Returnal - Return All

Dreaded Gazebo wrote:

I had a terrible weapon for the boss fight though and died pretty quickly in its second stage. I think I have a better idea of how to handle this boss - at least the first two stages - and with a better loadout I feel relatively confident. Which means I'll wrap it up after a dozen or so tries :D

Yeah, I was not fully prepared for the further stages of that boss the first time, but thankfully managed it pretty successfully on my second.

Managed to hit Biome 6 last night. I've only been playing a couple of times a week, but now I feel I may want to bump that up? I'm constantly impressed by the sense of scale in the environments, which I think is helped by having this be in third person, rather than first? I'd be curious how different I'd feel otherwise.

Spoilers re: Biome 6

Spoiler:

I'm always glad when games discover how terrifying being deep in any sort of ocean would be. It may be a particular inclination toward not-quite-phobia of mine, along with a healthy appreciation of XCOM's Terror from the Deep when I was a child, but loving this biome so far.

Spikeout wrote:
Stele wrote:

I'm already halfway to your death count without beating boss 1. Ugh.

Last night it was so laggy I couldn't even see the enemies. Just firing blind so I had to quit.

Honestly don't worry, I probably died most in Biome 1, the other Biome's are tougher but by that time your starting to really learn the mechanics & understand the game better.

If you look at Hades I think it took me something ridiculous like 60 attempts before I beat the game. I think your first completed run was half that. You'll get there Stele. Remote play definitely won't help your cause :p

Orphu wrote:

I cannot imagine trying to play a game like this over remote play. Congrats on making it as far as you have!

Thanks, guys.

Got home last night and played a bit after everyone was asleep. Because I hadn't played much before remote play, I forgot how awesome the controller is. None of the speaker sounds worked on remote play as far as I can tell, and maybe some of the rumble wasn't working either. The triggers did work at least. but I feel like I was playing crippled, plus the lag.

I had another unlucky run where I grabbed some malignant resin and got nailed with half integrity after that and died to one of the stronger enemies a couple rooms later.

But then I had a pretty good run. Had enough to buy the integrity upgrade at the fabricator. Then had about 400 more when I hit the boss, so teleported back to fabricator. Got a healing item, and an astronaut. So went into the boss with nearly 3 lives again. Got Phrike to phase 3 for the first time. A couple of new attacks got me.

Spoiler:

Double rings, wtf. Are you supposed to jump the first and dash the second? It killed me the first time I saw it, so didn't get to experiment.

But it felt like a much better run. If it wasn't 1am I would have started another. I really need to get through this biome soon and make some progress. It's getting pretty annoying seeing grapple points, underwater items, lava items, etc. all in biome 1 and knowing those upgrades are in other biomes.

Down goes Phrike the next run.

Spikeout joined me on voice chat and I broadcast my game, so he coached me through a few rooms, we went to fabricator and planned what to buy for boss, and then pushed me a little farther on some side missions than I had went before. I ended up with proficiency 5, and a nice level 6 carbine, and decided it was time. One mistake, when pushing through a side mission I died and wasted my astronaut. But I went back to the fabricator and bought a large health item instead.

Got into phase 2 without getting hit. Then got hit by a nasty melee attack in phase 3, and down to 10% health or so, popped my item. Then finished off the boss only getting hit once more.

Biome 2 is vastly different. That was unexpected. Made it through maybe 5 rooms before dying. Crazy flying strong enemy knocked out most of my health.

But good day, and yes remote play sucked. Don't do it. This is a TV game.

Got to the foot of the mountain in biome 2 last night and unlocked the new weapon, hollowseeker.

Then there was a cutscene but apparently that's not the biome 2 boss? That's up at the top? Anyway the mini boss or whatever teleported around behind me and kicked my ass.

So I also saw blue rooms and some of those rooms you drop into with intricate laser puzzles inside a force field that disabled your dash move. Didn't seem worth the risk of death. But I guess I need to figure them out...

