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II haven't updated my journal or YouTube in awhile now. Not that this really surprises me as I can procrastinate. (Who doesn't from time to time?). This last week my BIL was ill and off work so nearly every day I went over there to wreak havoc in X-Men Legends. We started a new game with all four characters under player control. I opted to play as Cyclops as he's my favorite character.
Sure he may be a whiney guy in the comics but I still have a soft spot for old Cyke. Concurrent with playing the first game during trips I decided to fire up a solo Cyclops game in X-Men Legends 2: Rise of Apocalypse. I can say, without a shadow of a doubt, that Cyclops fares much better in the second installment. In the first game just about everything blocks his optic blasts and his stun is a directional beam. Leadership is still awesome, however, and makes boss fights go much faster. I haven't used his XTreme ability so I cannot comment on that.
In X-Men Legends 2 the directional stun is replaced by a PBAE stun + DD in the form of Optic Flash. It's most efficient at low ranks to keep it cheap but the higher levels stun for longer allowing it to be comboed with Fusion Beam. At low ranks if you're swarmed you just have to keep spamming it and hope Cyclops doesn't run out of energy. It also goes through walls and has a high Z-axis tolerance. That makes it ideal for setting a trap at a door. Run in, get all the enemies chasing Cyclops, run back out and around the corner then as the enemies try to get through the narrow door stun them all in one shot.
Fusion Beam inflicts radiation damage every second. It's not uber - only about 260/second maxed - but that's more then enough to kill most enemies. It also works on those pesky enemies that are energy resistant. It was my workhorse beam. I also used Piercing Beam to finish off enemies but that didn't see much use. It simply wasn't very efficient for the energy cost. His XTreme, Optic Rage, is pretty bleh. The targetting is extremely finicky and it will go over the heads of enemies too close. However it is fast firing and has great knockback. Unfortunately enemies are only slowed during XTreme moves, not stopped, so any not hit by the beam can continue to attack while Cyclops recovers.
This leads me to another nitpick I have with the game - stuns don't take effect until the victim stops animating. Once an animation has started it can only be stopped by death. An enemy that has a stun land when they start an attack chain won't stop attacking until the chain finishes. Bosses are also completely stun immune which is incredibly frustrating when they're spawning clones or just being general pests.
Anyway, on with the details of the run! This was my third trip through the game. I played on Hard and loaded up a file that had already cleared Hard mode once. I expected it to be a pretty difficult challenge and didn't want to hamper myself right out of the gate. Cyclops started the run at level 67 with some decent gear as he was one of the main members of my prior team. I blazed through the prologue with the default quartet to promptly get the other three teammates killed in Genosha. Yes I know I could have just removed them but wheres the fun in that?
Grizzly and Abyss fell without trouble. Being good at run-and-gun makes pure melee enemies a snap. The standard enemies on Hard do inflict some serious damage in a hurry but potions were plentiful and I walked into the game fully stocked. I died for the first time in Elemental Tomb (Act 2- Savage Land) when completing a puzzle using Iceman. I was ice skating and went a little too far such that I ended up face-first in a pit.
Oops. My bad.
My first true bout of trouble came fighting Mikhail. It's a multi-stage battle and in the first part he spawns one clone at specified health intervals. These must all be destroyed before the real Mikhail can be hurt again.
Mikhail and all of his clones have a beam that causes automatic knockdown with a long recovery. It is nigh-impossible to dodge this beam but it has a long re-use timer. However when there is only one player character and too many clones they can cycle this beam infinitely in a knockdown loop. Once you're in this loop there's nothing you can do.
Second death of the run. The second attempt was also rough but as the clones spawned I ran around the room to split them up then killed them one at a time. The next phase was easy. It was a little annoying positioning the second and fourth controllers while dodging the laser but it's something that's easier done with only one character. The third phase was a PITA because of the lag that spiked up every 30 seconds or so. If I had to wager a guess I'd say there's a script running that's supposed to make Mikhail do something when the slowdown hits but nothing special ever happens. The only reasonable explanation I've heard is that he's slowing time but it's still bullshit and I loathe it so very much.
