Brawlhalla: A PS4 Crash Course

An Arena of Legends

At first, Valhalla was for the Vikings and Odin to gather in heaven, sparring amongst themselves all around Asgard. The story goes that the Valkeries, the divine talent scouts of Odin, became enraptured in competition, each trying to bring in the next prime champion to their lord’s holy battleground. Before he knew it, Odin found a minotaur swinging a giant ax violently at a water bending pirate in the hallways. A cyborg dives into an Orc’s back and they begin an explosive aerial battle. Odin was at a loss…

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‘Soldiers of Odin’ by riksa90 on http://fav.me/d9s0rbi

This swelling of champions caused increasing property damage in Asgard and Odin had to find out some way to organize the chaos before it drove him mad.  He created The Grand Tournament of Valhalla, or as we mortals know it, Brawlhalla. Now Asgard is enraptured in this new craze and the greatest among the warriors are put on podiums to bask in the glory of their victories across the various scenes of the battle.

Controls

Ps4 brawlhalla-Controls

*You can also wall jump indefinitely by just leaning against that wall and jumping.

*You can charge heavy attacks!

*Buttons can be mapped differently from the settings menu.

Vocabulary

As you spread your valkyrie wings, you will find yourself searching for a mentor or a youtube channel. Well, Brawlhalla has it’s own Jargon or game-specific terminology that pro players and tournament announcers will use. For the sake of being a beginner’s guide, I will include the most popular and then there will be a link to a more in-depth vocabulary at the end of this section.

So we know of light attacks. Air attacks are any attacks performed in the air, followed by heavy attacks which we will henceforth define as signature moves (sig). These then get paired with the directional buttons (Down, Sideways, and Neutral/No Input) to create our directional input terms. There are also some advanced techniques used within the reddit Brawlhalla community forums.

Moves and Basic Techniques

  • Lights Attacks –  Dlight, Slight, Nlight
  • Heavy Attacks – Dsig, Ssig, Nsig
  • Air Attacks       – Dair, Dsig, Nair
  • Ground Pound- (Air+Dsig) / GP
  • Recovery          – Air and Any direction except down.
  • Spot Dodge       – Dodging without inputting a direction.
  • Fast Falling       – FF; Pressing down at the height of your jump to fall faster.
  • Edge Guarding – Preventing a player from getting back onto the stage.

Each Legend also has four stats which I’ll define because it can only help you further-

  1. Strength – Strength will affect how much damage your Legends does for every hit and consequently, your enemies will fly farther per hit.
  2. Dexterity – Your attack speed as well as well as your Heavy’s charge time are related to your Dexterity.
  3. Defense – Determine how much damage your Legend takes and how easily they can be launched.
  4. Speed – Your speed stat serves as a gauge on how fast your Legend can make it around the stage, and how fast your dodge is.

Character Selection Screen (As of  December 18, 2017)

Characters are constantly with Xull, the bottom right Orc Warrior, being the most recent.

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Weapons

There are a plethora of weapons in Brawlhalla, however, each Legend is assigned a pair of weapons each, with none being the same. Once your battle begins, snagging a weapon is your priority. They will eventually begin to appear on the stage in a generic neon flame sword icon as shown to the right. You pick them up with ▢ and are able to swap them by tossing them (R1/L1) and picking up another. Beware while you are weaponless despite being able to pick up the gadgets (Items) available. Every time you swap weapons it will switch between the two your character has assigned. There are several weapons that all work differently for the Legends.  Instead of showing you how they generally work I highly recommend you experience with each Legend’s signature moves to determine which weapons really flow best.

Winning VS Losing

 

The way to defeat your opponent is similar to another platform 2D fighter we ALL know. Every single one of us knows so don’t even try to deny it. You are to use everything at your disposal to deal damage to the enemy players.  On the image above, look at the top-right corner.  When the battle first begins, it will look white. As the damage to a character increases the gauge will go from White > Yellow > Red.   Once they’re red, it is time to lay it on with the heavy attacks or a bomb/sticky bomb to the face. Once a Legend has been KO’d, the attacker will get +2 and the KO’d Legend will receive a penalty of -1. If you are extra careless and die without being hit by a player you will be given a salty ol’ -3, so avoid any accidental suicides.

Avoiding the KO

So there are a few techniques that are crucial when it comes to rebounding or combating what could be a possible KO. If you get thrown from the stage to the sides, or below, you have approximately two jumps, a recovery (UP and Signature) and a dash (R2) to get up and reach a flat wall to latch on to and get back into the game. Watch below as Scarlet (Rocket Lance) recovers from almost the bottom of the stage!

If someone tries to toss you into the air and juggle you, it may be frustrating for them to build that meter enough for you to escape. You can always dash out of the way (Don’t forget the dash!)  however, you can also use R1/H to toss your weapon down and totally interrupt their combo. Not sure if it’s a pro move but it works for me and annoys my friends.

Congratulations! ~and some finals tips~

With that said, you are officially ready to jump into Brawlhalla. Some other tips to keep in mind

  • Learn when to include a weapons toss into your attack or technique to expands your arsenal of moves/tactics.
  • Punish other players whenever possible. If they miss or are baited into a signature move, take advantage of that a impale them for it.
  • When you get a grasp of a Legend you like, then learn where their moves will land, a simple combo you can use, and which stance helps you the most in the game.
  • Unlockable stances for your characters will alter their stats slightly to tweak your Legend.
  • HAVE FUN!

Free to Play at What Cost

Now that you know how to play I would like to go into the aspect of the game that fuels the potential future of the game.  Brawlhalla is completely free to play. Once download it, all modes are available to you and all items as well. You can purchase Legends with gold, which is earned in-game from online matches. Slowly but surely you can pay to have the characters unlocked with nothing coming out of your pocket. This takes a bit to do however I highly recommend springing the money and purchasing the Founder’s Pack. Not only will you unlock every Legend available, you also unlock every single future Legend that comes with the expanding roster. This will also greatly improve the chances that fantastic updates and events keep coming to the game.

Mammoth Coins

Oh, the ever cried about premium currency in every free game out there. Even though one can go down to Wendy’s and spend seven bucks on a meal, somehow people still think premium currency shouldn’t exist. This is the only way you are able to support the game besides buying the previously mentioned founder’s pack or a collector’s pack. If you can’t see yourself being able to support a developer with a large purchase of coins, buy the minimum. See it as tipping your waiter for a fantastic and neverending meal. A free one at that.

Mammoth coins can be used for a variety of things. Most importantly all kinds of skins. I personally think some of the skins are FANTASTIC and are worth their price especially if you feel like you are in this game for the long run. Let me give you a little waterfall of some of the delicious skins the game has to offer but first let me mention that you can also find skins for weapons, along with skins for the KO Effect that occurs when someone gets obliterated at the edge of the screen.

 

Hopefully, this little guide was enough to jump start your interest into the ever-evolving Brawlhalla. There are talks that soon Ps4 and PC will have cross play available so you will be able to play amongst each other soon enough. Go out and find friend and mentors. There are several groups out there on sites like Reddit and Facebook that can help you to further explore Brawlhalla.  Also be sure to follow the twitch streams for excellent gameplay learning opportunities and possible leaks and giveaways. If you have any questions, or you would like to add or edit anything of the guide, please leave us a comment below!

Brawlhalla Downloads

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