Fear Effect 2: Retro Helix
A walkthrough for the children
by Thomas Wilde

Table of Contents:

- Disclaimer
- Introduction
- Weapons
- General Hints
- Walkthrough
	Part One: The Aqueduct
		- getting into and out of the aqueduct
	Part Two: The Palmetto Maze
		- Rain above the party
	Part Three: The Life of the Party
		- Hana at the party
	Part Four: An Elevator Clinch
		- reuniting Rain and Hana
	Part Five: Matchmaker
		- the Wing Chune Building
	Part Six: Weapons of Mass Distraction
		- Rain's clever escape plan
	Part Seven: No One Ever Goes There
		- the Temple of Xi'an: uniting the mercenaries
	Part Eight: Unrest Easily
		- Hana in the Queen's Tomb
	Part Nine: Tests
		- Hana and Glas' first tests
	Part Ten: Demons in the Garden
		- the Elemental Challenges
	Part Eleven: It Isn't Even Past
		- Glas' flashback
	Part Twelve: Final Exams
		- Hana and Glas in the Tower
	Part Thirteen: Showdown
		- the last boss)
- Plot Summary
- Plot Questions
- Codes
- Hana and Rain
- Endings
- Conclusion

===========
DISCLAIMER:
===========

Hana, Rain, Deke, Glas, Mist, Jin, and all other heavily
armed or otherwise bastards are the intellectual property of
Eidos Interactive, and their usage in this document does not
comprise a challenge to Eidos' copyright.

This walkthrough is copyright 2001 by Thomas Wilde. Please
report any unauthorized usage of or alteration of this
document to storyteller@msc.net. All requests to host or
use this document should be directed to the same address.
Please read the document in its entirety before e-mailing
me for gameplay questions; odds are, if it's not in here,
I can't help you.

This game deserves its Mature ESRB label. As a document
about this game, this walkthrough probably shouldn't be read
by the young or the easily offended; it contains talk of
demons, insectile gynocology, revisionist theology, murder,
and a straight guy talking about lesbian relationships.
All in all, it's pretty stupid.

=============
INTRODUCTION:
=============

This document is intended to get you through Fear Effect 2:
Retro Helix with as few problems as possible. Fortunately,
this game isn't anywhere near as difficult as its
predecessor; the control's been tightened up, and the
puzzles don't have asinine solutions hidden in obscure
places (did *anyone* manage to defuse Jin's bomb on Disc 1
of FE without a walkthrough?). Thus, I was able to beat it
in remarkably little time. I have decided to write this
walkthrough, as there would seem to be a need for it.

Make no mistake, though; FE2 is still out to kick you in the
face and make you like it. It's like six John Woo movies,
the MENSA test, and a punch in the stomach all mixed into
one. You know how in Gamefan, they used to talk about the
games that separated the "hardcore" from the "weaksauce" or
the "sausage?" Strange terminology notwithstanding, FE2 is
one of those games. It takes a special blend of hatred,
skill, reflexes, and sheer bloody determination to get all
the way through to the end of this game on Normal. If you
can, Hard isn't that much more difficult.

I do have to mention one thing here. Eidos has made quite a
big deal out of Hana and Rain's relationship in the months
leading up to this game's release. In the game itself, Hana
and Rain are quietly involved, and neither make a big deal
out of it. While the very inclusion of Hana and Rain's
relationship is completely gratuitous, made all the more so
by the way Hana and Rain both look (there are lesbians, there
are lipstick lesbians, and then there're *these* two), it's
treated in a more intelligent manner than I was expecting.
I'll discuss this more later, because, well, I just don't
know when to leave well enough alone.

This walkthrough is written using the assumption that you
have a copy of the instruction manual. Therefore, I won't
waste your time and mine with a description of the controls.

Also, so I've mentioned it: I have managed to write this
walkthrough without cheating or, for the most part, looking
at online guides. I did consult Edwin Chow's puzzle guide at
one point (I wish I hadn't, since that puzzle turned out to
be so bloody *simple*), which is available at www.gamefaqs.com,
and Kevin Kaelin's walkthrough--available at www.gameshark.com
--was invaluable when I was dealing with that %$#@#*& floor
puzzle in the tower. I'd like to thank both for their help.

Other than that, this guide is brought to you solely by me. I
mention this, because I am quite proud of it.

...and now, on to business.

========
WEAPONS:
========

Things need shot in the gritty futuristic dystopia of Fear
Effect 2, and you're here to shoot them. A note or two,
then, on your basic tools for that holy task:

Knife, Boot Blade, Brass Knuckles, Smakjack:

Various characters' melee weapons. FE2 isn't shy about
handing out the ammunition, and with the exception of one
optional boss fight, you're never forced into hand-to-hand
combat. Don't worry about these too much, but do try to use
them for sneak kills; in this game, your only silent weapons
are your melee weapons.

Hana's Melee command is slightly different than the others',
in that she throws a roundhouse kick or flipkick at an
opponent. Hers seems markedly faster. That doesn't mean you
should use it more often, but it is worth remarking upon.

.90 Pistol:

These, of course, can and must be dual-wielded. They combine
decent stopping power with a good rate of fire, but quite
frankly, they don't do anything that other weapons don't do
better. Hana can get some mileage out of them against the
mutants in the Temple of Xi'an, but all in all, the pistols
aren't much use.

Shotgun:

Ammo is scarce for this at the start of the game, but the
Shotgun owns the Temple of Xi'an and the Elemental
Challenges. Resident Evil players will be shocked to find
that the Shotgun still packs a respectable punch at range in
FE2, but its slower rate of fire gives gun-wielding
opponents the chance to shoot back. Against enemies who are
going to return fire, use the Assault Rifle or Uzis, but
against teleporting demons, skeleton warriors, statues, and
other melee-minded opponents, the Shotgun is your best option.

Deke's hand cannons are effectively dual-wielded shotguns.
These are the things that maniacal killing sprees are made
of. They must be used.

Uzis:

Once again, you can't be seen in public unless you've got
one of these in each hand. Uzis hold 15 bullets, and can
throw all of those bullets at an opponent at about Mach
*Now*. The Uzis' problems are twofold; for one thing, ammo's
very scarce for them, and for another, they don't really
pack much of a punch. Like the pistols, they're made
obsolete by other weapons.

Assault Rifle:

A full-auto death machine, the assault rifle is always a
decent choice. It kills many things with a quickness, and
knocks away what it cannot kill (i.e. the robed priests in
the Temple of Xi'an). As an added bonus, against enemies
that are close together, you can simply hold down the
trigger and your character will wave it around for you. The
Assault Rifle and Shotgun are your basic bread-and-butter
weapons, as well as the easiest to find ammunition for once
you're out of the Aqueduct. Annoyingly, the teleporting
demons in the Garden can shrug off rifle fire, so don't
even try it against them.

The true value of the assault rifle is that enemies who are
being shot with it stop moving or firing back at you. They
jitter for a couple of seconds, and then, hopefully, they
die. This feature is probably the most important.

Arc Taser:

Rain gets this out of Jin's Package in the Palmetto Maze,
Hana will get one from the package in the Wing Chune elevator
shaft, and Glas starts with one. The Arc Taser fires a bolt
of electricity which bounces back and forth from enemy to
enemy. Its big draw is that enemies hit with it (usually)
stop moving, so it's just the thing when you've walked
through a door and into a mob of guards. As an added bonus,
it has effectively infinite ammunition, as it'll slowly
recharge after you're done using it. It's your single best
weapon on the 86th Floor. Unfortunately, later enemies can
walk right through it, so ignore it once you've reached the
Temple of Xi'an.

EMP:

An electromagnetic pulse generator. Hold down the fire
button until it whines and let go. The resulting flash will
stun mechanical enemies for a *very* short period of time.
In general, the EMP is a good "stealth" weapon for when you
see a Fixer around a corner waiting for you, but its long
charge time and short stun time limit its effectiveness.
Later, when Glas runs up against mecha, the EMP is your only
(slim) chance for survival.

Note that the EMP burst will work on all enemies within a
room, regardless of whether you're pointing at them or not.

Sonic Boom:

A strange weapon that Deke starts with, and Rain has it
later on. It works like the EMP; hold down the button until
the whine gets really high, and let go. The Sonic Boom will
release a pulse which will damage or kill everything within
a certain radius. Like the EMP, the time it takes to fire
limits its effectiveness, but if you have time to get it out
and charge it, it does all right as a "street-sweeper."

RL 480:

A (comparatively) low-powered rocket launcher; in this game,
it's less like an anti-tank weapon and more like a shotgun
with a blast radius. Don't use it often, if at all, because
it's laughably weak and it'll hurt you if it's fired at
point-blank range. Seeing as how the modus operandi of most
of the enemies in this game, not counting humans, is to get
close to you as fast as they can, and *also* seeing as how
many enemies can weather at least one rocket before dying,
using the rocket launcher becomes almost suicidal.

SS 2000:

A flamethrower with remarkably good range. It's very
effective against acrobats and Catseyes, but, as is becoming
a theme here, later opponents aren't terribly bothered by
it. The soldiers in Glas' flashback are particularly
irritating about this, as they need to get tagged three
times with this (five times in Hard Mode) before they die.
Its ammo does last a long time, though.

GL 120:

A grenade launcher. Deke has one on him during his missions,
and Glas receives one from his flashback. Launched grenades
travel a fair distance, roll a bit further, and explode
upon contact with an opponent. Unfortunately, both the
blast radius and the grenade itself are small and weak,
making this weapon something of a waste of time. As an added
bonus, you can't find any additional ammo for the gun.

Plasma Wrists:

A wrist-mounted laser gun that Rain has to use at one point,
this is a jumped-up single pistol that fires in three-round
bursts. It's not all that bad, but it'd be nice if there were
alternatives. Its infinite ammo and high rate of fire are
definite advantages, but you'll be firing it at acrobats,
and, well, they don't like to get hit with it. So they don't.

==============
GENERAL HINTS:
==============

-- Save. Save often, save repeatedly, save every time you
get something done. This game will kill you just to watch
you die, and there are no medical packs or herbs.

The lone exception is when you're running on red, and you
know just one more attack will kill you. If you were in
better condition on your last save, you might want to keep
on going; the alternative is saddling yourself with having
to keep restarting with a close-to-death character, right
when he's about to head into a serious fight. Next time,
you can tread more carefully on your way to the next save
point, and hopefully save when you're in better condition.

-- After any firefight, get into the habit of tapping
Square, Triangle. This will call up your current weapon on
your inventory screen and reload it. This is particularly
vital with the shotgun and pistols. Just don't do it without
thinking, or you'll switch weapons. There's nothing quite
so infuriating as shooting at a group of people and realizing
that the reason you're taking hits is because you're brandishing
the EMP at humans.

-- Without an inventory screen to fall back on, you'll have
to rely on your reflexes in the middle of a fight. The
Square button calls up your inventory starting with your
weapons, starting with whatever weapon you are currently
holding and then cycling through the rest. The Circle button
calls up your inventory starting with your "quest
items"--keys, keycards, your cell 'phone, and so on. Later
in the game, those spare seconds could mean life or death,
so remember the distinction.

-- Practice movement until you can do it smoothly and
intuitively. There are a lot of "running puzzles" in FE2,
where you'll need to outrun something chasing you. Go
straight down hallways, rather than turning early and
getting caught on corners. It'll save you a lot of cheap
deaths.

-- Whenever you switch characters, you'll receive a Rush
Moment, returning your health meter to green. You'll also
switch arsenals and quest items, so try to take a moment to
examine your inventory. Many times, a new character will
have a new item that you should take into account, such as
Glas' Grappling Hook or Rain's Sniper Scope.

-- Running away from enemies in this game can get a bit
complicated. Every time your character goes through a door,
he or she will execute that strange little animation where
they put their guns away and stand there for a second. You
can still be hit during this animation. Do *not* leave a
room while enemies are shooting at you, and do *not* leave a
room if you've got a passel of zombies or demons behind you.
You'll take a couple of hits before you can leave. You also
put away your weapons and stand there for a second while
using the cell 'phone, so don't save your game unless
everything around you is dead. (...and now, I'd like to
bid a fond welcome to the parent watchdog groups; they're
the ones in the back who're foaming at the mouth. Hi!)

-- Sneak kills are good. This is when you crouch-walk up
behind someone and your targeting crosshair turns red.
This means that whatever you do to that enemy will be
fatal. Unfortunately, sneak kills only work on human
opponents, but that's no reason not to try for them
whenever you can. As an added bonus, sneak kills raise
your character's confidence, thus raising you back
towards green on your Heart Monitor.

Note that if you want to sneak kill more than one person,
you'll need to be quiet about the first one. That usually
means using your character's melee weapon.

============
WALKTHROUGH:
============

I sort of have a confession to make.

I played through FE2 once on the Normal setting, then sat down
to write this walkthrough on a second play. I didn't realize I
was actually on the Hard setting until about halfway through.
In the Hard game, a few of the puzzles have different solutions,
or are at least longer, while enemies take roughly a third
again as much punishment to kill. Furthermore, all dropped
ammunition is about two-thirds or less of what it is in a
Normal game. There's almost no such thing as a "useless weapon"
in Hard mode. Admittedly, it's not *that* much harder than
Normal mode--like I said, I didn't notice the difference
until I hit the Temple of Xi'an and noticed how rapidly
my shotgun shells were being depleted--but it's difficult.

