Screenshot: Santa Monica Studio / Sony / Kotaku
Boy, here are some God of War Ragnarök tips. And yes, is very good and offers a satisfying conclusion for this new era of the franchise.
So knowing that and after all the hype, you’re probably excited to jump in and get going with Kratos and friends. But before you start playing Ragnarök, here are some tips to consider from me, someone who has played over 40 hours. And don’t worry, there are no major spoilers below.
You can pause scenes
Simple advice, but good to know because some of the scenes in Ragnarök are very long. You may need a bathroom break!
Set “Swipe Up” to quickly see where to go
PS5 and PS4 controllers have touchpads. While these are used by most games as little more than giant buttons, God of War allows you to assign certain actions to swipes. Personally, setting it to point the camera in the direction of my current target was the only useful action I found in the game. Technically, you can do the same thing with the push of a button, but this is faster and easier.
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Screenshot: Santa Monica Studio / Sony / Kotaku
I pre-ice his ax before fights
One of the first things you learn is the ability to “charge” your Levithan ax with ice, and it’s a great thing for the rest of the game. Anytime you get a chance to hold the triangle to “freeze” your axe, do it! You will deal more damage and gain access to special attacks. Later on, grab the upgrade that allows you to freeze your ax while running as well.
Save Health Drops for Later
During fights, an enemy will sometimes drop a health buff. While you may be tempted to immediately smash them to recharge your HP, wait! Leaving them around can save you during ambushes or larger fights. Wait to open them when you know the area is either completely cleared or you are very, very low on health and need a boost. Your HP will be low early on, so managing these drops effectively can help you survive tough encounters.
Try the dwarven armor set, Nidavellir
Not too far into the game, you’ll come across a side quest involving mining rigs and dwarfs. Take a detour and finish this questline as it will give you the materials needed to craft the Nidavellir armor set. This armor has a huge advantage, whenever you execute a stunned enemy using R3, the armor provides a burst of health. Very useful in the early game!
Don’t forget to block and counter
It’s easy to just focus on swinging your cool ax and chain blades because they’re so cool and they make enemies “SPLAT” or “BOOM” when used correctly. But wait! Don’t forget to block and dodge. Later enemies and tougher bosses will require you to block and dodge attacks, so start practicing early on. (And remember, you can’t block attacks marked with red circles!)
Screenshot: Santa Monica Studio / Sony / Kotaku
Use Atreus to locate lost enemies
Sometimes you can kill what you think is the last enemy, but the combat music keeps playing and you can’t access any loot. This is not a bug, rather there is likely a lone enemy hanging around somewhere. A quick way to find him is to press square and use Atreus’ bow attack to find him, as he will shoot the bow in the direction of the bad guy.
Get aggressive abilities for Atreus
Speaking of Atreus, when upgrading your abilities, focus on the ones that make you more aggressive and give you more ways to stun, damage, and counter enemies. This will make it much more useful in fights.
The first nine minutes of God of War Ragnarök
Take advantage of the blade claw when you unlock it
Early on, you will be able to unlock an ability for your Blades of Chaos called “Hyperion Grapple”. Once unlocked, point your swords at an enemy and hold R1. Kratos will traverse the battlefield and crash into the bad guy or monster through the chains of blades. This will deal a lot of stun damage, which is useful as it will often allow you to execute the enemy.
You can even upgrade it to deal more stun damage, making it a very powerful move for taking down large enemies or clearing small ones, as it has no cooldown.
Do you need to stun something? Beat him!
While your ax and swords are awesome and very powerful, don’t forget that Kratos has some beefy fists that can come in handy in a fight. That’s because his fists do more stun damage, filling that stun meter below the enemies’ HP bar.
In fact, it’s better to hit some enemies, like armor-clad Travelers, than slash them, because once stunned, you can rip off their armor and make them more vulnerable to other attacks. Fast and annoying creatures can also be stunned into place with Dad of War’s fists of fury.
Screenshot: Santa Monica Studio / Sony / Kotaku
I love the Lance. Worship the Spear. Update it too!
