Hollow Knightis a beautiful game. But it’s not just because of the hand-drawn visuals, the cute characters, and the obscenely good soundtrack courtesy of Christopher Larkin. It’s also because of the many different regions of Hallownest, each with its own charms, nuances, perils, and atmospheric qualities. It’s the variety of these areas and the thrill of discovery when visiting them that makes this adventure so brilliant.
Hollow Knight Best Charms Ranked
You’ll live a pretty charmed existence with these in your arsenal.
However, as much as I would love to say that every area is perfect, the many pockets of Hallownest do not stack up equally, and some areas are better than others. So, using my critical faculties, gauging the general opinion of theHKcommunity, and by sprinkling in just a smidge of bias. I will rank every area ofHollow Knightfrom worst to best.
Just to clarify, we will be taking all aspects of the regions of Hallownest into consideration here. Which includes but is not limited to their aesthetic, design, landmarks, bosses, enemy variants, standout moments, and score.
20Resting Grounds
Through Their Devotion, Hallownest Lasts Eternal
The Resting Grounds is a very important place inHollow Knightnarratively,as it indicates to new players where the three Dreamers are and introduces players to Essence and the Dream Nail.That being said, though, that’s pretty much all this area does.
Sure, you can access an area where you can take on Revek, and The Blue Lake is a very pretty place to visit. But when you strip it for parts, really, it’s just a place to turn in your Essence and nothing more.
19Fog Canyon
Who Will Pee On Me If I Touch One?
If we were ranking these areas based purely on their aesthetic, Fog Canyon would be quite a bit higher, butwhile the floating Jellyfish and celestial music help slightly, it’s easily one of the most underwhelming areas in terms of gameplay.
The jellyfish enemies serve as environmental hazards to avoid rather than enemies to take down. The whole area, including the Teacher’s Archives, is a rather basic test of platforming that’s trivialized if you have Isma’s tear. Plus, the boss battle within, Uumuu, is easily the most underwhelming boss of the whole game, and I include the likes of Gruz Mother in that equation. In short, it looks awesome, but looks can be deceiving.
18The Howling Cliffs
Nothing To See Up Here
The Howling Cliffs is an area you can access by backtracking to the area where you begin the game and climbing up the hidden path behind you. It seems like a fun and exciting discovery that promises a lot, but when you get up there and check things out, you realize there isn’t much of note here.The enemies are basically the same as The Forgotten Crossroads, the scenery is pretty drab, and aside from Joni’s Blessing there isn’t much reason to go there at all.
I will admit, the area where you get Joni’s Blessing with all the Butterflies is visually stunning, and the Grimm Troupe DLC at least gives this area some additional purpose, but overall, it’s just not an area that you’ll look back on as a marquee moment of yourHollow Knightexperience.
17The Abyss
I’ve bought a house in the abyss. I’m getting my post forwarded to the abyss.
Next we have The Abyss, the area that you’ll need to explore after you get the King’s Brand in order to get your Shade Cloak. In terms of atmosphere, it shoots for something similar to Deepnest, with a dark, ominous, and oppressive vibe. But unlike Deepnest, it fails to really offer any sort of jeopardy or genuine moments of fear.
The shades that attack you are cool, and some of the lore around the Abyss is also worth reading up on.But because there’s very little reason to explore The Abyss beyond a quick in-and-out for the Shade Cloak, and its whole schtick seems to be ‘Jeez, It’s dark here.’ I think it’s one of the areas that I remember least fondly.
16The Forgotten Crossroads
Forgotten For A Reason
The Forgotten Crossroads is many players' starting point inHollow Knight,and it’s the place where your love affair with this game will begin.But if you ask the community why the game is so hard to get into if you don’t stick with it for the first few hours, they’ll tell you that the reason they stopped playing was because of this dull, grey, boring opening area.
