Posted December 12, 2019
I just finished the game in Normal Mode, and there's very little in the way of guides, hints, or even advice for new players.
So, based on my first playthrough and a little over six hours of gametime, here's some advice/tips/FAQs/etc for new players!
Some non-story spoilers ahead!
What is Odallus: The Dark Call?
Take the NES era Castlevania games, give them an aesthetic and story reminiscent of the manga Berserk, and you've got the right idea.
GENERAL ADVICE
While you can clear a level on your first try, you probably won't. Instead, treat your first run through a level as a practice run, learning the layout, collecting loot and learning how the new enemies behave.
The same goes for fighting bosses. For the first one or two tries, just focus on learning their attack patterns, where to hit them and when they're vulnerable.
Don't worry about running out of lives. Lives just let you respawn at the last checkpoint you activated, the pillars you press Up at. When you're out of lives, you go back to the level select screen and are given three more lives for free.
Items used before dying do not replenish! Keep that in mind!
You can return to the map/level select at any time from the pause menu or by going back to the start of a level. This saves your progress, including any puzzles you've solved in a level, but the most important thing is that it restores your health to full. If you're about to die and don't want to waste a life, or just don't want to be where you are in a level anymore, this is a useful feature to keep in mind. Most chests also respawn when you leave a level, too, so you can always find more HP and restock your special weapons for free if you remember where they are.
Levels in Odallus aren't very long. It took me a little over 6 hours to beat the game 100%, and that was mostly exploring, experimenting and forgetting where I was trying to get to.
Secrets are everywhere. Sometimes it's just orbs/money, but there's a lot of chests to replenish special weapons or regain HP as well. Not to mention a few more carefully hidden secrets that have useful upgrades for your gear. Pay close attention for walls that are darker than normal and try attacking them.
Don't overthink puzzles. The solutions are usually pretty obvious, with only one or two requiring more than a little effort to figure out.
Attack chests to open them. That's really all there is to say about that.
There is no falling damage. At all. Except for specific pits at very specific places (signposted by a little skull/tombstone checkpoint), but they only do a quarter-heart of damage per "death", so it's not much of a concern. Otherwise, just jump into any and all pits you see. Maybe you find some loot, maybe it's a new route or shortcut, or maybe it's an actual secret that leads to an entirely new area on the map screen.
To change swords or armor, open the pause menu and go up. There's no real benefit to changing your sword or armor back to an earlier one, but you can still do it if you really want to.
STORES
Every level has at least one merchant, usually more. They're hard to miss, look for the guy in green standing next to a stall. Don't worry, you can't hurt him and he can't die.
Every time you buy an item, the price of that item increases slightly, so buying from mid-level stores can quickly become a drain on your money. Instead you should save your money/orbs until you know which store is closest to a boss for easy healing or resupply before taking them on.
Orbs are money. They drop from most enemies at a pretty high drop rate, and can be farmed pretty easily from certain chests in the levels.
Honestly, I wouldn't bother buying anything for most of the game unless you absolutely need some extra health. Particuarly early on, when you only have a few hearts, it might not be worth buying HP restoring items since they get more expensive every time you buy one.
Extra lives are a waste of money 99% of the time. The only point in the game I found buying extra lives to be worth the cost is when fighting the final boss, so you can get back to it faster after dying instead of running the gauntlet at the start of the level and risking taking damage.
Some levels have large, three-eyed skulls on chains near the start. These are teleports, and once you find their counterpart you can use them to skip a large chunk of that level. They work both ways, too, letting you go back and forth as much as you like!
All chests give set items. They don't drop random items, so you'll always know what you're getting, be it food or a special weapon. It never changes, no matter how many times you replay the level.
COMBAT/NAVIGATION
Your normal sword attack is good enough to defeat most normal enemies, and even most bosses. Once it's upgraded, though, you can out-damage almost everything. Keep in mind that the first sword has a slight delay between swings, so learning to hit and back off or jump away will save you a lot of trouble.
Also worth noting, in case you somehow miss it, is that you can attack while jumping or crouching. Several enemies are easily dealt with by just crouching in front of them and slashing.
No dropping or rising attacks, though. You can't Goomba-Stomp anything or stab upwards.
Learn how enemies behave. Almost every enemy has an exploitable pattern to their attacks or movement. For example, one early enemy does three attacks, then there's a delay before they attack again, always in the same order. For that enemy, you can duck, jump, duck, and then hit them. This is also true for bosses: They always have patterns that you can, and should, learn.
Most projectiles can be destroyed by hitting them with your sword. Some tough ranged enemies can be easily taken out by just spamming attacks point-blank and destroying their projectiles while damaging them constantly.
Jumping is essential to getting around levels, dodging attacks and even just avoiding enemies you don't want to deal with. How long you hold the jump button adjusts how high you go; if you just tap it then you'll do a small hop, useful for getting through some tight gaps where a full jump will result in taking damage.
If you hit a ledge while moving left or right in the air, you'll grab onto it. Press up while hanging to climb up, press down to drop. Some puzzles are set up so that you can't jump across a gap, but have to grab the next ledge while falling. Just walk off and hold in the direction of the ledge you want to grab. Later, you get the ability to double-jump and glide, taking your mobility to the next level.
