Today, we got our first real, new, meaty trailer for Hollow Knight: Silksong in several years, complete with a September 4 release date. Fans are already unpacking details from the trailer, including pointing out that it looks like the base game of Silksong might be bigger than the base game of Hollow Knight – quite a feat for something that started out as DLC.
Evidence for this comes from the trailer above, which has text stating the game contains over 200 enemies and over 40 bosses. Compare that to Hollow Knight's launch trailer, which said over 140 enemies and over 30 bosses:
So it sounds like Silksong is launching with more enemies and bosses than Hollow Knight did. And though we don't know the size of the explorable area in Silksong, it stands to reason that it probably needs to be big enough to fit all those little guys, and thus its map is likely to be at least as big as the original Hollow Knight if not more. And while that may sound like a given for a sequel, it's helpful to remember that Silksong didn't start out as a sequel – it began as DLC, and then somehow morphed into something seemingly even bigger than its predecessor.
Now, that comparison doesn't include Hollow Knight's DLC, which added tons of new enemies, areas, bosses, story, and other content. With all that included, the existing game of Hollow Knight is almost certainly larger than Silksong was at launch. That said, we learned today that developer Team Cherry is still working on more Silksong for the months and years after the game's launch, making it possible it will eventually surpass Hollow Knight's DLC as well.
If you absolutely can't wait until launch to find out what some of these enemies and bosses entail, we did get to preview Hollow Knight: Silksong earlier this week at Gamescom in Cologne, Germany. Funnily enough, it looks like the exact same demo we played back in E3 2019, only with six more years of polish, illustrating how far the game has come in its lengthy development.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can find her posting on BlueSky @duckvalentine.bsky.social. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.