In any event, I mention this because it may mean there are
discrepancies between Normal mode, which is what most *sane*
people are playing on, and this walkthrough. Please accept my
apologies, and be aware that I'm working to correct that
wherever I can.

Currently, the only puzzles that I know for a fact are
different are the Sliding Maze in the Queen's Tomb and
the "Simon" rhythm game in the tower. As mentioned below,
I think the geometric lock in the Palmetto Maze might be
different, but I'm not sure.

This document is written assuming you're using the default
control setting. I play a *lot* of RE, so I don't think it's
as clunky a control setup as most seem to.

============
Part One:
The Aqueduct
============

We start with a series of cutscenes, reintroducing us to our
antiheroes from FE. Deke's in a bad way, Glas is a suicidal
alcoholic, and Hana's... being Hana (she's exhibiting the
writers' "Eszterhasian sex-is-death phobia," to quote David
Smith's review on psx.ign.com, and that's such a great line
when applied to a video game that I have to repeat it here).

In Hana's sub, Jin, who we last saw in FE when a helicopter
splattered him all over Hong Kong, will tell Hana about your
goals. While your mission objectives will be restated as
you advance through the Wing Chune, try to remember the
images Jin shows you. It'll save you a bit of frustration
later if you, say, remember what the genetics computer lab
looks like. Afterwards, you'll meet Rain and be dropped off
in a hallway. Follow Rain.

(There's a keypad on the wall in this first hallway, but you
can't use it until your second time through the game. See
the Codes section, below, for more on this.)

When you reach her, Rain will tell you what you have to do:
start up a nearby generator. Go out the left door.

Head down the hallway. One side door can't be opened for a
while yet; another leads to a small room with a red grating
on the floor. Ignore both of them for now.

Keep moving down the hallway until you hear clanking and
Hana's heart monitor starts up. Draw a weapon. (By the way,
do take a moment to admire Hana's Croftpack (tm). Look at
all that *stuff* she's got in there!) Go around the corner
to make your first wary acquaintance with the Fixers. In
this situation, I recommend using the shotgun to blow them
away one by one. You'll net pistol ammo from the wreckage,
as you will from most Fixers.

There's a locked door in the center of this room. Note that
the keycard reader next to it is yellow; this is what those
of us in the trade call a "visual cue." You can't get it
open yet, so don't worry about it. There's an EMP hidden in
the dark alcove to the right of the door, if you're into
that sort of thing.

However, to advance our plot, head down the hallway to the
left of the door. Move forward to the twisted grating, and
after the cutscene, Take the Metal Hook.

Go back up the ramp, past the save point, and into the
unlocked door in the hallway. Use the Metal Hook on the
grating to receive the Yellow Keycard. Go back to the yellow
door where you fought the Fixers, and Use the Keycard on the
keycard reader. You'll be let into the generator room. Climb
down the ladder and Use the generator lever. Rain will radio
and tell you to return to the main hall.

While you activated the generator, two Fixers have arrived
further down the hallway. As you walk towards them, another
one will drop from the ceiling. You can't just dash in and
start blasting away without getting killed, but you *can*
use the EMP to deactivate them briefly. While they're
stunned, hit them with pistol bullets until they explode.

Back in the main hall, the door will close in Hana's face.
Rain tells Hana to flip the switch again, so it looks like
you're heading straight back to the generator. On your way
there, another Fixer will be waiting in the hall by the
ramp; this one rolls grenades. EMP it from around the
corner, then switch to the pistols to finish the job.

There's one more blue Fixer ready to drop from the ceiling
in the room with the yellow door; have the shotgun ready and
blow it apart. Use the Yellow Keycard again, climb down the
ladder, and throw the generator switch. When all's said and
done, Hana's trapped, you're apparently not as sneaky as you
think you are, and you're now playing as Rain. Rain is almost
identically equipped to Hana, so not much has changed. She
runs like a girl, doesn't she? (*Yes*, I *know* she's a girl,
I'm not *blind*, it's an *expression*, shut *up*.)

You'll start in a long hallway with a save point to Rain's
left. The steam jets are operating on a specific pattern;
this is basic platformer stuff. Picking your way through
them should be easy.

What gets difficult is that you're between two Fixers when
you exit the room. Immediately run to your left, hit that
Fixer with two shotgun blasts, and ambush the second when it
comes around the short "corner." The gray door here leads to
a dead end, so head around the corner and go down the
ladder. There's another save point, and another door.

This hallway is lined with hydraulic steel platforms. Get
used to seeing it, because you'll come back through here
more than a few times. This isn't really all that difficult,
as the platforms move slowly. I've never been able to
discern a pattern to them, but usually I can get through if
I just run for it.

There's a Fixer with its back to you in the next hallway,
and an invisible Uzi on top of a crate. Destroy the one,
grab the other, and head to the next door. Ready the assault
rifle, because there's a cutscene lurking in wait, and a
firefight lurking behind *that*.

Suddenly, things will get crazy. There are four Fixers and a
scared technician in this room. The technician, and all of
his breed on this level, won't hurt you unless you shoot him
first. However, he may wind up getting chopped in the
crossfire as you exchange bullets with the Fixers. Ideally,
you should shoot the Fixer directly in front of you as you
enter. Then stop firing; the target at the foreground's the
technician. Wait for him to run away, then take out the
Fixers one by one as they come marching in from the right.
You can do this without taking a hit if you're fast and smart.

Further notes on the technicians: they're really just all
over the place in here. They can be a bit annoying, as
Hana and Rain do take aim at them, but they're harmless.
On the other hand, they're relatively weak, and they
drop useful things like Uzi ammo. If it's your first time
through the game, consider terrorizing the technicians,
but it's not really worth the effort in the long run.
You'll find out why. Oh, yes. You'll find out why.

There are two additional doors in this room, one on either
side of the large gray machine. Go through the one on the
right first; you can't do anything here quite yet, but you
can save your game. Return to the large room and go through
the left door.

You'll have to dispatch two Fixers here, but it's easily
accomplished with the assault rifle or your two-gun Uzi
mojo. The left-hand door in this hallway leads to a dead
computer, so it's useless for now. However, in the other
room, you can use the Flash Disc on what you may recognize
as the security console Jin showed you. Unfortunately, it's
got a toy surprise inside.

================
PUZZLE: Gas Trap
================

Rain and her huge brain get the first serious puzzle of the
game, and it's a bitch, particularly since your objective
isn't really made clear. (It almost never is.) You need to
manipulate the buttons to form the numbers 80 and 86, to do
so with only six buttons, and to do so within three minutes,
or Rain will be gassed to death.

Figuring out what you're to do here is the first obstacle.
After that, it's fairly simple.

Answers:
80: 1, 2, 3, 4, c, d
86: 1, 3, 4, a, c, d

Success will unlock the door and give you the security
access codes you'll need later.

Head back to the main room, the corpse-strewn abbatoir, and
go through the right-hand door. Save your game again, and
this time, go through the unlocked door on the left.
Remember that the door on the right in here requires a
numerical combination.

Before, all of these doors were locked. Solving the gas trap
puzzle unlocked one of them, and your next objectives are
inside. Take note of the broken-down Fixer in this corridor;
it'll prove useful later. Dispatch the lone surprise Fixer
that's waiting for you and open the door. There's a technician
in here, but, as usual, don't bug him and he won't bug you.
Use the glowing console to find your next puzzle.

========================
PUZZLE: Security Console
========================

The legend for this puzzle is in the upper right-hand
corner, and the alphabetical codes are on the right side of
the machine. When you figure out a password, which isn't
difficult, punch it into the system and hit the gray switch
on the right. You'll need to put them in in a certain order
to solve the puzzle.

Note the colors on the left side of the machine, next to the
three keypads, and the color of the flashing light on top.

Put in the "blue code," the "yellow code," and the "red code,"
in that order. If you can't figure them out, just put the
game down. (My notes are incomplete on the issue of which
code is which, and quite frankly, I'm not gonna go turn the
game on again right now. My eyes feel poached.)

Success will activate a machine in the room with the sunken
platform, turn on the dead computer you saw before, and
activate the console next to you. Go use it.

======================
PUZZLE: Control System
======================

Once again, it isn't so much the puzzle as it is figuring
out the puzzle's rules. The top row of numbers is positive
and the bottom, negative, but that doesn't matter, since
these equations basically solve themselves.

Pick a number by highlighting it and pressing X, then
highlight the space between numbers on the top of the puzzle
and press X again to insert the number. Solve all five
equations, then press the OK button.

The answer:
2, 5, 10, 13, 1. Like I said, it doesn't matter much; all of
these problems are addition except the last, and there's
only one "1" on the entire board to begin with.

Solving this puzzle drains the submerged walkway. You'll
switch back to Hana, standing next to the ruined generator.
Save your game.

Across the waterway, there's a videotape lying on the ground
and a door, shaking disturbingly. Walk forward a bit, until
the door splits open, then quick-turn with L1 and *run like
hell* back across the makeshift bridge, to your starting
point. The rats will fall into the water or scurry into the
wreckage, and you'll be safe to proceed. (The death-by-rats
sequence, incidentally, wins my coveted Golden AIGH! Award
for Nastiest Fate To Befall A Videogame Character. Previous
winners include Steve Burnside, anyone Reptile kills, and
anyone hit with the Cerebral Bore in Turok 3.)

Take the Videotape A. There's a single Fixer around the
corner that's easily dealt with, and two technicians
cowering just past it. Head through the first door you see,
and take the Fixer Piston from the wrecked Fixer. There's
also a "hidden" Uzi inside the small fort made of barrels.

Back out in the hallway, passage is blocked by a wall of
steam. In order to get rid of it, you've got to solve
another puzzle.

==================
PUZZLE: Steam Vent
==================

As frequently happens, there's a clue to this puzzle on the
parallel wall. Note the number of missing lines on each
graph, and their color. Also note that the gauges on the
console are both circled by lines of matching colors. I'll
give you another hint: it's not as complicated as you think
it is.

Plug in, left to right, the number of lines on each graph,
accomodating the colors.

In other words: 5 blue, 4 blue, 3 yellow, 2 yellow.

That's the puzzle I consulted Chow's guide for, and I still
feel like an idiot over how simple it turned out to be. In
any event, the steam will clear.

At the end of the hallway, Hana will meet another technician.
He'll give her a Mirror Segment and a Green Keycard. Hana
radios Rain, and suddenly, they lose radio contact.

You'll switch back to Rain, still in the control room. Pull
out the assault rifle and head out. There's a Fixer just
outside, ready to be destroyed by point-blank rifle fire,
and some ominous things waiting down the hall. In the save
room, you'll find another Fixer, but the real trouble there
is if you left the technician alive. Turn away from him so
Rain's auto-aim doesn't get confused and take out the Fixer,
then save your game again.

In the wrecked lab, go straight down and around the barrels.
As you reach the bottom of the room, a cutscene will begin,
featuring a large mutant with a large chunk of pipe. This
will start a fight, but the boss will start with Rain behind
him. Empty a rifle clip into him from behind, and you'll
drop him in short order. Use his body--you can't leave the
room, annoyingly--and you'll get a little cliffhanger.

You're back with Hana. Climb the nearby ladder. There's a
Machine Cog on a dead guy at the top of the ladder; take it,
and use the Green Keycard to open the nearby door. You'll be
back in the second hall, at the side door you couldn't open
before. Head back to the main hall, and this time, leave
through the right-hand door. Be careful, though, as a
surprise ceiling Fixer has arrived while you were away.

On the formerly submerged bridge, take out the sentry Fixer
from the platform before you climb down the ladder. Grab the
Fixer Head Key from the wreckage at the bottom of the
ladder, then go out through the other door. You're back in
the room just past the steam vents, which means there's a
save point nearby, *and* Hana now gets to deal with that
same damn sliding metal corridor that Rain did before. There
are also two more ceiling Fixers to contend with, but they
should be becoming old hat by now. They drop, they turn,
you shoot them, they explode. It's an intricate ballet.
With guns.

Past the sliding metal corridor, there's another Fixer and
another ceiling Fixer in that conspicuously long hallway.
The wrecked lab is empty again, however. In the lab, Use the
Machine Cog on that large gray machine. This will activate a
Fixer above the first corridor, which means you have to
backtrack *all the way back* to where you started the game
to destroy it. Save your game along the way; the sliding
metal corridor is actually quite difficult when you try to
go back through it from the other side. There'll be another
Fixer just outside the lab and a grenade Fixer in the main
hall. When you've destroyed the newly activated Fixer,
you'll get a Fixer Battery from the wreckage. Take it, and
go back to the lab.

Go through the lab door to the left of the machine. Two
ceiling Fixers are waiting in the hallway. You need to go to
the room at the end of this hall, the one with the
previously offline computer, and destroy a Fixer inside.
That Fixer will drop Videotape B when destroyed. Use the
computer; Hana will automatically insert Videotapes A and B
into it. Videotape A isn't really relevant--although it is
sadistic and a little blackly amusing--but Videotape B has a
keypad combination for you. Write it down.

