Overview:
-Estimated achievement difficulty: 5/10
-Offline: 45 (1000)
-Online: 0
-Approximate amount of time to 1000: 30-45 hours
-Minimum number of playthroughs needed: 1
-Number of missable achievements: Lots (see below for more info)
-Glitched achievements: None!
-Do cheat codes disable achievements?: No Cheats
-Does difficulty affect achievements?: Yes (3 difficulty based achievements)
Overall this game is not very hard, especially using all of the tools that will be provided to you in this road map. The most important thing is to plan and not deviate from that plan, otherwise you'll have to do another playthrough.
Introduction:
Welcome to Rise of the Argonauts! This game has a total of 45 achievements and requires only one playthrough to get 1000 since the difficulty achievements are stackable. Of the game's achievements, 14 achievements are story/difficulty related while the remaining 31 will require you to complete different deeds or complete different constellations.
The game itself has a ton of missable achievements. The reason for this is the constellation system it uses. To finish a constellation in the game, you must "light up" all of its stars. Stars light up after you complete a specific deed. Although some of these deeds are very easy, others are cumulative and have several portions of them that can be missed. It is for this reason that if you don't plan and focus on deeds, you will miss one and thus force yourself into doing another playthrough. Don't be discouraged though, by using this map and the links provided this shouldn't happen to you.
As far as glitches go, the game doesn't have any huge, reoccurring ones that happen to everyone. Instead you will get glitches randomly. Often times enemies will fall through the floor and therefore prevent you from being able to finish a battle, or sometimes everyone will just choose not to talk to you. Due to the randomness of the glitches it is highly suggested that you use manual saves often. I had 6 save slots used by the time I finished the game. This protected me from glitches and allowed me to backtrack in case I missed something.
Step 1: Preparation
Before we begin the playthrough let's do a bit of preparation. First of all from the main menu go to options and change the game's difficulty to Legend. After this do not touch the difficulty setting again until after you get the achievement for beating the game on legend. If you touch it even once, you risk missing out on that achievement. Next and most important is Ben 1262's walkthrough. In that walkthrough, Ben has laid out everything you need to do to get Corona Borealis, Crown of Mastery, the hardest achievement in the game. Make sure that you follow his walkthrough to the letter, otherwise you risk missing something and therefore forcing yourself into another playthrough. In the next step I will layout the playthrough and things to focus on. Sometimes my advice will differ from Ben's, if that's the case go with mine.
Step 2: Playthrough on Legend
Here I will layout by level what you need to do to get the full 1000 in a single playthrough. Once again, follow Ben 1262's walkthrough linked above exactly, but if my advice differs from his go with mine. Before starting here are a few more tips:
- Do your best to hog all the kills. Your companions (Argonauts) will steal kills from you often which puts you at risk for missing some of the combat deeds. That said I also suggest avoiding any aspect that makes the Argonauts healthier or more powerful
- Do not dedicate any of your deeds to the gods until I tell you do to do so. There are a limited number of deeds out there and we'll need to save them up to get all of the maximum favor achievements.
- When given the option to take Argonauts with you, I always took Pan and Atalanta because their attacks are weak and they knock enemies to the ground a lot.
- Once I had maxed out Apollo and Athena's favor I chose only Hermes options since I found his aspects to be some of the best in the game.
- Use god powers as much as you can every time you enter a battle. You'll need to use them at least 25 times before finishing the game.
-Do not purchase the Apollo aspect Rallying Presence II until you have the deed Survivor: Revived incapacitated Argonauts 10 times.
IOLCUS:
Use Ben's walkthrough until you get to the training room and begin sparring with the guards. After you complete all the rounds, you have the option to choose what kind of guards you fight. I always chose spearmen or macemen since they both carry shields (swordsmen do not). At this point, using the mace use a + attack to knock all of them over and then use a , attack to break their shields. Repeat this sparring process over and over until you get the deeds Sunderer:Shattered 60 shields and Stalwart:Knocked down 60 foes. Next, use the spear and perform the shield bash () followed by a attack to get the Shieldmaster deed. NOTE: If you hit the shield out of their hands it doesn't count as a smashed shield so make sure they're blocking your attack.
After that continue to follow Ben's walkthrough until you get to the part where you must enter Ares' cave. In this cave you will want to equip the spear and use spear throws to kill all of the enemies (+). Simply run and dodge around until the spear throw recharges and then let it loose again. This may take a little time to kill all the enemies using only this method, but it's worth it in the end. When you approach the end of the cave (you'll know it's the end because you'll see a shrine of Ares in the distance), pull out your sword and immediately kill the minotaur with dash attacks (+ or +). After that pull the spear back out and use the spear throw to kill the last two enemies. Use Ben's walkthrough to finish the level. NOTE: By the end of the cave I had 19 spear throw kills.