Also what's up with the item in a yellow shield that seems to always be at the start of biome 2. When can I access that?

The Hollowseeker is one of my favourite weapons, such a satisfying punch to it with a generous spread. It was neat to be able to jump in & watch you through the share play feature.

I noticed a couple of things, your very aggressive with the blade vs the elite enemies, staying close to them once their in the downed state to get those extra attacks in. It did work for you a couple of times but it would be easy to take one of their blows, plus any enemy fire coming your way would be hard to see.

The other trait you seemed to do was almost play it as a slow paced cover shooter at points against normal enemies. This is were I'd strongly recommend using the environments to your advantage. You have Selene's fast paced movement, you can drop off ledges, circle around behind enemies or run straight for them dashing through their orbs or to the side of their lasers, shooting as you close the distance then timing your blade strike as you come into range.

The yellow shield that's blocking doorways, is that the one you're talking about? I think you can get through that two different ways

Spoiler:

one is by obtaining the 'Blade Balancer's artifact that improves the strength of your blade. I'm nearly sure one of the five adrenaline levels has 'improved melee attack' which will also get you through them.

I went back to Biome 1 & died about 3 times by just being too aggressive & almost arrogant that I couldn't get killed here anymore after having completed the harder biomes. The weapons are so poor in biome 1 starting out, just having one or two traits max & beginning at level 0 on the weapon proficiency level. This is where I wish more stuff carried over, especially when you've finished one full run & unlocked a lot of cool weapons & traits.

I just read that shieldbreaker alt-fire can do those yellow barriers too. Haven't seen it again to try it, but going to hold onto a weapon with that to see.

I tried what you said a bit today, getting in close to melee and finish the weaker enemies. It seems easy with the crawlers, and even the fliers on biome 1. But biome 2 they all fly so high, melee is a pain in the ass. I am having a lot of trouble. 4 runs this afternoon and I haven't made the base of the mountain again. I know I could just sprint there, but without picking up a level 5 or 6 weapon I'm not going to do very well when I get there.

Of course one run was totally my fault with choices. I had parasite to take a deathblow and survive and for the first time finally got the artifact to increase integrity with just 2 resin. Things were going well. Then I saw this parasite to heal off obolites but you can't use siliphium. Sure, why not. I already had like 150% health. Kill things and get healed, seems smart...

That was a terrible mistake. I ran into a side room with 3 items and couldn't heal. Then got near critical health. Saw an item to clear all parasites which I did. Oh crap I lost my extra life. But stupidly I didn't backtrack to pick up all that health. Then got into a big fight with one of those lockdown enemies, plus 6 or 7 other fliers, plus 3 of the ground ones... just got massacred. Comedy of errors.

Welp, that's basically a wrap! Additional items recovered, last boss (re)defeated, confusing additional ending footage watched... I don't know if I have it in me to scavenge the levels for the missing glyphs and logs, despite kinda wanting to get the platinum.

I'd have to double check, but I think it was 35-40 deaths total for my visit(s) to Atropos.

Definitely going on my GotY list for this winter's postings. I better start my write ups now!

The mini boss thing I was talking about was a Severed. Fought 3 or 4 more of them on the way up the mountain. Very tough.

Made it to Ixiom my first time. Got him to phase 2. Used revive machine in the fabricator room. Got him to phase 3.

Ah well. I might have done better with a better gun. I love the hollowseeker. But I ended up taking a new one near the end and lost my homing alt fire. Had the stupid horizontal barrage and I'm sure I missed him more than I hit him. I teleported around looking for my old gun but couldn't find it after a couple rooms so didn't want to waste too much time.

Hopefully next time things will go smoother.

Stele wrote:

The mini boss thing I was talking about was a Severed. Fought 3 or 4 more of them on the way up the mountain. Very tough.

Made it to Ixiom my first time. Got him to phase 2. Used revive machine in the fabricator room. Got him to phase 3.

