Returnal PS5 (and now PC!) story-driven third-person bullethell rogue-lite

Are you spending Ether to cleanse stuff? That’s just late game Ether burn. Save it to unlock a new item at the start of a run or use it for the one run rez. The yellow crystals are that run only currency that you can use at the fabricators you randomly find

Boss 3 down with a Level 11 sidearm. It really wasn’t too bad. Got through the first phase taking no damage. Made some stupid blunders on phase 2, but persevered. Phase 3 seems tricky but as long as you keep moving and taking shots when you can, it’s do-able. I think it helped to have the “repair on low integrity” parasite.

On to Biome 4.

How would somebody know that?

About using ether? For me it seemed a better choice to use it for item unlocks and just not worry so much about malfunctions. Early game, they usually aren’t that hard to clear just by playing normally. Sometimes you’ll get a really shitty one (like the one where enemies auto fire back every time they get hit), but usually it’s not too bad.

I know you’re probably not playing anymore, but about how far did you get into a level before dying?

Anyway, I beat boss 4 on my second try with a pretty crappy sidearm. I grabbed it just before entering the boss room because the stats looked good but didn’t notice that it was “burst fire” which I don’t like. He wasn’t that bad. Moving on to biome 5. I have no idea what’s going on with the story anymore, but I do like the creepy exploration stuff.

Made it to the final boss… and died. But I think I know how to deal with him. Some of the weapons you unlock later in the game are trash. Either that or I don’t know what I’m doing with them. Give me a modded up Rocked Launcher or Hollowseeker.

I agree. The end game weapon, that grenade launcher, is worse than the side arm. Maybe it absolutely rocks bosses but I die to mobs before I ever get to a boss if I use that thing.

I finally beat Phrike!!! Game time: 14hrs 57mn.

Congrats! Now on to the rest!

I’m still trying to take out the final boss. It’s the slog to get to him that’s the challenge. There’s a lot of stuff to wade through. Plus, I’m trying out some less favorable weapons to level up their mods.

I’m close to the secret ending, only need one more shard, but I’m taking a break for a bit.

What’s truly amazing about this game if how easily I can get back in the groove. Last night I hadn’t played for about a week, but it’s so smooth and natural to control that I was back to Phrike and died in the third phase on my first run, and killed him on my fourth.

Funny side effect, though, I dipped back into Remnant recently right after playing Returnal and that game felt like moving through tar. It was painfully slow to move, but as a bonus, nothing in the game intimidated me anymore!

Yeah I was poking around in Remnant too again with the recent 60FPS patch. The thing that makes swapping between them the hardest is dodge is on X on one and O on the other by default.

Final Boss defeated thanks to a heavily upgraded Carbine. Whew!

And all that is just me!

The game is on sale at PSN for $50. I bit for that price. I love the atmosphere and gunplay. I just hope I don’t get tired of the roguelike nature. Got to the first boss but either I’m doing something wrong or he had way too many health bars. Went in with a pretty good setup and still didn’t get half way through before death. Ah well once more into the breach.

I finally got my hands on a PS5, luckily on the same weekend that Returnal was on sale. I think this game is awesome, even though I played for hours last night and didn’t make it to the first boss or get any permanent upgrades aside from the teleport.

My one big issue so far is the design of the visual cues. Primarily, I wish the game did a better job of distinguishing between types of items. Maybe I’m missing something, but the highly valuable Ether on the ground looks exactly the same as parasites or other malignant items that I often don’t want anything to do with. It’s kind of a bummer that for such a fast paced game I have to break the flow to walk up to the item and read its text to know even the general purpose of the thing is sitting on the ground. Do I want to go risk my life for that purple thing on the ground that may be the most valuable resources OR completely worthless? This seems like an intentional decision since there is no shortage of colors available, but it stinks.

Yeah, the color of the ether and the parasites make them difficult to distinguish.

Got the game and played for about 3 hours till I beat the first boss. Sort of a pushover compared to previous challenges the game throws at you. Got me the first time as I got used to the basic patterns but went down the second time.

This game is excellent. I really like the overall design and how much if blurs the line between rogue like and straight up action game, with such a heavy focus on the story:

So I got another session in. Sadly, this weekend I’m off, so I can’t keep playing. This has it’s hooks on me deeper than any recent game I can think of. Maybe Hades is the closest.

Anyway, lost a good run on biome 2 to an auto system update during rest mode (now they are deactivated). But the next run was equally good. Got what I feel was a good chunk of the way up the mountain, but the alternative paths keps becoming longer and more dangerous as I wen’t up (quite different from the first biome). So I finally got killed very close to the summit.

Let’s hope Sunday I can find time to try again.

Went back this weekend to get the secret ending. Flare gun is underrated, carried me through the final biome and just shredded the boss faster than I have with any other gun.