DELPHI:
No special notes here, just continue to follow Ben's walkthrough and make Athena/Apollo dialogue choices.
MYCENAE:
NOTE: By this point I had made enough Apollo dialogue choices to buy the aspect Healing Beacon. Use God Powers from this point on as much as you can in battle.
Use Ben's walkthrough until it's time to fight in the Arena. For round 1 have Pytheas avoid all action and make sure he doesn't die; if he does reload and try again. In this round I personally used the spear and its attack. After that achievement popped I went back to decapitating enemies with the shield after impaling them with the spear. For round two you're going to use the sword only. Take out Thankallos as quick as you can and then use sword dash attacks to take out everyone else. For round three just follow Ben's advice and continue on using his walkthrough until you must fight in the Arena again.
For the first round of this portion use the sword to take out the minotaurs as fast as possible then once again use sword dash attacks to kill everything else. NOTE: I had 18 beast kills after this round. For round three finish off the Bezerker: Killed 35 enemieas with dash attacks and Peltast: Killed 25 enemies with thrown spears deeds. Finish the level.
SARIA:
Before going ashore I suggest using just enough deeds to allow yourself to buy the Conviction II aspect from Athena. From this point on do not use anymore deeds until told to. Now go ashore and follow Ben's walkthrough until you are allowed to venture out into the jungle. Once in the jungle you will want to focus on the follow things:
- Get as many beast kills as you can, you will need 60 by the end of the island.
- Use the spear only. With Conviction II you should be able to get the Divine Precision: Critically struck 35 enemies with the spear deed before the end of the island.
- Kill any and all enemies that Pan or Atalanta knock to the ground with the spear's attack as often as you can. This will help you on your way to completing the Unyielding: Slew 30 prone enemies deed.
- Remember to continue using god powers as often as possible.
With those things in mind follow Ben's walkthrough until you get back into the village and are about to speak with Agrios about Callas' body. Before you do that refer to this thread and use its advice to finish off the dialogue deeds for Apollo, Ares and Hermes. NOTE: After the first choice, the subsequent choices do not give you favor. After this point all you need to do is choose Athena dialogue choices to finish her dialogue deed. Continue on using the walkthrough until you enter the second Hep’na je fight (the one in the cave). During this battle simply hold down the and wait for your companions to fall. When they do run up to them and press to revive them. Do this until you earn the Survivor: Revived incapacitated Argonauts 10 times deed. After that finish the fight and the level. NOTE: Reviving Argonauts requires the Apollo aspect Rallying Presence.
KYTHRA:
On Kythra simply follow Ben's walkthrough and focus on the following things in combat:
- Kill at least 50 corrupt Ionians for the Master Executioner deed.
- Finish off the Unyielding: Slew 30 prone enemies deed
- Finish off any other combat related deed other than killing certain types of enemies.
NOTE: By the end of Kythra I had both the Leo, Savage Lion and Ursa Major, Great Bear achievements.
TARTARUS:
If you're still looking to complete some combat related deeds you can do so on this level. By the end of this level I had the Master Condemner: Killed 125 tartarus fiends deed completed. Also by the end of this level, if you haven't spent any deeds you should have enough to be able to max each god's favor individually. To do this, save your game and dedicate all your deeds to a certain god until you max them out and get the achievement. From there reload the game and repeat. Once you have all four of those achievements, max out Apollo and Athena and begin working on Ares or Hermes (your choice which one). NOTE: There is a spot in Tartarus, noted in the walkthrough, where you must destroy some bulbs to stop your enemies from respawning. This point can be used to finish off any deeds you may need for combat/tartarus fiends.
IOLCUS FINALE:
In this final level you will be finishing off the Aquarius, Peerless Warrior and Corvus, Eyes of Hecate constellations and earning the Corona, Crown of Mastery achievement. Follow Ben's walkthrough and save your game before going ashore. Now, when you are asked to choose two Argonauts choose two but do not accept. Instead rapidly press the button until you exit the screen. Then once again press to go ashore and you will go there alone. From the docks go until you kill the first two Blacktongues. After that run back a little bit and there will be a never ending stream of Ionian warriors that will come at you one by one. Do this until you complete the Aquarius, Peerless Warrior and earn the Corona, Crown of Mastery achievement. After that reload your game and actually take your Argonauts with you. NOTE: If you don't reload your game and go on alone the game will freeze a little bit past your cutscene with Sinon. Now follow Ben's walkthrough and finish the game to earn all three difficulty achievements.
Conclusion:
That's it! If for some reason you are missing an achievement you can either load up a previous save or if it's that bad start a new game.
[x360a would like to thank Method for this Roadmap]