Oh well, Mikhail fell and I was off to Act 3. I died once in the Infinite Factory and had to start the area completely over. I had just completed the first wing and had talked to the undercover spy to deliver the DNA sample when out of nowhere a squad appeared and steamrolled me. I had just enough time to blink, register that the leader had Enhanced Damage, and start to fire a stun when they killed me. Save regularly on solo runs for death is always just one bad RNG roll away! A single blow from an Enhanced Damage enemy can put the hurt on.
The rest of Act 3 presented a reasonable challenge and a few near-deaths but no more WTF moments. Other Enhanced Damage leaders were treated as the threats they were and eliminated from a distance. Sugarman was a joke. After it finally hit me to run out of the area the fight starts in because of all the blocking pillars he was an easy kite. The Sinister computer was harder but retro Iceman didn't pursue after his first bout of freezing me and retro Storm's lightning stuns weren't enough to overcome Fusion Beam. A combination of Optic Flash spam and Piercing Beams destroyed the projectors easily enough.
The revivers in the Madri Temple were annoying but with persistance and lots of healing they fell. Again, the only threats were Enhanced Damage and Genetically Enhanced. Now I found myself face to face with the 3 Stepford Cuckoos. It would have helped tremendously if I had remembered before engaging that they, like Mikhail, have the ability to spawn clones. Fortunately the chamber was just big enough that I could split the sisters up. Holocaust was a pushover compared to them even with his healing ability. Each time he started draining a flunky spamming Optic Flash killed the minion pretty quickly.
So that was it with Act 3. Act 4 wasn't much different. The enemies just had more hitpoints and I played Ring-Around-The-Infinites. Even the Platform mission was easier then I expected. One piercing beam each and I had two ruined generators in the first section with plenty of time to spare. Since the timer disappears once those are destroyed I killed all the enemies before moving on. Let me tell ya, running through the first set of platforms from target to target gets one hell of a train built up. There were so many enemies on screen the Gamecube struggled to keep up. I was genuinely worried that the game would crash or they would overwhelm Cyclops. My worries were unfounded. Cyclops's AE stun had a chance to really shine and Fusion Beam quickly wore down the heavy weights.
Then I got to protect Sgt. Killjoy ugh I mean Kilroy (yeah, that's what I meant haha) from the hordes of sentinels. It would have been difficult if the sentinels attacked in groups larger then 2 and couldn't be Fusion Beamed as soon as they appeared on screen. By the time each landed and started walking around they were already at 50% or less health. Sgt Kilroy took more damage while standing around like a fool after the second generator then both timed parts combined. I'm always so happy when he gets blown up. The rest of the mission was cake. I learned the hard way on my very first playthrough not to fight Bastion anywhere near the edges (he can command the summoned Sentinels to blow up and the explosion sends you flying) so that fight was a simple matter of staying healed and shooting Bastion - who decided halfway through that he didn't want to move anymore.
Archangel wasn't difficult either. It's not a great encounter to tell you the truth and it's much more annoying on multiplayer with the teleporter beam moving the ENTIRE team if it hits anyone. However, Cyclops fares very well solo. I haven't mentioned it before but it applies to my entire run. I started with his visor equipped. The visor has some minor stat bonuses but the thing that kept it in an inventory slot the whole game was the movement speed +10% modifier. Being able to outrun enemies is imperative when you're dependant upon kiting. In the fight against Archangel that bonus is golden. You see, when the fight begins you're up against Archangel and a group of infinitely-spawning Infinite flunkies. When his health drops about 25% he tries to use the teleporter in the center of the roof to escape. You then destroy the arms of this machine causing it to malfunction and emit a beam that chases the player and forcibly teleports them to one of several small pads on the same roof. Archangel freaks out and flies around perching on (six I think) pedestals out of reach. You have to outrun the beam and stand behind him so the beam destroys the pedestal itself. Once all are gone the machine stops working and you continue fighting Archangel directly until he runs out of health.
One major annoyance in this game is being hit by one of the Infinites in that battle, momentarily stunned, then teleported across the rooftop because the beam caught up to you. Stupid beam, go chase the Infinites for awhile!
Overall I'm always disappointed with Apocalypse's tower. The flat, horizontal design style doesn't give any sense of scale for such a massive structure. It's such an imposing thing in cutscenes but then you get there and just blaze right through because it's so small. If you don't pay attention you'll blink and be at the top. It really feels like the developers were running out of steam by that point.