Go back to the lab and out the right-hand door. Save your
game here, and input the combination from Videotape B into
the locked door. Be careful of the lone ceiling Fixer that's
guarding the door, though.

In here, there are two grenade Fixers waiting on the upper
platform. Down the ramp, however, Hana will see a crowd of
Fixers repairing a work area, and refuse to go any further.
You need to provide a distraction. Go back to the upper
platform, and leave through the door across from where you
came in.

This is your distraction. Note that you can Use something on
the barrel in here.

Use the Blasting Cap on the barrel. Hana will muse that she
needs to hide before the Fixers come, so duck into the
darkened alcove and wait for the Fixers to run by. You'll
get a Rush Moment. Sneak out the door while the Fixers are
busy.

You'll have to deal with a parade of four Fixers, but they
come at you one at a time; they're all rifle bait. Destroy
them, as well as a final sentry on the lower platform, and
take the Fixer Chip from the desk. Head back.

You've now got all the parts you need to repair that broken
Fixer Rain saw earlier. Go over there, dispatching the
Fixers that will try to stop you, and Use the Fixer Head Key
on the wrecked Fixer. Match the chips at the bottom of the
screen with the appropriate slots, and it'll reactivate.
After fixing the nearby broken door, it'll break down again.

There's a lone technician on the other side of the door.
Leave him be and save your game. Climb down the nearby
ladder, and you'll see someone strapped to a circular
platform on the other side of the room. Guess what. It's
Rain, now starring in the community theater production of
_Barbarella_. Fasten your seatbelts, kids... 'cause this
bus ain't stoppin' til *weird city*.

============
BOSS: Spooky
============

Call him what you will. He's big, he's got a big gun, and he
calls people "kitties." He's pretty Spooky. As with all boss
fights, you'll receive a Rush Moment right before you start.

In any event, Spooky is apparently immune to small-arms
fire. He is not, however, immune to electricity, which makes
one wonder why he chose to ambush you near an electrified
waterfall. Maybe it was the only place where he could hook
up whatever the hell that thing is that he strapped Rain to.

In any event, haul out the assault rifle and get to
shootin'. You need to get into a position where your barrage
of firepower will send Spooky sliding into the water at the
top or bottom of the room; one clip of ammo is sufficient to
get him all the way across the room, regardless of where he
started. Do this three times, and the boy is toast.

After Spooky falls, go back over to Rain (oh, good, thank
you, *another* closeup, *that* was necessary) and Use her
(no laughing in the back, please). Rain will tell you that
Spooky set bombs elsewhere in the facility, and she'll unlock
two doors. You should recognize them; they were shaking
ominously earlier. You have two minutes to get the job done.

Head back there--these are two separate doors, incidentally;
the camera is not playing tricks on you--and Use the bombs
to defuse them. One room has a scared tech in it, and the
other, a single Fixer. In other words, this is a piece of
cake. A delicious, pointless, playtime-padding piece of cake.
On your way back to Spooky's lair, be sure to save again.

Climb back down the ladder, and Spooky will get right back
up, the loveable goof. Hana triggers an explosion to deal
with Spooky and dash through the nearest door. When you get
control of Hana, just hold Up and start running; when you
get to the end of the tunnel with Rain, hit the Triangle
button to open the door. This may take a couple of tries,
but there's not that much to it. Just run, and run, and run
some more. As you escape the explosion, Hana will get down
to what she does best: fanservice. Don't blink, kids!

=================
Part Two:
The Palmetto Maze
=================

You'll begin this disc in control of Rain. As is de rigeur
upon a disc change, save your game. Head outside, and you'll
find yourself looking at a guard with his back to you. Creep
up behind him and sneak-kill him, then lay waste to the two
guards nearby. You'll get two Uzi clips and another Uzi.

Move forward, around the corner, and down the ramp. There's
a massive waterfall here that you should take note of, but
only after you're done shooting five guards to death. This
can get a bit tricky, but fortunately, guards can't shoot at
you unless they're in the same screen as you. If you stay
down, even if they get the drop on you, they'll miss their
first shot.

A nearby ramp heads up into the Palmetto Maze. Head up
there, and note that there are two guards on either side of
the top of the ramp, and one more standing guard at the
corner leading to the Palmetto Maze itself. All are
particularly dense, so you can pull out your knife and creep
around for some quiet, sneak kills. You may as well save
some ammo, right?

There's one guard at the start of the Palmetto Maze. Uzi
him, then cautiously sneak around. If Rain's heart monitor
starts up, a guard is coming into the screen. Wait for him,
then blow him away. The Maze is remarkably easy to navigate,
so that won't be much of a problem.

There are two areas in the maze where there are red squares
next to a section of wall. If you step near them, a secret
door will open. The first time you open a door, Rain will
note the presence of guards on a small "island" in the maze,
as well as a banner moored nearby; the second one of these
you find will result in Rain radioing Hana. Hana will tell
Rain to take out the guards.

Use the Sniper Scope. Rain will dispatch both guards,
although one of 'em will blow the Scope off the rifle with a
_Matrix_ homage. Then proceed carefully back to the first
secret door and shoot the banner. Rain will swing down to
the island.

A switch on the wall will raise a ramp back up to the
Palmetto Maze. Jin's Package is on the island nearby. Take
it to start a cutscene and switch characters.

=====================
Part Three:
The Life of the Party
=====================

Save your game in this front hallway. Almost everyone in
this area is window dressing, except the guards. The guards
themselves are harmless as long as you don't actually touch
one of them, but if you do, it's Game Over.

If you don't already play with Quick Draw off, I recommend
you turn it off now. Accidentally drawing a weapon here will
end your game, unless you do it in the women's restroom.

The party has three levels to it. The first level has
nothing of interest except the escalators. The second level
has a women's restroom (another save point), a men's
restroom (presently inaccessible), the elevators (currently
locked down), and an open bar. More on that later.

On the third floor, a red carpet leads to a special guarded
door. Your Silver V.I.P. Bracelet won't help you here; it's
V.V.I.P.s only past this point. The inherent contradiction
has been noted.

Also on the third floor, for your viewing pleasure, is the
single most frightening thing in a game filled with mutants,
demons, devils, and mad gods:

THE MACARENA SURVIVED TO THE MID-21ST CENTURY.

Shake it off! Keep going! Fight on, Hana, for everlasting
peace! On the second floor, to the right of the ramp,
there's a guy in a tuxedo. Move towards him to get ineptly
hit on. (Points for courage, buddy.) Change screens, come
back, and Big Tom will have a Filled Glass for you. Take it
and head upstairs.

Walk past the red carpet. You'll have a brief conversation
with a mysterious benefactor, and receive a Bell and a Gold
V.I.P. Bracelet. Use the V.I.P. Bracelet on the guards at
the door, who will now let you through.

The V.I.P. balcony is crawling with guards. You might want
to backtrack to the women's restroom and save your game at
this point, as this part can get a little tricky. Carefully
thread your way through the guards and head right. Dr.
Gyen-Won Liu is the guy in the white jacket, leaning on the
right-hand corner of the balcony. Use the Glass on him and
leave the V.I.P. area. You've gained a Hair Sample.

One cutscene later, you're back in control of Rain. Go back
up to the Palmetto Maze using the newly opened ramp. Once
there, look around a bit; there are a few more guards to
deal with, and there's also a wheel on the wall around here
somewhere. Use the wheel to turn off the waterfall I mentioned
earlier, revealing a ladder.

Work your way out of the Palmetto Maze, back the way you
came. There'll be more guards in the Maze and another set of
three morons just outside it, ready and waiting to get
knifed to death. One guy's waiting by the waterfall, but
he's no big deal. Ready the Arc Taser and climb the ladder.

Three guards are waiting for you just inside this door.
Pivot slightly and hit the closest one with the Arc Taser.
The bolt will rebound to all three of them; hold down the X
button until they all drop. Use the Maintenance Keycard to
get through the door. There's a save point in the next room,
and one guy is standing guard in the room beyond that. Use
the Flash Disc on the computer against the left wall for the
first in a series of three puzzles.

======================
PUZZLE: Geometric Lock
======================

Here, you'll have to shape the right symbol to look like the
left. You can choose which direction you'll stretch it with
the control pad, with the "neutral" position meaning you'll
leave it alone. X will make your choice. As always, hitting
Triangle will end the puzzle and start over.

This is the order the symbols were in on Hard mode. I know
some of these solutions carried over, so if you're having
trouble, try using a different solution than the problem
you're on, or hell, solve it yourself. These aren't that
hard. I'll work on having a legend for the Normal difficulty
in a future revision.

Legend:
U = Up
D = Down
L = Left
R = Right
- = No change

#1: U, D, U, D, U, D, U, D
#2: D, L, D, L, D, L, D, L
#3: D, R, U, L, D, U, D, U
#4: D, U, L, D, -, D, R, U
#5: D, L, R, D, -, L, -, R
#6: L, D, R, U, -, D, L, U

Solving this puzzle will open up the maintenance system. Go
into the next room and Use the control panel.

=======================
PUZZLE: Electronic Loop
=======================

Listen to Rain; she knows what she's after. You need to use
these pieces you're given to set up a looped circuit which
begins at the blue dot on the left-hand side.

The game doesn't tell you that you can select a piece, then
rotate it with the Circle and Triangle buttons. The game
doesn't tell you a lot of things. The game... is a bitch.

Basically, you need to start and end a loop circuit with the
blue dot. Your circuit cannot connect to any of the other
pieces on the board, and it must reduce the voltage to
"zero." You'll know when you've placed a piece correctly
when you hear a "bloop" sound and the voltage drops.

Here's the puzzle solution, for you slackers. Consider the
circuit board a grid, like so:

  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
A - - - - - - - -
B - - - - - - - -
C - - - - - - - -
D - - - - - - - -
E - - - - - - - -

Put Straight Connectors at:
B4, C1, C3, C7, D8, E5

Put Corner Connectors at:
A6, B2, B5, D4, E4, E7, E8

Put T-Squares at:
C2

Always rotate these pieces so they connect to those around
them. You should hear a "bloop" each time you put an
accurately rotated piece in place.

Solving this puzzle will deactivate the video surveillance.
Go to the next room and Use the tangle of wires underneath
the bank of screens.

===============
PUZZLE: Fusebox
===============

Listen to Rain. The key here is to rearrange the colored
rods so that they match the pattern shown on the bottom of
the left-hand graph. However, you must rearrange the fuses
so the rods can be moved in the first place.

In order for there to be no current running through a rod,
you must arrange the fuses so that the colored fuse housings
that match the rods you're trying to switch have no fuses in
them. For example, if you want to switch the blue and white
rods, switch the fuses around so the blue and white fuse
casings, on both the top and bottom of the fusebox, don't
have fuses in them.

Once you've figured that part out, this puzzle is as good as
solved.

Unfortunately, Rain's wrong. Solving this puzzle fries the
elevator's activation controls and alerts security. She'll
radio Hana, and then you're back on your own. You can't use
the door in this room, as there are too many guards in the
next room.

Go back the way you came. There's a new guard in each room,
both of whom have their backs to you. Knife them to
death--boy, that Sneak Kill count is just rackin' up, isn't
it?--and keep moving. You'll get the Bridge Control Card
from the first one.

In the room at the top of the ramp, go in with your knife
equipped. You can sneak-kill the first, switch to the Uzis,
and kill the guy on the next screen--who, judging by where
he is, was *looking at you* while you shanked his friend.
Nice guy. Good thing you shot him.

Sneak and shoot your way back through the Palmetto Maze,
through a fresh wave of guards. You see, you might've
noticed a control panel back on the island that you couldn't
do anything with. That's what you're after. Head right once
you're in the Maze, go through the first secret panel, and
go down the ramp. Use the Bridge Control Card on the panel,
and Rain's off to the party!

==================
Part Four:
An Elevator Clinch
==================

Buy the Fear Effect 2 clothes-changing theme, "The Sleaziest
Guitar Riff Ever," now on Elektra. Rain changes into an
evening gown (keep it in your pants, boys) and hits the
party herself. Hana's told you that you need to catch a
security guard on a break, and use their access to get to
the elevator. Where do you think that you could find a
security guard on a break?

The first thing you'll notice is that the men's room is now
unguarded, and that should be all you need to know. Head in
there. If you get caught by a guard in here, you'll be sent
back out of the room, but it won't be game over.

Sneak cautiously up to the guy at the back of the room
and--ahem--Use him. When the cutscene's over, you'll have an
Elevator Keycard. Go to the elevators by the women's
bathroom on the second floor and Use it on the elevator.

You'll switch to Hana. Go to the same elevator and get in
it. Use Rain (one more snicker and you're out!), and then
walk over to the security camera in the corner. Use your
Dress on it. The resultant cutscene... well, um, it's not
porn, *but*...

Anyway, it's time to change discs. Ahem.

