Darksiders III – Basic Tips For Beginners

Intro

 
Don’t panic. For a souls-like, it’s not that bad. You do need to know how to approach the game, but the difficulty level is halfway reasonable, and I feel that anyone who has beat the first two games in the series can beat this as well. 
 
 

Options

 
I am going to recommend the following settings for someone just starting out: 
 
Keyboard + Mouse is fine. I played through the entire game and never ran into bits where I wanted a controller. 
Run is V, which is somewhat annoying; you may want to remap it. 
Switch consumable is mouseup/down. This is actually a problem, as the middle mouse button is actually used, and you’ll want the renewable healing to be selected nearly all the time. Switch this to anything else. 
Difficulty of Balanced is reasonable. 
Combat mode should be set to Classic. The main difference is that you can now interrupt your attacks with a dodge. 
All of this can be changed after starting a game. 
 
 

Combat

 
Your most important defensive tactic is the dodge. The instant you learn how to dodge, the game turns from frustrating to reasonable. Not only can this remove you from danger, it has invincibility frames and can let you retaliate against enemies that attack you. Also, because there’s no stamina, you can get away with just spamming it, and because you’re using Classic combat mode, you can dodge even while attacking. In general, trading blows with an enemy is a terrible idea; if you see a windup, dodging is the correct choice, even if you think your blow will land first. I would suggest not bothering too much with getting the correct timing for the retaliation strike at first. There are some enemies where this is important, but they’re farther into the game, and that skill will come with practice. Instead, just dodge as soon as you realize you need to dodge. 
 
Your second most important defensive tactic is positioning, especially when fighting multiple monsters. Having more than one enemy attacking means that you can’t time dodges as well, since you have more than one enemy to watch. (And that’s before they start blocking your camera.) Also, Darksiders III does not have protection against off-screen attacks. (Some games will have off-screen enemies stop attacking. This game doesn’t do that.) You should be attempting to only fight one enemy at a time, or making sure that only one enemy is in range to attack at a time, and that they’re all on-screen. I would also recommend you get in the habit of pulling enemies into cleared areas. Just walk forward until something notices you, then wait for them to come to you. If you run to the enemy, you’re likely to get blindsided by an enemy hiding in ambush, or dodge into range of another enemy while fighting, or otherwise bite off more than you can chew. 
 
If attacked by a big monster and a small monster, I generally suggest killing the smaller monster(s) first, just to reduce the number of enemies you need to deal with. 
 
You have significant range on your attacks. Staying back lets you actually see what’s going on, which is a good thing. 
 
Your healing is instant, you just need to not be attacking or dodging to use it. Take advantage of that. 
 
Your Havoc mode isn’t that useful, but it comes with free healing. I mostly used it for boss fights that I had a reasonable shot at winning, but wanted an edge. 
 
 

Exploration

 
Your souls are best spent on level ups for almost all of the game. (At some point you’ll want to pick up an armor, but that’s not for a while, and that’s the only thing you need to save up for.) Also note that you can give Vulgrim souls even if you don’t have enough for a full level-up. Use the lurcher items as well. They’re nice to keep around to save up for an armor, but until then, just break/sell them the next time you’re at Vulgrim. 
 
I suggest using your level ups on strength and health, and mostly strength. A few levels into arcane are nice, but can wait. 
 
Upgrade your main weapon, and whichever subweapons you actually use, whenever you have resources to do so. There’s nothing else to use this stuff on. 
 
Destroy everything. You can get items from random clutter. Nothing important, but every little bit helps. 
 
Keep your ears open. There are quite a few ambushes around, but the enemies involved are usually noisy, so you can get a heads-up. 
 
Your renewable healing doesn’t regenerate when you visit Vulgrim, just when you die, or sometimes when killing an enemy. You can, however, give all your souls to Vulgrim, then run straight into an enemy somewhere to get a free refill. 
 
I never used a consumable (on purpose), and don’t think they give enough souls to bother selling them. Don’t worry about them too much. 
 

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