Dodging is the order of the day as I make a Hunter miss swipe after swipe while I slay his buddies. I even make him slay a few for me!

(5:03) Level 5 ('Assault on the Control Room') on Normal. This shows a solo cavern megabattle in which I keep a Hunter close throughout, repeatedly dodging his swipes as I work my way through the other 37 covies with assorted weaponry including a rocket launcher. It makes for a nice challenge, and occasionally he acts as a shield. Also there's some bonus grunty humour at the start.

Released November 25th 2012, gameplay recorded November 24th 2012.

00:02 Leaving my Marines blocked by the Ghosts, I head into battle with pistol and rocket launcher. My flashlight alerts the Hunter and I lead him around the large block structure to get him lined up nicely for smacking the first Grunt into the chasm. "Wa-haaa!" Nice. Then it's back around to give the second one a smack, but he's tougher than the last and it doesn't kill him. After a brief cry of pain, he's straight back to sleep! That is one dozy Grunt huh? However, it's lights out for the little fella when I lead the Hunter around for another whack. The nearby Grunts wake up and now the fight begins in earnest.

00:58 I tag the nearest Grunt and soon headshoot the second, then get to work with the pistol on enemies further back. Sure I could've slammed a rocket into them pronto, but I thought I'd play with the pistol for a while. Besides which, this way I'm creating loose plasmas on the ground. When I eventually lob a frag grenade it sets off a chain reaction which takes out three Elites (one of them going off the side of the bridge). Right after that, my first rocket kills a Hunter and my second gets an advancing Elite.

01:49 Switching to a plasma pistol, one of many spare weapons I placed in the battle area beforehand, I send a few plasma balls up the bridge, plus another rocket which does some good damage though it hits a bit shorter than I'd planned. While the mess is clearing I pick up a needler and fire a stream. Can't really see what I'm aiming at, but I'm expecting the needles to home. I'm pretty sure at least one needle finishes off a raging Elite while I'm using the Hunter as a shield, but it sounds like the majority piled into a Grunt.

02:10 After a brief delay to recharge my shield and then to let the Hunter close in on me from behind, I advance to engage in some more needle play, killing two Elites with long streams (I like a bit of overkill). I fire a long-distance rocket towards an Elite spotted past the bridge, but I don't think it gets him. A Grunt comes out to meet me but gets needled.

02:41 Another Grunt advances, but for a moment I ignore him while lobbing a plasma towards distant Jackals; I'm not sure if it gets any. I fire a rocket too and it looks like it's landing short, but it seems to take care of the yellow-shielded Jackal I was going for. After another Hunter dodge I rocket the Grunt. Ok it's a bit of a waste, but I had plenty spare and it's fun. Dangerously close though!

02:55 Yet another plucky Grunt runs forth, but again I ignore him for a moment. A rocket takes out two Jackals on the left, then my second tube handles a Jackal running for cover (I enjoyed that). Now for the Grunt, who's been busy shooting the Hunter ("It wasn't me"). My first plasma grenade misses but then I score a tag low down which sends him airborne amusingly.

03:08 There's still some significant opposition to deal with before I advance off the bridge, so I get busy with that, initially with some needles. A couple of rockets finish off two Elites, but my Hunter gets too far from me and opens fire. I quickly head back to stop it. After getting more needle ammo and firing another deadly stream, a barrage of Hunter fire makes me back off for a while. And none too soon either, as my Hunter companion gets caught in a blast.

03:36 With all rockets gone, I swap the launcher for a plasma rifle then advance off the bridge, though taking care to keep my Hunter close so he won't open fire. Needles and plasma finish off one of his spiky colleagues at the exit, then I go left to tackle the three Grunts, one of whom amusingly yells "Run away!" before getting launched by a plasma grenade.

04:14 There's one other Hunter left, and I close in with a few plasma balls then a stream of needles. One of the needle explosions turns him around as he swipes, so he ends up going the other way and I take the opportunity to pile in a few more needles, ha ha. He's down after a couple of thumps and a bit of plasma, and then his body gets knocked flying when my Hunter misses yet another swipe at me.

04:42 This battle has been about dodging my Hunter, so it's only fitting to end that way. After leading him to the edge - a bit carelessly as I briefly get too far ahead and he gets a chance to open fire again - I do a tag-dodge and he drops into the chasm, suffering a blast part way down. 41 swipes, 41 misses. So long fella, it's been fun!

Closing remarks This movie used a save I created when working on the megabattle, back near the time of my movies BCM48-50. The enemy hadn't all retreated as far as they could, and in particular there was a Hunter near the start of the bridge. While trying out that save, I found myself dodging his swipes for a while as I tackled other enemies, and realized I could really go to town on that theme, maybe fighting the whole battle while dodging. When I finally got around to doing that, namely for this movie, I also realized I could add some humour at the start by making the Hunter smack a few Grunts dead, so that was a nice bonus.

When leading him around during the Grunt smacking phase, I was facing him a lot of the time, which was really just for show. It would be easier to look where you're going and keep the appropriate distance just by sound, but it's not very hard to run backwards like I did. You soon get used to the whereabouts of that block. Not that you need to go around the block, but I found that to be a nice way of lining him up for his whacks.

I also did some plays in which I left the launcher behind, instead going in with a needler and assault rifle and proceeding to use other weapons too. I managed to get though a couple of full battles that way (keeping my Hunter with me and avoiding all swipes) but it took a fair bit longer to wear down the opposition. That would've made the movie a few minutes longer and I wasn't sure so many people would have enough patience for that, so I decided to feature the rocket launcher instead. The launcher obviously speeds things along a bit.

There were an extra three covies besides the usual 35. Namely the early Shade Grunt and the two Pelican attack Ghost pilots, all as mentioned in my article.

© 2004-2020 by Rockslider