Even with 66 days left to live, Soul’s journey is pretty harsh in Phantom Blade Zero. Whether it’s enemies attacking simultaneously and without mercy, increasingly challenging bosses, or fast-paced combat where anticipation is as important (if not more so) as reaction, surviving in the Wulin can be surprisingly difficult.
Thankfully, plenty of strategies abound, whether it’s playing stealthily, finding more materials to upgrade your weapons to higher levels or taking advantage of Power Surges and weapon switching. Let’s dive into 15 of the most important tips and tricks here, starting with…
How to Unlock New Talents
Unlike a Souls-like or many other action RPGs, Phantom Blade Zero doesn’t feature traditional leveling. Instead, you’ll earn Remnant Dust, your main currency alongside other materials to upgrade weapons, purchase items and unlock new Talents. However, there’s another catch for the latter: you’ll need specific collectibles to progress further through the tree, including Memory Flowers (which increase max HP), Sha-Chi Amber (which increases max Sha-Chi) and Banyan Hearts. It’s essentially the game’s way of telling you to get out there and explore to really tap into Soul’s potential.
Unlock New Talents ASAP
Unless you ignore the Talent tree for hours while hoarding said collectibles, you should unlock talents as soon as they’re available. It may seem tempting to save up for something else (like ignoring the Sha-Chi branch for something in the Memory Flower line); later talents have prerequisites. So unlock whatever you can, whenever you have the Remnant Dust.
Don’t Underestimate Stealth
Stealth can be a surprisingly strong equalizer, especially against groups of enemies. That’s because when Soul assassinates an enemy, you’ll be prompted to execute another if they’re close enough. Two enemies out before a fight starts is pretty big, and if things aren’t going your way, retreating and breaking line of sight to reset enemies before using stealth is a viable tactic. Focus on the weaker foes, though. Some enemy types can’t be assassinated or lose much health and must be dealt with the old-fashioned way.
Weapon Switching and Its Benefits
Weapon switching is a core pillar of combat, and you should exploit it whenever possible. As you’re more familiar with certain weapons, their combos and where they end, swapping to another weapon can keep the damage rolling. More than anything, switching restores all your Sha-Chi, making it the best way to recover from black-flash attacks. Even if you’re on the back foot and running out of Sha-Chi, switching is highly encouraged to keep your defenses up.
Experiment With New Weapons
Every new weapon is worth trying for one reason or another, but you’ll quickly notice how Phantom Blade Zero provides options that may be useful in forthcoming fights. The Parting Hooks, for example, are great at breaking through shields and counter-attacking after a special guard stance – perfect against enemies with a high attack rate. It also means not having to equip a Phantom Edge specialized in breaking through shields.
Newer is (Sometimes) Better
Of course, later weapons in the same category also tend to have higher damage numbers, so even if you’re not taking advantage of their unique attacks, it’s worth swapping over to the one-handed Oriole Sword over, say, Sanguine, the starting weapon, for the slightly higher attack and guard break damage. The latter may seem better at higher levels but over the long term, the newer options will be far more potent.
Reverting With No Cost
Of course, there are plenty of times you don’t need to use the newest weapon or want to stick with your current arsenal. But if you still want to give it a few swings, upgrade the weapon to level 10 to at least unlock its first core passive. If you don’t like it, revert it back to level 1 at no additional cost.
How to Circumvent Talisman Usage
Reverting any weapon, primary or Phantom Edge, above level 10 requires a Weapon Reforge Talisman and Phantom Reforge Talisman respectively. That increases to two when reverting a level 20+ weapon. So if you want to experiment with different builds or worry about running out, make a separate save file, then revert everything. You can then reload it if you’re not satisfied with the results, saving any Talismans in the process.
Upgrading Medicine
Among the many upgrade materials are different tiers of Healer’s Memory, which can bolster the different medicine that Soul equips. None of the three sisters can help, so where should you turn? It turns out you have to progress as far as Pangzhen and reach the doctor in the Green Serpent House. He’ll upgrade your medicines for Fragment Dust, as long as you have the required materials, thus improving their buffs and number of uses. Don’t neglect to return and upgrade them as much as possible – having up to 12 health recovery items can make a big difference.
The Benefits of Different Medicine
As with everything else, you should try out different types of medicine – each offers different benefits, including temporary buffs. I’m partial to the Kuye Dew and Lament Draught for the damage resistance and attack increase, respectively. However, you might also want to try the Spirit-Returning Broth, which increases guard break for a brief period.
Unlocking Higher Tier Upgrade Materials for Purchase
Alongside discovering different upgrade materials in the wild, you can also buy them from vendors, including Quick Hand Zhang. Higher tier materials, however, require unearthing Zhang’s other “versions,” which are found in subsequent regions after the Crimson Forest. Thankfully, it’s quite easy to find them. Just look for the swords embedded in posts and follow them to the man in question (who will also offer quests to find each region’s treasures for rewards).
Talk to Everyone About Everything
However, you might not even know there are multiple Zhangs to discover (even with sporadic hints in the dialogue) without asking the first about it. To that end, talk to everyone you meet and exhaust all their dialogue options. They may have quests to offer as well.
Pick Up All The Lore
As esoteric as the storytelling can initially be, the lore is pretty compelling, offering more background on a region, its various figures and different factions. But even if you don’t care about stray letters, documents and whatnot, they’re still worth collecting for Fragment Dust, which can quickly add up and take care of your future upgrade needs.
Level Up Phantom Edges
Phantom Edges can make a huge difference, especially when taking advantage of their status effects or wiping out multiple enemies at once. But even if you’re not using them, they’re worth continuously upgrading because of Flowing Chi. This Talent makes it so that regular enemies who use red flash attacks or have been guard broken while under 50 percent HP can be hit with a follow-up Phantom Edge attack (which varies with each weapon). It doesn’t even consume any Remnant Spark, making it much more useful to weaken an enemy for an execution. But since enemies become tougher as the game progresses, keeping them at a high enough level is as important as any other weapon.
Power Surges
Each weapon has a unique Power Surge attack which consumes Sha-Chi Essence. Besides dealing a hefty amount of damage, they can interrupt an enemy’s attack, making them ideal for when a boss has just recovered from being guard broken (assuming they’re not immune to attacks in this state). While Sha-Chi Essence can be recovered with normal attacks, they build faster with heavy attacks that consume Sha-Chi, so keep mixing up those combos and switching between weapons when the situation calls for it.
