Everspace 2's epic space shooter/adventure with a side of intergalactic trade and rogue-lite elements gives players tons to do and a huge world to explore. However, this means new players might sometimes feel a bit lost or need some help understanding some of its systems. While the tutorial sequence is excellent and covers many of these mechanics, some additional tips and tricks will help players traverse the stars more effectively.
Everspace 2's combat is fast, deadly, and fair, requiring players to maneuver their ship and evade the attacks of a variety of deadly foes. Meanwhile, the game utilizes a trading system that simulates supply and demand, allowing players with a good understanding of the system to get more money from any goods they find or purchase.
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Always Bring Nanobots
One piece of advice that may seem pretty self-explanatory, players should always bring Nanobots with them when heading out to fight and explore the world. Nanobots allow players to repair their ship and restore its health, allowing them to pull their ship back from the edge of destruction should combat go badly.
They can also be used to top up health between a series of encounters to reduce the number of trips back to a friendly shop or station, which makes space adventuring far more convenient. Nanobots can be restocked from shops easily and sometimes found as loot, too, so it's pretty easy to keep them topped up.
Get a Cargo Hold Early
Having a Cargo Hold increases the amount of inventory slots available for storing items, allowing players to hold more loot and carry more back to base after heading out. Additionally, equipping a Cargo Hold allows players to dismantle unwanted ship gear for parts, which opens up the game's crafting system.
This allows players to turn unneeded gear into components and then into new gear that'll hopefully be more useful, and dismantling enough of an item allows players to reproduce it from a blueprint whenever they have the parts. Better Cargo Holds offer more materials from dismantling, and Cargo Holds can be acquired as loot from enemies, storage containers, or purchased from a shop.
Try Out the Crafting
Expanding on the previous point, players can also use the crafting system to modify and upgrade their existing gear by increasing the rarity and/or level and adding a catalyst to provide various benefits. These adjustments and upgrades all require components that can be acquired throughout the game world and by dismantling unwanted equipment.
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Invest in Perks
Once players have met certain characters in the world, they'll be able to acquire perks by giving those characters the resources they request. The earliest example of this in the game is Dax, whose first perk must be purchased as part of a story quest.
After this, players are able to purchase perks from unlocked characters by fulfilling their resource request for that perk. These perks can have a variety of effects, like reducing upgrade costs or extending the range of the tractor beam, which can prove very useful when navigating space.
Armor Up
Players should also grab their ship some plating as soon as possible. Dax offers some after fixing his beanies, but players can grab better plating for free by heading to the trading post near Union Bridge and solving a small puzzle.
Players will need to swing around to the opposite side of the rock that holds the trading outpost, grab an energy sphere, and then bring it back to the trading outpost and plug it into the socket near the landing pad. This opens up a hatch and allows players to nab some Phase Plating, making the early game easier. As the game goes on, players should make sure to buy or craft better plating whenever it becomes available since it acts as a buffer between the ship shields and health, which can be regenerated by defeating enemies.
Collect Everything
When exploring each area, players will likely see all kinds of materials. Crystal deposits, ores, scrap metal, shipwrecks, and storage containers, for example. Players should collect as much stuff as they can carry when out and about since money and resources will be needed in great amounts if players hope to unlock perks and gear up for some of the game's tougher challenges.
Upgrade Cargo Holds for more storage, and take advantage of supply and demand to turn a profit on any commodities found.
Supply and Demand
Players will find items known as "commodities" throughout the game world as loot and for sale at various shops. These commodities only have one purpose: selling them to make some cash.
When it comes to turning a profit, players should look at the current demand for a given commodity in their current region. It's easy to get a rough idea by looking at the colored border around the item in the inventory. Blue-green for high, yellow/orange for medium, and red for low.
They can also be highlighted in the inventory to see a bar that shows the range of lowest price to highest price throughout the game world, with the current region highlighted. When possible, players should always strive to sell any commodities in systems where they're in high demand.
Everspace 2 is available now for PC and coming soon to PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.
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