Quite late in the game, you will gain access to a new weapon – a magic spear. I won’t spoil how you get it or why, but it’s very cool and useful. What makes this spear powerful is that you can cast magical copies of it forever, giving Kratos a powerful weapon from a distance. And the spears can pierce through enemies, which Kratos can later blow up when you hold the triangle. This is all good and you should try to update it as soon as possible once you unlock it.
Those vents you see? Ignore them until you get the spear
The spear is not only a great weapon, it also helps in solving later game puzzles! All those little air vents you see in the various realms? Those can’t be used until you get the spear. Go back to him to solve those riddles.
The same goes for the bright yellow cracks
Yes, those also need the spear.
Keep an eye out for chests
They can be hidden in many places and are very important. Each of these will give you more resources and hacksilver, allowing you to upgrade all of your god-slaying gear. Keep an eye out for Nornir chests, which are dark blue and locked behind runes. You’ll have to solve a little puzzle to open them, but they do grant health and rage boosts!
Sell armor and weapons you don’t use
Having more hacksilver and crafting resources is helpful early on, as you start the game with basically nothing. So feel free to sell any armor or weapons you find you don’t want. And don’t worry, if in a few hours you feel like you made a mistake, you can always re-create those things later.
But trust me, you’ll quickly find a few pieces of gear you love, and everything else can and should be sold to help improve the stuff you’re actually using.
Oh, and sell all the artifacts too
After finding books or other collectibles, you can sell them to blacksmiths. And they don’t punish you for doing it. In fact, the game even tells you this at one point. So sell those things too!
Screenshot: Santa Monica Studio / Sony / Kotaku
Make sure to use your XP to get new abilities
In all the chaos of killing and looting, you might forget to take a moment to level up your skills and unlock new ones. So get in the habit of always checking your skills whenever you see a blacksmith, defeat a boss, or after a cutscene. This happens often enough that you shouldn’t go too long without updating Kratos.
Also, upgrade your skills and rune attacks
There is a lot of shit to update in this game. (In fact, there’s probably too much to play with, really.) Another thing to upgrade is your weapons, which can be equipped with two runes each. Upgrading these runes can enhance already powerful special attacks in some cool ways.
Oh, also upgrade your skills once you’ve completed the associated challenge
Wait, there’s more shit to update. Over the course of the game, you will complete challenges that connect with different abilities. Once you’ve fully completed all levels of a challenge, you’ll be able to upgrade that associated skill. For example, the fantastic Hyperion Pull ability I mentioned earlier can be adjusted, after you’ve used it enough times, to deal even more stun damage.
Pick one or two stats that interest you and focus on that
Granted, all those buffs, armor management, and skill adjustments can seem complicated and difficult to follow. And something like that is! But luckily, you can also ignore it all and pick just two stats that interest you the most.
So if, like me, you just want to do a lot of damage and have tons of health, just focus on gear that increases your vitality and strength. I did this and easily made it to the end of the game as a god killing machine.
Screenshot: Santa Monica Studio / Sony / Kotaku
Use hex arrows to freeze things without the ax being embedded
See something you need frozen? Throw your ax at him. Simple. But what if there are two things? Well, don’t forget that you can have your teammates shoot hex arrows at something, like a large gear connected to a door, and when you freeze it, the gear will stay frozen even after you remove the axe. This will allow you to freeze two different things at once!
On PS5? Play at 120 FPS if your TV allows it
If you’re lucky enough to own a PS5, take advantage of Ragnarök’s suite of visual options. Specifically, if you have a TV setting that allows it, play at 120fps. Really. It’s unbelievable and makes me unable to go back to 60fps or… shivers… 30fps.
To enable 120fps, go into visual settings and select “Performance Mode” and then enable “High Frame Rate Mode”. hey! You too can kill gods at a silky smooth 120 frames per second.
You can continue playing once the credits are accumulated (and you should)
I won’t spoil how God of War does this, what it means for the story, or how it works with the other characters in the game. But yes, you can continue playing and finish the side quests you didn’t complete before finishing the main story.
And you should keep playing once the game is “over” because there are some fun moments and conversations to discover once it’s all said and done.
Source: news.google.com