Tuesday, March 31, 2015

ZombiU Hardcore -- St. George's Church

Another PTSD-inducing area, St. George's Church begins near where you picked up your first keycard in the Safe House. Slide under the door from the first section of the area, descend the stairs to the area that had two zombies -- kill them if they're still there -- and then approach the furthermost door to the right and scan it to open it.

TIP: If you go the other direction, you can scan a door to get into a previously inaccessible area where you'll find a weapon upgrade.

Playing Dead

After you open the door, descend the ladder and you'll quickly find yourself on a walkway surrounding water -- this is the area near the church. Most of the zombies in here are alive, so expect them all to be, especially those in the water.

Firstly, stop and look into the water for zombies that look dead and aren't. Your safest bet is to kill them quietly so you don't wind up waking others.; do so with the crossbow as in the video walkthrough or with the silencer gun. If you wake zombies and they start coming for you, back up as you fire so you have more time to kill them. If you have time, you can also put down land mines to ensure they don't get you.

When you are forced to go down into the water because of the fence along the walkway, slowly pass the fence and immediately get back up on the walkway, hugging the wall as you go. There is a mine in the water at the far side of the pool that will blow up as you pass it while you are in the water -- you might want to kill a zombie by pushing him in towards it to get rid of the zombie and the mine.

As soon as you get past the walkway and the pool, turn left and look up to see two zombies come down from the ceiling at you. If you're not aware of where they're coming from you'll have no clue they're even coming. The second zombie is a crawler and easier to deal with, so prioritize the first.

Being wary of the mine if it's still there, enter the next room. You'll see a tall cabinet that you can push -- don't. Instead, turn left and crawl into the crawlspace there, turning the corner and coming out into a little room. Loot the room, then open the door, re-enter the room with the cabinet and this time push. Climb up and turn immediately left to see a zombie -- kill it.

Into the Warehouse

Nobody is alive in the next room excepting yourself. You'll see a hole in the wall at left that leads into darkness -- this is where the area really starts to get nasty.

Enter into the darkness and head left, going into the well-lit room you see there. Three zombies are sitting in chairs and look dead.  The two at left are dead, the one at right is not. Kill him, quietly if possible. Now leave that room, turn left, and equip a flare. move forward, following the wall at left, and when it ends turn and go around the wall until it's at your left again. Notice the blue barrels at right and just take note that there is a crawlspace behind them. In the meantime don't touch them, as they're noisy and you really don't want to go that way now anyhow. Instead, move forward a bit and turn right when you hear zombie noises. Point the flare at the wall where the zombies are and toss it. You'll see there are four regular zombies flanking an armored -- not good. Chuck a grenade at them with the right timing and you're done.

NOTE: What I did in the video walkthrough was a bit more risky; I threw a Molotov cocktail to set the four regular zombies on fire and backed up while whacking on the armored to kill him. The four died from the flames as I killed the armored, essentially.

TIP: You can and should continue backing up, even out of the room, rather than let them kill you!

After the five zombies are dead, continue down that hallway. At the end you'll find a corridor slightly off to the side with two ways to go. Stop in your tracks and don't move an inch. Your map is being jammed, obviously, and the jammer is in the room to the right down this little corridor. However, so is a well hidden bombie. When you walk into the room, there are boxes to your right and past that a corner of a wall alcove; the bombie is crouching down between the far side of the boxes from you as you walk into the room and the corner walls of the alcove. As you can see in the video, you can walk up and shoot him in the face, but if you miss you have to be very careful in how you kill him obviously because, well, he's a bombie. 

After he is dead, whack the radar jammer and you'll see you're on the other side of the room that the girl who cried out for help is supposedly locked up in. You can't get in from here. Also notice that behind the bombie is a crawlspace. You could crawl in now and move forward, but you can grab the couple optional upgrades available in the warehouse and score the CCTV map in the process instead.

Clearing Out the Warehouse

After killing Mr. Bombie, leave the room, turn left and walk down far enough to be safe, then turn around and toss a grenade at the pile of rubble blocking the left door (the one across from where the bombie was). Inside is a live zombie and an upgrade. Return to where you stood where you threw the grenade and you'll see a nearby door; pick the lock. There are three zombies in this room; one is a crawler, one is feigning death on a reclining chair -- these two are right near each other -- and one is wandering around.

