Risk of Rain Returns Providence Trials: How do they work?

While it’s got its fair share of classic features to choose from, the new Risk of Rain Returns does not skimp out in regard to novelties. Not only have we got four new characters to unlock, but Risk of Rain Returns also features Providence Trials.

Providence Trials are, arguably, the most important and notable new feature in Risk of Rain Returns. These are remarkably difficult and, often, fairly complicated mini-missions forcing you into iterating on previously tested tactics over and over again. This is, in more ways than one, the true challenge mode of Risk of Rain Returns, and not everyone might enjoy it.

That said, there’s merit in Hopoo Games including Providence Trials in Risk of Rain Returns, and we’ll explain why that’s the case in our explainer on this set of challenges.

Risk of Rain Returns: Providence Trials Explained

The fact that Hopoo Games included alternative skills for each of Risk of Rain Returns‘ 15 main characters is huge all on its own, adding to the sheer scope of the game’s already impressive level of variety. What’s, perhaps, even more interesting here is the fact that there are usually two ways to go about unlocking these alternative skills, with one exclusive to Providence Trials.

So, while you could complete specific objectives in regular Risk of Rain Returns matches to unlock alternative skills, you could also test them out via specific Trials, if you choose to do so. Trials are purpose-built missions that spotlight particular characters, item sets, and/or skills. The Commando, for example, has an alternative skill that replaces his classic combat roll with a high-speed slide, and one of his Trials is all about going fast by leveraging the slide. Successfully completing the Trial in question instantly unlocks the skill, but completing its attached alt-objective does the job, too.

What this means is that players who wish to avoid playing Providence Trials can, indeed, do so. As these are remarkably difficult and obtuse in some cases, it’s understandable that some would prefer to avoid them. Yet, Trials do give you a shortcut for some extremely grindy skill unlocks, so you’ve got an alternative if you’d like to contend with it!

How to unlock Providence Trials?

Something to keep in mind here is that you won’t be able to start rampaging through Providence Trials right off the bat. Instead, you’ll need to successfully finish a full regular run of Risk of Rain Returns before the Trials are made available.

The silver lining here is that you can complete your run on the easiest difficulty, ‘Drizzle’, and the game won’t punish you for choosing the easy way out. From what we’ve seen so far, the only reason why you’d need to crank thinks up to ‘Monsoon’ would be if you’re trying to snag the secret Robomando character, or if you’re Achievement-hunting, for example.