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Distorted Travesty 3

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Grounder
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Grounder »

I decided to Assist Mode against Hex 1 because I didn't think that I would win within a reasonable timeframe... And now I've been fighting Vault Demon for a few hours. Oi.
Why don't you eat me?

I am perfectly tasty...

AND I'LL STEAL YOUR SOUL! :twisted:

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gamercal
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by gamercal »

Well... I did it... I'm not entirely sure how, but it is done :D. And I have video proof of my victory to upload too, so hooray! I'm super glad that I didn't have to use Assist Mode though, it would've felt so hollow to have to use it at the very end of the game after doing everything else at the intended difficulty level.

Here's the video of the fight, if anyone's interested:




Game registers about 2910 deaths at the end, but I think the actual count is a little over 3000 because I lost like 100 deaths on the final boss to the game glitching up when I tried to start XSplit for recording it. It got stuck on the Retry menu and I had to kill it via task manager :(. Don't think there's anything you could do about that though, but incase you wanted to look into it it happened because Windows did a "confirm this action" pop-up that took me out of everything cause admin permissions etc. You know the one.

Time is also a bit low because of that, but I'd say it took me 90 hours in the end to do. I had every item except for four,

presumably all in the Tower Defence game cause I couldn't beat Bonus Round 2 in that

. I also had every equip except one that I can't remember the seller for... care to enlighten me?

I assume it's the 10% drop rate up equip, cause it's between the 5% one and the 5% higher-tier money equip. I fear I may have missed it if it's sold by the guy next to Bubble Tower, cause he disappeared into the Hidden Village once that unlocked.



Despite all the negativity I showed in here (sorry about that >_<), I really did enjoy my time with this game. It pushed me to my limit more than most games I've played... even beyond them in cases (

here's looking at you, crystal air dash/jump refreshers

). I got super annoyed with what felt like imprecise controls a lot of the time, but once you get used to how they operate you can do some truly spectacular things in the latter half of the game. Plus seeing as how my controller physically broke at the end of the game, I get to blame a lot of my feelings of imprecision on it instead. Yay!

The only thing that kept getting me from a control perspective even by the end was switching characters/weapons, cause no matter which shoulder buttons I used for that I always got confused when it came to the super intense fights that forced you to use everything at your disposal due to immunities etc. But I recognise this is an entirely personal problem, which doesn't affect most of you out there.

This is probably the point where I should mark some of the highlights of the game for me, but honestly there are too many to go over! There weren't many places I truly hated, which for a game of this size is really saying a lot. Much of it was more along the lines of "really, you expect me to do THAT!?", which there is absolutely nothing wrong with as a concept. That final fight is probably the perfect encapsulation of that ideal, so again fantastic job on that one ^_^. If you want some of my favourite areas that I remember...

Gate 4, as said before.
Burning Lands
Lava Cave
Sepiroth (I'm not even a FF player and I thought that fight was immense)
Magical Castle
That one Strike Chain boss in the CHAOS Factory place.
Mr. Saturn.


I guess my biggest overall criticism of the game is that it's maybe TOO long, especially for the genre that it is. I actually can't remember any game that I put 90+ hours into for a first completion, let alone an "Intense action platformer" as you made Task Manager refer to it as :P. That length will probably stop me from doing an LP series for the game, cause whilst the vast majority of it is super solid, I did feel a bit burnt out by the end of it all. That probably explains why I had to take a break from the game 3 times in the last area alone! The tutorialisation was a bit inconsistent in areas (

particularly the STG and Jeremy Mech portions, the former requiring you to seek out the instructions pre-flight and the latter having nothing at all! Up + A/B = homing attacks btw guys.

, and one might be inclined to say that there are a few too many game styles at work in the end... but overall it is a super well-polished game that kept me going better than most other games I've played in recent history.

So, as raocow would say, thank you very much for make Zephyr.

For anyone who wants some insight into the final boss (WARNING: LONG POST):

For the record, I'll sometimes refer to Warmaster as Zero because it's shorter. He's literally Zero from the MMZX games, complete with all four chip forms found in those games. So yeah. Don't confuse him with Zero from the MMX games! He was in Gate 4 :P

Warmaster starts off by chaining two attacks together, then he pauses for a decent length of time. This goes up to three attacks when he hits half health. Each attack he does fills a unit of his special gauge, which he will usually (but not always) use when filled for an extra powerful attack corresponding to that form. This special counts as part of his attack chain, and can be used at any point during it. He has four separate forms, which he will periodically switch between. He'll also switch forms after you remove a segment of his health bar, and usually switches to a form that is immune to the last attack you were using on him.