After killing the zombies, enter the non-Raven door in the room. The key to getting this Raven's code is that the Raven symbol is in two pieces and you have to back up and align the two pieces so that you see the symbol reunited. Only then will your pad pick up the code to the Raven door.

Re-enter the room with the now-dead zombies and find the Raven door. Right above and to the right of this door is the CCTV junction -- scan it. Then, open the door and find the least exciting Raven room ever. Return to the main room and look to the chair where the zombie was sitting -- on that wall is a steel cabinet. Push it aside and crawl in.

TIP: The crawlspace behind the blue barrels you ignored upon first entering the warehouse drops you into this room.

In this crawlspace is a dead zombie and three exits. To your left -- coming in from this direction, at least -- is where your friendly bombie was. To your right are two exits, the closest of which is to the Safe House and the furthest of which takes you into the actual church.


Through the Church Proper

Be prepared when you drop out of the crawlspace, as there are two zombies coming at you as soon as you do. You find yourself on the top of some pillars and part of the ceiling they used to support; the first zombie is lying near your feet -- shove him off -- the second one is down a little ways to your left, assuming you've turned right to shove the prone zombie. Kill this second one or at least push his ass off so he can't hurt you. After both zombies are gone, none can get up here -- and neither can you after you get down -- so take a moment to look around and get your bearings.

Walk to the end of the platform and then cross the little protrusion to your right. It's a good idea to kill the zombie on the platform across from yours while he's faking death as I do in the video so you don't have to deal with him up close. You can also turn back towards where you shoved the first zombie off and kill him below. Remember, every zombie you kill is one that won't chase you if you wind up down there.

NOTE: Yes, your flares and grenades will fizzle if they fall in water.

WARNING: The water has deep areas where you cannot use your gun.

From the protrusion on the first platform, drop down to the one below and shove or kill any zombies that are coming at you from the platform at left. Climb up and slowly cross, watching the upper right for any zombies coming out of the alcove. 

NOTE: Notice as you cross that there is a staircase leading up to where you are now to your left -- that staircase is your only way back up if you fall; also note that if you need to use flares or grenades, the staircase wood doesn't burn.

Crawl all the way through the crawlspace, ignoring the first exit to the left. Loot the body and the chest, then peer through the window. You can make your life a lot easier by sniping from here. There are zombies at the far end of the room on your level, including a spitter. If you can kill him and/or others, great. If not, you can at least get them off that platform. Another zombie is laying between you and them, and shooting him and getting him off his platform will save you being surprised by him when you cross.

When you're done sniping, get back into the crawlspace and take the first exit at right. This is a great place to snipe zombies on the first level, as they really can't reach you here. Beware, though, any zombies crawling at you from the second room.

Slide under the grating to move into the second room. If you didn't kill the spitter while sniping earlier and he fell into the water, he'll be spitting at you now unless you shot off his legs. Another spitter is down there, too, making life even more interesting. Drop down on the beam below you; you may have to kill the spitter(s) from either beam and/or use either beam as cover by putting it between you and it.

Spitter(s) gone, drop to the lowest beam if you haven't already, then climb it to the next platform. Here you'll find a zombie that looks dead and isn't unless you sniped him earlier. From this platform you can turn towards the far wall, jump, and grab the platform on the wall to get the ammo you see there. You can then turn and jump back. It's risky, but it can be done.

From the platform where the feigning zombie was, move further towards the room at the end by carefully crossing the planks. If you haven't killed the zombies in that room by sniping them, you'll want to wait, watch, and kill them from here when they appear. The room ahead has a tiny wall hiding as they walk behind it; sometimes they walk out in front of that wall and sometimes they don't, so prepare for a zombie to be hidden back there.

TIP: If you want a full clear, instead of going into the room, follow the beam down to the far wall where it is very close to the water. Kill anything that you see from here and drop down into the water. Move forward a bit, turn right around the first corner, and turn right again so you're under the aforementioned room to get an upgrade -- note that this is the only upgrade in the entire area. Lastly, fight your way through any zombies left on the first level to the staircase to get back up to the second level and get back to where you left off.

After you're sure there are no zombies hiding in the far room on the second floor, enter it. Behind the little wall inside you'll find a ladder. Climb it. You climb up into a room with a bombie staring at you; shoot him and blow him up, then a zombie will jump out at you from a huge gap in the left wall leading up to a blue room. The bombie should take out one zombie back in his corner, but you'll see another coming at you from as well. 

