Beginner Tips and Tricks

Listed below are several Beginners Tips and Tricks which will help you in Sifu.

Start Fights with a Weapon

Keep in mind that you can use weapons in Sifu even though it is a kung-fu game that focuses on hand-to-hand combat. Weapons can be found littered throughout each stage and include sticks, pipes, swords, staves, and bats. Having a weapon at your disposal will make encounters a lot easier, therefore before you head to the next section make sure to look around to see if there is a weapon you can pick up and take with you. If there is nothing available go back to an earlier area to retrieve one.

Counter Guardbreak Attacks

It is essential in Sifu that you know how to block, parry, and dodge as you will be unable to defeat opponents by simply pummeling them. To be effective during combat in Sifu you need to learn to combine your attacks with a strong defense. Although most enemy attacks can be blocked by just holding L1 on your controller, you still need to watch out for Guardbreak attacks indicated by glowing limbs as they will break through to deal damage and knock you back. To successfully avoid this type of attack and set up a counter you need to flick the left stick of your controller away just as the attack comes in.

Unlock Important Sifu Skills

The XP you earn deafeating enemies can be used to unlock new Sifu Skills to increase your moveset and give you more options during encounters. In order to permanently unlock a Sifu Skill you need to spend the same amount of XP on it five times in total (these unlock contributions carry over between playthroughs). Important Sifu Skills you should consider investing in are Charged Backfist, Strong Sweep Focus, Pushback Cancel, and Weapon Catch.

Take Advantage of the Structure System

Every time you manage to block an attack in Sifu the Structure bar on the bottom of your screen raises. When this Structure bar fills to the max you will be temporarily stunned, leaving you open for devastating attacks. The enemies you encounter will also have a Structure meter so even if they manage to block or parry your attacks it will full. When you are facing opponents who are hard to hit be sure to take advantage of their Structure meter by blocking their attacks and unleashing a strike when it is full.

Regain Structure during Boss Fights

Make sure during a boss fight you keep an eye on your Structure meter to ensure that it doesn't fill up to the max, and you become vulnerable to their attack. If your Structure bar is almost full you need to back away during the fight, so it lowers back down. This will happen providing you do not sprint or attack. Try to use the environment as cover while you regain your Structure.

Dealing with Multiple Enemies

When you are in confrontations where you find yourself facing multiple enemies at the same time it is crucial that you do not let yourself get surrounded by them as this will lead to you being quickly overwhelmed no matter what level you are. The best thing to do in this situation is to continue moving making sure that you keep all the enemies in front of you. Focus on the armed enemies first as they will deplete your health quickly with their attacks. Leave the enemies with special gold or silver health bars until last as they will take additional effort to defeat. Pushback and sweep Sifu Skills are particularly effective with groups of enemies as they temporarily take them out of the fight which reduces the numbers you have to deal with.

Perform Takedowns

Always try to perform a Takedown whenever the prompt appears as doing so will enable you to pull off a finishing move that will eliminate the enemy and also enable you to recover some of your health. The Takedown can't be interrupted by other enemies, they will just stand motionless and look at you in awe while you perform it. This makes Takedowns particularly effective for thinning out encounters against multiple enemies.

Prioritize Weapon Durability

Shrines are represented by little green dragon statues and there are several of them on each level. Shrines contain stat boosts that will help you in a number of ways. These include giving you increased Structure, more Focus bars, and the ability to earn more Foucs after a successful parry or dodge. Keep in mind that some of these boosts are locked to a specific age range. One of which is the reward that grants additional weapon durability which can only be used if your Sifu is 25 or younger. It is therefore important that you prioritize maximizing those categories first while you are able to.

Find Shortcuts

All the levels in Sifu feature a shortcut that allows you to quickly get to the boss from an early section in that stage. This means that when you discover a key you should replay the level right away in order to finish it with a lower age counter.

Manipulate your Saves

Whenever you die in Sifu the game instantly creates a save meaning that you will not be able to undo the death that has just occurred. You can though get around this by uploading your save to the cloud before you tackle a dangerous enemy or boss. If you die in the confrontation, or you didn't perform as well as you hoped you can simply close the game and download the save from the cloud which will place you back at the start of the fight.

Take a look at our Detective Board Guide to find out the locations of all the collectibles in Sifu.