After all that Act 5 actually presented the most difficult battle of the entire run. Living Monolith wilted like the pansy he is (ahh, flower-based puns, uh hyuck). Here's a tip for ya buddy, if your powers are dependant on sunlight don't fight in the bowels of an Egyptian pyramid! The Anubites were just more of the same as they're practically carbon copies of other enemies. Heck, the shamans move, attack, and revive exactly like Madri Priests.
No, no, no, the wall I hit came in the form of Mr. Sinister.
Or should I say Dark Beast. I hate you Beast. I hate you with the fire of a thousand suns. If it had been economically feasible I would have repeatedly killed you in that battle just for my shear amusement. Mr. Sinister's beam was aggravatingly accurate and took a big chunk out of Cyclops' hide but you Beast were so much more annoying. Even Mr. Sinister's fear was nothing compared to you constantly getting in the way during the precious brief periods when Sinister was vulnerable and the fact that you were faster then him meant you were always only a step behind. When you pinned me in a corner and chained hits until Cyclops died I just chaulked it up to me making a tactical error in not killing you asap. However in the rematch when, after a long fight I finally killed you but because you run faster then Sinister he was closer to the reviver and just resurrected your furry blue butt, I realized you were made of pure FTP and I was proven right when you propeller kicked me into a pit with Sinister barely clinging to life by a tiny shred.
I am gleeful that your AI is as dumb as a rock and that you easily get stuck on obstacles like the Nullifiers even though you could take two steps in either direction and walk around. Every time you threatened to pin me near a door once more I just ran out of the room because the developers forgot to make the doors lock and your furry butt is programmed to return to the middle of the room but Mr. Sinister will just stop where ever he is and stand around..
On our third encounter Mr. Sinister was not so fortunate. I endured his endless blathering (jeeze Mr. Sinister just shut up already, sheesh, players already understand that a blue lifebar means an invulnerable enemy) and claimed victory. Unfortunately defeating him ends the battle immediately so there was no time to beat on Beast alone. GRRRR.
After that roadblock Apocalypse was easy. The only time I was even remotely in danger of dying was when Apocalypse and all 4 Horsemen where chasing me. Cyclops reached level 78 upon Apocalypse's fall. I enjoyed the ending cinematic and saved my clear data.
******
Now that that's over I can get back to Everquest and my Langrisser 2 Walkthrough. The X-Men Legends itch isn't completely out of my system yet. I might try a solo Nightcrawler run next.
Sure he may be a whiney guy in the comics but I still have a soft spot for old Cyke. Concurrent with playing the first game during trips I decided to fire up a solo Cyclops game in X-Men Legends 2: Rise of Apocalypse. I can say, without a shadow of a doubt, that Cyclops fares much better in the second installment. In the first game just about everything blocks his optic blasts and his stun is a directional beam. Leadership is still awesome, however, and makes boss fights go much faster. I haven't used his XTreme ability so I cannot comment on that.
In X-Men Legends 2 the directional stun is replaced by a PBAE stun + DD in the form of Optic Flash. It's most efficient at low ranks to keep it cheap but the higher levels stun for longer allowing it to be comboed with Fusion Beam. At low ranks if you're swarmed you just have to keep spamming it and hope Cyclops doesn't run out of energy. It also goes through walls and has a high Z-axis tolerance. That makes it ideal for setting a trap at a door. Run in, get all the enemies chasing Cyclops, run back out and around the corner then as the enemies try to get through the narrow door stun them all in one shot.
Fusion Beam inflicts radiation damage every second. It's not uber - only about 260/second maxed - but that's more then enough to kill most enemies. It also works on those pesky enemies that are energy resistant. It was my workhorse beam. I also used Piercing Beam to finish off enemies but that didn't see much use. It simply wasn't very efficient for the energy cost. His XTreme, Optic Rage, is pretty bleh. The targetting is extremely finicky and it will go over the heads of enemies too close. However it is fast firing and has great knockback. Unfortunately enemies are only slowed during XTreme moves, not stopped, so any not hit by the beam can continue to attack while Cyclops recovers.
This leads me to another nitpick I have with the game - stuns don't take effect until the victim stops animating. Once an animation has started it can only be stopped by death. An enemy that has a stun land when they start an attack chain won't stop attacking until the chain finishes. Bosses are also completely stun immune which is incredibly frustrating when they're spawning clones or just being general pests.