Ah well. I might have done better with a better gun. I love the hollowseeker. But I ended up taking a new one near the end and lost my homing alt fire. Had the stupid horizontal barrage and I'm sure I missed him more than I hit him. I teleported around looking for my old gun but couldn't find it after a couple rooms so didn't want to waste too much time.

Hopefully next time things will go smoother.

The Severed are total jerks. There are a couple of places where you'll fight more than one at a time!

Definitely like the hollowseeker. There are some really good traits on it that lend themselves well to defeating the enemies you'll find in most places, though I also found a preference for weapons with low fire rates and heavy punch (and/or dmg over time).

I found that it was better for me to stick to a gun I was fairly conversant with, rather than switching to a higher proficiency one. This was particularly true in biome 2, since there are a lot of flying enemies!

Well had my first crash and of course it was during the early parts of a great run. Cleaned out Biome 1, had a great weapon in Biome 2, about 70% more than starting integrity, at least +20% protection and +20% damage, just about to warp over to Biome 3 and kaput.

Stele wrote:

I just read that shieldbreaker alt-fire can do those yellow barriers too. Haven't seen it again to try it, but going to hold onto a weapon with that to see.

Had one this morning on biome 2 and no it did not work. Maybe a higher rank one?

I did get blade balancer on my first Ixiom run yesterday so finally got to smash some yellow doors then.

This morning I had a trash run and then a better one. Made the mountain and used the portal to summit, but still only had a rank 5 spitmaw. Not enough range for Ixiom I think. So I backtrack one room and...

Tyrian wrote:

The Severed are total jerks. There are a couple of places where you'll fight more than one at a time!

Yeah that sucked. 2 of the bastards took me to the edge of death.

So I go back to summit and teleport to the base. I think there's usually some items right inside. I see health and probably should have ran for it while a strong enemy was spawning in. Tried to shoot from door cover but spitmaw range sucks and I ended up dead.

I did have a super awful malfunction that prevented me from gaining weapon proficiency. Got it picking up that malignant key at the start of biome 2. So I'll never do that again. Getting rid of it required killing enemies at the same time, 4 times. I did eventually clear it while I was swarmed by those flying octopi actually. But my proficiency was only 6 at the summit, when it was 10 the first time I fought Ixiom.

It's wild how just one thing can derail a run.

Stele wrote:

Had one this morning on biome 2 and no it did not work.

I did get blade balancer on my first Ixiom run yesterday so finally got to smash some yellow doors then.

I think the Doombringer alt-fire is actually the one that can break yellow energy barriers, but I've not tested it.

Stele wrote:

I did have a super awful malfunction that prevented me from gaining weapon proficiency. Got it picking up that malignant key at the start of biome 2. So I'll never do that again. Getting rid of it required killing enemies at the same time, 4 times. I did eventually clear it while I was swarmed by those flying octopi actually. But my proficiency was only 6 at the summit, when it was 10 the first time I fought Ixiom.

It's wild how just one thing can derail a run.

This was pretty much what I eventually decided. I would VERY RARELY risk an attempt to pick up malignant items or break corrupted obilite chunks without cleansing. Malignant chests are almost never worth it. Particularly, since some of the malfunction clear states are really really tough to get rid of. The "kill enemies simultaneously" one is hard. Killing enemies with melee can be tough as well in a few of the biomes (if there are no turrets, and a lot of the enemies fly and/or explode when they're close? That's... a problem).

Ixiom down, 2nd try. One other failed run. Then I did the daily challenge since I was getting low on ether again. It was a ridiculous piercing ricochet weapon that just obliterated biome 1. Really fun.

I find that's good for a change of pace and then I usually have a good real run after that. And I did.

Hollowseeker with serrated? I think, the DoT skill. That helped I'm sure. Just one large siphium vial, which I used to heal in phase 2. Beat him with my own health critical. Whew.

Got the grapple! Only made it like 3 rooms in area 3. Those broken automoton things... One hit me when I killed it with a ring. Then I fought 2 at once. Jumped over the ring when I killed the first to attack the second and then I swear it self destructed on me.