==========
Part Five:
Matchmaker
==========

Here's where the Arc Taser starts earning its keep. Your
adversaries in this stage are either yellow-suited acrobats
with an enormous facility for dodging bullets ("WANTED:
biochemists to work with Dr. Gyen-Won Liu. Must be thin,
fit, willing to work with doomsday viruses, able to handle
plasma blasters. Ability to dodge bullets via improbable
acrobatics a plus. Apply within."); or Catseyes, which lazily
drift after you until they make contact, whereupon they explode.
The Arc Taser will both immobilize and damage mutiple opponents,
letting you take out whole rooms of enemies with minimal risk.
However, note that Catseyes aren't really dead until they explode,
and also note that when they explode, they can catch you in the
blast. I've gotten killed more than once by a Catseye that
I'd dispatched, only to have it blow up in my face while I
was doing something else.

You begin as Hana. Save your game, then head forward and
climb the ladder on the side of the elevator shaft. Keep
climbing even when the elevator starts heading up again, and
Hana wil take care of the rest. You'll switch characters.

As Rain, equip the Arc Taser and head through the door to
your right. Whack the acrobat here with the Taser as she
strolls towards you; she has the Biohazard Keycard. Head
back out to the front hall, across the skyway--pausing to
save your game--and use the Biohazard Keycard to open that
door. Two more acrobats aren't paying any attention on the
other side, and they almost demand a pair of silent knife kills.

The only unlocked door in this next room is the one on the
left. Go to the flashing cocoon on the wall and Use it. Rain
will change into a biohazard suit. Take a moment to
reconsider your inventory; you've lost all your weapons,
replacing them with the considerably-less-useful Plasma
Wrists. You've still got the Flash Disc and a Blasting Cap,
but you've gained a Video Room Keycard and a Bypass Keycard.
Remember what the green-suited woman said in the cutscene;
unnecessary rooms have been locked down, and all codes have
been changed.

>From here out, this becomes a stealth mission. If you pull a
weapon on the yellow-suited women, they'll respond in kind,
and they're much better with these things than you are. It's
easier and safer to just work around them. Head back to the
main hall and go through the door on the right.

In this hallway, there's a single locked door with six
digits on it. They don't work on this keypad, but write them
down anyway. Now, head back, through the main hall, into the
hallway on the right where you got the Biohazard Keycard.
Your Video Room Keycard will open the door on the left.

Go to the console with all the screens on it, and punch in
the number you just wrote down. You'll activate the video
archives system, and have to solve a relatively easy puzzle.

==================
PUZZLE: Video Maze
==================

Note the direction that the arrows are heading in. When you
press the control pad, you'll release your marker into the
maze. Send it to the right; it should flow into the outside
lanes of the maze. When it reaches the top "lane," send the
marker down twice, through two more lanes, and as it passes
over the red dot, hit down again. This is more a test of
your timing than anything else. (On Hard Mode, everything
about this puzzle is much faster, but nothing else has
changed.) When you solve this puzzle, you'll activate the
security screens.

There are nine screens here. Seven are worthless except as
curiosities, but the sixth and ninth hold valuable clues.
The sixth shows someone entering the code to the door in the
next hall--4615207--and the ninth shows the solution to the
next puzzle.

Leave the Video Room, go to the front hall, and cross the
hall to the next door. In this hallway, punch the code into
the keypad and enter the lab. There's nothing here at the
moment but unsuspecting acrobats, so leave them be. Use the
Bypass Keycard to enter the next room.

In this lab, Use the Flash Disk on the glowing red screen.
Unfortunately, the codes have been changed.

======================
PUZZLE: Alignment Code
======================

You still have the code. It's across the bottom of the
screen. Rearrange the digits of the code in the same pattern
as they were on the Video Room monitor to solve this puzzle.

In order, assuming the top slot is 1st and the bottom is 6th:
4: 3rd place
2: 5th place
B: 6th place
3: 2nd place
D: 6th place
A: 4th place

For further clarification:

- - - - - -
- - - 3 - -
4 - - - - -
- - - - - A
- 2 - - - -
- - B - D -

Arrange the letters in such a fashion. When you complete
this, you'll hear a chime.

Problem solved. Rain will radio Hana, who will promptly
trigger a motion sensor. Oops.

=====================
PUZZLE: Motion Sensor
=====================

Hana has 30 seconds to find a way out of this trap, or
she'll get nerve gassed. Y'know, if I were Hana, I wouldn't
even leave the house without a syringe of atropine. Run
across the room, to the door on the right-hand side, and
shoot the panel you find on the wall there. You'll turn off
the motion sensors and blow out a fusebox in another room.

I mention this as a puzzle because it's so counterintuitive
to all the other ways you solve problems in this game. I
discovered it by accident; I was just sweeping the room with
Uzi fire because I was frustrated.

Before you leave this room, grab the Dispersion Canister off
of the counter and get out the Arc Taser.

There's an acrobat in the lounge here. Zap her, pick up the
Security Keycard she dropped, and save. Leave through the
door to the left, zap another acrobat, and use the Security
Keycard to get through the door at the end of this hall. Use
the fusebox in this room and switch the fuse to the top
slot. You can also enter the right room on this hall, and
find a valuable clue on a computer. Remember how DNA's
various parts relate, and remember what colors they're
identified by on the filmstrip.

Now, go back to the lounge and leave through the door on the
right. Hana will start walking across a bridge. You'll have
your first encounter with Catseyes, so have that Arc Taser
at the ready, and remember to be wary of their explosions.

In the next room, two Catseyes are guarding a box of
Rockets, an EMP, a case of Flame Canisters, and two doors.
The door on the left has to be blown open with your Blasting
Cap, but it has radiant prizes inside: an SS 2000 and an RL
480. A Catseye and an acrobat are guarding them, but a
little taste of Arc Taser will win the day. (You can skip
this without any problem, admittedly, but the flamethrower
comes in handy later.)

Through the other door, two Catseyes are guarding the first
of the four labs you'll need to visit. Zap them and Use the
Hair Sample on the computer Jin showed you. You'll get the
Genetic ID Card.

Head back to the lounge and save. Go change the fuse again,
this time to the bottom slot, and Use the Security Keycard
to get through the door to the left of the fuse room. Zap
both the acrobats in this decontamination shower, and Use
the Genetic ID Card on the door at the end of the hall.

This room looks safe enough, but you'll notice that not only
does the Use prompt come up, but Hana takes damage if she
takes more than a couple of steps forward. Use the
Dispersion Canister to reveal yet another timing-required
hallway, this one lined with infrared lasers. This is fairly
simple as long as you're patient; there's plenty of room to
stand between the lasers. Once you get to the other side,
Use the door. Hana will radio Rain.

As Rain, go to the next room. A console that used to be dark
is now lit up. Use it to get Hana out of her present fix.

You'll go back to controlling Hana, who's had a Rush Moment.
Go through the now-unlocked door, and then through the door
right next to it. You'll be in a small room with a
cylinder-shaped object in the corner and a Catseye. Blast
the Catseye, and Use the E.L.P. (whatever that is) on the
heavy steel door. You'll get the Centrifuge Tubes. Now turn
around and Use those on the cylinder to receive the Purified
Tubes.

Head back the way you came. You need to change the fuse for
the last time. In the fuse room, put the fuse in the middle
slot, then head back to the darkened room where you started
the level. Zap a couple of sentry Catseyes and look around
for a gadget you can Use in the far corner of the room. When
you find it--no, not the computer, the other gadget, the one
that didn't have power earlier--Use the Purified Tubes on it.

You'll receive Gland Blot G, Blood Blot A, Nucleus Blot T,
and Cell Blot C. Each of these slides is a different color,
and you've seen four computers with screensavers flashing in
those four colors at various points on this floor. It's time
to do a little backtracking. Find those computers again--one's
in this room, one's in the room with the DNA film strip, one's
in the lab where you made the Genetic ID Card, and the final
one is in the laboratory just past the infrared laser room--and
Use the appropriate Blot on them. You'll receive four Discs:
Adenine, Cytosine, Guanine, and Thynine.

Be *very* careful while you're doing this. As usual, enemies
will repopulate the stage while you're accomplishing
plot-related tasks (you can always tell when you're doing
something right in this game, because the game will summon
opponents from the ether to try and kill you). A particularly
nasty ambush is waiting for you as you go back across the bridge
from the yellow computer, where two acrobats and a Catseye will
be right on top of you as you come through the door. I recommend
you pull out the SS 2000 and just kinda wave it around until
everything's dead. Dodge *this*, Carrie-Anne.

When you have all four disks, go to the room with the
centrifuge and go through the last door you haven't used.
You'll be in the DNA code room, littered with inactive
Catseyes. I've never seen these guys wake up, so don't worry
about them. Use the DNA Code Disk on the computer in this
room for Hana's last puzzle on this mission:

====================
PUZZLE: DNA Sequence
====================

As long as you remember a few things from your items and
from the film strip in the laboratory, you can breeze
through this puzzle. Specifically, remember how the colors
relate to each other.

Red always bonds to yellow, and blue always bonds to green.
Also note that you can use the Circle and Triangle buttons
to flip a "game piece" over.

In other words, match your "game pieces" to the empty spaces
in the DNA sequence. It's a bit time-consuming, but it is
easy. You can do this without any trouble unless you're
completely color-blind.

===========================
Part Six:
Weapons of Mass Distraction
===========================

After she gets the DNA sequence on disk, Hana will get the
skyway blown out from under her. You'll switch to Rain. You
need a distraction. Fortunately, one will present itself.

Head out to the main hall, and back through the Biohazard
door. Remember that big, shiny, candy-like red button that
you couldn't do anything with? Use it. You'll be ushered
into the room to the right that you couldn't enter before.
Walk up to the green-suited woman, and she'll hand you
something nasty. After she leads you into the containment
room, save your game.

Distraction, hm...? What have I *possibly* got that could
provide a *distraction*...?

Explosives! Why, of course! What occasion *doesn't* call
for explosives? Use the Blasting Cap on the window in the
containment vault. Rain will blow a hole in the vault glass
and radio Hana.

Stealth is out the window at this point, and the acrobats
know that you're an impostor. Equip the Plasma Wrists and go
out shooting. Three acrobats are in the lab room, and they
won't die easily (although I've noticed that if you skip the
post-explosion cutscene, they'll be "inactive" and you can
sneak up on one of them). With luck, though, they *will* die,
and you can get out of here. On your way to the next save
point, you'll need to dispatch a Catseye/acrobat team, as
well as two acrobats and two Catseyes in the main vault
room. Finally, there are three acrobats on the bridge
outside. Stay low and keep shooting, and with luck, you'll
win through to the save point on the bridge. Use it.

Keep running, regardless of whatever happens. An iris
shutter will start closing as you run towards the front
hall, but Rain will Wachowski her way through it if you
reach it in time. See, there's a reason she's so skinny:
it's because that's how she looks in the Matrix.

On the other side of the door, you've got company.

===============
BOSS: Spooky #2
===============

*Uh*-oh. No tricks this time; someone gave Spooky's brother
a containment suit and a gun the size of Rhode Island. He
already had the grudge.

Here's your key to winning this fight, a key that it took me
a shamefully long time to pick up on:

Duck.

That's right. Hold down R2 as the fight starts, and
immediately open up on Spooky with the Plasma Wrist. He
won't touch you with his machine gun barrage, and when he
goes to one knee, get up and run past him. When he stands
back up, quick-turn, kneel again, back away from him, and
fire at him all the while. He'll die before he can inflict
enough damage to you to kill you, and for some reason,
staying low confuses the AI. His rockets will miss.

With Spooky dead, Rain blows open the elevator shaft and
goes to join Hana. The mission is over.

======================
Part Seven:
No One Ever Goes There
======================

Hana and Rain get another change of plans dumped on them by
Jin. Meanwhile, a cutscene reintroduces you to Jakob "Deke"
Decourt, who I'd almost forgotten about by this point. When
you get control, pick up the Genetic Marker from the freshly
dead guy on the floor. This triggers a cutscene, after which
you'll have to make Deke outrun his own explosion. That's
some nice planning there, Deke.

After you've done this, Deke pauses to dress up like
Crocodile Dundee and meets with the Chinese guy. When the
cutscene's over, you're in some slums and you're being
swarmed by mutants. Ain't that always the way?

The mutants here are tough, but slow, and they don't have a
distance attack to speak of. Even better, when killed, each
one drops either 15 rifle bullets or 5 shotgun shells. Use
Deke's hand cannons to clear them out quickly (he does have
other weapons, but there's no good reason to use them), and
be sure to use your greater maneuverability to your
advantage (the continent of Antarctica has greater mobility
than the temple mutants). One of the first mutants you kill
will drop a Machine Key.

Go through the next door you see, wiping out mutants as you
go. There's a massive truck here with a Useable gas tank on
its front. Go to the next door, and you'll find Diesel Fuel
inside. Save your game, then head back to the truck. Use the
Diesel Fuel on the gas tank, climb the nearby ladder, and
Use the Machine Key on the truck's cab. Deke will start up
the truck and express his displeasure with the doublecross
in a creative, healthy fashion. Ugh. That is *not* coming
out of the grille.