As Lostsoldier said, Claire is your primary attacker for this fight. her whip is perfect for fighting Normal Zero at a safe range to dash away from the sword, her daggers are ideal for hitting Fire Zero until the last phase, and her Missiles are much better at attacking Wind Zero than Jerry's Gravity Well. She's also generally better against Water Zero because unlike Jerry she can shoot upwards to hit him whilst he's floating, but if you equip the Energy Crystal to make Jerry's Buster always shoot mid-level shots you can deal extremely heavy damage to Water Zero before he goes airborne. This is Jerry's biggest use in the fight, though you can also use Shotgun Ice to hit Fire Zero in the final phase.

Once you deal enough damage, Warmaster will trigger a multi-form special attack. This is done twice, and each time it's the same attacks used in the same order. For the first one, if it triggers whilst he's against a wall you can get away with doing two dash motions - one to go through the tornado's at close range, and the other to go through him as he dashes into the wall as Fire Zero. If he's in the centre, double-dash away as he dives into the corner as Normal Zero, then avoid the Fire Dash in the usual way. For the second special, hopefully it triggers with him in the centre, as then you can lure him into the corner and be out of the way of the geysers from the Fire Dash and react from there. The volcano can be really tough to avoid from there, but Jerry's ground dash can be useful for getting around it.

It IS possible to damage Warmaster during these specials, but he changes forms so quickly that you'll usually end up hitting an immunity. So just focus on evasion. When his special ends, he'll begin a new cycle using the form he was last in before using the special. This is especially important after the second special, as he'll be vulnerable to a specific attack for much longer than at any other time during that phase. Take advantage of it! Oh, and after the first of these special attacks his offence gets boosted, and he becomes immune to everything except one attack type per form (except Fire, for some reason Pierce still works until Phase 3). More bullets, wider ranges, standard stuff. This makes Fire form much more dangerous though, as his basic shot gets a slow trailing bullet to go behind it.

Some specific form strategies that I was able to pick up during my ~5 hours trying to beat this boss:

Normal - Be patient and don't attack until you know the chain is over, as he can use his sword swings at any point to catch you off-guard. To avoid the mine blast, go about a dash length away from him and double jump to dash over him as he comes towards you. Toy avoid his special, run to the opposite side of the room and jump-dash through the buster shots. This is the easiest form, but don't get reckless!

Fire - By far the toughest form. This one can be super tough to avoid damage in due to the sheer diversity of moves he can chain together. If you see a Buster Shot as the first attack, get ready to jump as he's probably dashing at you right after. If he charges in the second of three attacks, watch for the reverse charge, as that commonly happens too. The volcano special is tough to avoid, but try and stream the pure-orange flames away from Zero as best you can. If the special is the first attack of a chain, you'll have to make good use of an air dash to avoid damage, and generally hope that a charge isn't the next attack in line. A thing to note - you can break the rock walls at the side of Zero with element hits to damage him directly - use Holy Water if you can for this, but Shotgun Ice is pretty good too for pegging him at range. Also, make good use of Double Dashes to maximise distance and avoid some of the more ridiculous patterns.

Wind - Usually a simple form, made more complicated by frequent use of his special. It's this weird homing bullet that slows down before it reaches you, but basically serves to make all dodging afterwards super complicated. It lingers into other phases too, which is REALLY annoying if he switches to Fire or Water right after launching one. Most of the time your goal in this form is to get to the other side of the room and spam missiles against him, trying not to miss too many when he jumps cause they recharge slowly and aren't rapid-fire friendly. His slash attacks are easy to evade, but don't disappear like Normal Zero's so look out for that if you transition to this phase from Normal. Otherwise the most dangerous attack is his sudden dash at you, which often gets followed up by an attempt to Goomba Stomp you (an achievement for that is possible lol), so stay alert and be ready to dash through him at any time. This will be the phase you can deal the most damage to, especially at the start when he's vulnerable to Shot as well. Just don't miss! If you had the Super Missile Charge item on, you could easily charge one up as he does his jump tornado move and peg him when he comes down.

