Master Difficulty = Huge spike

[emailking]

I'm at corrupt Taro. It's easier at times and harder at others. For example, the woodnight took me about an hour of attempts on expert, but I got him on the 2nd try on master. On the other hand, I beat the Shrine Guardian on the first try on expert, but needed about 10 attempts on Master. Non boss fights are also harder, like the God Shrine encounter omg that was so hard on both expert and master. Well I'm going to push through but no idea if I'll actually be able to handle the final boss. I couldn't on expert, had to ratchet down to story difficulty. I know there's a way to cheese it, but I'm worried about

Spoiler

the intermission fights which you can't cheese.

 

[Kratos7X_]

I just beat Kena on Master difficulty and hell what an intense experience I had with this game. There were so many moments it felt almost unfair. Often the challenge during boss fights was just about dodging the boss while trying not to get stabbed in your back by the small enemies. Though I want to encourage all of you. It is not an impossible platinum trophy. Just keep trying and you will see how you improve yourself with each attempt. (Except of Toshi Boss battle - I still don't know how to dodge his meele attacks -__- ) 

I never played any dark souls game and usually I try to avoid games with a high difficulty. But I stumbled into Kena and did it and so can you! Good luck everyone! 

 

[Optinooby]

Just a question, I see Master is heavily complained about, but I see nobody 100%s on Master, only on lower difficulties where the 100% is perhaps less useful, I guess this is mainly due to Roadmaps advising this route. 

 

But is it possible to 100% on Master without much more trouble than Master currently is or would 100% make Master even worse???

 

I don't know if 100% would help Master more than hurts it which is why I ask......

 

Thanks

Edited January 19, 2022 by Optinooby

[MySoulisHigh]

Just beat it on Master difficulty and worth the challenge. It's mostly worse in the beginning with less abilities and upgrades but once you get past the Woodsmith and get the shield dash, it becomes more manageable. Corrupt Toshi took a few tries but knowing when to shield dash before his melee moves gets you some hits in and when he goes up in the air, shoot his eyes when they're yellow to down him and get hits in there. Throw in some rot hammers when you can and it becomes much easier. Corrupt Rot God was a little annoying during the first phase but phase 2 once you just shield dash under the grab attack and avoid his other moves, double jumping to slow time with arrows helps get shots in. Phase 3, just jump and shoot up enemies to build courage and then get the rods out asap to quickly end the fight. Found the last two bosses much easier than I thought. Feels good to legitimately get the platinum. Definitely recommend getting at least 65 rot and having your shield, melee attacks fully upgraded.

[totakos1]

4 hours ago, Optinooby said:

Just a question, I see Master is heavily complained about, but I see nobody 100%s on Master, only on lower difficulties where the 100% is perhaps less useful, I guess this is mainly due to Roadmaps advising this route. 

 

But is it possible to 100% on Master without much more trouble than Master currently is or would 100% make Master even worse???

 

I don't know if 100% would help Master more than hurts it which is why I ask......

 

Thanks

It is possible to 100% the game on master and I don’t think it makes it harder! It’s good to go for as much completion you can on master or 100% cause it helps you in general later on and your deaths aren’t gonna make you lose anything but little of your time so it’s worth it! The only annoying part will be some cursed chests but once you learn the pattern you are good to go!

[Optinooby]

1 hour ago, totakos1 said:

It is possible to 100% the game on master and I don’t think it makes it harder! It’s good to go for as much completion you can on master or 100% cause it helps you in general later on and your deaths aren’t gonna make you lose anything but little of your time so it’s worth it! The only annoying part will be some cursed chests but once you learn the pattern you are good to go!

 

Thanks for the response, I've asked a few players the same question occasionally as I like to see the different opinions, every1 mostly says this same thing more or less.

 

It makes me wonder why the guides advise to 100% Easy and then any% Master difficulty. On Easy the 100% is really only for the trophies when on Master, it is actually really useful as well.

 

Is 100% quite a chore to the point that when you have 100% Easy or Normal, you can't really be bothered to 100% again on Master cause of what it involves???

 

I'm still to get to the game, I'm strongly thinking to ignore the Roadmaps out there and actually sort off Speedrun or Any% my 1st playthrough on Easy, then 100% on Hard.

