, and hidden personas to plenty of minor characters who barely speak otherwise. The surprises found in Dream Nail text only add to the sense of discovery Hollow Knight tries to evoke.

Silksong’s Narrative Would Be Enhanced By A Dream Nail Of Its Own

It would be great if mind-reading returned in Hollow Knight: Silksong, but it needs to overcome one stumbling block. The Dream Nail is an artifact tied to an ancient Moth Tribe devoted to The Radiance, which may be extinct after the player completes the Seer's questline. Also, because the Knight needs the Dream Nail to access both of Hollow Knight’s challenging true final bosses, Hornet shouldn't have it, and it's debatable whether an equivalent item exists. Hollow Knight: Silksong could simply explain that another Dream Nail made its way to Pharloom through traveling merchants, but that would cheapen the original Nail.

How Hollow Knight: Silksong Can Bring The Dream Nail's Function Back

An all-new item with Dream Nail properties would be ideal, and fortunately, it's not hard to justify one. Pharloom has been described as a haunted land, and the implied return of Hollow Knight’s ghosts would also mean the return of something with the Dream Nail’s Essence-converting abilities. Silksong’s theming around seemingly magical silk and song could fashion this item into a Legend of Zelda-styled instrument, most likely a harp with a similar wind-up on its strums to the first game's Dream Nail. Using it to find bits of extra lore during downtime, combat, and the traversal in between would make Hollow Knight: Silksong’s dense world feel even more full of detail.

Hollow Knight: Silksong

Franchise

Hollow Knight

Platform(s)

PS4 , PS5 , Xbox One , Xbox Series S , Xbox Series X , PC , macOS , Linux

Developer(s)

Team Cherry

Publisher(s)

Team Cherry

Genre(s)

Metroidvania