IMAGE(https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/9/98/ViperProbeSelfDestruct-TESB.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20111002051444)

Can't wait to do biome 1 again with the grapple after the kids are asleep. And try to progress in 3 of course.

Did a very thorough biome 1 run, since the portal to 3 was way at the end. Had some decent health. Saw my 2nd house scene finally. Got a rocket launcher, then on to Biome 3. I was very nervous about the drones I've heard a lot about. Saw a couple in my first foray, but a lot more this time. Nothing too bad, except one room I grappled up to the top to get an item, and then bam, like 8 drones spawned in a circle around me. I ran, fell, dashed, back to the room before, and then picked them off with hollowseeker. Whew.

Activated a revive machine, thinking I might need one look at the boss first. Ended up with a rifle a couple rooms before the boss and stuck with it.

Beat the biome 3 boss in one shot. Haha. Wasted ether.

Holy crap that was a lot of cutscene. Answers, questions, weird stuff.

Started biome 4? I guess. Got to house and my 3rd scene there. Some crazy stuff on the TV. Whoa.

Managed to get all the way through the level, collect both keys, and open the boss door. Had a level 19 hollowseeker. Used another revive machine. This time, actually needed it, didn't even beat phase 1. 2nd try, got to phase 2, but whoa that's a lot of stuff coming at you. And the purple lasers that you can't dash through really messed me up on phase 1 both tries.

Ended up being a 3.5 hour run or so, going through all those biomes and story and stuff. Sheesh. Also looks like I started back in biome 4? Stuck there for a while now? It's fine starting at weapon level 15, but I just was surprised, I thought you could backtrack to the other biomes and bosses? Maybe I wanted to beat Phrike again...

Ya know, there were 3 or 4 runs the other day where I got cubes from hidden rooms in biome 1. But then once I beat Phrike I never found another cube in the wild. And with boss 2 and boss 3 there was no cube for beating them. So I feel like I'm missing a lot of data cubes...

Stele wrote:

Ya know, there were 3 or 4 runs the other day where I got cubes from hidden rooms in biome 1. But then once I beat Phrike I never found another cube in the wild. And with boss 2 and boss 3 there was no cube for beating them. So I feel like I'm missing a lot of data cubes...

I finished Biome 6 this long weekend, and I think I've managed all of five data cubes. Later on the access to the data cube reader is more prevalent, but I haven't seen the cubes themselves quite as frequently. I do plan on running through to get through the other story bits, so with all of the traversal mechanics unlocked, curious if I'll see more now.

Arise! Well, arise for me I just got back from a vacation and have just about wrapped up my 2nd RE8 run, so I'm ready to hop back into this and see if I can knock it out before Ratchet and Clank gets here. It looks like there have been several stability updates since I last played, so I'm hopeful I won't have any more crashes.

When I last played, I made it through a good portion of Biome 2 before an update wiped out my save, so I will also be turning off auto updates on my PS5 until I finish Returnal. It doesn't look like a save solution is coming anytime soon, and I don't want to fight my itch to play any longer.

I've been skimming through the thread a bit and noticed that Stele was playing this on Remote play for several days. You absolute madman I'm surprised you managed to have any success with that. I would think any latency would make this game much more difficult.

The bosses in this game are weird.. i just finished biome 3 and it wasn't close. Had a good carbine, and because I was having bad luck with useful boss consummable drops I had 3 reg vials, and the store purchased large vial of integrity and an astronaut figurine. I just burned 2 of the reg vials, and probably didn't even need to do that but I was worried about some sort of burst damage since I really only got to the boss once before and didn't get past phase 1, so had no clue what to expect.

Same thing with Boss 1 and 2... I either wiped, or I blow them away no problem.

I think the common thread for me is getting a hold of the damage siphon (damage turns to integrity based on adrenaline level). I'm bad and impatient with trash mobs, and so that artifact basically keeps my health topped off as I play. Even though that skill isn't all that helpful for bosses, it allows me to get there at max health and some extra HP consummables.

