Hollow Knight: Silksong
Ascend to the peak of a haunted kingdom and experience the rich lore of this new world. Hollow Knight Silksong explores a vast, expanding land of turmoil as Hornet learns the history of the Pharloom and the great citadel that sits at its peak. With its wide cast of characters and lore speaking to players through a poetic fashion, localising such a stylised language can present challenges.
Discover how Universally Speaking helped tackle the task of bringing the world of Pharloom to life in multiple languages.
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Game
Hollow Knight: Silksong -
Release date
September 2025 -
Developer
The Challenge
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Linguists could not access playable builds or full story materials due to strict confidentiality limitations, leaving limited context to work from. Three weeks into the project, Brazilian Portuguese was added to the scope, requiring rapid onboarding without disrupting delivery.
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Hollow Knight's established lore and dedicated community demanded precision, consistency and cultural sensitivity in every terminology decision. The game's tone of voice added further complexity: a rich, slightly archaic style had to stay clear, accessible and consistent across characters with distinct personalities.
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Creative linguistic challenges ran throughout, from invented place names and lore-driven terminology to undefined character genders and the translation of songs and poems.
Our Solution
A dedicated team structure, with two project managers (one primary, one backup), ensured continuity and risk mitigation. Language teams were built around experienced leads responsible for linguistic quality and lore adherence.
A centralised communication model kept things moving: language-specific channels enabled direct collaboration between translators, editors and proofreaders, while cross-language coordination, terminology decisions and workflow updates were managed centrally by the project managers.
A secure translation management system with a shared terminology database underpinned the process, supported by automated QA checks tailored to the project and structured query management reviewed before client submission.
When Brazilian Portuguese was added late, the team onboarded it using reference kits, shared glossaries and PM-led cross-language alignment to keep consistency intact.
Services we provided
- Localization
The Outcome
Hollow Knight: Silksong launched simultaneously across six languages managed by Universally Speaking.
Linguistic quality was high, with less than 1 percent LQA bugs across the total wordcount.
Community reception was strong, with language-specific Steam reviews averaging from Very Positive to Overwhelmingly Positive.
Results That Made a Difference
Hollow Knight: Silksong launched simultaneously worldwide, with high linguistic quality and a strong reception across every region.
Languages, Simultaneous Launch
German, Spanish, Italian, Korean, Brazilian Portuguese and Russian
Managed entirely by Universally Speaking
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