 

Just such a backlog

[emailking]

I wouldn't want to try to do the cursed chests on Mater but I think everything else can be 100%-ed just fine. It would definitely be more useful to do it on Master if you're only going to do it on one of them.

[totakos1]

1 hour ago, Optinooby said:

 

Thanks for the response, I've asked a few players the same question occasionally as I like to see the different opinions, every1 mostly says this same thing more or less.

 

It makes me wonder why the guides advise to 100% Easy and then any% Master difficulty. On Easy the 100% is really only for the trophies when on Master, it is actually really useful as well.

 

Is 100% quite a chore to the point that when you have 100% Easy or Normal, you can't really be bothered to 100% again on Master cause of what it involves???

 

I'm still to get to the game, I'm strongly thinking to ignore the Roadmaps out there and actually sort off Speedrun or Any% my 1st playthrough on Easy, then 100% on Hard.

 

Just such a backlog

Although I did the 100% on normal I ended up doing 100% on master as well, the 70% of the stuff are easy to get rest are challenging but when you get the  dash ability everything left over becomes quite easy! It is not a chore but since you can do 100% on easy technically it saves you time and requires less effort so it’s recommended but again on master it makes the game easy eventually if you are willing to go through it! Only issue although there is tracking of what you’ve got in the game per area it doesn’t show where and what you’ve got (at least when I payed it )so it does require exploration which is kind of enjoyable cause it is a beautiful game!

[damcrac5]

2 hours ago, Optinooby said:

 

Thanks for the response, I've asked a few players the same question occasionally as I like to see the different opinions, every1 mostly says this same thing more or less.

 

It makes me wonder why the guides advise to 100% Easy and then any% Master difficulty. On Easy the 100% is really only for the trophies when on Master, it is actually really useful as well.

 

Is 100% quite a chore to the point that when you have 100% Easy or Normal, you can't really be bothered to 100% again on Master cause of what it involves???

 

I'm still to get to the game, I'm strongly thinking to ignore the Roadmaps out there and actually sort off Speedrun or Any% my 1st playthrough on Easy, then 100% on Hard.

 

Just such a backlog

So my warning about 100% on master difficulty would be one specific chest in the second zone. You have to kill so many creatures in a time limit and I couldn't get it done on expert after an hour of trying. Onviously someone more skilled than myself can get it done, but that was the only part of the game I couldn't get past on expert. To go with that, when you select master difficulty at the start, you can't change it. 

I'd still recommend getting most things on material difficulty anyway as it helps you get stronger and have more health and abilities, but 100% would be an added difficulty.

Edited January 20, 2022 by damcrac5

[DrBloodmoney]

13 hours ago, Optinooby said:

Just a question, I see Master is heavily complained about, but I see nobody 100%s on Master, only on lower difficulties where the 100% is perhaps less useful, I guess this is mainly due to Roadmaps advising this route. 

 

But is it possible to 100% on Master without much more trouble than Master currently is or would 100% make Master even worse???

 

I don't know if 100% would help Master more than hurts it which is why I ask......

 

Thanks

 

It's possible, but the thing about the collectibles is - it's incredibly advantageous to get some of them - the meditation spots, and the rots, up to at least 65 rots makes a substantial difference to how difficult the fights are, and on Master, it is certainly to the player's advantage to go for that much - however, some of the other collectibles (the rot hats, cursed chest and flower shrines for example) are less of a gameplay benefit, and more just busy-work.

 

Because they can often require additional fights - and sometimes quite tough ones - it's not really to the player's advantage to leave the 100% for the Master run - it's much more useful to do it first, which gives you the knowledge of where enough of the rots and the meditation spots are, so you can do the Master Run more efficiently, and find enough to upgrade fast, without having to be going too far out of your way to get them, and just concentrate on the main-line and the bosses.

[Optinooby]

I would be doing it with the notion of being in a Platinum Speedrun so I'm talking sort of 'How would 100% Master be if I had rehearsed and optimised the whole route from start to finish to maximum effectiveness' kind off as opposed to starting and winging with no prior knowledge or experience at all!!

 

I wanna try it anyway so think I will give it a go, I may 100% easy a few times first to optimise the route with less stress, and then try to incorporate that on Master.

