15 Things You Need To Know Before Playing Stellar Blade

Stellar Blade is all about exhilarating sci-fi action starring a tough heroine, Eve, who’s tasked with helping reclaim Earth. With humanity on the verge of total collapse, and countless monsters known as Naytiba, it’s up to you to aid Eve on her mission. Our Stellar Blade beginner’s guide has several tips to help you start your journey.

15 tips you should know in Stellar Blade

Our Stellar Blade beginner’s guide focuses primarily on some basic mechanics players should know when starting the campaign. We’ve also included various tips due to the concepts that you’d encounter within the first few hours.

You can have your drone scan an area by pressing the DualSense controller’s touchpad. This is singularly the most important action you can do while roaming various locales, since the drone can reveal the following even through textures or those that are underwater:

• Enemies – These include those that are hidden and waiting to strike.
• Humans – These also pertain to deceased individuals that can be scanned. There are also airborne troops, part of Eve’s cohort, that grant upgrades.
• Crates – You can pick up a lot of goodies and rewards.
• Robots – These, too, drop lots of materials.
• Objects – These can either be structures you can interact with or camps/waypoints.
• Yellow markers – Ledges, ropes, or pathways are highlighted, too.

Stellar Blade uses the tried-and-tested concept whereby resting at a camp (i.e. sitting on a chair) fully restores your health and restocks your consumable items. However, enemies will also respawn.

There are also two kinds of camps:

• Legion Camps – These have a chair (rest), radio (change music tracks), and skill terminal (unlock or reset skills).
• Supply Camps – These have the above, as well as:
  • Repair Console – Contains unlockables, upgrades, and perks.
  • Payphone – Allows you to fast travel.

As mentioned above, payphones serve as waypoints or fast travel points. These allow you to move from one area of the zone to another, saving you the headache of having to go on foot. You can learn more about certain distinctions in our fast travel guide.

As for the map, you can access it by swiping up on the DualSense controller’s touchpad. Take note that not all of the regions in Stellar Blade have maps. Some are considered “corridor worlds,” which have smaller and more compact areas.

There are many ways to boost Eve’s capabilities in Stellar Blade:

• Skill Points (SP) – SP is akin to experience points in that the resource is gained by defeating enemies and completing quests. This is used to unlock new skills.
• Body Core – Collect three of these to increase Eve’s max HP.
• Beta Core – Collect three of these to increase Eve’s max energy (i.e. used to cast skills).
• Weapon Cores – Used to increase attack power.
• Tumbler Enhancement – Used to increase the maximum number of tumblers (i.e. healing flasks/potions).
• Gear Socket – Increases the number of accessories that can be equipped.
• Gears (i.e. accessories) – These have rarity levels and you can get duplicates. The higher the rarity, the better the effect.
• Exospine – These types of equipment are unique, and they can be upgraded to gain new effects.
• Drone upgrades – You can improve the drone scan, as well as unlock different kinds of ammo.

To increase survivability and damage, we recommend checking our Body Cores/Beta Cores guide and Exospines guide.

Eve has a lot of skills under her disposal, as well as combos that have increased strength the longer the string of hits. Bear in mind that skills consume beta energy–which you can think of as mana/MP. However, there are also passives that allow you to restore beta energy when you hit or parry enemy attacks.

Likewise, you can use relatively cheap SP Initializer items. These will reset an entire skill tree (not just a particular node).

Lastly, there’s another mechanic called burst. These are more advanced skills with stronger effects. These use up burst energy, as opposed to beta energy. You can learn more about Eve’s abilities in our best skills guide.

You may also unlock skills that can greatly improve the flow of combat. Here are some examples:

• Perfect Parry – Press L1 just as an enemy’s attack is about to land. You can follow up with the Counter move, as well as a burst.
• Perfect Dodge – Press Circle just as an enemy’s attack is about to land. You can follow up with the Reflection move and a burst.
• Retribution – Doing a Perfect Parry lowers an opponent’s guard meter (represented by yellow pips under their health bar). If your opponent is stunned, you can do a Retribution move that deals tremendous damage.
• Blink and Repulse – Press at the right time to avoid an enemy’s grab attack and do a riposte of your own.
• Assault and Ambush – One-hit kill moves if you strike an opponent stealthily.

As an aside, those who aren’t used to games with fast-paced combat can go to Settings -> Gameplay -> Action Assist. If you enable this option, it will show quick-time event (QTE) prompts. These help you dodge or parry enemy hits.

You don’t always need to get into the thick of the fray when fighting Naytibas. That’s because the drone gets upgraded into a makeshift firearm just a few hours into the campaign.

You can aim by pressing and holding L2. Likewise, you can hold Down on the D-pad to change the type of ammo/shot.

The locked containers in Stellar Blade come in three variants:

• Breach – This has a minigame where you have to press buttons on the D-pad based on the sequence of arrows. There are also crates that have randomized sequences.
• Press – A square will move around a grid, making a sound on the correct tile. Press the button at the proper time to complete the sequence.
• Passcode – Unlike other games where you can input a passcode as long as you know it (i.e. thanks to Google searches, perhaps), Stellar Blade requires you to obtain the necessary clue first. Only then will you be able to key in the code. Likewise, take note that discovered passcodes are found in the Codex tab of your menu. If you’ve yet to unlock a particular container, you can refer to the tab to learn of its general location.

Stellar Blade has plenty of tasks for you to tackle:

• Side quests – These are denoted by exclamation point icons on the map.
• Bounties – You’ll find these on the bulletin board in the city of Xion. For instance, the fishing minigame has its own arc that culminates in bounties called Where Is the Fantastic Bait and The Fish of Legends.

One thing to remember is that many missions in the game present a prompt that allows you to return to the quest giver NPC. It’s a great way to save time if you need to turn in a mission.

Speaking of puzzles, there are quite a few that you’ll want to solve. Examples include the Xion math puzzles and the Lost Ark puzzle. Apart from these, there are sectors in zones that you can only access if you manage to complete certain quests or undertake specific actions. Locations include the Eidos 7 Flooded Commercial Plaza and the Wasteland Forbidden Area.

That does it for our Stellar Blade beginner’s guide. These are just a few tips to help prepare you for this scintillating sci-fi adventure.

Stellar Blade has you facing off against vicious Naytiba, all while trying to figure out your origins. Action, thrills, and a bunch of collectibles/unlockables await. For more tips, you can visit our guides hub.