At the side of the crater that swallowed your new truck, you
can find an RL 480 hidden in the shadows on the crater's
other side. I'd save that for Hana or Glas, though. Blowing
away the near-constant stream of mutants that keep dropping
from the sky, go through the nearest door. Inside, you'll
fight three mutants, one of which will drop an RL 480, and
another, an Elevator Lock Key.

Of the three new doors in here, two are locked. Shoot the
lock off the other with your current weapon, and repeat the
process on the other side. You'll come into an elevator room
and have to shoot two mutants off of yourself, but a save
point is your reward. Use the Elevator Lock Key on the
elevator to go up.

You're back outside. Ignore the two suicidal mutants ("Og
destroy intruderrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr..." *splat*), and busy
yourself with the two "dragon doors" in this area. Both
doors hold a welcoming committee of three mutants, but each
door also has an Ancient Crank behind it. The red door leads
to the Ancient Gold Crank; the gold door, the Red Crank. Use
the Cranks on the appropriate dragons in the appropriate
rooms, and the door between the two dragon doors will unlock.

The next room holds a save point and two doors. The one you
first see is a dead end, although there's a .90 pistol
hidden in the right corner; save that for someone who you'll
actually *use* again. You'll have to waste two more mutants
as you head for the other door, and once you do, one of them
will shut it behind you.

It's time to make your acquaintance with what I think of as
the priests; they look like the Servants of Oblivion in
Turok 3. They float around, they screech, they throw
themselves at you like robed lawn darts. They're easy to
dodge and you won't see them again after this disc, but I've
yet to find a weapon that will actually *kill* these jackasses.
They do fly back quite a distance when you hit them with rifle
fire, though. When you go to the door at the bottom of the
room--your only escape route, incidentally--you'll get another
mini-cliffhanger and lose control of Deke.

After a cutscene starring Glas, Hana arrives at the Temple
of Xi'an. She's not there a minute before she falls down
through a hole in the ground; you'll start off with her at
that same dead end you saw a moment ago with Deke. Grab the
.90 pistol now, if you like; this is the last time you'll
actually get some use out of the pistols, so go crazy. You
can't open the door Deke just went through yet, so head back
towards the elevator. At the bottom of the elevator shaft,
in the "infirmary," a dead mutant will drop the Archeology Key.

Going back into the room with two locked doors, the
Archeology Key unlocks the one closest to Hana. Inside, two
priests are having a sock hop. Keep them at bay with
judicious firepower and snatch up a RL 480 and the second
Mirror Segment. You now have a complete Mirror. This is your
key for the door Deke ran through, so go back and open it.

Dodge the trio of priests by the clever tactic of running in
a straight line--idiots--and go out the same door Deke did.
You'll wind up on a narrow mining tunnel, blowing away
mutants, which leads to *another* mining tunnel, which in
turn leads to an ambush. You'll switch back to Deke to
dispatch a trio of mutants, a task made irritating by Deke
having his Sonic Boom equipped at the beginning of the
fight. Switch weapons as fast as you can and take out the
mutants, then go through the door on the left side of the
screen.

You'll have to dispatch another mutant or two, but a
cutscene awaits behind the door at the top of the ramp.
Deke, Hana, and Glas meet again for the first time, and
Glas gives Hana two Bandages. After a doublecross and an
interruption, you finally play as Glas--in his mech.

Muahahahaha.

You've only got one weapon: the chaingun on the mech. It's
enough. It might be all I'll ever need. Take out mutants and
walls along the way to... crashing the mech. Damn.

Meanwhile, Hana corners Deke, but then has to fight off some
mutants. You'll take control of Hana again. Cap the mutants
and head up the taller of the two ladders. In the next room,
Rain shows up in the nick of time, and you wind up taking
control of *her*. Criminy. And now, we shall play "Musical
Gunmen." Start the tape!

There's another .90 pistol lying right next to Rain. Grab it
and head down the tunnel; you'll wind up retracing Hana's
steps. The rendezvous point at the top of the stairs is a
wreck, but it's also a save point; of the three mutants
guarding it, two of them will drop RL 480s. If you want the
game's "good ending," *go here.* The previously locked door
to the side of that tunnel is now open. Go through that,
down the ladder, up the ladder, and through the door, where
you'll find Deke. One emotionally charged moment later, where
Deke reveals that he either isn't human or is the single most
extreme bungee jumper in the history of his race--so extreme,
in fact, that he doesn't use a *cord*--you'll switch back to
Glas. Note that Glas being dropped on his head is a theme of
the FE series as a whole.

Boy, when Eidos designs a level, they use it to its fullest
extent, don't they? You've crashed down into the courtyard
by the elevator, but your mech's blocking the way to the
dragon doors. Take the elevator down to the lift room
and save your game. Go back out to the area where Deke
crashed his truck, and an old man will give you a Peach and
the Storage Room Key. That Key will unlock the last of the
locked doors around these parts, so quick-turn--ignore the
mutant--and get in there, but ready the Shotgun first.

Two mutants will catch you in very close quarters in the
storage room. Take 'em out quickly, and grab the Rockets and
the RL 480 that they drop. A bundle of Dynamite is on a
barrel in the upper right-hand corner, so take that as well.

Backtrack to the wreck of your mech--watch out for the
surprise mutant in the elevator--and Use the Dynamite on the
wall next to it. Be careful--the explosion can and will hurt
you. You'll clear the way to the dragon door. Go through the
center door, save, and go play dodge 'em with the priests
again. That's right; you're following this path for the
*third time*. When you reach the room where Hana caught up
with Deke, Hana will help you fight back a sudden rush of
mutants. Dispatch them with the Uzis Glas pulls out, or
switch to the assault rifle. Either way, this isn't too
tricky unless you get cornered or run out of ammunition at
a bad moment. When you win, you'll get a ridiculous number
of rocket shells and rifle clips, as well as a cutscene
where Hana and Glas come to an uneasy armistice.

=============
Part Eight:
Unrest Easily
=============

After a long cutscene, you're back in control of Hana.
You'll start at a save point with Glas nearby; irritatingly,
this is the only save point on the level. Run forward, into
the tomb. Take note of the strange glyphs on the walls and
head out to the left. There's a door on the left of this
hallway; inside are three skeleton warriors and 20 shotgun
shells, if you're running low on ammunition. Otherwise, skip
it, as it's far more trouble than it's worth. Using up twelve
shells to get twenty isn't much of a trade, particularly when
you might very well get killed doing it.

Head down the path, to the circular room, and climb down the
ladder. You'll enter a cutscene where a ghost appears to
Hana and tells her that if she doesn't abandon her quest,
she will feel great pain. Hana refuses to abandon Rain and
attacks the ghost without effect; the ghost laughs and sends
Hana on her way with some gifts. When it's over, you'll have
been given a Hair Pin, a chunk of Gold Buillion, the Sun
Coin, and the Moon Coin.

==================
PUZZLE: Coin Panel
==================

This panel is on the wall in the hallway. You should've seen
it on your way to the ghost's meeting. Now, revisit it, and
Hana will automatically insert the Sun and Moon Coins.

You should have noticed one of several panels on the walls
in the main hall has a sun and a moon in it. Press the Moon,
then the Sun Coin--the top, then the bottom--and press the
bottom switch. You'll give yourself thirty seconds to get to
that door before it closes. This is a piece of cake.

Inside, you'll find a storeroom. The Terra Cotta Key is on a
desk, but to get it, you'll have to dispatch a reanimated
statue. Much like most of the hand-to-hand fighters in this
game, the statues are only as dangerous as you allow them to
be. Take this guy out with a few shotgun blasts from across
the room, and it's the end of the threat. Of course, you
won't always be able to do this, but the theory is sound.

The Terra Cotta Key fits a door on the upper level of the
circular room. Use it. You'll be let into an atrium
surrounding a pool. On the raised dias, you'll be revisited
by the ghost. One cutscene later, you'll appear in front of
a Chinese building, wearing Chinese clothes and without any
of your weapons. You've still got most of your "quest"
items, however.

=======================
PUZZLE: The Haunted Inn
=======================

Something to take note of for these "puzzles" is that the
spirit guiding you is *never* just talking to hear the sound
of his own voice. He's giving you clues. The clue here is,
"...in a moment of self-reflection..."

Use the Gold Buillion on the man standing near you. He'll
give you back the Inn Room Key and the Butterfly Coin. Run
down to the other end of this hallway and Use the Inn Room
Key.

If you simply Use the bed, Hana will only get a restless
night's sleep. You need to Use one of your items.

Use the Mirror on the bed. Hana will go to sleep with it on
her chest, and the ghost will recognize his own folly.
You'll rematerialize in the poolside area. Take note of the
symbols on the door in here, as you'll need to know them. As
you leave, the statues will reanimate, so take care of them
now; if you don't, you'll have to do it later, under a time
limit.

Outside, Use the Coin Panel again, and this time, press the
Butterfly and Moon Coins. You'll open another doorway in the
main hall.

Two skeletal warriors are just inside this doorway. Move a
bit to your left, and only one will reanimate. Take him out
with shotgun blasts or sustained rifle fire, then cautiously
activate and dispatch the other. Taking on more than one
skeleton warrior in close quarters is one of the fastest
ways to die in this game, so, well, don't do it.

There are three new doors among the winding paths in the
next room, but you can only open the one furthest to the
left. Ready the assault rifle and walk through it; remember
what I said about fast ways to die? This room is one of
them. Once inside, stick the rifle in a skeleton warrior's
face and blow him away. Change clips and do the same to his
friend. Now, and only now, get anywhere near the guardian
statue. It'll reanimate, and you can take care of it. After
all of this, claim the Dig Key.

Head back out onto the winding path. The Dig Key unlocks the
next door over. Inside, cautiously creep down, then against
the left side of the room. Two guardian statues will
animate, but from here, you can hit them both at the same
time with shotgun blasts. Dispatch them and take the Wood
Planks.

Finally, Use the Wood Planks on the last door.

=====================
PUZZLE: Night and Day
=====================

Another hint, if you will: the important thing the ghost
says here is his speech about the dragon and the phoenix.

Talk to the villagers to get the Astronomy Key. It will open
the nearby door.

Inside, all you can Use are the two window blinds. One has a
dragon behind it, while the other has an egg (or something).
Remember what the villagers said about their daughter, and
the ghost's tale of how day becomes night and night, day.

Open one blind and close the other, revealing the dragon and
concealing the phoenix egg. When you leave the shack again,
it will be night, and a ghost will drift by you. Follow her
and her slippers to the well, and Use it. You'll get the
Remains.

Return to the house. Open the closed blind and close the
open one to bring back the day. Outside, Use the Remains on
the villagers to receive the Lily Coin and pass this test.

Now, because the ghost is a jerk and wants you dead, he puts
you back down in a room with a statue in one corner, 20
shells in another, and makes sure you're not armed. Ready
the shotgun before you take a step, and be ready to greet
the statue with five quick blasts. Then grab the shells and
leave.

Head outside and save your game, then put the Lily Coin into
the Coin Panel. Press the Butterfly, Lily, and Moon Coins in
order to open the door back in the atrium. You'll have to
whack a couple of skeletons on your way there, though. The
most bizarre boss in the game is through this door.

==============
BOSS: The Wall
==============

This guy's tricky, but the Evasion roll will win the day yet
again. He shoots sprays of rockets at you, and they go in a
certain direction depending on what face he shows. The
minotaur shoots straight forward, and is the only face of
the Wall which can be injured. The skeleton shoots to the
right, while the samurai shoots to the left. Stay out of
their way and wait for your opening. Rifle clips occasionally
show up during this fight, but they do so right in front of
the Wall. I'm not going to get those. Are you?

When the Wall's dead (crumbled?), run through the hole
you've created.

===============
PUZZLE: Justice
===============

The important part of the speech here is that justice is blind.

Get the Clay Pot from the small stack of them to your left
to see a cutscene, then walk forward and Use the gong. The
judge will throw you out of court. Walk back to the same
stack of pottery to talk to the ghost of Wong Lin again.

The guardian statues are blocking her, huh? What could you
possibly do... Justice is blind.

Use the two Bandages on the statues. Hana will blindfold
them. (I'd be a lot happier if I'd actually reasoned this
out, rather than Using everything in my inventory on the
statues until something worked.) Use the Clay Pot on the
judge, and you'll receive the Bull Coin.

When you reappear in the Tomb, you'll be standing on top of
20 shotgun shells. Outside in the Wall's room, two skeleton
warriors are waiting for you, and whatever you left alive in
the atrium is still there. Cap 'em and get outside the tomb
to save. You've got an Aussie to shoot at.

On the Coin Panel, press the Sun, Butterfly, Moon, Lily, and
Bull Coins in. The large cube in the front hall will slide
into the floor. Unfortunately, those statues that have been
making Hana's heart monitor kick in since you started this
trip are also going to animate. Take care of them with the
fading remnants of your ammo supply, then jump down after Deke.

Unfortunately, that might not be Deke after all.