 

It's a shame you can't change the difficulty ever

 

 

[Game_Molecule]

On 22/09/2021 at 6:08 PM, yowzagabowza said:

I'm so tired of thinking I'm going to watch a fun kids movie and it turns out to be a tear-jerker like "Up" or filled with trauma like Lion King or something. 

If I am watching that kind of movie, it's because I want to have a good time! Not feel like shit for two hours.

I'll tell you the best movie I've seen that had plenty of opportunity to be heart-wrentching but wasn't, and that's Peanut Butter Falcon. Regardless of what you think of  Shia Lebouf, that movie is great the whole way through.

You will enjoy Grave of the Fireflies.

 

Kids today are way too soft.

[DemonslayerRyuu]

I was wondering if I played this offline (digitally) — can I use the Master difficulty exploit? Or must buy the physical copy and play that offline? Or it is even still possible to do it if I play offline?

[communistwookiee]

1 hour ago, DemonslayerRyuu said:

I was wondering if I played this offline (digitally) — can I use the Master difficulty exploit? Or must buy the physical copy and play that offline? Or it is even still possible to do it if I play offline?

Because it was shipped two months after the digital release, the patched version is on the disc. You'll have to do it legit.

Edited March 13, 2022 by communistwookiee

[DemonslayerRyuu]

3 hours ago, communistwookiee said:

Because it was shipped two months after the digital release, the patched version is on the disc. You'll have to do it legit.

So the same goes for the digital version? I cannot exploit this even though it is digital and I am playing it offline?

[starscream171]

Asking out of curiosity -

 

Does this method still works after the patch 1.16 on PS4 ?

 

Here is a method

that gets you this trophy instantly without needing to replay the game at all (having beaten it once on easy or normal will suffice).

This is confirmed to work on PS5 with patch version 1.04:

1. Fast Travel to Mountain Shrine after having finished the story (very north of map). Make a MANUAL SAVE while standing at the Mountain Shrine Meditation Spot.
2. Interact with Meditation Spot, this will trigger the final cutscene/credits. Skip them by holding .
3. When back in the main menu, just start a NEW GAME on MASTER DIFFICULTY.
4. Wait for the initial cutscene to load until you can control Kena, press when prompted to do so.
5. Immediately after this, press Options-Button  and load your MANUAL SAVE that you made in Step 1 (not the Master Autosave).
6. Now you should be back at the Mountain Shrine. The game will think you are on Master Difficulty because there are no fast travel points in the map if you interact with the fast travel point in front of you.
7. Interact with the Meditation Spot again. Skip cutscene. Trophy.

*Still needs confirmation if this exploit works on PS4 version. I tried on PS4 and couldn’t get it to work there.

Edited March 13, 2022 by starscream171

[communistwookiee]

20 hours ago, DemonslayerRyuu said:

So the same goes for the digital version? I cannot exploit this even though it is digital and I am playing it offline?

When you download a game from the PS Store, all current patches are automatically applied, so it wouldn't matter if you play offline unless you downloaded the game prior to the patch that fixed the glitch and haven't updated it since.

Edited March 14, 2022 by communistwookiee

[steel6burgh]

It's a shame that there was an exploit for master difficulty in this game because the people that exploited it missed the best part of the game which was to beat and play it on master difficulty.  Master difficulty in this is a about the type of challenge games should have and it really was a lot of fun.  Nothing more than memorizing boss patterns and you can honestly get hit a good 4 to 6 times depending on how many times you can rejuvenate your health.. The last boss battle was a bit annoying only because of how long it lasted to have to start it over every time you die.  Other than that the difficulty rating for this game is bit over exaggerated.  Maybe a 6 tops and that is only because of the final boss fight i'd rate it that high.  I think that people thought they were playing a kids game, which they are, but that made them think it had to be a easier than it is.    I personally didn't enjoy the 1st play through collecting everything but the master play through was pretty nice.

