Ready to head to the clouds and take on The Tempest? Not without our handy Stormland tips, you’re not.
Insomniac’s latest VR game offers a sprawling mass of islands to shoot your way across. But there are several elements to Stormland that make it a bit more complex than your average first-person shooter. So settle into our Stormland tips guide before you head out into the wilds and make sure you’re prepared.
11 Stormland Tips To Get You Started
Be Agile
Stormland basically makes you a cross between Iron Man and Captain America; you can perform athletic miracles like throwing yourself up cliff faces at lighting speed, but also hover in the air and throw yourself across chasms. Treat combat as a fluid, agile experience; don’t get bogged down on the floor all the time. Use verticality to your advantage. One thing you should try instead of jumping with the standard button is to grab hold of the ground and use it to fling yourself upwards. It gives you great mobility.
Don’t Start A Run On Monday
Stormland is a live game; its world resets every week and you start your mission to take down Terminus from scratch. This happens on Tuesdays at 9:00 AM EDT/6:00 AM PDT/2:00 PM GMT. From that point, wherever you are in a run, you’ll need to start from the bottom all over again. It’s a good idea, not to start a run close to that time unless you intend to see it through in one sitting. You’ll keep your resources but you’ll have wasted a lot of time.
Get Into The Habit Of Dismantling Most Guns
Stormland doesn’t have a reload function. Once a gun is out of ammo, it’s useless to you if you’re out in the field. But don’t just drop it on the ground; that’s wasteful and you risk accidentally putting an empty gun in one of your holster slots. Instead, get into the rhythm of grabbing your empty gun from the top with your free hand and then pulling it apart. Doing this nets you some alloys you can later spend on new weapons, refills and upgrades. Not much, mind you, but it’s a greener way to discard of your unwanted weapons.
…But Keep Your Rare Finds For Later
That said, you shouldn’t necessarily dispose of every gun as soon as it’s empty. You can refill its ammo, but only back at a workbench (and for a cost). This is a bit of a hassle and, nine times out of ten, it’s better to just get rid of it and find a new one. But if you find an especially helpful gun, maybe one that’s a level or two up from what you have available to purchase, it might be worth keeping hold of it and seeking out a bench.
Seek Out Checkpoints Before Getting Into A Fight
Chances are, if you’re about to get into a big fight, there’s a checkpoint nearby. They’re circular platforms attached to a small tower, often located near a workbench. It’s worth dotting around the island to find one if you’re about to get into a big fight, otherwise you risk respawning on the other side of the map if you die. Not that it takes you long to return to the same point, but it saves a bit of time.
Unlock Multiplayer As Soon As Possible
Oddly enough, the multiplayer unlock is actually a side quest in Stormland, though you’ll likely end up doing it very early on. The mission is called Lost Operator and it opens up after doing one of the first main missions in the story. You can find out more about how to unlock it in our guide here. Once you have it, you can enjoy all of Stormland with a friend and, frankly, it’s much better that way.
Unlock Upgrade Nodes As Soon As Possible
In Stormland, the upgrades you attach to your body are only temporary. But unlocking additional nodes to attach more upgrades is permanent. Unlocking nodes costs the same currency as usual upgrades — a mix of alloys and Aeon Buds — so it’s best to get the heavy spending on unlocks out of the way early so you never have to think about it again. If you follow any of our Stormland tips, make it this one!
Choose Your Upgrades VERY Carefully; You’ll Have Them For A Week
As you probably know by now, Stormland resets itself every week. The world is remixed, objectives are refreshed and new conditions are established. You’ll also have all your upgrades stripped back and you’ll need to purchase them again. Once they’re attached, though, you can’t take them off until the next cycle. So make sure to pick ones that are the most helpful, especially given the conditions of that week’s cycle. You don’t want to spend all your slots on features you won’t use.
Harvest Everything
Stormland’s resources system features two main currencies: alloys and Aeon Buds. Alloys can be used to buy weapons and upgrades, while buds are primarily reserved for character upgrades. Harvesting each, however, is ridiculously simple. Alloys come from metal deposits growing out of the ground, crates and dismantling weapons. Buds come from crushing fruit growing on trees and finding rare flowers. You can also get scores of both from grabbing the seed-like object at the top of the heavily guarded towers in each layer of the Stormland. But, basically, you are never far from either of these two things, and you should gather them as often as possible. Use your wrist-mounted gun to avoid wasting ammo when harvesting.
Get Four Weapon Slots As Soon As Possible But Hold Five Guns
You start off the game with just two weapon slots. Pretty soon on, you can unlock a permanent third over-the-shoulder slot at a workbench. But you can also purchase a fourth slot every week from an upgrade terminal. Given Stormland’s ammo situation, it’s far better to stockpile fully-loaded weapons than it is to scrounge leftovers from dead enemies. Having four weapon slots filled leaves you with the least chance of being caught in the middle of combat without any ammo. Better yet, take a fifth weapon in your hand; you’ll still be able to climb up structures but you might need to put it down to do some two-handed interactions.
Switch Between Dual-Wielding And Two-Handed Guns Appropriately
Perhaps my favorite feature in Stormland is that any gun can be held with either one or two hands. If you choose the latter option, your weapon morphs to accommodate your free hand. This makes them more accurate and, frankly, it feels cooler. But you need to choose the right times for both two-handed and dual-wielding combat. Two-handed is for long-range, cover-based shootouts. Dual-wielding is when you’re standing right in front of an enemy and want them dead ASAP. Just make sure you’re choosing the right setup for the right situation.
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Stormland is available from today on the Oculus Store. Got any more Stormland tips? Let us know some in the comments below!
