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So, you are looking into fighting through the war-torn, infested streets of Valor Mortis, eh? Well, we have good news for you, as we have collected a bunch of tips and tricks that will aid you in your adventure in an effort to make exploring this dark and twisted world just a little bit easier.
1: Upgrade Your Skills Often
As you begin Valor Mortis, you will start as a simple man trying to make your way through the rough and tough world, fighting monsters, people, and people who have turned into monsters, but you aren’t alone in this journey, as you have a skill tree that you can use to boost your various stats like health, stamina, and many more.
Throughout your journey, you will need to make sure you are using this skill tree as much as possible, using the game’s resource of Catalysts to improve your character in a bunch of different ways to improve your fighting skills and push through the enemy lines.
2: Use Your Items; Don’t Be a Hoarder
While exploring Valor Mortis, you will often come across items throughout the game that you will think will come in handy later in the game, so you won’t use them, but we are here to say use those items as they grow on trees because you will find hundreds of them.
Although the game doesn’t have a hundred grenades for you to use, most of the items you will find, such as grenades, bullet pouches, whetstones, and more, can be a common drop from enemies and the game world, so hoarding them doesn’t exactly make your fights any easier, especially against bosses.
Due to this, we recommend that if you are fighting a tough enemy that has killed you a handful of times, what’s the harm in making your sword cut a little deeper, giving yourself more ammo, or simply just blowing them to kingdom come and going wild and enjoying the slaughter?
3: Complete the Side Quests
Now, this goes without saying, but side quests are very important in the world of Valor Mortis, as they aren’t just here to help fill out the world, but they can also grant you some unique items that will aid you in your journey while also being very quick to complete for the most part, so you won’t have to jump through many hoops to complete them.
The main reason you want to complete side quests in the game is because of the Embers that they give you, which can be used in your skill tree to provide certain bonuses that will help you later on in the game.
Along with this, a lot of the quests are quite interesting to complete, with many of them having rather deep or tearful endings, or some just providing a unique view on the horrifying world in Valor Mortis.
4: Play Around With the Controls
Now, this may not be the tip for you, but for those who like to play games like Valor Mortis a certain way, we would recommend that you have a small play around with the controls within the game, as the key bindings may not be to your liking upon starting the game.
The reason we say this is because there are different button layouts already preset within the game’s settings that provide different experiences to the game, with one layout having the dodge button on R1 on PlayStation controllers and another layout having the dodge on Circle.
Each of these layouts is to the player’s own preference, but if you like to play a certain way and the default layout isn’t working for you, go check out these settings.
5: Upgrade Your Swords and Guns
This may be a rather obvious one, but bear with me as there is a small twist. While playing through Valor Mortis, you will gather quite a few weapons in your arsenal that you can use against your enemies, but you may decide you want to focus on using one weapon throughout the game, and this is a big mistake.
Due to there being numerous weapons in Valor Mortis, you will need to get used to the idea of swapping to each weapon depending on the situation at the time, so if they are close range, use the blunderbuss; if they are far away, use the pistol or musket; if they rush you, use your sword; and so on.
Because of this requirement to use variety, upgrading each of these weapons is an incredibly important part of the game, as you will need to make sure that each of these weapons keeps up with the others, as there’s no point having a rank 1 pistol that does no damage to ranged enemies and a rank 10 blunderbuss that does a lot of damage but can’t hit them, so ranking them each up equally is rather important.
6: Upgrade Your Transmutations
Just like the above with your swords and guns, Valor Mortis provides you with the opportunity to use abilities within the game known as Transmutations that each have their own unique payouts. Whether it be using the Fire Transmutation to set the enemies and world ablaze or the Stasis Transmutation to freeze enemies and the world in place, you will need to swap between them to keep combat fresh.
Similar to the guns above, each of these transmutations has its own upgrade paths that you can upgrade and unlock throughout the game, and you should try to keep them updated as much as you can, as they are all viable in your journey, and having them as strong as you can get them is really important.
7: Focus Enemy Weak Points
A big part of combat in Valor Mortis is taking down incredibly challenging enemies with a sword and a gun, but to the enemies they might as well be a toothpick and a pea shooter, so to deal the most damage you can, you need to focus your attention on the enemies’ weak spots.
Now, not all enemies have obvious weak spots, as most enemies do have a head, which counts as a weak spot if they do not have others, but the biggest version of a weak spot is the boils that appear on enemies that you will need to shoot or slash when you get the rapier to chunk their health.
Not all of these weak spots are easy to hit, as many of them can be hidden behind shields, the enemies hide them themselves, or even you need to tear down defenses to open them up, but either way, looking for and getting used to breaking these boils is a surefire way to take enemies down rapidly before they take you down.
8: Explore What You Can of the World
Sadly, the world of Valor Mortis isn’t a big one to explore, as the game world is incredibly linear with only a handful of diverging paths to explore, but when you do explore these paths, you will be rewarded with some rather interesting situations.
Whether it be discovering powerful loot like Embers or upgrading components, fighting challenging enemies, or just simply finding cool locations to visit, there are so many places to look for and discover within the world that won’t take you too long to explore, so why not have an adventure amidst the death?
9: Stealthing is a Viable Option
Although the game is very fast-paced with a lot of in-your-face enemies that will rush you the second they get the chance, there is the option to stealth around the game and avoid confronting some enemies head-on, and this is quite a useful way to clear out sections of the game, as enemies can get overwhelming.
Along with this, you are also protecting your healing items and reducing the risk of being taken on by challenging enemies with a group of smaller enemies around, as you can simply sneak around and reduce the number of threats around you.
10: Don’t Expect Bosses to Go Down Easy
Now this might be a rather obvious tip, as bosses in any game should be hard; that is why they are bosses, but when it comes to Valor Mortis, bosses aren’t always just a one-and-done scenario, as some bosses hold extra phases, challenging attacks, unique mechanics, and so many more scenarios that can easily distract and kill you quickly.
Due to this, we recommend that you take your time and allow yourself the chance to learn how a boss attacks before jumping straight at it and trying to tear it down quickly, as you will lose health and healing potions a lot faster than the boss will.
11: Don’t Give up, Keep Trying
No matter how angry you get with Valor Mortis, do not give up. Just like other Soulslikes, this game is good at making you struggle to earn your victories, as it isn’t supposed to be a game of walking up to a boss, stabbing it once, and walking away like a hero; you need to earn it, and the way to do that is to keep trying.
You will lose, and you will win, but overall, if you want to beat the game and say it with pride, you cannot let the game win and slow you down. Although our tips and tricks above may not work for everyone, they can at least provide some form of help that can boost you up that little bit to get a foothold in Valor Mortis, so no matter what, keep trying!
Before you leave, make sure you check out the bottom of the page for more guides for VALOR MORTIS. We’ve got a lot more tips waiting to help you out!
For your next read, why not check out our review for Valor Mortis, or check out our review for Hellraiser: Revival!
Liam is a Senior Editor, Writer, and Critic for Thumb Wars and has been working with the team since day one. Liam is a big fan of all things gaming, as you will catch him playing all of the new releases from every genre you can imagine. Whether you find Liam gaming just for fun or spending his free time streaming, you will always find a smile on his face when it comes to all things gaming.
