Hollow Knight Basics Guide

Hollow Knight is an indie action-adventure game created in the style of a Metroidvania. A loose definition of a Metroidvania is that it borrows heavily from the structural design of classic games like Super Metroid and Castlevania. In practical terms, it means the game is a challenging, open-world platformer that requires unlocking specific abilities and items to access new areas and progress through the kingdom.

Before starting your journey through Hallownest, here are the essential gameplay basics you should know.

Combat & Soul Management

In Hollow Knight, you control a silent protagonist known as The Knight. The Knight’s primary weapon is the Nail, which acts much like a sword and can swing up, down, left, or right.

• Nail Upgrades: Your Nail can be upgraded up to four times by visiting the Nailsmith in the City of Tears. Upgrades require Geo and a rare material called Pale Ore.
• The Down-Pogo Trick: Striking downward with your Nail (Down + Attack) while in mid-air lets you bounce off enemies, environmental spikes, and bouncy purple mushrooms. Master this early—it is essential for crossing spike pits and reaching high ledges before unlocking higher-tier movement abilities.
• Combat Rhythm: Combat revolves around learning enemy attack patterns, dodging precision strikes, and finding safe windows to counterattack.
• Soul & Focus: Attacking enemies fills your Soul Vessel. Soul powers your spell attacks as well as your primary healing ability, Focus.
• Healing Windows: Healing with Focus requires standing completely still for a full second to restore one mask of health. Avoid panic-healing mid-fight; instead, wait for a boss to stagger or use wide attack animations to safely heal.
• Geo Currency: Defeating enemies rewards you with Geo, the primary currency used to buy maps, items, charms, and station access.

Upgrades: Abilities & Charms

As a Metroidvania, Hollow Knight features numerous upgrades scattered across the world:

• Abilities: Permanent movement and combat skills tied directly to world progression (such as the Mantis Claw for wall-jumping or the Mothwing Cloak for dashing). These are active at all times once unlocked.
• Charms: Equippable items that grant passive bonuses (e.g., increased invulnerability frames after taking damage or expanding your Nail reach). Charms can only be equipped or unequipped while resting at a Bench.
• Wayward Compass: One of the most important early-game Charms, bought from Iselda in Dirtmouth. Equipping it places an icon showing your exact position on the map screen.

Overcharming

To prevent equipping every Charm at once, your character has a limited number of Charm Notches. Each Charm costs 1 to 4 Notches to equip.

If you try to equip a Charm that requires more Notches than you currently have available, you can force it into place after several attempts. This state is called Overcharming.

Overcharming lets you gain the extra Charm effect, but at a severe cost: you will take double damage from all sources while Overcharmed.

Secret Charm Combinations

Certain Charms interact with one another to grant unique hidden effects when equipped together. Experimenting with different setups can unlock surprising combat and traversal synergies:

• Defender’s Crest + Flukenest: Transforms your cloud of flukes into a single, massive explosive dung fluke.
• Spore Shroom + Defender’s Crest: Modifies your healing spore cloud into a toxic stink cloud that deals damage faster.
• Grubsong + Weaver political / Grubberfly’s Elegy: Little weavers spawned by Weaversong will gather Soul for you every time they strike an enemy.
• Sprintmaster + Dashmaster: Stack these together to gain a significant extra boost to your movement and dash speed.

Exploration & Mapping

Hallownest is a vast, interconnected cavern system full of hidden secrets, breakable walls, and locked pathways.

• Mapping System: Upon entering a new zone, your map is completely blank. To reveal the area, you must locate the mapmaker Cornifer, who sells basic area outlines for Geo. If you miss him in an area, his wife Iselda will sell the missed map in her shop in Dirtmouth.
• Updating Maps: Cornifer’s maps only show the general layout. To update your map with newly explored rooms, you must equip the Wayward Compass Charm and sit at a Bench after exploring.
• Map Pins & Markers: Purchase Map Pins (such as Bench Pins and custom Marker Pins) from Iselda early on. Marking locked doors, tough bosses, or paths you can’t reach yet saves you hours of aimless backtracking when you return with new abilities later.
• Can You Get Soft-Locked? No! It is very common to drop down a steep shaft into a scary new zone (like Deepnest or Ancient Basin) and feel stuck. You cannot get permanently soft-locked in Hollow Knight—there is always an alternate path, a hidden wall, or an ability nearby that will lead you back home.
• Interactive Maps: If you prefer direct navigation assistance, several online third-party maps detail every item, secret, NPC, and boss location across the kingdom.

Benches & Fast Travel

Checkpoints (Benches)

Benches function as safety checkpoints throughout Hallownest. Sitting at a Bench accomplishes three main tasks:

1. Fully restores your health masks.
2. Updates your map with newly explored rooms.
3. Allows you to edit your equipped Charms.

The Stagways (Fast Travel)

Fast travel across Hallownest is handled through a network of stops called Stag Stations.

• Unlocking Stations: When you locate a new Stag Station, pay the Geo toll box inside to open the gate and summon The Last Stag.
• Traveling: Speak with The Last Stag to travel instantly to any previously unlocked station. If he is absent when you enter a station, ring the station bell to summon him.

Death & Soul Recovery

When you die in Hollow Knight, you leave behind a dark shadow of yourself called a Shade. Upon death, you lose all accumulated Geo, and your Soul Vessel cracks, limiting your maximum Soul capacity to 66%.

• Retrieving Geo: To regain your lost Geo and repair your Soul Vessel, you must return to the location of your death and defeat your Shade in combat.
• Using Rancid Eggs: If you die in a treacherous or hard-to-reach area, you can use a Rancid Egg to safely retrieve your Shade. Give a Rancid Egg to Confessor Jiji inside the locked cavern on the far right side of Dirtmouth (requires a Simple Key). She will summon your Shade directly to her hut, allowing you to defeat it safely without risking another death.

(Watch our video guide above from the Hold To Reset YouTube channel to see Confessor Jiji’s Shade retrieval system in action!)

This guide is part of our larger Hollow Knight guide and walkthrough hub. Check out our main walkthrough index for area guides, boss strategies, and item locations, or head over to our King’s Pass guide to begin your journey!

These are the core Hollow Knight gameplay basics to know. Let me hear what else you think is relevant in the comments below.