The action-adventure game God of War: Ragnarok is the sequel to God of War, released in 2018. The second spin-off was also developed by US video game developer SCE Santa Monica Studio and celebrated its release on November 09, 2022. In our beginner’s guide, we’d like to give you a few tips and tricks to help you on your way as a budding demigod and godslayer.
In the latest sequel, you’ll set out as Kratos with your son Atreus and plunge into sometimes daring adventures including dangerous battles. As the title of the second part suggests, Ragnarok plays a big role in it. Roughly speaking, it is about the “fate of the gods” and a new world that emerges after the demise of the old world. In our article we will introduce you to the basic game mechanics, such as combat or leveling up your character. One thing in advance: since this is the direct sequel to God of War (2018) and the video game follows on from it, even though a few years have passed, it is recommended to have played the predecessor. We recommend this because some game mechanics return and the story is more coherent.
God of War Ragnarok: Exploring the game world & combat mechanics
The created game world will definitely captivate you in the second installment of the God of War series. In addition to contemporary graphics and coherent sound design, this one was designed with a lot of attention to detail. On your exploration trip through the mystical worlds you’ll encounter smaller and huge enemies, which you’ll have to finish off. While you control Kratos and his son and eliminate enemies, you’ll also collect loot, explore new unknown areas and open some chests on your way. In addition, you will find collectibles in each new map section, where achivements will be waiting for you when you find all of them. Sometimes you have to solve puzzles to get the loot.
As part of the main quest series, you will meet the familiar dwarf brothers from the previous game, among others, who will support you on your journey with a magical door. If you missed or didn’t find some of the items in an area, don’t worry. Areas already traveled can be revisited and explored later. The dwarves also support you with their business. Thanks to their magic, you will find this in every section of the map. There you can buy, sell and improve new equipment or materials.
The basics of combat in God of War Ragnarok
Besides the basic combat mechanics like attacking with your weapons or special abilities like the Spartan Rage, the combat support from your dear son Atreus is the key to victory. If you want to deal quick fire damage, attack with the Blades of Chaos. To inflict frost damage on your enemies, swing your leviathan axe. Either you dash in your attacks on a nearby enemy or by pressing the “R3” key you aim at a target of your choice. With “R1” you attack with lighter attacks, while with the “R2” key you perform stronger attacks. With the stronger attacks you not only deal stronger damage, but sometimes also stun your opponents. When the enemy indicator turns red, you can perform certain finisher moves.
The Leviathan Axe can be used for melee combat and can also be hurled at your opponents. With “L2” you target your opponents (or objects) and with “R1” or “R2” you throw them. Afterwards, you have to press the “triangle” key to make the axe miraculously fling back to you. The Blades of Chaos can also be hurled, and you can use them to pull smaller enemies towards you to take your full combat power out on them. And if you want to take out your raw physical power on the enemies, you can also punch and kick your opponents with “R1” or “R2” without equipping the weapons.
Besides the melee weapons, Kratos Shield is also at your disposal. An enemy attack can be blocked by pressing the “L1” key. Some attacks are marked with a yellow icon, you can block these less well and should rather dodge instead. And stronger attacks, which cannot be defended against, are marked with a red symbol. Blocking is impossible with these. As is often the case, blocking depends on the right timing. A short tap on the “L1” key parries enemy attacks, and with good timing you can execute counterattacks.
If you want to invest your gained skill points wisely, the rune attacks are a good choice. You can equip your weapons with lighter or more powerful attacks. As you play, you’ll find new ones or level up your available rune attacks. If you have this equipped on the weapon of your choice, you can execute it by holding the “L1” key and pressing “R1” or “R2”. The ignited attacks do stronger damage, stun enemies and the damage can be done to more than one enemy. God of War Ragnarok also introduces relics , which you can equip and level up over time. Relics serve as combat support and weaken your opponents or improve your own stats when activated via “L1” in conjunction with the circle key.
How to level up in God of War Ragnarok
Unlike many other role-playing games, your main leveling focus is on your equipment and weapons. You can complete the skill tree available in the game and advance the level advancement. However, the equipment is even more significant: to increase your character level, you’ll have to upgrade the weapons including weapon attachments and all three pieces of armor (chest, hand and hip armor) . You can find them in chests or buy them with hacking silver. To upgrade the equipment or weapon, you will need resources (metals, steel, etc.) and, as the game progresses, special and rare resources.
You can improve your weapons with special resources like the frozen or chaos flame, as well as fragments like the chaos sparks. To find them, you should also complete quests far from the main story and explore more remote areas. The values differ in the following categories:
- Strength: Increases the damage done to enemies
- Defense: Reduces the damage done to you. Is upgraded mainly in your equipment and shields
- Vitality: The amount of health you have determines how much damage you can take
- Cooldown: Especially when using rune attacks, you should level up this value. This value reduces the time until rune attacks or relics can be used again.
- Luck: This value should certainly be advantageous in a game of chance against dwarves or other inhabitants of Midgard. In God of War, however, a high luck value is more useful for finding resources or automatically activating supporting automatic equipment abilities.
Wir hoffen unser Einsteiger-Guide zu God of War Ragnarök konnte dir einen guten ersten Eindruck der Spielmechaniken des Action-Adventures geben. Besuche unsere Seite gerne wieder, denn wir werden bald weitere Artikel zu God of War auf unsere Seite bringen.
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