The area serves as an extension of the King’s Pass tutorial in truth, and doesn’t really do justice to how eye-catching and wonderful the rest of the game is. The bosses within, like Gruz Mother and Failed Champion, are pretty lackluster, and generally speaking, I feel like the area sadly lives up to its name, because if Dirtmouth weren’t a hub area you return to often, I would have forgotten about this area completely.
15Infected Crossroads
A Marginal Improvement
I’m ultimately glad that the developers were aware of how dull and lifeless the Forgotten Crossroads were and how it only became more apparent as the game rolled on, and you got more powerful. The Infected Crossroads at least makes the area more colorful and interesting, not to mention more dangerous. However, this is only a marginal improvement.
Because the infection is blocking certain areas of the map, the area becomes a pain to navigate.This may have been intended as a little additional difficulty spike, but it actually just makes navigation a pain as old paths are closed, forcing you to go the long way around. Anything is an improvement on the base Forgotten Crossroads. Don’t get me wrong, but these dirty tricks drag the appeal of this area down massively.
14Royal Waterways/Isma’s Grove
Slumming it in the Sewers
Despite my undying love for Dung Defender, I have to place the Royal Waterways quite low on this list. It’s the first area of the game that tries to use dim, claustrophobic pathways to unsettle you, and I suppose it doesn’t do a bad job. Not to mention, the re-animating enemies add to that fear factor. However, the overall design feels a little limited in scope because of this.
It’s very easy to get lost in this area, and Cornifer is in an awkward place unless you enter via the Fungal Wastes. The bosses within, Flukemarm and Dung Defender, are some of the easiest in the game, and while Isma’s Grove is visually a lot more appealing, it’s merely a means to an end as far as getting Isma’s Tear is concerned.It’s not a bad area per se, but it’s quite underwhelming compared to others higher on the list.
13The Hive
There’s A Real Buzz Around This Place
I think The Hive, a DLC area withinHollow Knight, gets a little bit of a bad rep. I’m not about to defend it as one of the best things the game has to offer, but as an additional and optional area, I think there is fun to be had here.Visually, it’s a very striking location, with some of the cutest but deadliest mob enemies within the game, and you get Hiveblood if you do brave the Hive, which is great for late-game platforming challenges like White Palace and the Path of Pain.
However, where this area falls down is the layout of enemies. These mob enemies have a habit of swarming the player, leading to fights where you’ll have to move with extreme precision, or more likely, use a doorway to cheese each encounter, which wrecks the flow of the gameplay. Then,when you get to the area’s boss, it’ll be a huge anticlimax, as the journey to them is much harder than the fight itself.It’s a decent little excursion, but considering it’s DLC content, it’s surprising how little it adds to the overall game.
12Dirtmouth
A Growing Solitary Town
While Dirtmouth does suffer from a lot of the same issues that The Forgotten Crossroads suffers from aesthetically, this area still ranks significantly higher due to its hub-like nature. As you progress through the game, more and more characters will return to this desolate town, merchants will offer impressive gear, and you’ll get to find Zote in his dream form, which is a blast.
Plus, with the addition of the Grimm Troupe, you’ll be able to take on the boss I would consider the hardest one within the game outside of The Radiance, Nightmare King Grimm.Dirtmouth just feels like a warm blanket in the hostile world ofHollow Knight,and with each new face in town, this feeling grows exponentially.
11Ancient Basin
Hallownest’s Public Transport Hub
I can understand why some don’t immediately take to the Ancient Basin, as it’s a dark, dingy, and uninviting place. However, there is a lot to love about this area. This is the area that allowsthe player to gain access to the Tram System, a discovery that completely changes how the player can navigate the map, making backtracking and exploring the lower region of Hallownest much more manageable.
Not to mention, this area plays host to one of the coolest bosses in the game, Broken Vessel, which in turn gives you access to the Monarch Wings, which are game-changing, to say the least. If we take the White Palace and Abyss as separate entities, it does lack the lore that makes other areas so interesting, but all in all, it’s a brilliant place that somewhat prepares you for the dark and foreboding nature of Deepnest.
