How to Unlock Drifter in Risk of Rain Returns

Risk of Rain Returns is a thrilling return to the classic roguelike adventure that features a wide variety of survivors to play as. One on the roster that has become increasingly popular is the Drifter.

Aptly described as a “resourceful brawler”, she not only packs a huge punch literally with her backpack, she’s even better at collecting scrap that can be used to spawn items among other things that can be immensely beneficial to a team, or even solo. If you’re wondering how and where to find her, here is our handy guide for how to unlock Drifter in Risk of Rain Returns.

How & Where to Unlock Drifter in Risk of Rain Returns

In somewhat similar fashion to Engineer, unlocking Drifter in Risk of Rain Returns involves getting your hands on a bunch of drones. This time though it’s all done in just one playthrough, and there are a couple of ways that you can go about this.

To unlock Drifter, you need to recycle 6 drones in one playthrough. There’s a variety of them scattered throughout each zone of the game, and some deal damage (Gunner, Flamer, Attack, Missile) while others provide healing support.

They can be recycled via a ‘Recycler’, which looks like a blue-colored dumpster machine. In return for recycling a drone, you get an item of randomized rarity to use if you want. They’re also scattered throughout the game, and this is the machine you want to find for this objective. You can use it to unlock Drifter one of two ways.

The first is to literally just find as many drones as possible in one zone that has a Recycler, or build up your drone stock early on. This can be way easier with a friend or two who also pick up drones, as when they break, if you have the money you can claim their drone as yours. Then just put each drone into the Recycler machine until you’ve reached 6 altogether.

Side Note: Recycler machines can be a little difficult to find sometimes, as their spawn rate is entirely random. Some runs you may not see one at all up to the final area. You can chose to either cycle back around with your current character and build, though the fight back through will be significantly harder, or start over completely and cross your fingers.

Alternatively, we’ve heard that if you have the Artifact of Command equipped, you can grab a Drone Repair Kit equipment item and just bring one drone to a Recycler and do the following: put the drone in the Recycler, then repair it with your Repair Kit. Rinse and repeat until you’ve done it 6 times over and the challenge unlocks, which will also give you Drifter as a reward.

That concludes our guide for how to unlock Drifter in Risk of Rain Returns. We hope you found this helpful, and let us know if you enjoy playing as this particular character.

Be sure to check out all of our other guides for Risk of Rain Returns, as well as our official review of the game.