Anyway, on with the details of the run! This was my third trip through the game. I played on Hard and loaded up a file that had already cleared Hard mode once. I expected it to be a pretty difficult challenge and didn't want to hamper myself right out of the gate. Cyclops started the run at level 67 with some decent gear as he was one of the main members of my prior team. I blazed through the prologue with the default quartet to promptly get the other three teammates killed in Genosha. Yes I know I could have just removed them but wheres the fun in that?
Grizzly and Abyss fell without trouble. Being good at run-and-gun makes pure melee enemies a snap. The standard enemies on Hard do inflict some serious damage in a hurry but potions were plentiful and I walked into the game fully stocked. I died for the first time in Elemental Tomb (Act 2- Savage Land) when completing a puzzle using Iceman. I was ice skating and went a little too far such that I ended up face-first in a pit.
Oops. My bad.
My first true bout of trouble came fighting Mikhail. It's a multi-stage battle and in the first part he spawns one clone at specified health intervals. These must all be destroyed before the real Mikhail can be hurt again.
Mikhail and all of his clones have a beam that causes automatic knockdown with a long recovery. It is nigh-impossible to dodge this beam but it has a long re-use timer. However when there is only one player character and too many clones they can cycle this beam infinitely in a knockdown loop. Once you're in this loop there's nothing you can do.
Second death of the run. The second attempt was also rough but as the clones spawned I ran around the room to split them up then killed them one at a time. The next phase was easy. It was a little annoying positioning the second and fourth controllers while dodging the laser but it's something that's easier done with only one character. The third phase was a PITA because of the lag that spiked up every 30 seconds or so. If I had to wager a guess I'd say there's a script running that's supposed to make Mikhail do something when the slowdown hits but nothing special ever happens. The only reasonable explanation I've heard is that he's slowing time but it's still bullshit and I loathe it so very much.
Oh well, Mikhail fell and I was off to Act 3. I died once in the Infinite Factory and had to start the area completely over. I had just completed the first wing and had talked to the undercover spy to deliver the DNA sample when out of nowhere a squad appeared and steamrolled me. I had just enough time to blink, register that the leader had Enhanced Damage, and start to fire a stun when they killed me. Save regularly on solo runs for death is always just one bad RNG roll away! A single blow from an Enhanced Damage enemy can put the hurt on.
The rest of Act 3 presented a reasonable challenge and a few near-deaths but no more WTF moments. Other Enhanced Damage leaders were treated as the threats they were and eliminated from a distance. Sugarman was a joke. After it finally hit me to run out of the area the fight starts in because of all the blocking pillars he was an easy kite. The Sinister computer was harder but retro Iceman didn't pursue after his first bout of freezing me and retro Storm's lightning stuns weren't enough to overcome Fusion Beam. A combination of Optic Flash spam and Piercing Beams destroyed the projectors easily enough.
The revivers in the Madri Temple were annoying but with persistance and lots of healing they fell. Again, the only threats were Enhanced Damage and Genetically Enhanced. Now I found myself face to face with the 3 Stepford Cuckoos. It would have helped tremendously if I had remembered before engaging that they, like Mikhail, have the ability to spawn clones. Fortunately the chamber was just big enough that I could split the sisters up. Holocaust was a pushover compared to them even with his healing ability. Each time he started draining a flunky spamming Optic Flash killed the minion pretty quickly.
So that was it with Act 3. Act 4 wasn't much different. The enemies just had more hitpoints and I played Ring-Around-The-Infinites. Even the Platform mission was easier then I expected. One piercing beam each and I had two ruined generators in the first section with plenty of time to spare. Since the timer disappears once those are destroyed I killed all the enemies before moving on. Let me tell ya, running through the first set of platforms from target to target gets one hell of a train built up. There were so many enemies on screen the Gamecube struggled to keep up. I was genuinely worried that the game would crash or they would overwhelm Cyclops. My worries were unfounded. Cyclops's AE stun had a chance to really shine and Fusion Beam quickly wore down the heavy weights.
Then I got to protect Sgt. Killjoy ugh I mean Kilroy (yeah, that's what I meant haha) from the hordes of sentinels. It would have been difficult if the sentinels attacked in groups larger then 2 and couldn't be Fusion Beamed as soon as they appeared on screen. By the time each landed and started walking around they were already at 50% or less health. Sgt Kilroy took more damage while standing around like a fool after the second generator then both timed parts combined. I'm always so happy when he gets blown up. The rest of the mission was cake. I learned the hard way on my very first playthrough not to fight Bastion anywhere near the edges (he can command the summoned Sentinels to blow up and the explosion sends you flying) so that fight was a simple matter of staying healed and shooting Bastion - who decided halfway through that he didn't want to move anymore.