When you get the glide ability, you need to double-jump then hit the jump button a third time and hold it to start gliding. It's a little awkward, but you don't need to use it that often anyway. The exception is when you see blue rings rising out of the ground; just step into them and hold the jump button to start flying up as long as you're in the beam/rings. You can also attack while gliding.
About midway through the game, you get the ability to dash. You'll need this to get through some puzzles and traps, but it's most useful for hit-and-run attacks on larger melee enemies and some bosses; hit them, turn and dash away before they can get an attack off, then repeat until they're gone.
You can't dash through enemies or attacks. You'll just be hit and take damage. You can avoid some damage this way, though, by dashing into an attack and using the invulnerablity frames to keep dashing through to safety. Very useful for getting past several traps with minimal damage in some levels.
You can dash-jump by dashing and, right as it's about to end, jumping. I never found it to be useful or even needed for anything, and it doesn't seem to offer any real benefit beyond looking cool.
You can't breath underwater until you get a certain item. However, you have about 6 seconds before you start taking damage underwater, letting you sequence break and get to some areas before you're meant to if you really try.
Jump height is greatly increased underwater.
Double-jumping is pretty self-explanatory. After getting a certain item, you can jump and then jump again. You can also jump after falling instead, and several puzzles involve this technique. It also makes many of the early jumping puzzles incredibly easy, since instead of timing a bunch of moving/breaking platforms you can just double-jump and skip most of them. Most useful, though, is that you can jump straight over almost every enemy and avoid fighting if you're trying to conserve HP for the boss.
Remember to use your special weapons: the Axe, the Torch and the Spear. You'll find them scattered everywhere in levels, and with three types you'll almost always have some on hand. Some really annoying enemies are best dealt with using a special weapon (particuarly the spear or torch), but the main use for special weapons is against bosses. The second boss in particular is a real ball-ache to deal with using just your sword, but keeping some distance and spamming axes makes it easy. All three special weapons do more damage than your standard sword and have better range, so if you find yourself having trouble, use them!
Every special weapon you pick up adds 5 to your stock of that weapon, until your current limit.
All three special weapons are easily farmeable. Three levels in particular have a chest very close to the start that will give you a special weapon every time it's opened, often within seconds of starting the level, and you can easily save/return to the map then re-enter the level to open the chest and get the item again. Rinse and repeat until you're fully stocked!
Some routes are hidden by breakeable blocks in the floor or by snow blocks. Your sword can't do much here, but try your special weapons! ^_^
So, based on my first playthrough and a little over six hours of gametime, here's some advice/tips/FAQs/etc for new players!
Some non-story spoilers ahead!
What is Odallus: The Dark Call?
Take the NES era Castlevania games, give them an aesthetic and story reminiscent of the manga Berserk, and you've got the right idea.
GENERAL ADVICE
While you can clear a level on your first try, you probably won't. Instead, treat your first run through a level as a practice run, learning the layout, collecting loot and learning how the new enemies behave.
The same goes for fighting bosses. For the first one or two tries, just focus on learning their attack patterns, where to hit them and when they're vulnerable.
Don't worry about running out of lives. Lives just let you respawn at the last checkpoint you activated, the pillars you press Up at. When you're out of lives, you go back to the level select screen and are given three more lives for free.
Items used before dying do not replenish! Keep that in mind!
You can return to the map/level select at any time from the pause menu or by going back to the start of a level. This saves your progress, including any puzzles you've solved in a level, but the most important thing is that it restores your health to full. If you're about to die and don't want to waste a life, or just don't want to be where you are in a level anymore, this is a useful feature to keep in mind. Most chests also respawn when you leave a level, too, so you can always find more HP and restock your special weapons for free if you remember where they are.
Levels in Odallus aren't very long. It took me a little over 6 hours to beat the game 100%, and that was mostly exploring, experimenting and forgetting where I was trying to get to.
Secrets are everywhere. Sometimes it's just orbs/money, but there's a lot of chests to replenish special weapons or regain HP as well. Not to mention a few more carefully hidden secrets that have useful upgrades for your gear. Pay close attention for walls that are darker than normal and try attacking them.
Don't overthink puzzles. The solutions are usually pretty obvious, with only one or two requiring more than a little effort to figure out.
Attack chests to open them. That's really all there is to say about that.
There is no falling damage. At all. Except for specific pits at very specific places (signposted by a little skull/tombstone checkpoint), but they only do a quarter-heart of damage per "death", so it's not much of a concern. Otherwise, just jump into any and all pits you see. Maybe you find some loot, maybe it's a new route or shortcut, or maybe it's an actual secret that leads to an entirely new area on the map screen.
To change swords or armor, open the pause menu and go up. There's no real benefit to changing your sword or armor back to an earlier one, but you can still do it if you really want to.
STORES
Every level has at least one merchant, usually more. They're hard to miss, look for the guy in green standing next to a stall. Don't worry, you can't hurt him and he can't die.
