Hollow Knight — PC pick-up-and-play system requirements, expected FPS and crash fixes

Hollow Knight is a Metroidvania-type game developed by an indie studio named Team Cherry. Most of the game's story is told through the in-world items, tablets, and thoughts of other characters. Many plot aspects are told to the player indirectly or through the secret areas that provide a bit of lore in addition to an upgrade. At the beginning of the game, the player visits a town of Dirtmouth. A town built above the ruins of Hallownest. The players descend down into the ruins to find some answers to his questions. The game revolves mainly around the exploration of the in-game world, which requires the players to have some platforming skills. The players have to find secrets that are scattered around the level and battle their enemies. There is a certain degree of backtracking in the game as some areas are locked until the player defeats a certain boss or picks up a specific item. Each area changes as the plot advances so it may be surprising to come back in a certain area. The Protagonist uses a nail which serves as a replacement for a sword. Players can attack in four directions. The nail is upgradable.

As a 2017 indie title, Hollow Knight sits at demand tier 5 (Moderate (mainstream GPU)) — moderately demanding on PC. Most discrete GPUs from the last few generations run it fine at 1080p with headroom to spare.

What to tune first on Hollow Knight

• These run on integrated graphics — spend your budget on resolution and texture filtering.
• Frame-rate caps are unnecessary; let it run as high as the display allows.
• Only touch settings if you see stutter on very old hardware.

The FPS table above is a model estimate from the demand-tier + GPU-index method. Real frame rates vary with drivers, background apps, thermals and resolution. Treat it as a buying or upgrade planning aid, then verify in-game. For step-by-step fixes, see the crash-fix and optimization guides linked on this page.