When you complete the guided main story, the game enters the Cycling World.
This phase enables players to experience the game’s traversal, combat, exploration, fast progression, and rich world for as long as they would like. Players will always have new places to discover, new objectives to unlock, new world lore to uncover, and new upgrades to earn.
This section describes fundamental cycling world concepts.
Improved Progression
The cycling world opens several new progression options beyond the main story to provide more depth
and variety:
- Weapon Schematics go up to V5
- New Skills are available to unlock with growth
- New Aeon Bud slots are available to unlock with growth
Cycles and Community
A cycle is a unique Stormland layout that lasts for a calendar week. The rollover between cycles occurs on Tuesdays at 8:00 AM ET for all players simultaneously.
With each new cycle, the following things change:
- The global Condition of the Stormland – the Spire effects and Tempest strategies that influence
- distribution
- The shape of the cloud surface
- The constituent biomes and islands
- The position and layout of individual islands
- The position and layout of new Tempest Strongholds
- The distribution and makeup of enemies and resources
- The mission list
- The cycle-specific collectible index
Cycles are shared by all Stormland players. You can discuss findings such as collectible locations, secrets, or Terminus build strategies in the Insomniac Discord or your preferred community.
Daily Changes
In the cycling world, the distribution of resources and enemies in the Stormland refreshes each day.
Every day, the following things change:
- Alloy and fruit positions
- Weapon and Utility chest locations and content
- Tempest squad composition
Terminus and Escalation
Conquering the Tempest command tower in Terminus is your over-arching objective in the cycling world.
To do so, you must ascend through all 3 open-world strata, unlocking them in sequence by completing Storm Portal missions.
When the next cycle rollover occurs after having achieved victory in Terminus, the Tempest increase their Escalation Level. This causes their squads to have more enemies and start mixing in higher tier enemies. Failing to complete Terminus within the following 2 cycles will reduce the escalation level.
Defeating Terminus at the maximum escalation level of 2unlocks a special ending.
Hero Ascension
At the end of the main story and at the end of any cycle in which you’ve successfully completed Terminus, your hero can opt into a conversion. The following upgrades are traded in for growth.
- Equipped Aeon Buds & corresponding skills
- Holstered Weapons and Gear
- Acquired Weapon Schematics
- Unlocked Strata access points
Growth is used to expand the player’s power ceiling with new Aeon Bud slots and new skills. Purchases made with growth are permanent and never reset.
If the player doesn’t defeat Terminus within a cycle, they retain all upgrades. But they don’t truly ascend.
By starting on a fresh new cycle with a new character build, you can play the cycle with an appropriately powered character alongside the rest of the community and tailor your new character’s build to the new cycle conditions. The world is revived, the gameplay stays challenging, and progression stays brisk.
Additional Activities
Here are some fun things to do in the cycling world:
- Find human habitats. Campsites filled with artifacts and audio logs populate the world.
- Shoot down weather balloons. Capsules filled with resources drift through the upper atmosphere.
- Raid supply barges. Aerial ships hold supplies for skilled gliders.
- Climb towers. Tempest drilling devices contain valuable weapons.
- Scan collectibles. New collectibles appear in each stratum.
- Intercept Tempest transmissions. Some Strongholds and Terminus towers beam transmissions from Tempest command. Scan transmissions to learn more about the Tempest’s ominous motives.