Water - Potentially the most hazardous form when the special is used. A ring of ice surrounds Zero, which then stops at a fixed time and slowly starts aiming towards you. If he switches form, the rest of the ring immediately fires at you. A lot of this phase comes down to pattern recognition and judicious use of double dashes to blitz through the majority of the crazy stuff. One big thing to note is that his floating mechanics work similarly to the flying CHAOS bots, in that his vertical position is influenced by your vertical height. Jumping will cause him to go up - use this to try and get the special ring to stop higher up on the screen so you son't have to dodge horizontal shots. It also means that despite what Jeremy tells you it is not recommended to use the Morph Ball, as that will make Zero come down the screen fasters... so you'll just get sniped by his staff or something.


Most of the form switching seems to be random until the final phase. In the second phase, Zero will usually switch forms after three waves of attack in his current form, unless you damage him enough to remove a health segment. In the last phase, he will switch after EVERY attack wave, as well as when you remove a segment. However, the pattern is pretty consistent - Normal/Wind/Water/Fire/Normal. It does seem to change a bit depending on his health though - in my video it goes to Normal/Wind/Fire/Water once I knocked another segment off. Normal/Wind seems to be consistent though, and he always seems to cycle through every form before returning to Normal. Oftentimes it's best to pre-emptively switch to the next form and stick with it, rather than trying to reactively switch and stay relevant. This is especially true for the Normal Form, which is practically impossible to attack safely due to the severe lack of downtime between his attacks. Jerry can actually do work here too, as the Water/Fire segment is perfect for Megaman attacks. Just play defensively and don't get flustered trying to switch to attack like I did a ton xD

Finally, equipment. I tried giving Claire a bunch of defensive items to mitigate the high damage output, but in the end you are better off going with more aggressive items for her. Her damage is naturally higher than Jerry's, so the Sword of Bravery is an obvious fit. You'll be spamming Hearts a lot against Fire Zero, so increasing their recovery rate is a solid option if you're not confident enough to use the claws for 15% more damage up. Which is probably not worth it since then everything does 11 damage, and that's a bit too high. I then used a Dash augment (the iframe one), but a couple of other items such as Super Missile Charge down and Dagger Rebound would be useful too. MAYBE the Holy Water Trail could be good for the last phase... I never actually tried it, but now that I think about it that might be ok to maximise damage against the Volcano special. I would advise against the Hair Whip heart recover item, as it only works when you do damage and most forms becomes immune to melee. Jerry was my main tank, due to his lower natural damage output - Plot Armour + Force Armour made regular damage go down to 6-7 per hit, and everything else 8 damage. If you wanted a more aggro Jerry, the Crossbow and the Energy Orb are probably the best skill modifiers he has for this fight. As far as other damage downs go, Warmaster's attacks are all over the place but Element is the most prominent non-Normal attack, coming in both Wind and Water forms. All of the Fire forms hits are Explosion damage though, so if you're always getting hit there use Explosion/Contact damage downs.
Last edited by gamercal 8 years ago, edited 2 times in total.
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ano0maly
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by ano0maly »

Actually, his sprite is Model ZX from Megaman ZX.
gamercal
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by gamercal »

... oh. Well way to go and ruin my entire post, geez xD
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Grounder
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Grounder »

Finally made it through.

AND THEN SUDDENLY RIDLEY
Why don't you eat me?

I am perfectly tasty...

AND I'LL STEAL YOUR SOUL! :twisted:

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ano0maly
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by ano0maly »

Also if you need help finding the remaining items, people may be able to assist you here. As for the

turret defense level, did you use ground turrets? I had a hard time beating it when using primarily ground, but I know that someone else just placed a bunch of float turrets instead and apparently that makes it relatively easy.

gamercal
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by gamercal »

ano0maly wrote:Also if you need help finding the remaining items, people may be able to assist you here. As for the

turret defense level, did you use ground turrets? I had a hard time beating it when using primarily ground, but I know that someone else just placed a bunch of float turrets instead and apparently that makes it relatively easy.

