Stellar Blade difficulty settings explained: All options & how to change

Souhardya Choudhury
Stellar Blade Eve

Stellar Blade’s fast combat will test players’ skill levels every now and then and it can get a bit overwhelming for new players. Thankfully, the game provides a difficulty setting for adjustments, so here’s everything to know about it.

Stellar Blade‘s combat is one of its biggest selling points, as the fast-paced melee battles are a sight to behold. However, if that is not suitable for you, you can simply change the difficulty at any time during the playthrough and adjust it according to your liking.

Here’s everything you need to know about Stellar’s Blade‘s difficulty settings.

What are Stellar Blade’s difficulty settings?

Stellar Blade has three difficulty options — Story, Normal, and Hard mode, which are your usual easy, medium, and hard difficulties. However, initially, you will only have access to the first two modes, as to unlock the Hard difficulty setting, you will have to complete one playthrough.

Stellar Blade Story difficulty explained

The Story difficulty in Stellar Blade is the easy mode, so the enemies would relatively be weak, especially in the early stages of the game. Once you start traveling through the world as Eve, you will also notice that parry timings are much more forgiving in this difficulty as well.

If you are new to action games or just want to have some fun with the story, the Story mode might just be the perfect difficulty for you. However, if you are experienced in fast-paced melee combat titles, you can even turn the difficulty up to Normal Mode and head in for a challenge in Stellar Blade.

One of the best features of the Story mode in Stellar Blade is the Action Assist, which helps you massively with parry timings and counterattacking. You can simply toggle this feature on or off from the Gameplay Settings and use it whenever you are struggling to beat an enemy if you do not have it on all the time.

Stellar Blade Normal difficulty explained

Stellar Balde’s Normal difficulty is for those who want a bit of a challenge during their playthrough. If you loved the combat in franchises like Devil May Cry or Final Fantasy, we recommend playing in Normal mode.

Not only is defeating the enemies somewhat challenging here, but the parry window is tighter. There’s a significant jump in difficulty when you go from Story to Normal mode, so keep that in mind before changing difficulties in Stellar Blade.

Being well-versed in melee titles is a must if you opt for this difficulty, as there are no Action Assist or lenient parry windows. However, don’t worry if you are struggling in Normal mode, as you can simply change the difficulty whenever you want in Stellar Blade.

Stellar Blade Hard difficulty explained

The Hard mode in Stellar Blade is a drastic increase in difficulty compared to the Normal mode. In this difficulty, enemies will deal much more damage than normal and enemies will be much faster resulting in an extremely tight parry window.

However, you will have access to a bunch of new skills that will in turn boost your damage as well. This is why it is a pretty fulfilling experience for players who want to have another go at the game with boosted damage and an extremely difficult enemy AI.

How to change Stellar’s Blade difficulty?

To change Stellar Blade’s difficulty mid-game, you can simply head to Settings in the pause menu, and select your preferred mode in the Difficulty option. As the game allows you to change the difficulty mid-game, you can experiment with both modes and find the most suitable option for yourself.

Best difficulty mode in Stellar Blade

The best way to experience Stellar Blade would be the Normal mode, although that entirely depends on your skill level. Sure, Hard mode can be really fulfilling, and Easy mode is the best for beginners. However, if you are a fan of a bit of challenge in gaming, the Normal mode is just the sweet spot between painful difficulty and extreme easiness.

That was everything you had to know about Stellar Bladde’s difficulty settings. For more on other highly anticipated titles, check out our guides:

Grand Theft Auto 6 | The Division Heartland | Marathon | Wolverine | Elder Scrolls 6 | Marvel Rivals | Black Myth: Wukong | Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 |  Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree DLC | 2XKO (Project L)

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About The Author

Souhardya is a Games Writer at CharlieIntel, currently covering Diablo 4, EA FC 24, Baldur's Gate 3, and Elden Ring. He has a degree in Media Science & Journalism and has previously worked at Spiel Times and Sportskeeda. You can reach him at [email protected].