Written By: Charlie M. Case
Hollow Knight, an explosive indie success released in 2017, is a charming metroidvania that does not tell you about itself.
That is to say: Hollow Knight does not exposit, elaborate, or entertain in words. Dialogue throughout the game is sparse and utilitarian, written lore is opaque, and clear-cut explanations are not provided. This is, to be quite clear, not a criticism—because Hollow Knight thrives on showing.
The game, set in the post-calamity, still-dying kingdom of Hallownest, utilizes visual design and environmental storytelling to set its tale’s scene and mood: the dreary intricacy of its environments, sickly stark orange of its enemies, and bleak ghosts from its bygone kingdom all combine to effectively present to the player a distinct, cohesive setting. You are setting foot in a place where the dead outnumber the living.
The ghosts aforementioned are everywhere—both literal ghosts, which give the player glimpses into what Hallownest once was and what came before it, and metaphorical ghosts. The metaphorical outnumber the literal. They come in many different forms: the walking corpses that litter Hallownest’s environment, animated by the infection which sent the kingdom to ruin; the last member of a civilization who passes on before your eyes; the protagonists’ own connection to the royal family, forgotten and rediscovered as play progresses.
Hallownest, and Hollow Knight’s approach to storytelling, are steeped in memory. Of what once was, of what came before even that, and of one’s own experiences, forgotten or repressed or too painful to look at.
It’s captivating.
A player is able to see two actual memories play out before their eyes. One is a memory from the protagonist. The other is a memory from the game’s penultimate boss. They each, almost exclusively through visual storytelling, betray key details about the events and players that led to Hallownest’s fall, which cast into a new light the story details revealed thus far. They also are both extremely difficult to get to in-game.
The first requires various conditions to be fulfilled, and is very much a late-game find, if one finds it at all. The second, on top of many of the same conditions, requires the player to complete a non-mandatory, hidden, extremely difficult platforming segment. These difficulties serve two purposes.
First, they mirror their own nature. Hallownest’s, and its characters’, forgotten memories want to stay forgotten. It is possible to beat the game in multiple different ways without recovering them—it is only through toil and curiosity the memories can be viewed.
Second, and more simply: Hollow Knight is a game, and games are necessarily and enthusiastically interactive. Instead of its story being told passively to the reader, Hollow Knight rewards those who play it: who explore, who examine, who invest themselves in the whole of what Hollow Knight is. Only by engaging with it can you tease out what it has to tell you. Only by meeting Hallownest’s many ghosts can you recover the memories they hold.
I encourage you: step inside. Play. Look, and read, and remember.