The best order to kill these zombies is in whatever order they come in, which I've found is usually bombie, zombie behind bombie that lived, and then zombie that jumps out at you from the left. After all zombies are dead, climb up into the blue room. You hear a woman's screams and see a door and a ladder. The door you can open so you can get back into the warehouse easily, but it's the ladder that you need; climb it.

Monday, March 23, 2015

ZombiU Hardcore -- Return to Vikram's, Collect Two Dee Letters & Magnum

Video walkthrough

The fastest way to get back to Vikram's after you've returned to the Safe House is by way of the nursery manhole. Just climb up to where you had to climb up due to the locked door below, exit the door and take the door to your left. Then go back the way you came from Vikram's.

TIP: Don't forget the upgrade in that staircase, either, it's easy to miss (between the manhole and the door above).

If you cleared the place out before there's no zombies here left to kill. As soon as you pass through the gate that was once locked, a girl starts crying out for help through your comm channel. She's setting you up for St. George's Church; just continue on into Vikram's.

A Nasty Business, No Mistake

A pad upgrade is on the desk, and that upgrade is your key to the petrol. Vikram, unfortunately, has turned and is gobbling on his son when you come in. Kill him. When you exit the building, turn left instead of right, turn the corner of the building, and unlock the gate there. Pick up the petrol, the pump-action shotgun, and the weapon upgrade, then go into the door where you'll find stairs leading to another manhole. Don't go further; instead, turn around and go back out the gate. Go straight past the two cars and through the narrow passage ahead, up the ladder, and down the ladder to the right. Cross the park following that wall to the gate you couldn't open before -- your pad upgrade lets you open it now. Open it and and get the Dee letter and weapon upgrade within.

Dee letter and capacity upgrade in hand, turn around, go out the gate, cross the park, go back up the ladder, and get the weapon upgrade if you didn't before. Go back down the first-mentioned ladder above towards Vikram's and get the goodies inside the room behind the coded door halfway up the stairs if you haven't already, The code for the locked door is accessible around the corner from the shelter by scanning behind a tarp on the wall of the next building over -- you can see from the video walkthrough that it's also accessible from a certain spot on the ground.

WARNING: If you haven't been up here before, there's a zombie at the bottom of the ladder near the Ravens' shelter, so let him climb up to you and then kill him before going into the shelter. You can also kill him from below through the gate -- he can't open it.

Second Dee Letter and Magnum

After saving the game, return to the nursery area. You'll find a spitter near the doors, over by the explosive barrel. Kill him without going too far from the doors, because just over the hill is a flame zombie. Next, kill the flame zombie and lastly kill the regular zombie nearby. That should be the only resistance between you and the shack near the nursery's front entrance and playground. Open the shack with your pad upgrade and you'll find the magnum pistol and a Dee letter.

ZombiU Hardcore -- Get Medicine For Vikram

Video walkthrough

This level officially sucks, but it is possible to get through. After the door is unlocked in the Approach to Vikram's area, you'll go through to a door leading outside -- go to the right instead of down because you can't get back up. Going to the right allows you to visit the Safe House and come back.

When you're ready to drop down into the area, you might want to kill the spitter that is roaming about just ahead from this vantage point where he can't get you and where you can hide from the spitballs. A red and white explosive barrel sits between you and he, so if you can get him near the barrel, shoot it and let the flames take care of him to save some ammo. Just remember to back up behind the door so you don't get spit on.

After spitter zombie is dead, follow the wall towards the beat-up pile of vehicles and scan for the CCTV transmitter. Then return to where the spitter was and approach the fence. You'll see a hole in it you can slide under -- do so. You see an old-time van here; to the right of it is a zombie playing dead and laying on the ground. Kill him, then pick up the weapon upgrade in the tall grasses nearby.

Note: You can come in from the other direction, but doing so this way cleans up the place for when you come out of the building via the staircase on this side of the building on the second floor.

Into the Death Trap

Now turn and look into the ball courts near the building. There is a single zombie there; you can snipe him from here or kill him in whatever other fashion you desire. After you do, approach the hole in the fence and slide under, then turn the corner of the building and enter it by the front door.

NOTE: This is where the demo starts. Why Ubisoft decided this wretched portion of the game should be the demo is beyond me; it may have driven buyers away it was so nasty.