==========
BOSS: Deke
==========

Your assault rifle is the best thing for Deke right now, and
even then, it'll only do damage while Deke himself is
visible. Hold L2 and use your Evasion roll to dodge the
readily telegraphed, slow-as-hell grenades he's firing. When
Deke rematerializes, shoot him. Rifle clips will
occasionally show up, so watch for those. You probably need
them by this point.

This isn't all that tough, really. The trick is to only roll
back and forth right in front of Deke, rather than letting
him chase you all over the battlefield.

After he's gone, Hana will get the Emperor's Plaque, and
outside, Glas will get doublecrossed and dropped into a pit.
As Glas, save your game, equip the shotgun, and rampage
through the hallways like a mad god. Guardian statues will
try to stop you. They will fail.

Eventually, you'll reach an old man. He'll only fight you
for about a second before Hana comes to Glas' "rescue." Hana
will then proceed to get both her and Glas into a bit of
trouble.

==========
Part Nine:
Tests
==========

After the Emperor's cutscene, you'll begin as Glas. The left
mirror takes you to a puzzle of sorts, while the right
mirror takes you to a dangerous maze. I recommend you start
with the left-hand mirror, and save your game every time
you're back in this room.

================
PUZZLE: Conquest
================

You'll have to win four "chess" matches to continue. Your
tools:

Small Soldier: 10/10
Medium Soldier: 20/20
Large Soldier: 35/35

The weaker a piece is, the further it can move in a round.

When one of these pieces tries to capture another, the
stronger one will win, but will take "damage" roughly
equivalent to how strong its opponent was. For example, a
Large Soldier beating up on a Medium Soldier will win, but
will walk away at 15/35 strength; the same is true if the
Medium Soldier attacks the Large. Soldiers with equal point
values will stalemate, and both pieces will be taken off
the board.

The AI for these four matches isn't really very good, so you
should be fine. The trick, I find, is to sacrifice a Medium
Soldier early on to dispatch your enemy's Small Soldiers,
thus giving yourself the movement advantage. When that's
done, whittle down your enemy's numbers and use your highly
mobile Small Soldiers to reach and capture your enemy's flag.

The fourth battle is a bit trickier, in that you have seven
Medium Soldiers while your opponent has two Small, three
Medium, and two Large. Once again, the key is in movement:
sacrifice one Medium to kill both of his Small, then whittle
away his forces until he's down to Large Soldiers. You can't
even force a stalemate in this fight; he's got more numbers.
However, Large Soldiers move like bricks, so you can easily
outmaneuver them with Medium Soldiers.

When you win, the General will give you the Bravery Medal,
and tell you the story of Qin Shiquahandi (and I know I
didn't spell that right). Afterwards, he'll return you to
the outside room. Step through the right mirror, and it's
back to straight platformer action. There are five tests on
this level, and you have to pass each one if you want to
succeed.

1: Pass the flame spouts. This is easy work; just watch the
patterns and move. Actually, Glas won't get into any real
fights for quite a while, so you could run straight through
this section, taking three hits, and still be fine.

2: As you round the corner, another stone golem will emerge
from behind you. Start running, and don't stop; hug the
curves and don't run against the corridors' "walls." Once
you get to the curved platform, quite some distance away,
the walkway will collapse and he'll get off your ass. This
is straightforward, but may take practice.

3: This intricate maze will collapse if you're on the wrong
part of it at the wrong time. Slowly work your way along the
bottom, staying as low as you can, and keep running. You
should be able to outrun the inevitable collapse.

4: Thread your way carefully through the geysers of fire. I
usually go straight through the bottom here, where the
pattern is thinnest and easiest to see.

5: The stone golem returns! You have a bigger head start
this time, but he's moving a little faster. Once you've
beaten him, move towards the glowing light in the distance.

Glas is done; it's Hana's turn. As before, the left mirror
is a puzzle, while the right is a test of wits and speed.

====================
PUZZLE: Sliding Maze
====================

Oh. *This* puzzle. Damn this puzzle to *hell*.

Either this maze is random each time you play, or it's at
least different on the second play through. In general--once
again, the point of this puzzle isn't at all obvious--you
need to slide the colored stones into the tray at the bottom
of the board. Whenever you press against a stone with your
playing piece, it will skid all the way to the edge of the
board. Gray stones will slide right off the bottom of the
board unless they hit the tray.

Be *very* careful with your token. You can ruin the entire
maze by accidentally hitting a gray stone. The solution is
really just a question of time, but it can be awfully
frustrating.

With the maze solved, Hana undertakes the same maze that
Glas just did. The differences here are small and subtle:

-- Hana is discernibly faster than Glas. Outrunning the
golems should be a piece of cake.
-- Fire spouts are blocking the route Glas took through the
collapsing maze. You'll need to go through the bottom route,
then slowly work your way up to the top.
-- The pattern on the second set of fire spouts is a bit
different, but not tragically so.

When Hana passes her tests, you'll be given a Mercury Vial
and a Pearl. The door Qin Sheng opens for you leads to a
barge. Still in control of Hana, you'll need to convince the
bargemen to move.

Use the Emperor's Plaque on the throne, then go to the front
of the boat and use the Mercury Vial. You'll get to
steppin'. Next stop: Penglai Shan.

====================
Part Ten:
Demons In the Garden
====================

Hana will lose track of Deke and Glas in the fog, and wind
up alone. For right now, this place is quiet and somewhat
peaceful, so you can relax.

Through the doors on either side of you, you can pick up
four Bridge Tiles, off of floor tiles that look like Chinese
characters. Take them back to the main hall, where you can
Use them on the water. This will create a bridge.

Inside, you'll meet an old woman. She sets you onto your
latest challenges, gives you a Tiger Plaque and Dragon
Plaque, and sends you on your way; meanwhile, a
white-skinned man in a red robe summons purple demons.
PROTIP: Uh-oh.

Outside, an old man will give you a Digging Tool and a
Chinese Fan. From here out, you're on your own. This part of
the game follows the Space Quest school of puzzle design,
where the answers don't always make a lot of sense, and
where seemingly ornamental parts of the level are actually
vital parts of the problem. Check *everything* here to see
if it can be Used or Taken, particularly if it's goofy-looking.

You can save your game in the gazebo area; in the Water
Garden, on the same screen as the water wheel; and in the
Earth Garden, just across the bridge to it. The Chinese
characters in the floor are now teleporters, which will take
you to different elemental realms if you Use them. More to
the point, there are now teleporting demons all over Hell's
half-acre, and they're arguably the most dangerous enemies yet.

A note on the teleporting demons: each one takes two good
shotgun blasts to put down, and all of them drop five
shotgun shells when killed. They're very fast, and their
ability to teleport can result in some very, very bad
situations. Your best weapon against them is your own
mobility, as they don't lope as fast as you can run, and
they never actually teleport right into your path. If more
than one of them comes after you at once, run until you have
space to quick-turn and shoot once, then keep running. You
have to be careful, fast, and smart, or they'll tear you up.
Single demons are best dealt with by careful and precise
shotgun blasts as they lope towards you.

(On Hard mode, the Elemental Gardens turn into a deathtrap.
The demons take at least three shells to kill, they drop
three shells, I could swear they're faster, they occasionally
appear in groups of three, they will teleport right into
your path like the world's ugliest speed bump, and they guard
the save points with a fanatic's zeal. And yes, I managed to
beat the level. I wish bragging about this sort of thing
wasn't so bloody pathetic, you know? 'Else I'd be strutting
like a rooster.)

So. In case it's not horribly obvious, here's where the
various garden tiles will teleport you:

 Upper left: Gold
 Lower left: Water
Upper right: Fire
Lower right: Earth

In each elemental realm, there are more tiles on the floor.
These tiles will teleport you to the other Realms, so you
don't have to backtrack through the main garden. A pale gray
tile will teleport you back to the Realm's corresponding
section of the Garden. Note that the Gold Realm is the only
area in the entirety of the Challenges that demons haven't
overrun.

Blue tile: Water
 Red tile: Fire
Gold tile: Gold
Aqua tile: Earth

In order of the Challenges, here's the best way to proceed
(not mentioning anything about wiping out the demons,
because, well, yes, you *should* be doing that, what do I
have to do, hold your hand?):

1: Teleport to Earth. In this cavern, there's a weird
section of earth that looks like a fanged mouth. Use the
Digging Tool on it to get the Rock Salt.

2: Teleport to Fire. Pick up the Empty Gourd from the bench
next to the furnace.

3: Teleport to Water. Use the Rock Salt on the cylindrical
gadget next to the pier. This'll grind it fine, turning it
into Salt.

4: Go to the end of the pier. Use the Salt on the water.
This will kill the monsters, and Hana, of her own violition,
will dive down to get the Water Crystal. In the process,
she'll break the Digging Tool.

5. Use the Empty Gourd on the water to fill it. Now you have
a Salt Water Gourd.

6: Teleport to the Water Garden. Be careful of the demons,
and Use the water wheel by the save point. This will desalinate
the water in the Water Realm, turning it fresh again (just
how much salt did you dump in there?).

7: From the garden, teleport to Gold. (You didn't teleport
straight there from Water because, well, you needed to use
the water wheel anyway, and if you teleport into the garden
from Gold, you'll materialize with demons on either side of
you. It's not a good time.) Use the Salt Water Gourd on a
section of the "mud" here to form a plank.

8:
========================
PUZZLE: Golden Platforms
========================

This is simple. Watch the pattern and move. If your feet
touch the "mud," you'll take a hit; dying here means Hana
gets changed into a gold statue (or, if you prefer, she gets
"Midasized"). The only tricky part of this comes with the
upper right-hand platform, which is out to screw you over.
You'll need to alternate between it and the middle platform
a couple of times before you can move on.

Also, take note of the platform at the top center, which
connects the upper-right and upper-left platforms. This
platform appears twice during the main pattern, and the
*second* time is when it appears in conjunction with the
upper-left platform. Watch for that; it's probably the
single most irritating thing about this particular puzzle.

For all of this, you'll receive an Empty Goblet and the Gold
Crystal. With the Gold Crystal in your hands, the puzzle
deactivates, and you can cross it safely.

9: Teleport to Water. Fill the Goblet and Gourd with fresh
water from the pier.

(Optional: from Water, teleport to the Water Garden and save
your game. The further along you get on this quest, the more
demons show up and the more frenzied they get. Right about
now, I started saving my game every time I accomplished
something, but I usually had to waste two or three demons to
do it. The Water Garden is also the single safest place to
teleport back to the Garden, as here, and here only, demons
don't typically hang out right on either side of the
teleportation square.)

10: Teleport to Fire. Stand on the center tile and Use the
Fresh Water Goblet. One of the flames behind you will flare
up. Step into it and only it--it can't hurt Hana now--and
Take the Fire Crystal.

11: In Fire, note that the furnace is now lit. In order, Use
the Empty Goblet and Broken Digging Tool on it; you'll fix
the Digging Tool.

12: Teleport to Earth. Back where you found the Rock Salt,
Use, in order, the Digging Tool, Fire Crystal, Water
Crystal, Gold Crystal, and Fresh Water Gourd. If you were
wondering when the element of Wood came into play, there you
go. You'll receive a Diamond.

13: Teleport to Water, then back to the Water Garden. Three
more demons will try to stop you on your way out, so don't
get too complacent.

14: Head to the gazebo. Use the Diamond on the wooden doors,
and you've passed the Elemental Challenges. Hana walks into
the light...

==================
Part Eleven:
It Isn't Even Past
==================

The past isn't dead. It isn't even past.
    -- William Faulkner

I enjoy using wildly inappropriate quotes for stuff like
this, or at least quoting "high culture" when discussing
"low culture." This level is the hardest part of the game.

Glas, wandering in the fog, has a flashback. Suddenly, he's
in military garb, short-haired, and barking orders into a
headset. Wherever he is, it's a while ago, and he's back in
the middle of something violent.

As usual when you're suddenly thrust into a new situation,
take a minute to examine your inventory. You've acquired a
Grappling Hook, your ammo supply has evened out some, and
you've got an EMP.

Cautiously creep towards the screen, past the inactive mech.
There are two guys standing on the mech's other side, and
I'll take a moment to mention how all soldiers in this stage
are enormous bastards; they can do evasion rolls, just like
you. They can also absorb a wildly ridiculous amount of
punishment... just like you. As a general rule, the assault
rifle or shotgun both work well against them, although
prohibitive amounts of ammo are required. Another useful
tactic is to get out a flamethrower and hold down the
trigger on them, following their rolls and hitting them
as they stand back up. Either way, you'll need to be careful.
This stage is your last chance to get any sneak kills, so
take advantage of that.

Open up on these two with your rifle. It'll probably take
you a full clip, but just try to follow them when they roll
out of the way. With a little luck, you can catch at least
one of them by surprise. When they fall backward shooting
into the air, they're dead. One has a Gate Key, so grab
that. Also, check around the parked forklift on the
right-hand side of this room for a SS 2000. You'll be
getting boatloads of flame canisters on this level, so you
might as well get to the settin' on fire.

Head out the door those two were guarding. There's a mech
coming right for you, so ready the EMP and fire the moment
it comes onscreen. While it's stunned--which won't be for
long; have I mentioned that the EMP is a gyp?--run past it
and use the Gate Key on the door.