Archangel wasn't difficult either. It's not a great encounter to tell you the truth and it's much more annoying on multiplayer with the teleporter beam moving the ENTIRE team if it hits anyone. However, Cyclops fares very well solo. I haven't mentioned it before but it applies to my entire run. I started with his visor equipped. The visor has some minor stat bonuses but the thing that kept it in an inventory slot the whole game was the movement speed +10% modifier. Being able to outrun enemies is imperative when you're dependant upon kiting. In the fight against Archangel that bonus is golden. You see, when the fight begins you're up against Archangel and a group of infinitely-spawning Infinite flunkies. When his health drops about 25% he tries to use the teleporter in the center of the roof to escape. You then destroy the arms of this machine causing it to malfunction and emit a beam that chases the player and forcibly teleports them to one of several small pads on the same roof. Archangel freaks out and flies around perching on (six I think) pedestals out of reach. You have to outrun the beam and stand behind him so the beam destroys the pedestal itself. Once all are gone the machine stops working and you continue fighting Archangel directly until he runs out of health.
One major annoyance in this game is being hit by one of the Infinites in that battle, momentarily stunned, then teleported across the rooftop because the beam caught up to you. Stupid beam, go chase the Infinites for awhile!
Overall I'm always disappointed with Apocalypse's tower. The flat, horizontal design style doesn't give any sense of scale for such a massive structure. It's such an imposing thing in cutscenes but then you get there and just blaze right through because it's so small. If you don't pay attention you'll blink and be at the top. It really feels like the developers were running out of steam by that point.
After all that Act 5 actually presented the most difficult battle of the entire run. Living Monolith wilted like the pansy he is (ahh, flower-based puns, uh hyuck). Here's a tip for ya buddy, if your powers are dependant on sunlight don't fight in the bowels of an Egyptian pyramid! The Anubites were just more of the same as they're practically carbon copies of other enemies. Heck, the shamans move, attack, and revive exactly like Madri Priests.
No, no, no, the wall I hit came in the form of Mr. Sinister.
Or should I say Dark Beast. I hate you Beast. I hate you with the fire of a thousand suns. If it had been economically feasible I would have repeatedly killed you in that battle just for my shear amusement. Mr. Sinister's beam was aggravatingly accurate and took a big chunk out of Cyclops' hide but you Beast were so much more annoying. Even Mr. Sinister's fear was nothing compared to you constantly getting in the way during the precious brief periods when Sinister was vulnerable and the fact that you were faster then him meant you were always only a step behind. When you pinned me in a corner and chained hits until Cyclops died I just chaulked it up to me making a tactical error in not killing you asap. However in the rematch when, after a long fight I finally killed you but because you run faster then Sinister he was closer to the reviver and just resurrected your furry blue butt, I realized you were made of pure FTP and I was proven right when you propeller kicked me into a pit with Sinister barely clinging to life by a tiny shred.
I am gleeful that your AI is as dumb as a rock and that you easily get stuck on obstacles like the Nullifiers even though you could take two steps in either direction and walk around. Every time you threatened to pin me near a door once more I just ran out of the room because the developers forgot to make the doors lock and your furry butt is programmed to return to the middle of the room but Mr. Sinister will just stop where ever he is and stand around..
On our third encounter Mr. Sinister was not so fortunate. I endured his endless blathering (jeeze Mr. Sinister just shut up already, sheesh, players already understand that a blue lifebar means an invulnerable enemy) and claimed victory. Unfortunately defeating him ends the battle immediately so there was no time to beat on Beast alone. GRRRR.
After that roadblock Apocalypse was easy. The only time I was even remotely in danger of dying was when Apocalypse and all 4 Horsemen where chasing me. Cyclops reached level 78 upon Apocalypse's fall. I enjoyed the ending cinematic and saved my clear data.
******
Now that that's over I can get back to Everquest and my Langrisser 2 Walkthrough. The X-Men Legends itch isn't completely out of my system yet. I might try a solo Nightcrawler run next.
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