Yeah, I was trying to use a Ground/Shock combo in the tunnel-like sections of the tower, cause I tried using some Float turrets once and failed on the second wave. I think I got about 5 waves through before not being able to kill everything on Jerry's side, mostly due to not being able to put any more things down and the damage output just wasn't high enough. I'm not gonna stress over it in any case, I'm functionally only missing a single arrow shot because of it... thank you Zephyr for putting the Heart Piece on the first optional challenge ^_^
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Lostsoldier20
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Lostsoldier20 »

ano0maly wrote:Also if you need help finding the remaining items, people may be able to assist you here. As for the

turret defense level, did you use ground turrets? I had a hard time beating it when using primarily ground, but I know that someone else just placed a bunch of float turrets instead and apparently that makes it relatively easy.

Mega Turrets. Nothing but Megas. I'm not sure how well it works out in the main stages and Optional 1, but Alice Tower and the last bonus got a lot easier after I started to abuse them. That and Shock to give the Megas a few more shots.

I'll need to try Float spam though. The one time I used them, they seemed really really weak even for decent shot rate.
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by ZephyrBurst »

Fun thing I noticed when giving myself a full set of max level anythings. Megas are always the best. Even though their DPS is fairly low per single enemy. That's not really possible due to their cost though, at least not early on.

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Grounder
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Grounder »

Having trouble with the real second boss of Gate 5.

Is there a solid strategy for dealing with the projectiles in the tail end of the fight? Kraid likes the corner a bit too much for me to have breathing space by that point?
Why don't you eat me?

I am perfectly tasty...

AND I'LL STEAL YOUR SOUL! :twisted:

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gamercal
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by gamercal »

Welp, I must just really suck then, cause not even that strat is letting me do the last wave of these things. Oh well, I won't miss those items too much.
Grounder wrote:Having trouble with the real second boss of Gate 5.

Is there a solid strategy for dealing with the projectiles in the tail end of the fight? Kraid likes the corner a bit too much for me to have breathing space by that point?
I don't remember having any issues with this fight, but that's probably because I used the Plasma Canister so my Spazer was constantly cleaning out the nails. It also lets you make him roar through the hand just by shooting, so you can go for more missile shots. So the fight basically becomes jump and shoot, with the occasional missile once you see your shots connect with the mouth. The rocks aren't generally much of a threat, and from what I saw in Boss Replay he never actually comes to the far right... so you should be safe enough!
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Lostsoldier20
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Lostsoldier20 »

ZephyrBurst wrote:

Fun thing I noticed when giving myself a full set of max level anythings. Megas are always the best. Even though their DPS is fairly low per single enemy. That's not really possible due to their cost though, at least not early on.

Glad to know my "I can't do enough with skill and planning I'm just gonna cheese it" is confirmed cheese.


gamercal wrote:Welp, I must just really suck then, cause not even that strat is letting me do the last wave of these things. Oh well, I won't miss those items too much.
The tower is by far the hardest of all of the sections. My plan on wave 1 was to give Claire 6 Grounds, 1 per layer of the zig-zag to ensure nothing from the first wave got through for her, and then spammed Megas for Jerry. (he got 2 shocks to start too, placed in specifically good spots) This was the hardest wave until wave 9, and the only wave that requires a ton of attacking yourself. Also, I placed Jerry super close to the portal.

As the thing progresses, switch Claire over to 2 shocks and 7 Megas in the zig-zag tunnel. (one layer has 3 megas, then the layer you'll have Claire stand in will have 1, and a shock, then the layer below is 3 megas) and have the other shock 2 layers above the other shock. Meanwhile give Jerry a bazillion more megas, prioritize his upgrades, and hope for the best.

It might still take a few tries, but it works "enough".
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ZephyrBurst
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by ZephyrBurst »

I tend to give Claire floats and a shock for her zig-zag zone.
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ano0maly
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by ano0maly »

Lostsoldier20 wrote:
ano0maly wrote:Also if you need help finding the remaining items, people may be able to assist you here. As for the

turret defense level, did you use ground turrets? I had a hard time beating it when using primarily ground, but I know that someone else just placed a bunch of float turrets instead and apparently that makes it relatively easy.

Mega Turrets. Nothing but Megas. I'm not sure how well it works out in the main stages and Optional 1, but Alice Tower and the last bonus got a lot easier after I started to abuse them. That and Shock to give the Megas a few more shots.