Also, not sure if I screwed somthing up, but going into Biome 4 I was presented a new weapon.. my current weapon was pretty good, so I left it, not wanting to learn something different. I haven't seen that new weapon again... do you think I broke it?

Dyni wrote:

I've been skimming through the thread a bit and noticed that Stele was playing this on Remote play for several days. You absolute madman I'm surprised you managed to have any success with that. I would think any latency would make this game much more difficult.

Yes I'm nuts. Thankfully I've had much more success in the 4 days since I got back from the beach.

Carlbear95 wrote:

Also, not sure if I screwed somthing up, but going into Biome 4 I was presented a new weapon.. my current weapon was pretty good, so I left it, not wanting to learn something different. I haven't seen that new weapon again... do you think I broke it?

I always pick up weapons with new tag on the gun or the skills. Sometimes I switch right back after, but with the way the computer inventory is, it seems like you need to get things multiple times to get 100% so I grab them whenever I can.

And RE: cubes, I got one on my 2nd run of biome 4 today at lunch. I need to go try and turn it in since I think that part was actually before the boss room in this biome. Just inside the key door if I remember.

Also this 2nd run of biome 4 is wild. Got another house visit and now I'm more confused than ever. But I also unlocked the 2-way radio artifact, which seems awesome. And I got my 3rd usable item inventory slot finally, just out in the middle of the level somewhere. Not sure why that didn't show up last run?

Anyway lunch break over so had to quit mid run. Really hate that. Wish there was a more reliable suspend save option. I have a nice thing going where I gain/lose a malfunction and my suit repairs. So I've stayed pretty topped off on health and picked up several resin. I just grabbed a large heal item and am at full health already. Thinking I might just try boss first thing instead of prepping more. But there's also an astronaut in the fabricator. I think if I farm obilites for that I will definitely beat the boss this time...

Decisions decisions.

So I did clear more and buy the astronaut. Beat the boss only using the health though. Woohoo.

Biome 5. Had a key so got elemental suit upgrade first. Then chose one of the 3 main paths. This one had a challenge room behind a normal door, not side mission. And I couldn't backtrack because it was too far a jump for the grapple. Made it to final wave, 3 frozen Severed enemies. Holy crap. I killed 2... Then couldn't find the third. Oh there he is, in the f*cking wall.

IMAGE(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E21r437XoAALy9o?format=jpg&name=large)

Having an amazing run and going to have to restart and throw away an astronaut because of bug. Do better, house marquee, do better.

So 4 or 5 more runs tonight, never as good as that one.

And just when one seemed like it might gel, the game crashed, and my PS5 powered off. Maybe overheat? Never seen anything like it.

Feels like a completely wasted evening after that stupid bug.

I've only ever had Returnal crash once, other times though I've scheduled to go on Rocket League with my brother or friend Daniel, been deep into a run & had to just stomach losing all that progress.

You've made some progress over the last few days Stele, even with the bug & your PS5 crashing. Keep it up! Glad to see Carlbear pushing on, I'm near sure that weapon will show up at some point in Biome 4, they surely would have accounted for players not picking it up because they already had a great weapon equipped.

Superb work Tyrian on defeating the final boss again. It's sounding more like I'm gonna have to look the meaning of this story up too, it's very very cryptic.

Aeazel you'll definitely mop up all the extra points you couldn't get upto or elements you couldn't get past once you go back to Biome 1 fully upgraded. It's fun to be able to go everywhere.

I've been still back in Biome 1 trying to fully get everything the Overgrown Ruins has to offer. I'm playing far too aggressively to the point of stupidity & got killed another couple of times last night. I've obviously got the full suite of traversal options now but man you barely feel any more powerful than when I was just starting the game. I was thinking the guns I'd unlocked in the later biomes with 3 or 4 traits, some levelled up, would be up for grabs here but apparently not.

If Housemarque sorted the save system, had more Rogue lite elements so that you feel more powerful each run & added in a separate co-op horde style mode this would give Returnal a second wind & be accessible to far more players.

I'm gonna go for another run here this morning, play a tad more cautious at least.

I agree, Spikeout. The 1-3 proficiency cap is a bit frustrating. While you can find later biome weapons in levels 1-3, they're limited to the traits capped by your proficiency. Some of those weapons only really shine with combinations of traits.

I just finished the game again last night (same unchanged ending), and I'm a bit frustrated with the missing items I need to obtain to pop trophies. Totally at the mercy of the game's level generation system for specific rooms to appear in order for the glyphs to show up. I don't even know what I'm looking for!

Yeah, I was able to get the missing BIome 4 and Biome 5(?) weapons, so I think I have the full arsenal available. Of course at some point I need to learn to use any of the weapons post-hollow seeker, as picking any of those up even if its +3 prof levels than my current usually leads to my quick death. I see Stele using what appears to be the Lobber in his screenshot, and I don't think I've ever gotten very far with it.

Also regarding crashing, yeah, still just the 1 for me, and I think I have more deaths than anyone here :).

Also, posting this comment behihnd a spoiler.. not really spoilery but just in case there are still some folks reading the thread who haven't picked it up.

Spoiler:

I hear the issues with the folks starting over in Biome 1, but starting in Biome 4 really seems to be harder for me. The relative strength of your starting pistol to the enemies seems much worse than Biome 1, and it seems like that Biome 4 is "shorter" than Biome 1 so less rooms to get proficiency/equipment. I've had more than a few "first room deaths", and through dumb luck one of the secret portals in that first room has dropped me into one of those mini-boss fights with nothing but a pistol at least 3 times.

Yeah the lobber is nasty. Sure it's only one shot but it kills everything non elite in one shot. Some of those tougher enemies in just 2 or 3 shots. DoT on it is better than serrated hollowseeker.

I completely agree with Carl spoiler. Biome 4 sucks. The best run I had was where I did the whole thing and beat the boss. I rolled into biome 5 with a level 19 weapon or so and while I might not have beat the boss in one shot, I truly believe I would have obtained all 3 keys if I hadn't got stuck with that stupid bug.

At lunch today I had what looked like a good biome 4 start with 3 solid artifacts but the only weapon I found was a shotgun and I ended up dead only 5 rooms in, before even hitting the central fabricator room. I unlocked that "take 2 hits before losing adrenaline" artifact. Wish I could pair that up with the healing 5% per adrenaline level. Maybe one of these days...

The grind for weapon unlocks seems really slow. Only a couple of level 2 skills unlocked for me but still plenty of level 1 ones missing depending on the gun. Could take longer to unlock this stuff than to beat the game.

Yet other things, like translation ciphers I'm almost done (38/40). Data cubes, I finally got another one yesterday, and when I turned it in, the text said 2/18. Seems like some collectibles are out of balance. Oh well.

Also the starting obelisk went from 3 to 5 to 7 ether now. It's bleeding me dry to start a run with an artifact. Had to skip it the last run.

Carlbear95 wrote:
Spoiler:

I hear the issues with the folks starting over in Biome 1, but starting in Biome 4 really seems to be harder for me. The relative strength of your starting pistol to the enemies seems much worse than Biome 1, and it seems like that Biome 4 is "shorter" than Biome 1 so less rooms to get proficiency/equipment. I've had more than a few "first room deaths", and through dumb luck one of the secret portals in that first room has dropped me into one of those mini-boss fights with nothing but a pistol at least 3 times.

Spoiler:

Hm, I dunno. A level 15 sidearm with 3-5 pips in fire rate beats the snot out of things in biome 4 compared to the level 0 against biome 1 critters.

I agree on the proficiency thing... until you realize proficiency doesn't really matter since you start each level with a minimum proficiency.