[jonesey46]

51 minutes ago, steel6burgh said:

It's a shame that there was an exploit for master difficulty in this game because the people that exploited it missed the best part of the game which was to beat and play it on master difficulty.  Master difficulty in this is a about the type of challenge games should have and it really was a lot of fun.  Nothing more than memorizing boss patterns and you can honestly get hit a good 4 to 6 times depending on how many times you can rejuvenate your health.. The last boss battle was a bit annoying only because of how long it lasted to have to start it over every time you die.  Other than that the difficulty rating for this game is bit over exaggerated.  Maybe a 6 tops and that is only because of the final boss fight i'd rate it that high.  I think that people thought they were playing a kids game, which they are, but that made them think it had to be a easier than it is.    I personally didn't enjoy the 1st play through collecting everything but the master play through was pretty nice.

I completely agree. I was shouting at my TV a lot of the time when dying to bosses, but felt so accomplished when I finally beat it. It was a very difficult time but very rewarding.

[Game_Molecule]

On 19/01/2022 at 9:23 AM, Kratos7X_ said:

I just beat Kena on Master difficulty and hell what an intense experience I had with this game. There were so many moments it felt almost unfair. Often the challenge during boss fights was just about dodging the boss while trying not to get stabbed in your back by the small enemies. Though I want to encourage all of you. It is not an impossible platinum trophy. Just keep trying and you will see how you improve yourself with each attempt. (Except of Toshi Boss battle - I still don't know how to dodge his meele attacks -__- ) 

I never played any dark souls game and usually I try to avoid games with a high difficulty. But I stumbled into Kena and did it and so can you! Good luck everyone! 

 

Throw a rot bombs at Toshi in the beginning of the fight. This will stun him long enough to get a few hits to fill up another rot gauge for another rot bomb. Just keep repeating and you will beat him on first try.

 

Check all the tips on the PS5 home screen cards. Every boss fight have 2-4 tips in video form.

[MonaSaxPayne]

I 100%-ed everything on easy, and when I played master I did everything except the 3 cursed chests in the house in the village 

[Asimb0mb]

Master difficulty is very comparable to your average Souls-like in terms of difficulty. You won't have too much trouble with the small mobs. The biggest struggle will be against some of the bosses. There was only one cursed chest I just couldn't beat, which was in one of the houses in the village, the house with the three cursed chests. I just couldn't beat the last one. But yeah, if you're familiar with Souls-like games, Kena on Master difficulty shouldn't be any harder than what you've played before in other games.

[WolfZie00]

A note for anyone playing on master difficulty - DO NOT LOAD AN OLD SAVE!! I went to play my master save today after a few weeks and after about half an hour I realized that the difficulty was on story mode. I should have had two manual saves, one story mode and one master mode but when I went to load after realizing what happened I only had story mode saves. I know for a fact I didn't change the difficulty in the settings since you can't change from master difficulty, the only thing I had done was load my old story mode save to see if I could get the exploit to work and that must have reverted my master save to story mode. Please be careful.

[Elegy]

Personally, I don't see where the difficulty spike in Master difficulty is after having done it legit.  They increased enemy life and damage as well as a slight increase to enemy aggression, but parry timing seems identical to normal mode and all the enemies, spawn points and fight phases are also identical.  It might be a huge spike going from story difficulty but it didn't really feel much different from normal except I had to clean up my fights so I didn't take damage.  The most annoying thing was the fact that the flying wasp normal enemies took two fully charged bow shots to down instead of 1 on normal which drags out a lot of fights where they are included.
 

This game makes it extremely easy to kite enemies as long as you want just taking pot shots with the jumping bow shot.  Most bosses that have gap closing attacks are extremely easy to parry as well.  Rot Hammer is more than enough DPS to deal with mostly everything in the game.  The end game is easier than the start because the dash strike is not only amazing at avoiding attacks, but also pretty much interrupts almost every attack in the game so if a boss is about to do something you don't like you can just dash strike into them and stop it.

Overall, I'd rate master difficulty a 5 out of 10 to do legit.  The last boss is also not that hard because his attacks are all extremely telegraphed and are all easy to avoid with either jump or dash.  The wood knight without rot powers in the interim phase between phase 1 and 2 can be easily dispatched just dodge rolling into his running pierce attack and then using perfect charge strike 2 times.  You can also dash strike into him for a free combo every time.

I think the main issue is that this game is probably more difficult than the target audience would want.  It reminds me of Entwined in that regard.

[emailking]

Felt like a big jump from Expert to Master for me. Did both legit. You also take more damage and also lose some magic when you get hit.