So, you’ve finally got your hands on a PlayStation 5 and are excited to try out Returnal—one of its big-name exclusives. However, Returnal is an unforgiving game that never holds your hand. After all, the plot is centered around being thrown into an alien world with no knowledge of what you face—and with your only way of learning being repeated death. That said, while there are many things you will inevitably figure out, there are other things you might never realize on your own. So, here’s a list of things that might make your time with the game a bit easier.
Image source: Housemarque on Twitter
The First Two Bosses Are the Hardest Part of the Game
You will lose to Phrike and Ixion. This can feel more than a bit despair inducing as they are at the end of their given zones and it can take more than an hour of hard-fought battles before you’re ready to challenge either of them again. However, don’t lose hope. You only need to beat them once—they become completely optional on all subsequent runs. Moreover, once you beat them, the game becomes dramatically less difficult. For Phrike and Ixion you have only a few basic weapons. (I suggest using the machine gun for both.) After you down them, on the other hand, you’ll gain new weapons that make both them and the subsequent bosses feel almost trivial in comparison. So, let’s focus on getting past them.
Turn on Auto-Run
While there is the simple fact that you’re going to have to memorize Phrike and Ixion’s attacks (there’s just no getting around this) you can make dodging these attacks much simpler. As the game tells you early on, you can run by clicking the right thumbstick. What the game doesn’t tell you is that you can make it so that you are always running in the game’s option menu. Once you do this, you’ll no longer be as dependent on dashing to dodge. I cannot stress enough how much easier this makes not only these bosses but the entire game. It’s almost like turning on easy mode.
But Don’t Forget to Dash
Remember, while dodging with auto-run is often enough, actually dashing straight up makes you invincible for about a second (except in the case of purple-colored attacks which appear late in the game). Be it boss attacks or lasers blocking your path, don’t be afraid to dash right through them. You’ll be just fine.
Aim For the Flat Top!
Returnal’s bosses and mini-bosses each have some sort of major, glowing weak point. For Phrike and Ixion, it’s the head. You’ll be shocked how much more damage you do when hitting it.
Image source: Housemarque on Twitter
You Can Grind to Make Yourself More Powerful in Subsequent Runs
While it may seem like you start from nothing at the start of each loop, this isn’t quite true. There are a few things that carry over that can make you markedly more powerful. The artifact unlocker right outside your ship is a game changer. In exchange for Ether, it grants you a new artifact right at the start of your run and makes it so that said artifact can randomly spawn on the map in all subsequent runs. Unless you’re actively aiming to fight a boss and want to save Ether for the Resurrection Machine, you should always buy a new artifact.
The other thing you can do is unlock weapon skills. Each weapon has various skills attached. They start off locked but by using the weapon, you unlock them. And once you have unlocked a skill it will be unlocked on that weapon by default on all subsequent runs.
Know What You Can Reach and What You Can’t
In each area there are many places you can’t access at the start. You’ll often see platforms that are too high to jump to, gaps that are too large to cross, tree roots that prevent entry to a cave, and pools of water that kill you upon entering. You gain the ability to overcome these obstacles as part of the main story. Breaking yellow energy barriers, on the other hand, requires a special item from the store (that you must purchase each run) and wading through red-black lava requires a permanent equipment upgrade from a side area late in the game. On the other hand, you can just dash through red lasers. And as for the stone cages, you can open them right from the start. Just look for a flat-topped pyramid with a yellow light on it attached to a wall somewhere near the cage and shoot it. (And before you ask, yes, I beat the game before I figured this out.)
Raise That Max HP
To beat Phrike and Ixion—not to mention reaching them in the first place—you need to make sure you’re the strongest you can possibly be on each attempt. While you can’t control the artifacts or weapons you get, you can always raise your maximum HP as high as possible. In Returnal, HP restoring items become max HP increasing items when you are at full health. Therefore, the less you get hit, the stronger you will be.
Doors Are Your Best Friends
Of course, not getting hit is easier said than done with all the bullets, lasers, and angry dog monsters coming your way. This is where doors come into play. The doors between areas act as both natural chokepoints and invincible barriers. By entering into a new area and then retreating back into the previous room, you can ensure all the enemies spawn in front of you with no possibility of flanking you. More than that, when they shoot a ton of bullets at you, you can just move back a bit more, slamming the door shut in their faces. You can then wait for the shots to hit the door and let your powerful alt fire recharge in total safety. Be warned though, any enemy that can teleport can come through the door even when it’s shut—though facing them one-on-one should be much easier than when they have friends with them.
Image source: Housemarque on Twitter
Pick Up That Dead Monster Money
Money is vital in Returnal. Purchasing a health pack and an astronaut figure before heading into a boss can easily be the difference between victory and defeat. And while you’ll find clumps of money lying about or in certain chests, your biggest supply of cash is the monsters themselves. All monsters drop money on death. However, it only lasts a few seconds. So, while it can be tempting to pick off enemies from afar in total safety, it hampers you in the long run by diminishing your purchasing power. Luckily, using the door strategy above, you can dash in and back out to safety and get most of that money with little risk.
There Are Always Shortcuts to the Bosses
Reaching and/or unlocking the boss room for the first time, can be a grueling experience—requiring you to visit nearly every room on the map. However, after you’ve done this once, things get dramatically easier. In the first area, all you technically need to do to rechallenge the boss is to find the boss room—and, until you’ve defeated Phrike, he will be marked on your map with the objective marker right from the start. In the second area, you only need to get through the desert section of the map. At the base of the temple is a special teleporter that will take you right to Ixion—skipping more than half the area. (Similar shortcuts exist for the rest of the areas in the game as well.) Now, whether or not you want to use these shortcuts is all up to you—you don’t want to be underpowered after all. But once you feel you have all you need to fight the boss—or just want to practice it and learn the patterns—you can head right to him. Don’t feel pressured to clear every room just because you can. It’s all too easy to lose a promising run by biting off more than you can chew for no real reason.
Resurrection Machines Only Work in Their Given Zones
Since you’ll always have to go through at least part of the first zone to find the gateway to the second, you may be tempted to use the Resurrection Machine if you come across it. However, be warned: if you use the Resurrection Machine in the first zone and die in the second, you will spawn back at the start of the loop—meaning you just wasted a ton of Ether for no reason. (And yes, I figured this out the hard way so you don’t have to!)
Top image source: Housemarque on Twitter.
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