In Returnal, you play as Selene — a planetary scout for ASTRA who gets marooned on a ruined planet searching for a mysterious signal. Returnal features rogue-like elements where Selene returns to Helios, her crashed ship, every time she dies. In order to discover the secrets of this world and why she keeps returning, the player must survive as long as possible. To help do so, we have gathered the best tips to help you stay alive.
Your melee weapon is stronger than you think, especially early on.
At some point during your first handful of runs you will eventually obtain a melee weapon resembling a sword. This can be used to disable red barriers, but is more effective as a weapon, especially against the dog-like Kerberon and the flying Lamiadon. Using your melee weapon to effectively one-hit these enemies can be useful to ensure you don’t miss any disappearing Obolites. It can also be useful to quickly finish off stronger enemies while your weapon is reloading. There are also a number of artifacts, consumables, and parasites which can make your melee even stronger.
The spaceship and the astronaut figurines.
The first time you obtain these artifacts you might be confused as to what they do, as their in-game descriptions are vague at best. The astronaut figurine is used as a one-time revive once you die, picking you right back up and refilling your suit’s integrity bar. You can also have the option to craft them at fabricators after you first obtain it, which is always worth the spent obolites. The spaceship figurine turns your dash into a weapon, dealing significant damage to enemies you dash through. Combined with the melee attack this combo can even help you defeat boss type enemies.
Don’t be afraid of malfunctions.
At first it can seem annoying to have to deal with suit malfunctions, but they are usually worth the trouble. Aside from almost always having a simple way to remove them built in, you will likely find consumables and/or xenotype machines that will clear all of your malfunctions at once. Just be careful not to risk obtaining any more malfunctions while you already have two afflicted, because this will trigger a critical malfunction, destroying a random item in your inventory.
Only spend ether on a reconstructor in biomes you think you will die in.
The reconstructor is a xenotech that allows Selene to return to the reconstructor with all of her obtained gear after she dies instead of Helios. This can be useful to save runs and continue making progress. However, what the game doesn’t tell you is that reconstructors are only tied to the biome you use it in. If you spend your hard earned ether on a reconstructor in the Overgrown Ruins and die in the Crimson Wastes, you will return to Helios and start your run over again. So make sure you don’t waste any precious ether in a region you are confident in so that you are able to spend them at the Cthonos.
Destroy every purple plant you see.
Another secret of Returnal hides in groups of bulbous, purple plants that sometimes litter certain rooms. If you make sure to destroy every one you will likely come across hidden parasites, resin, and obolites. It’s easy for new players to dismiss these plants the first time encountering them as the drops are kind of rare, and it’s hard to tell what they might contain without popping every one.
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Matthew has been a lifelong lover of video games since he could first hold a controller, and among his favorites are narrative-heavy, singleplayer games like; Divinity: Original Sin 2, Elden Ring, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice and Hollow Knight. Matthew also plays tabletop games like Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder and Call of Cthulu. He graduated from the University of North Texas with a bachelor’s in Sociology and minored in English.
