Days Gone for PlayStation 4: Beginner's tips

The world in Days Gone is rife with threats, and it can easily get the best of you if you're not careful. We have a few tips to keep your journey as least frustrating as possible. But should you want that extra challenge, you're always free to play on hard and alert the horde. It's your funeral.

• Disable NERO checkpoint speakers
• Take out infestations during the day
• Lay down explosives in swarmer caves
• Upgrade your bike early
• Don't waste bullets on Newts
• Lure Freaker swarms to ambush camps

Disable NERO checkpoint speakers

All over the map you'll come across NERO checkpoints that need to be powered up in order for you to gain access to the medical unit and grab an injection that permanently increases your health, stamina, or focus. Powering these up can be as simple as fueling the nearby generator or replacing a broken fuse, but what happens afterward can catch you off guard if you aren't expecting it. Each of these checkpoints has a handful of speakers that, when the generator is turned on, will start to emit loud noises that alert Freakers. This is especially dire when some checkpoints are located a rock's throw away from a horde.

To avoid this potential catastrophe, you can disable these speakers before they ever go off. Once you locate them, just hop up onto the roof and cut their wires with the button prompt on screen so that they fall to the ground.

Take out infestations during the day

Taking out Freaker infestations might seem like a little side activity that you can avoid, but it's best not to. If you're stuck out in the middle of nowhere and need to fast travel, you can only do so if the road is cleared of infestations first. After coming across a Freaker infestation your map will update with a red biohazard symbol so that you can keep track of its location.

Because of how active Freakers are at night, you should always try to take these out during the day — unless you really want that challenge. Once you're in the general area of a nest, Deacon will quip that it must be close because of how bad it smells. You'll see a lot of dead branches and twigs blocking a doorway or a corner of a room, almost like a giant bird made a nest there. You'll want to throw a Molotov cocktail at it from a distance and then stay back to shoot the Freakers as they swarm out.

Lay down explosives in swarmer caves

If you find a cave littered with dead bodies or bones scattered everywhere, you've stumbled upon a Freaker horde. These caves actually provide a great way to whittle down their numbers so long as you don't go too far in and alert them prematurely. Freakers are usually huddled in the very back, though some may be wandering around outside that will impede your progress and should be taken out stealthily for this strategy to work. Make sure you have some explosives on hand and lay down mines as you make your way through the cave — only using those that detonate by proximity. Once you're at the end, you can alert the horde and run out to let the mines to their job.

Upgrade your bike early

If you don't upgrade your bike early, you'll have a tough time doing a lot of missions or exploring. Your default gas tank is small, the exhaust is loud, and its suspension is absolutely shot. Upgrading these mean that your bike can take more damage, you can fast travel farther, and you're less likely to alert enemies when you're riding by.

To upgrade your bike as quickly as possible you'll want to build a lot of trust with Copeland's camp. This is the first survivor settlement that you'll discover. To build trust you can complete tasks for Copeland, complete missions in the area, send rescued survivors to his camp, and sell bounties to the local merchant.

Don't waste bullets on Newts

Newts are child-like Freakers that are smaller and much more agile than their adult counterparts. They also happen to be easier to kill. When you spot a small group of them, don't bother wasting your bullets. They usually won't attack unless they feel threatened, unlike adult Freakers that attack onsite. Just make sure you have a decent melee weapon on-hand and you can slice them up no problem. If they start to climb rooftops that you can't get, that's when you should start bringing out the ranged weapons. But in general if you stay away from them, they'll stay away from you.

Lure Freaker swarms to ambush camps

Ambush camps can have any numbers of bandits roaming about with assault rifles and snipers waiting to strike. To deal with these, just lure a horde of Freakers to them and let them to the dirty work for you. A few camps are set up close enough to swarmer caves that you can run by, lead them to the bandits, and run away to hide while you watch the action unfold. Make sure you do this during the daytime so that the Freakers return to their cave afterward.

In our review, we said that Days Gone was a ton of fun and a terrific addition to PlayStation's exclusives lineup despite its performance issues.