Through this door, you'll find two guards. The one you can
see has a rifle, and you can pick him off from here. The
other has a flamethrower, and will casually attempt to creep
towards you. Shoot him from your vantage point, and he can't
even return fire.

There's only one door in here, and you can't open it right
now. Backpedal, and--hoo boy. The mech will crash through
the outside doors. The moment you regain control of Glas,
open fire with the assault rifle, and you should knock over
the mech. Glas will use it to climb to safety.

Up on the rooftops, there's one guy in front of you with a
flamethrower, and a second hiding in the shadows behind you.
Take out the one in the shadows first, and then you can
leisurely riddle the other guy with bullets. Use the
Grappling Hook to swing across to the next rooftop, where
two more riflemen and another flamethrower await their
gruesome deaths. Give it to them, then Use the corner where
prompted to jump across.

On this rooftop, there's a gridwork of fifteen fans in a
row. The one in the dead center stops occasionally.
Cautiously make your way across the fans and Use it while
it's stopped. Glas will drop down a ventilation shaft into a
warehouse, where he'll grab a C4 charge. There's a save
point here.

Outside, you'll climb into a thoughtlessly unattended mech.
Unfortunately, you'll then get into a fight with another
mech, which is an exercise in frustration. Open up on it and
any stray soldiers with your chaingun, and just try to be as
accurate as you can. It will die... eventually.

Once it does, turn and run down the street in the other
direction. A helicopter will open up on your mech, but it
can't do much damage unless you stand still and let it. Keep
moving, whatever happens, until you see a ladder. Glas will
automatically abandon his mech once you reach it, and you'll
be back on the rooftops with a helicopter shooting at you.
Glas seems to attract these kinds of situations.

Fortunately, this time, there's none of that stupid "shoot
the flags down" nonsense. Run over to the raised object next
to Glas. You can't Use it, but that doesn't matter, because
Glas will eventually use it of his own violition. It's an
anti-aircraft gun, and he'll shoot down the helicopter.
After that, he'll swing across the rooftops again, and wind
up behind a pair of soldiers. Kill them with all due speed.
One of them has the Utility Key. Use it to open the nearby
trap door, and hop down behind another soldier. A Crowbar is
your reward for killing him.

Open the nearby trapdoor again. Glas will come up behind yet
another unwary soldier. Kill him. The nearby door will let
you back into the first room of the stage, with a soldier
right nearby and two more coming. Save your game here.

Outside, where the mech was, two soldiers are standing
guard. Take 'em out. Two more are inside the hangar where
the mech ambushed you, and the locked door in here can be
opened with the Utility Key. One more guard is behind it
with his back to you, just asking for a sneak kill. Do it,
and exit through the trapdoor.

Glas will set the C4 and run for it. The explosion totals
large chunks of the base, and puts you in a bad situation.

=====================
PUZZLE: Electric Maze
=====================

Save. Your. Damn. Game.

This does look completely impossible at first, but careful
study will show you how to do this. The electrical arc
always flashes at specific patterns--large flash, pause,
half-flash, half-flash, pause, large flash, and so on--and
the half-flashes follow the lines drawn on the floor.

Study the floor during large and half-flashes. There are
small bits of wreckage, scattered on the floor, which aren't
conducting electricity. You need to make carefully timed
dashes towards them, wait out the flashes, and move
carefully from wreckage to wreckage. This is frustrating,
and allows for almost no margin for error, but it can be done.

When you get to the door, pull out your EMP and use the Gate
Key to unlock it. The moment you're through, hold down the X
button and fire; there's a mech breathing down your neck. As
the mech is stunned, hit Square twice to change weapons and
wax the one soldier in here. When he falls dead, ready the
EMP again and fire it to stun the mech again, then use the
Gate Key to get out of this deathtrap.

Boy, never a dull moment, huh? The next two rooms have three
soldiers each, two with rifles, one with a flamethrower. Gun
them down with wild bursts of assault rifle fire and, in the
second room, find the door under the red light. It may take
a bit of exploring. When you do find it, Use the Crowbar to
pry it open.

Inside this remarkably sterile and peaceful laboratory, Use
the guy on the table. This is the cue for a lengthy
cutscene. When it's over, run for the gun on the floor,
which is about two steps in front of you, and you'll be done
with the flashback. You'll receive a Paper Doll from Glas'
brother during this cutscene.

Glas rematerializes in the Elemental Gardens, by the Gold
tier. While he can teleport to the Elemental Realms the same
way Hana did, there's really no need. Cautiously slaughter a
few more demons and leave via the gazebo.

============
Part Twelve:
Final Exams
============

All of those esoteric items Glas and Hana have been picking
up are about to come in handy. Each room they enter in these
tests has an emblem hanging on a door somewhere. Use the
item that you have which looks like that emblem. In order,
on each floor, you'll Use the Bell, Phoenix, Chinese Fan
(you actually Use this on the first two squares of the floor
puzzle, which makes it the exception that proves the rule),
Paper Doll, Mirror, Bravery Medal, Hair Pin (I was hoping
to use this to pick a lock; imagine my disappointment), and
Peach (and how that Peach has remained unsquashed after all
of the things Glas has been thrown off of, I'll never know).

===========
First test:
Hana will play an ancient Chinese version of "Simon." There
are eight steps, all of which are pressed fairly slowly.
This is a hard test to fail.

(On Hard mode, this test starts with three button presses
and goes as high as eight. They don't grow off of each
other, either. I recommend watching the pattern and writing
down the number of the buttons as it goes, then putting it
in. Otherwise, this gets real tricky. Then again, I always
did suck at "Simon.")

============
Second test:
Glas will encounter the pasty white woman in the cheongsam
again. She challenges him to a child's game. You have to
beat her to the dragon's eye.

This is one of those games that's so easy that it's actually
difficult. In short, try to roll high at the beginning, then
try to roll low when you get near the end. Whatever you do,
try to stay just behind or way ahead of the Immortal's pip;
she has a nasty habit of rolling *just* what she needs to
knock you back a few spaces. If you lose, you can try again.
And again. And again.

(On Hard Mode, the computer rolls high consistently.)

===========
Third test:
This is the last puzzle of the game, and it's a doozy.

===================
PUZZLE: Floor Tiles
===================

This is the one that made me beat my head against the table
and go looking online for help. I wasn't able to figure this
out given the clues provided; alert reader M. Piatko says
that the "safe" tiles are the ones on either side of the
exit door, and the "activation" tiles--the ones that ring
out with a faint chime when you step on them--are the ones
on either side of the entrance door.

In any event, here's the solution to the puzzle, courtesy of
Kevin Kaelin's FE2 walkthrough at www.gameshark.com. You
need to step on the tiles marked in order, or you will incur
wounds. (Incidentally, you get a Rush Moment at the beginning
of each new test, from the character switch, so don't worry
too much about damage.) Here is the solution:

      0 0
3 x x x 8 x x x
| x x - - 4 x x
- 2 - | x x x 7
6 x x | x - - |
x x x 1 - | 5 x
      S 0

In case it's not fully apparent from Baby's First ASCII Art
here, you'll start from the bottom tiles, on the one marked
S. These will reset the puzzle if you screw up.

If the above doesn't make any sense, think of the puzzle this
way, like a grid:

  +-1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8
A | x x x x x x x x
B | x x x x x x x x
C | x x x x x x x x
D | x x x x x x x x
E | x x x x x x x x
          S

The solution to the puzzle then becomes:

E4, D4, C4, C3, C2, C1, B1, A1
retrace to C4
C4, B4, B5, B6
retrace to E4
E4, E5, E6, E7
retrace to E4
E4, D4, C4, C3, C2, C1, D1
retrace to E4
E4, E5, E6, D6, D7, D8, C8
retrace to E4
E4, D4, C4, B4, B5, A5
Clear.

Boy. Didn't *that* suck. Onward.

============
Fourth test:
Glas must choose between his brother and his father. It's a
trick question; either way you play this, you have to fight
the Teleporting Demon From Hell.

In most ways, this guy's identical to the teleporting demons
from the Elemental Gardens, but if he gets close, he'll
exhale flame instead of clawing at you. This isn't a true
"boss fight," in that there's no life meter, but this demon
can take all the love you have to give. After using up three
rifle clips and three Uzi clips on him, then dying, I
switched to the rocket launcher, and yes, I know I said not
to use it. Shut up. *That* did the trick in about five shots
(eight shots on Hard Mode).

===========
Fifth test:
Did you cap any of the cowering guys in jumpsuits, back in
the aqueduct? If you did,  o/~ you're in trouble... o/~ One
of the Eight Immortals was apparently masquerading as the
guy who gave you the first Mirror Fragment, and he objects
to your shabby treatment of his brethren.

If you spared all of the technicians, he compliments Hana
on her compassion (either he didn't watch the opening cutscene,
or he didn't much care for Leung) and lets her pass without
further incident. Needless to say, this is why I was
encouraging you to leave the technicians the hell alone.

==============
BOSS: Immortal
==============

What's-his-face will teleport from corner to corner in his
room, moving fast and not staying in one place for long.
When he does stick around, he'll raise his sword and throw
purple lightning at you. If it doesn't hit in that initial
blast--I'm not entirely sure it *can* hit--it collects at
the center of the room and sweeps around counterclockwise.
You can dodge it without much trouble.

The big problem in this fight is that the Immortal has
decreed that he's immune to your weapons. You have to get up
in his face and kick him to death if you want to get this
done. You can do this, regardless of how bloody stupid an
idea it seems to be. Run in when he raises his sword and
kick him a couple of times, then dodge his lightning and
repeat. All in all, this is remarkably simple.

(I was able to beat this Immortal on the first try in
Normal mode, when a single kick skims about a tenth off of
his life meter. However, in so doing, I was nearly killed.
You can safely assume that the Immortal is far more dangerous
in Hard mode, just like everything else.)

===========
Sixth test:
Why is it that more of Glas' tests involve mortal danger?
Glas must now face his ultimate enemy...

================
BOSS: Royce Glas
================

A recurring theme in my leisure time recently is that of
oneself as one's worst enemy. First I watch "Evangelion,"
then I read _The Great Gatsby_, now this. Criminy.

Evil Glas, or at least Considerably Less Morally Ambiguous
Glas, is really just you with more ammunition and a bigger
health bar. He alternates wildly between rolling grenades,
shooting rockets, and opening up on you with his assault
rifle. He's used the flamethrower a couple of times, too.

Treat Glas like a particularly tenacious normal enemy. Most
any weapon will wear away quite nicely at his health bar. If
you're quick on the control pad, the only thing you have to
worry about is his assault rifle, and even that's only minor
damage. Use the pillars for cover, sneak up on him, and let
him have it. Some of the tactics you developed to deal with
the rolling soldiers in the flashback will come in handy here,
since Glas rolls around a lot if you get the drop on him.
If you hit him with an SS 2000 volley, Glas will roll to avoid
it, and you can just track him from roll to roll until the
flame runs out or he dies.

============
Seventh test:
We get a glimpse at Hana's childhood, and her first meeting
with Rain. The ghost from the Queen's Tomb offers her a choice:
Rain, or her parents? The life that might be yet, or the life
that could have been?

I haven't picked Hana's parents. Rain seemed to me to be the
natural choice, and as I didn't get killed or get into a
fight, it would seem to be the right one. The Immortal will
warn you that you've picked a path fraught with sorrow, and
send you on your way.

============
Eighth test:
To Glas' consternation, the old man with the missing donkey
is the Eighth Immortal. Glas must take a final gamble on a
platform floating in space, because he was brought into all
of this by sheer chance.

You start off with a choice between two blocks to step on.
One will hurt you; one won't. Pick one and trust to luck, as
they've been different both times that I've played through.
This theme continues, although, fortunately, you shouldn't
have too much trouble with this. Choosing wrong doesn't
damage you that badly, so you can probably manage to bulldog
your way through unless you pick *very* badly.

That's the last test. It's time to meet Rachel Kazra and settle
this. Glas gets some more of the answers, and steps through
the last gate.

==============
Part Thirteen:
Showdown
==============

You start as Glas, in this, the Void. Save your game. Move
forward and Rain will teleport in, waving a *really*
vicious-looking needle. Suddenly, Deke shows up... with
Rain. Or is it Mist? Hana arrives just in time to keep Deke
and Glas from shooting each other (they had to do the John
Woo guns-to-each-other's-heads pose sooner or later), and
the choice is left up to her. Which Rain is which?

You'll be given a crosshair and both Qins to choose from.
One has a needle; the other, the Flash Disc. Think about
it for a moment; which is more appropriate to the character
we've known throughout the game? More to the point, why
would Mist have given Deke the EINDS cure? Furthermore, do
you remember the opening cutscene from Disc 1, showing Rain's
dream? That needle one Rain has got looks a *lot* like the
one that got shoved into Qin Zheng's sleeping head...

In other words, the Rain with the disk is the real one.
Shoot the one on the left; Hana's pointing at her anyway.

A tearful reunion will follow, but things don't go your way
for long. Mist gets back up and jams the needle in herself.
Her mother is with her--there's no family resemblance--and
Mist will help her bring about their goals.

