Quick Links
After hours of grinding in the Roguelike world ofReturnal, you’ll finally stumble upon the final boss of the game. Whenever you’re defeated, you have to restart from either Overgrown Ruins or Echoing Ruins. This can make it quite hard to reach this boss unless you’ve been grinding for quite a long time.
RELATED:Returnal: Abyssal Scar Walkthrough
Much like every other final boss in the game, Ophion also features three phases in the battle, and you reach the next phase after making his health reach zero. You’ll be able to start the final act of the main story after defeating this enemy.
How To Find Ophion
There are six unique biomes in the game, andyou’ll have to go through all of them to find this boss. At first, you’ll spawn in the Overgrown Ruins where you’ll learn the basics of Returnal and find the first boss. You’ll have to go through five biomes to finally reach Abyssal Scar, the home of Ophion.
Normally, you’d spawn in the first biome if you’re defeated at any point in the game. Thankfully,the game has a permanent checkpoint in the fourth biome called the Echoing Ruins. You’ll spawn in this area until you finish the main story.
In the Abyssal Scar biome,you’ll first have to find the final permanent upgrade that will let you reveal hidden platformswith a white sphere floating in the air. you’re able to get this upgrade afterbeating a Malformed Typhonops, which will be one of the toughest battles in the game.
You can find the Abyssal Vault once you get this upgrade, and the Abyssal Key will let you into this vault.You’ll see the room in the picture above as soon as you enter. Fall through the giant hole to get to the Ophion battle, but make sure you’re ready for it since you won’t be able to leave mid-way.
How To Beat Ophion
Unlike other boss fights,you’re able to’t simply shoot the body of this boss to deal damage. You have to utilize the spheres that are unlocked with the final upgrade to Selene’s suit. As soon as the battle starts, you’ll be able to see two to three of these orbs flying to the left and right of the boss' body.
When you shoot these spheres,an explosion will reveal multiple spots on its body, as shown above. The enemy will take damage only if you attack these spots when you can see them. After taking enough damage, some of these spots will burst and you’ll have to target different ones until there’s only one left.
The spheres will get replaced at regular intervals during the battle.Whenever a new sphere spawns, you have to hit it again to reveal the spots.
Ophion Attack Pattern
Every hostile in Returnal has a specific attack pattern, and memorizing it can help you fight against them. Whenever you get to the next phase in the battle,the boss will get more and more aggressive, which will also change its attack pattern. There are some common attacks that you’ll see during each of these phases.
Phase One
In this phase, the boss will have a ton of different attacks that will be thrown at you.The boss can also perform multiple attacks together, which easily overwhelms the player. Here are the attacks performed by the boss in the first phase:
Phase Two
After you deplete the boss' health for the first time,it will trigger a cutscene where its face will change into a giant skull. During the second phase, it’ll be much easier to tell when the circular lasers will spawn on the ground since the boss has a visible stomping animation. Apart from that, you can see the following attacks:
While the attacks in the second phase might not be that lethal, the white spheres will make this phase hard.These spheres will constantly disappear and reappear in different places. You’ll have to shoot at them over and over again, which can be quite hard if you have a weapon with fewer bullets.
Phase Three
The boss willhave Selene’s face during the final phase of the battle, which already makes it hard to attack the enemy. Here are the attacks you’ll see here:
Quite a lot of attacks from Ophion use a purple laser,so it’s important to remember that you can’t dash through them like the red lasers. You’ll still take damage even if you dash past them at the right time.
Tips To Survive In Ophion Battle
You can focus on a few specific things during your run to have a better chance of survival during this battle:
