Beast of Reincarnation Beginner's Guide: Essential Tips for New Players

While not as complex as some of the 'souls-like' games it draws inspiration from, Beast of Reincarnation can become quite difficult early on if you're unsure of what you're doing. That's why we've prepared this guide with tips and advice for those just starting out in this Game Freak title.

Master the Parry

Unlike similar games where evasion is always a viable tactic, constantly trying to dodge enemy attacks will lead to disaster. This is due to a lack of invincibility frames and the enemies' ability to track your every move. Therefore, it's crucial to learn how to parry attacks from the very first enemy you encounter. Fortunately, the parry window (blocking just before an attack lands) is more generous than usual.

Beyond avoiding damage, all swords have passive advantages that activate when you successfully parry. It's also the primary way to build up charges for Kuu's abilities. In essence, parrying is the core mechanic in Beast of Reincarnation, and mastering it is essential for progression.

Red-flashing enemy attacks are the only ones you cannot parry. However, unlike normal attacks, these can be easily evaded with a dodge.

Evasion is Still Possible

While parries are key to advancing, there's no denying the convenience of evasion, which can feel missed early in Beast of Reincarnation. Fortunately, you can acquire the ability to 'roll' to temporarily disengage from combat and reposition yourself. This skill can be found in the skill tree under the 'Tracking Shot' branch.

Early Game Skill and Attribute Upgrades

Speaking of the skill tree, it's easy to feel overwhelmed by the upgrade options for both Emma and Kuu at the start of the game. Here are some recommendations.

For Emma, we recommend focusing on 'Intertwined Overload' abilities, which improve with increased Strength. Initially, it's worthwhile to enhance recovery effects and expand the intertwined bar by a couple of levels. If you desperately need to roll, start investing in the Tracking Shot branch.

For Kuu, we suggest focusing on increasing their Bloom stat to gain more power with their abilities.

Utilize Kuu's Abilities Extensively

Your canine companion, Kuu, is one of your greatest advantages in combat in Beast of Reincarnation. Quickly adapt to combos using the following sequence: parry multiple attacks to charge Kuu's bar, perform a combo with Emma, and then finish by summoning Kuu to use one of their abilities. If you also use abilities that launch enemies into the air, you can easily continue Emma's combo.

Don't forget to equip Kuu with learned 'mods' for even greater advantages (one mod per ability). The mod that heals Emma when her abilities connect is particularly useful early in the adventure.

Stealthy Emma

Although direct combat and parries are the primary mechanics, you can easily eliminate some enemies with stealth attacks by approaching them from behind while crouched, hiding amongst flowers, or using the branches Emma can create to surprise them from the air.

In areas with multiple enemies, take advantage of stealth to quickly deal with the most powerful threat first.

Target and Plan

When you target an enemy before they detect you, you can see their elemental or status weaknesses. This allows you to equip weapons, arrows, bolts, and Kuu's abilities that exploit these weaknesses before initiating combat.

Unfortunately, this cannot be done against bosses. If you want to exploit their weaknesses and arrived with the wrong gear, you can let yourself be eliminated to respawn at the camp and then equip yourself accordingly. However, this isn't strictly necessary. Even without exploiting elemental weaknesses, improved swords and shots deal sufficient damage.

Time to Eat!

There are two types of food in Beast of Reincarnation. First is the food you consume during gameplay. You can collect ingredients dropped by enemies or found during exploration and eat them as-is to increase Emma and Kuu's hunger bars (a full bar results in better automatic healing). However, if you wait until you reach a camp with the ingredients, they will be improved and provide greater benefits.

Any ingredients you don't use and have when you return to the Cleaning Walker will be used by Haruka—along with produce from your farm and eggs from your chickens—in recipes you find. Haruka's cooking will boost certain attributes for Emma and Kuu until your next visit, but it's not a significant increase to worry too much about until later in the game.

Leave Healing to Kuu's Paws

When you find curative item manuals, remember to have Kuu learn them (you can have him learn abilities at the Cleaning Walker) and then equip them. This will enable him to automatically use healing potions on Emma when she takes damage.

These potions are limited but automatically replenish when you visit a camp. Later, you'll find manuals for Kuu's own healing abilities that restore even more health.

Explore Everything!

Although Beast of Reincarnation features both linear and more open maps, exploring every corner is highly rewarding. Kuu will mark nearby items on the map, which is incredibly useful for finding skill manuals for the dog, elemental arrow and bolt types for Emma, and shrines (finding 10 shrines grants an additional healing stimulant).

Discovering these items provides a significant advantage for the rest of your playthrough.

We hope this short guide with tips and tricks for Beast of Reincarnation has been helpful for your initial hours of gameplay.