That's the theory, anyway. Now you get to disprove it.

==============
BOSS: Mist Qin
==============

If you shot Mist, you'll be fighting as Rain, who's carrying
roughly the equipment she had the last time you played as
her, plus a flamethrower. Otherwise, you'll start as Hana,
and after you inflict a certain amount of damage, Glas, and
finally Deke ("...I don't like you.").

Mist's new form teleports around the crazily spinning
battlefield. She launches an attack, and when it's over,
she'll disappear again. Mist has three basic tricks:

Flamethrower Mist
	Mist materializes, flops onto the ground like an
inchworm, and begins twirling around. She shoots fire from
either end; jokes about her "eating bad Mexican" would be
horribly uncouth. So don't do it.
	Mist will move from one side of the screen to the other
while she's shooting fire, and will dematerialize when she
reaches the opposite end. While she's doing that, try to run
around her, moving in the same direction as her flames, and
stay as far away from her as you can. I can't seem to
weather this form without taking at least one hit. On the
plus side, she can be hit with rifle fire while she's doing
this, and she sticks around quite a while.

Big Ass Blast Mist
	...okay, now she's just asking for it. Mist appears,
glows, and fires a beam straight ahead.
	This is easy to dodge unless she's got you in the
corner, especially because Mist stops pivoting right before
she fires. Once you're out of the way, move towards her and
start shooting; you should be able to do some serious damage
while she's recovering.

Lightning Ball Mist
	Mist appears, spins in place, and fires four balls of
static electricity.
	Here's the key. The moment Mist appears and does her
little flip, head straight towards her while shooting. She's
wide open, and the only safe spot from the lightning barrage
is directly in front of her.

Don't let the flamethrower ammo on the battlefield fool you;
this fight is all about the rocket launcher. Remember how I
said not to use it? I lied. I lied like never before or
since. I'm a bad man. Use the rocket launcher. On Normal
mode, one rocket will knock about a fifth of Mist's health
bar off, while in Hard mode, you'll need to hit her with
about fifteen of them.

If you don't have the rocket launcher--if you missed it back
in the Temple of Xi'an when you last played as Rain--you can
*barely* make do with barrages of rifle fire. The problem here
is that the difference between victory and defeat now rests
squarely with Mist; to wit, if she uses the flamethrower too
often, you probably won't survive long enough to take her out.

When you win as Rain, Mist will curl up into a little ball.
If you don't do something fast, she'll get right back up and
you'll have to do this *again*. Don't let that happen. Get to
her, circle her until you get the Use prompt, and Use the
DNA Virus.

When Mist is dead, one way or the other, it's game over.

======
CODES:
======

I've beaten FE2 three times, and twice, I received a button
sequence during the end credits:

Disc 1: U, U, R1, R1, R1, Square

Disc 2: L, R, U, D, D, Circle

Thanks to alert reader Kevin Myers (and had he not told me this,
alert reader Brandon Chaput would have), I now know what these
do. If you put in these codes on the title screen, with the
appropriate disc in your system, you'll unlock images for
the Art Gallery Extra. If you've got the codes for Discs 3
and 4, please send them my way.

Furthermore, on your second time through the game, you can
use the keypad in the first hallway to input secrets. Kevin
Myers also provides these codes:

11692: All weapons
61166: 999 ammo for all weapons
10397: Big head code

=============
PLOT SUMMARY:
=============

FE2 is sorta cumbersome, with all the plot twists it goes
through. I've written this down to help both myself, and,
hopefully, you, the reader.

====

Four billion years ago, the Ancients destroyed a creature
known as the Entity. The Entity chose to hide from his
destroyers, concealing himself within the primordial ooze
that would one day create all life on the planet. From this
ooze, humans were eventually born. The Entity is referred to
several times in FE2 as the Maker of humanity.

Three thousand years ago, a man named Qin Zhang tried to
unlock the secrets of immortality. He was only partially
successful, in that his potion made his body immortal, but
failed to prepare his mind. His body thus became an eternal
prison, and he slumbered for a time. This failed attempt at
divinity created a Dark Cipher, a possible way back to the
world for the slumbering Entity. This Dark Cipher is apparently
also referred to over the course of the game as the Retro Helix.

Twenty-two years ago, the first case of EINDS
(Environmentally Induced Nucleotides Degeneration Syndrome),
a disease that attacks cell reproduction, is diagnosed.
Also, as is remarked upon by various Immortals during the game,
this is the same year that Hana was born. Apparently, EINDS is
the move and Hana the countermove, in the chess game between
the Entity and the Eight Immortals. (One of the Immortals tells
Hana that the Eight Immortals only act through people, since
they learned long ago that they only make things worse if they
directly intervene. If you pay attention, a *lot* of the Immortals'
tests are games, or versions of games--chess, mazes, hopscotch,
dragon's eye, the musical memory test--making FE2 a game about
a game that's determined by games. The mind boggles.)

Twenty-one years ago (maybe; I'm basing this off of the
supposed age for Rain in the instruction manual), an
archeologist named Rachel Kazra discovered the sleeping body
of Qin Zhang at an excavation site. She injected herself
with his genetic material, attempting to create the
Perfect Being. Instead of dying like she should have done,
she became pregnant with twins; one would imagine that her
injection and subsequent pregnancy are what's depicted in
Rain's dream. These twins were half immortal and half
human. She named them Rain and Mist. Later, Kazra won past
the challenges at the Tower to gain access to the Genomic
Void, and there conducted her experiments in creating the
perfect being by uniting the two children. Her countless
failures, brainless mutants existing only to kill, were
scattered throughout the Temple of Xi'an. Qin Zhang was set
in place below the Temple as a guardian of the path to the Void.

The Entity was looking for his opening. If Kazra's
experiments succeeded, he would be reborn in the form of the
Perfect Being. In this he was aided by Mist Qin, who
embraced her divine heritage. Rain, on the other hand,
embraced her human side and fled from her mother and sister.
She made it to China, where she collapsed and was found by
Hana. They became friends, partners, and lovers.

At the start of Fear Effect 2, Glas has a blood sample from
one of his former team members, and Deke is sent to obtain a
Genetic Marker. When Hana brings the DNA sequence disk to
the Temple of Xi'an, they've put together the pieces of the
cure for EINDS. Glas and Hana realize that Glas' blood
sample is unnecessary if Hana has the DNA sequence on disk, and
Deke's genetic marker is likewise obsolete. They've all
brought basically the same thing to the table.

That's because the courier job is a ruse by Mist and her
allies on Earth to get the cure's parts in one place, where
she can destroy all the hopes of a cure at one go. EINDS is
the final stage of the Entity's plans for humanity, and when
the disease has run its course, the Entity has plans for the
survivors. Mist, who wants to see the Perfect Being reborn,
is working to make sure the Entity's plans bear fruit.

However, Glas and Hana manage to survive the Temple of Xi'an.
Despite Deke being possessed and used as a catspaw, Hana
and Glas pass the Eight Immortals' tests and make it to the
Genomic Void, where Rain faces off against and kills the
mutated Mist Qin. Mist is dissolved at a cellular level by
the doomsday virus Rain found in the Wing Chune building,
thus forever dividing the Perfect Being and foiling the
Entity's shot at rebirth. More to the point, Hana makes
the cure publically available to the world, and EINDS is
never allowed to complete its set task.

Of course, Rachel Kazra is still alive, out in the Genomic
Void past the Weak Water... and at some point, Hana will
apparently return to the Twin Juniper Garden, and become
stuck there for the rest of her life. There's a sequel
hook or two here, if you just look for them.

===============
PLOT QUESTIONS:
===============

I never played FE all the way through. I would assume, then,
that the red-robed freak in the Elemental Gardens is the King
of Hell. But who are his posse?

Why is the older Hana waiting for herself in the gazebo? Are
we to believe that Hana will fail this test at some point in
the future, or can she somehow get stuck there for eternity
if she does something wrong?

=============
HANA AND RAIN
=============

So... yeah. When this game was initially announced, it
looked like they decided to take FE, tighten up the control,
and add some softcore porn. All the screenshots of Hana and
Rain were of them in their wetsuits, and every preview I
read mentioned their (coy wink, sly chuckle) mysterious
relationship. I thought it was going to be a complete mess
of gunplay and HOT GIRL-GIRL ACTION. w00t!

That's what I thought, anyway, when I rented the game. I had
heard that the storyline was flat-out strange, involving
genetic viruses, Chinese mythology, and the implications of
the existence of an insane God, and well, if you add
lesbians and the whole "survival horror" aspect of it all,
you've got a game that I can't pass up. I'm a philosophy
minor and I'm addicted to B-movies. This is my genre.

So I played it, and kept playing it, and, well, it wasn't as
goofy as I was expecting. Yes, there's a lot of undressing
and accompanying panty shots; yes, Hana's party dress is
illegal in most states; yes, there's the elevator scene; yes,
that thing Rain gets strapped into is not right, will never *be*
right, and now that I've seen that, I'll never be clean again.

But Hana and Rain never get really *stupid* about it. It's
gratuitous and sensationalist enough that they're apparently
lovers, and the game only rarely does anything with that.
They flirt occasionally in the aqueduct, they bicker a
little, Hana's very protective of Rain, they distract the
security guys in the elevator by making out, and that's
about it. Then you get out of the Wing Chune building, and
the fanservice comes to a shrieking halt.

If you were to take Rain out of the game entirely and
replace her with a guy, you'd only have to change a few
things; if you made Hana a guy, all you'd have to change
would be her backstory. Obviously, the elevator scene would
have to play differently, but otherwise, the game would be
the same. Hana and Rain's relationship would be basically
the same.

Of course, then you start to get into the Challenges and the
various tests. Hana is told multiple times that trying to
find Rain will only end in sorrow, and she keeps going; the
very idea of abandoning Rain makes her lash out at the ghost.
Whenever she's talking to one of the Immortals, Hana
actually acts *desperate*, and then there's the kicker: a
line, spoken by one of the Immortals, about how Hana's love
for Rain is her strength.

While I don't care for the way it was used to sell this
game, I do have to admit that Hana and Rain's relationship
is treated with considerably more care than I was expecting.
While its being in the game in the first place is
sensationalist and more than a little distracting, I can't
honestly find any fault in the way it's depicted.

========
ENDINGS:
========

THIS IS YOUR SPOILER WARNING.

I beat this game on a rental, so I'd appreciate well-written
summaries of any other endings there might be for FE2.

Save Rain, Normal/Hard Difficulty:

Rain dips her knife into the DNA Virus (I hope that
wasn't an airborne virus, Rain!) and stabs Mist in the
throat. Mist screams and dissolves into nothing. Hana offers
Rain her hand, and with a weary smile, Rain accepts it.

A pair of newscasters say, smiling, that a cure has been
found for EINDS. Back on their hydroplane, Rain says that
she's surprised Hana didn't just sell the cure, and Hana
says that she didn't think that'd be right. Surprisingly,
Deke and Glas went along with it too. Rain asks to go along
on Jin's "retrieval mission," and Hana says that Rain's
staying home this time. She doesn't need a tech-head this
time because the job is so simple. Rain gives Hana her knife
so Hana won't break a nail, and Hana gives Rain the Pearl
that Qin Zhang gave her.

In a restaurant, Hana (wearing her clothes from the first
level of FE) invites Deke and Glas (likewise) to join her on
the Wong Lai mission. It's a big payday for easy work, but
Glas is wary of it ("We'll probably wind up getting chased
by dragons or something."). Deke signs up almost immediately,
Glas grudgingly agrees, and they set out on the job that
winds up becoming the first FE.

Don't Save Rain, Hard Difficulty:

Rain dies, saying that she'd rather die in Hana's arms than
live forever without her. Mist laughs at her, saying that all
Rachel Kazra needs is Rain's body. Hana screams in rage and
grief and attacks the newly mutated Mist, but she only lasts
a few minutes before Mist kills her with a blast of energy.
Then Glas attacks Mist, meeting with a similar lack of success.
As he falls dead, Deke is finally able to bring Mist down.
Unfortunately, Mist soon gets right back up. Deke grabs Rain's
body and runs through a convenient portal. The credits roll.

This is another surprise; the ending where Rain dies is
obviously not the right one. I expected that Rain's absence
from FE would be explained by having Rain get killed. No, no...
she just stayed home.

===========
CONCLUSION:
===========

Thanks to Kevin Myers, Brandon Chaput, and M. Piatko for their
contributions to this FAQ.

This document can be found on the following websites:

http://www.gamefaqs.com
http://www.cheatcc.com
http://www.dimfuture.net/elsewhere/junkdrawer.html

Note that the last site is my own, and as such, will probably
receive more and sooner updates than the other locations.

I can be reached at storyteller@msc.net with comments, questions,
and whatever codes you'd like to pass along. I don't know how
helpful I'll be re: game advice, as I don't actually own FE2,
but I'll try. Please be literate in any letters you send me;
anything that I can't readily make sense of won't be replied to.

Thomas Wilde
a.k.a. Wanderer
storyteller@msc.net
http://www.dimfuture.net/elsewhere/