Every time you buy an item, the price of that item increases slightly, so buying from mid-level stores can quickly become a drain on your money. Instead you should save your money/orbs until you know which store is closest to a boss for easy healing or resupply before taking them on.
Orbs are money. They drop from most enemies at a pretty high drop rate, and can be farmed pretty easily from certain chests in the levels.
Honestly, I wouldn't bother buying anything for most of the game unless you absolutely need some extra health. Particuarly early on, when you only have a few hearts, it might not be worth buying HP restoring items since they get more expensive every time you buy one.
Extra lives are a waste of money 99% of the time. The only point in the game I found buying extra lives to be worth the cost is when fighting the final boss, so you can get back to it faster after dying instead of running the gauntlet at the start of the level and risking taking damage.
Some levels have large, three-eyed skulls on chains near the start. These are teleports, and once you find their counterpart you can use them to skip a large chunk of that level. They work both ways, too, letting you go back and forth as much as you like!
All chests give set items. They don't drop random items, so you'll always know what you're getting, be it food or a special weapon. It never changes, no matter how many times you replay the level.
COMBAT/NAVIGATION
Your normal sword attack is good enough to defeat most normal enemies, and even most bosses. Once it's upgraded, though, you can out-damage almost everything. Keep in mind that the first sword has a slight delay between swings, so learning to hit and back off or jump away will save you a lot of trouble.
Also worth noting, in case you somehow miss it, is that you can attack while jumping or crouching. Several enemies are easily dealt with by just crouching in front of them and slashing.
No dropping or rising attacks, though. You can't Goomba-Stomp anything or stab upwards.
Learn how enemies behave. Almost every enemy has an exploitable pattern to their attacks or movement. For example, one early enemy does three attacks, then there's a delay before they attack again, always in the same order. For that enemy, you can duck, jump, duck, and then hit them. This is also true for bosses: They always have patterns that you can, and should, learn.
Most projectiles can be destroyed by hitting them with your sword. Some tough ranged enemies can be easily taken out by just spamming attacks point-blank and destroying their projectiles while damaging them constantly.
Jumping is essential to getting around levels, dodging attacks and even just avoiding enemies you don't want to deal with. How long you hold the jump button adjusts how high you go; if you just tap it then you'll do a small hop, useful for getting through some tight gaps where a full jump will result in taking damage.
If you hit a ledge while moving left or right in the air, you'll grab onto it. Press up while hanging to climb up, press down to drop. Some puzzles are set up so that you can't jump across a gap, but have to grab the next ledge while falling. Just walk off and hold in the direction of the ledge you want to grab. Later, you get the ability to double-jump and glide, taking your mobility to the next level.
When you get the glide ability, you need to double-jump then hit the jump button a third time and hold it to start gliding. It's a little awkward, but you don't need to use it that often anyway. The exception is when you see blue rings rising out of the ground; just step into them and hold the jump button to start flying up as long as you're in the beam/rings. You can also attack while gliding.
About midway through the game, you get the ability to dash. You'll need this to get through some puzzles and traps, but it's most useful for hit-and-run attacks on larger melee enemies and some bosses; hit them, turn and dash away before they can get an attack off, then repeat until they're gone.
You can't dash through enemies or attacks. You'll just be hit and take damage. You can avoid some damage this way, though, by dashing into an attack and using the invulnerablity frames to keep dashing through to safety. Very useful for getting past several traps with minimal damage in some levels.
You can dash-jump by dashing and, right as it's about to end, jumping. I never found it to be useful or even needed for anything, and it doesn't seem to offer any real benefit beyond looking cool.
You can't breath underwater until you get a certain item. However, you have about 6 seconds before you start taking damage underwater, letting you sequence break and get to some areas before you're meant to if you really try.
Jump height is greatly increased underwater.
Double-jumping is pretty self-explanatory. After getting a certain item, you can jump and then jump again. You can also jump after falling instead, and several puzzles involve this technique. It also makes many of the early jumping puzzles incredibly easy, since instead of timing a bunch of moving/breaking platforms you can just double-jump and skip most of them. Most useful, though, is that you can jump straight over almost every enemy and avoid fighting if you're trying to conserve HP for the boss.
Remember to use your special weapons: the Axe, the Torch and the Spear. You'll find them scattered everywhere in levels, and with three types you'll almost always have some on hand. Some really annoying enemies are best dealt with using a special weapon (particuarly the spear or torch), but the main use for special weapons is against bosses. The second boss in particular is a real ball-ache to deal with using just your sword, but keeping some distance and spamming axes makes it easy. All three special weapons do more damage than your standard sword and have better range, so if you find yourself having trouble, use them!
Every special weapon you pick up adds 5 to your stock of that weapon, until your current limit.
All three special weapons are easily farmeable. Three levels in particular have a chest very close to the start that will give you a special weapon every time it's opened, often within seconds of starting the level, and you can easily save/return to the map then re-enter the level to open the chest and get the item again. Rinse and repeat until you're fully stocked!
Some routes are hidden by breakeable blocks in the floor or by snow blocks. Your sword can't do much here, but try your special weapons! ^_^
Post edited December 12, 2019 by Cascadejackal