I'll need to try Float spam though. The one time I used them, they seemed really really weak even for decent shot rate.
Floats are effective in a zigzag setting like this because when an enemy enters its range, it takes a long time for the enemy to leave it. You just need to make sure that they don't miss. If the targeted enemy is too far away, it might dodge the turret shot by the time it reaches its target location.

Ground turrets on the other hand have their potential limited by the short-length floors in a vertical level like this.
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Grounder »

Okay, with that strategy I beat the boss first try.

Now, however, I'm having trouble on the next one.

How the heck am I supposed to get Alien Knuckles the Echidna out of his ball form when he's red?

Charge shots and missiles don't seem to work, and getting a bomb in on him seems way too hard to be solution.
Why don't you eat me?

I am perfectly tasty...

AND I'LL STEAL YOUR SOUL! :twisted:

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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Lostsoldier20 »

Grounder wrote:Okay, with that strategy I beat the boss first try.

Now, however, I'm having trouble on the next one.

How the heck am I supposed to get Alien Knuckles the Echidna out of his ball form when he's red?

Charge shots and missiles don't seem to work, and getting a bomb in on him seems way too hard to be solution.

This is Distorted Travesty. The solution is never easy.

I'm an idiot who likes vidya games.
And also maybe makes bad decisions based on those vidya games.
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by gamercal »

Use of the Charged Bomb Spam is a pretty reasonable way of landing the hit, as the bombs tend to go in a pretty wide spread. Use it in the air if you want them to spread further.

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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by jaxter0987 »

Responding to Grounder's help for a Gate 5 boss:
I never figured out how to get him out of his spinning when he's enraged, so I just learned how time my damage so I can missile it to death through the Special Defense increase. I tried bombing a couple times but I never lived long enough to get it to work, and I didn't know about the charged morph ball bombing thing until a later boss if I remember correctly.

You can attempt to do the same by getting it to slightly more than 60% (I'm not sure I remember the exact threshold) of its final "bar" of health and then wait until he starts the next cycle of walking around. This gives you enough time to damage race him before he gets into his spinning sequence. Or at least it gave me enough time.
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Grounder »

i ended up just skipping over the trouble part

yay for button mashing
Why don't you eat me?

I am perfectly tasty...

AND I'LL STEAL YOUR SOUL! :twisted:

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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Dragooner »

In gate 5,
http://i.imgur.com/fssJxUJ.jpg and http://i.imgur.com/ywmGrDo.jpg, is this a simple "fk you, lol!" room? Or am i here too early?
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Lostsoldier20 »

Dragooner wrote:In gate 5,
http://i.imgur.com/fssJxUJ.jpg and http://i.imgur.com/ywmGrDo.jpg, is this a simple "fk you, lol!" room? Or am i here too early?

I assume you killed everything and hit all switches if there are any? (I forget if there are in this section) Otherwise, whee bugs!

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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by Dragooner »

Lostsoldier20 wrote:

I assume you killed everything and hit all switches if there are any? (I forget if there are in this section) Otherwise, whee bugs!

Yeah it was a bug, tried it again later and this time the barrier was gone.
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by jaxter0987 »

Nightmare Gate 6 boss is smashing my head in. I'm sooo close to making a break through but I need a break.
I just need to get through the first half of the HP bar relatively unscathed and by extension get better at parrying. I always bring [ispoiler]Sephiroth (spoilered again because this was pretty hype when he appeared)[/ispoiler] down to like a 1/3 or even 1/4 of its health left and if I can enter the second half of it's HP bar with more room for mistakes, I think I can finally pull it off.
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by gamercal »

Just out of curiosity: Are you using the Golden Shield equip for Claire? It gives you an extra frame to parry with, so maybe that could be useful?


Also, for some reason my controls seem to be bugging out a little bit on a new save file. I'm in Gate 1 atm, so I have access to character switching... but it doesn't switch by using the right button. It's switching using the button I've assigned to Dash Left right now, and even if I alter my controls to re-assign that button nothing changes. I've restarted Joy2Key and DT3 several times with no success, and I even went back to my old save file with unedited controls just to compare and it works fine with all the options unlocked. Is this a known thing? And if so, would it affect me in the future when I unlock the dash?
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Re: Distorted Travesty 3

Post by lordalexander74 »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rB_Y1XZYLnE

Is that how one's supposed to get the Smarter than the Brain achievement? Tried that in the gate, but I'm guessing I wasn't fast enough.
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