Kena: Bridge of Spirits is a classic case of “easy to learn, hard to master”. We reveal 8 tips we wish we’d known when we started the game.
Those of you who have already played Kena: Bridge of Spirits know that behind the pretty exterior hides a challenging battle system and many small secrets that you can discover. And some of the puzzles are not as easy as they should be.
For this reason, we have put together a series of tips to make your way through the magical village with all its facets a little easier and which we would have liked to know ourselves before starting the game. We’ll start with a few general recommendations before revealing a few practical combat tricks.
If you still don’t know who or what Kena: Bridge of Spirits is, take a look at our review:
Kena: Bridge of Spirits in the test – love at first sight, enthusiasm at second
Table of Contents
1. often puts on the ghost mask
Shortly after you first enter the village, you get your first ghost mask. The game tells you that you can put it on again and again to discover exciting things. Unfortunately, we forget this hint just as quickly as we were told it, and to make matters worse, the game doesn’t remind us again.
Yet the tip is incredibly valuable. Through the mask you not only see where your next destination is, but you also find, among other things, Rott footprints that lead you to secrets or other things that you would otherwise miss. Unfortunately, you can’t walk around with the mask on your face, so we recommend that you put it on every now and then at crossroads or in interesting corners.
2. search areas thoroughly later
If you plan to collect all collectibles in the form of hats, rott and ghost mail, you can save yourself some work by searching for all items just before the grand finale. If you want to play through the story first, you can still use the save point before the grand finale.
Every now and then, while you are following the story, you will find a mechanism or an area somewhere that you can only enter later. For example, you need the bow to lower a bridge or a few bombs to move stones. If you don’t want to search through everything twice, play through the story first and then go on a treasure hunt.
3. Use the photo mode
What would a game with cute companions be without a photo mode? Exactly. So we recommend you call up the photo mode at least once and take a fantastic snapshot. By the way, the Rott are particularly suitable as motifs, because there’s always one dancing out of line somewhere, hanging out in a bowl or generally being very photogenic. You can see the result here:
Bonus: If you want to take really cool action photos, it’s best to take a few pictures during the boss fights. To do this, it’s best to set the difficulty level to “Story Mode” so that you can position yourself in peace.
4. There’s no shame in turning the difficulty down
The battles in Kena are tough. Okay, they don’t reach Dark Souls levels. But after the boss has sent you to the loading screen for the twelfth time, you’d better turn down the difficulty level before your gamepad or poor mouse flies through the screen.
Except for the highest difficulty level, which you only get after completing the story, you can switch between the individual difficulty levels completely freely and according to your mood. If a fight is too difficult for you, you adjust it downwards; if you want a real challenge, you adjust it upwards. The game always loads the most recent score.
5. use the red and healing flowers sparingly.
Especially on the higher difficulty levels, healing is scarce. On the one hand, you only have a limited number of healing flowers per boss fight, on the other hand, your Rott must first muster enough courage to be able to heal you. This makes every fight a micro-management and a weighing up of whether you would rather “spend” the Rott’s courage on your healing or on a powerful attack.
Try to dodge or block as much as possible instead of losing precious life for a careless attack.
6. Do not use aiming if you shoot a lot with the bow
Generally, sighting enemies isn’t a bad idea, because you’ll always have your enemy in sight. Unfortunately, this mechanic doesn’t always work so well, especially when moving. We had problems from time to time with aiming at enemies, which caused us to lose precious reaction time in battle.
Once you have targeted an enemy, however, the system works quite well – at least as long as you don’t shoot with your bow. Because then you automatically lose focus on the enemy because the game forces you to aim. The problem with aiming then starts all over again. That’s why we advise you: If you shoot a lot with the bow, you should not aim at all and rather track the enemy manually with the camera. This saves frustration and gives you valuable reaction time.
7. The red flowers always have top priority
You may have noticed it in some battles: Sometimes the floods of enemies just don’t want to end. The red flowers are to blame for this, as they constantly provide a supply of enemies. Here you should gather the courage of your Rott as quickly as possible and then unleash it directly on the red flowers.
The Rott will turn the flower blue, so you can destroy it with an energy blast or an arrow, which will end the haunting and later the battle. Sometimes you can’t attack the flowers immediately, but have to kill a few enemies first. That’s why you should keep an eye on them at all times.
8.Better to dodge than to counter, better to counter than to block
Those who have played Dark Souls or Sekiro know: attack is not always the best defence and executing a perfect counter is damn hard. The situation is similar in Kena: Bridge of Spirits. Especially on high difficulty levels, your enemies do so much damage that your shield can withstand one or two attacks before it breaks and you stumble.
We recommend dodging attacks rather than blocking or countering them, as you have no stamina bar but a shield capacity. If you are unable to dodge an attack, tap your shield button just before the opponent hits you instead of pressing it. This increases the chance of parrying the attack and then performing a counter attack.
Bonus: In addition, you should always make sure to watch your back and move around the battlefield as much and dynamically as possible so that enemies cannot attack you from a blind spot.
Now it’s your turn: What other tips have you found out and want to share with the community? Feel free to post them in the comments