I thought there was a secret ending if you beat the game again? I literally went through all the biome's again beating Phrike, Nemesis & Ophion, no new story beats in the house either. That was a bit disappointing.

I did unlock a devastating new weapon - the Coilspine Shredder - that you hold to charge up, then the disc like projectile flies out. You only get one or two shots before reloading but if you hit the target normal enemies are usually down in one shot.

I think I'll shelve this now as I want to get back to a couple of games before Ratchet hits next week.

Spikeout wrote:

I thought there was a secret ending if you beat the game again? I literally went through all the biome's again beating Phrike, Nemesis & Ophion, no new story beats in the house either. That was a bit disappointing.

I did unlock a devastating new weapon - the Coilspine Shredder - that you hold to charge up, then the disc like projectile flies out. You only get one or two shots before reloading but if you hit the target normal enemies are usually down in one shot.

I think I'll shelve this now as I want to get back to a couple of games before Ratchet hits next week.

Spoiler:

There's an additional ending snippet if you collect all the sunshard fragments (1 per biome), which leads to a 6th house visit. The item you receive adds an action you take at the end after defeating Ophion, and triggers a mildly different cutscene. It... still doesn't make a ton of sense overall in that nothing is conclusively explained

Cheers for the explanation Tyrian. I'll have to look up some YouTube story videos to see what people make of it.

Seriously, f*ck biome 4. Twice today I died IN THE FIRST ROOM.

Now, aside from that, I decided I was going to get the hell out of there and go to biome 5 ASAP. Stop grinding for obolites or integrity and just go go go as soon as I hit the main fabricator/boss room.

So like 3 other times I failed to even get to that point. f*ck biome 4.

And then finally... I got there, and got the hell out ASAP. This time I avoided the path with the lockdown fight, got some decent health and parasites, and stuck with the poly weapon for a bit. Got two of the keys done pretty easily. Also found a data cube on each path, so yay new artifacts! Then all that was left was the last path. Got to the infamous bugged room that I beat once but never again... died, and had an astronaut... and finished the room with 6% health!

Ooh, new weapon unlocked.

Spoiler:

Dreadbound

It seemed interesting, so I took it back... and got my water suit power finally! Biome 5 done.

Biome 6: Holy crap that's a lot of enemies. Really disorienting too... some rooms like the desert where there's not really a "door" between them even though there's a door on the map. So it gets weird backing up and shooting things, or them chasing you from room to room. Anyway, I found a revive chamber right at the start, and tried it, since I was still pretty low on health. I died immediately after that, haha. That actually helped because I picked up some resin and stayed full health for a while. Finally got the 200% integrity achievement!

Not sure how close I got to the end of biome 6. I switched weapons a couple times, and had a level 26 lobber. I got in a weird spot where there was one of the huge squid enemies that I was fighting, but then one of those spheres in the room too, but I couldn't see it. It just kept hitting me with those expanding rings, and right after I killed the squid, and then finally saw the sphere, it hit me again, in mid-air. I landed, and tried to pop a health item I had... but got hit again! Run over.

So, dreading biome 4 again... but at least I can finally go in the water areas. And can jump straight to biome 6 now. Feels like I'm getting close.

Hah I did finally have a smooth biome 4 run where I got up to 170% integrity. The difference: hollowseeker. That gun just really gels for me. And when it has serrated DoT it just murders everything.

I took the jump straight to biome 6. There was a chest in the starting room off to the side. Level 24 dread, so I tried it over my level 19 hollow... big mistake. Nearly died in the first room and ran back to switch guns then finished enemies still way easier with a -5 gun. Cleared another room easy then checked side rooms. Got a nice level 24 hollow still with serrated! I thought I was going to dig out of the hole I was in down to 40% health and maybe see the boss finally. But I hopped in a portal and there was a red beam puzzle with some items... I should have just quit and went back to main rooms. I missed one jump in the water, got hit, panicked because I was in red health, and fell off the ledge into nothing and died. What a sad end to what was a great run.