Slide under the table at right and climb over a bookcase ahead of you. Then enter the door that's open in the corner diagonal from the door you came in. There are two, but the one to the left is locked. In the restroom, duck down into the crawlspace and crawl around the corner into the hallway behind the door that was locked in the first room. You can turn around and unlock it if you like, but I personally never came back to this horrible place.

You're in a small hall -- don't leave it yet. Peer around the corner and you'll see a metal storage cabinet. When you approach it a zombie will leap out at you, so approach with a weapon at the ready so you can shoot it in the face. The room at left has nothing in it. Pick the lock for the door leading out of the hallway.

You're in a stairway. If you want full completion, go upstairs and kill the zombies in the room above you and then come back here. There are two zombies there. The medicine is not there. Whether you killed them or not, from here, go downstairs with a mine equipped. You'll see an armored zombie in the hall ahead of you. Let him sniff you out -- do not leave the stairwell -- then turn and walk around the bottom stairs and set the mine between you and the corner where he'll have to step on it. Turn around then and go under the stairs, ducking into a crawlspace there and crawling like crazy.The armored will hit the mine as you emerge into a small room with a door leading into the hallway right where he was standing. If you don't kill him this way, like I didn't in the video, then kill him immediately when you see him or right after you unlock the door to the small room and emerge from the hall.

Go into the room right across from the little room with the door you unlocked -- it's the first door at left if you're looking from the stairwell into the hallway. Open the door at the other side of the room and then head straight to the door on the left wall. Cross to the far side of that room and grab a key card. Leave that room and go to the room at left -- you'll deal with the room across later, so don't wonder about it now -- and use the key card to get into that room. Check the medicine cabinet and grab the medicine, then attempt to leave the room and fall into the basement below. Hell beginneth here.

Basement

Work your way through several tunnels and/or doors to the large room. Due to my lack of a WiiU right now I cannot say more, but I can say it's pretty easy to get there; something like right, then left, possibly more. A labyrinthine maze is not the challenge here. You hear screaming and start to lose lights and communication with the Prepper -- you've come upon the game's only electric zombie. Relax a bit, there is only one and no other enemies are down here. The electric zombie will only appear in the very large room, so if necessary you can run here. The room has several doors and crawlspaces leading to it, as well.

About the room, firstly; there is a corner of it that has a room within and a door. The safest spot in my opinion to deal with the electric zombie is next to that room's side wall because it has a wall paralleling the room's wall, so the zombie has to come to you from only one direction because you have two directions (left and behind you) blocked.

The easiest was to kill this zombie is to wait until it appears, chuck a flare to a location the zombie can easily reach but away from you -- say across from the entrance to your little safe spot against the wall by the big grease spot -- and then follow it up with a well-timed grenade. End of zombie. I used to kill it by shooting it as it came at me between the two walls, but that takes forever and you can get hit. The zombiei only bitchslaps, luckily, but it bitchslaps pretty fast.

After the zombie is dead, cross the room to where another short stone wall is. On the inside of this you can scan to find one of four Enochian symbols. Stand just a few feet back -- you still need to be able to see the symbol -- and then scan around the room and you'll be able to scan and find all four symbols from the same location. In the video you'll see me playing with my spray paint can -- that's where.

Up and Out

After you get the goods in the locked room, head straight across and go through that door. Head into the next room, up the stairs, and then get all the goodies in the room above. Equip a flare and open the yellow door, chucking the flare to the right and then running left down the hall and up the stairs to the second floor. Whether you cleared the zombies out or not in this room, head straight for the door to the right and go through it. 

NOTE: If you want a completion clear, you'll have to work that out yourself -- I really didn't care. I imagine following up the flare with a grenade would help, but in Survival Mode even the most innocuous confrontation can turn deadly in a second and make you start all over, not to mention that I'm not by any stretch a patient man, so I ran.

Return to the door the way you came in; you cleared it out then so it's still clear for you now. After the Prepper says "Incoming!" you should stay by the door until time comes to run between them and head for that hole in the fence -- you can slide under, they can't. This will get them away from you briefly. Make your way back to the ball court. Slide under the hole in the wall and head out of the front entrance to the nursery's playground, avoiding any zombies and/or shooting them. If you have zombies close on you, run back to the hole in the fence -- this is really your saving grace in a lot of ways, but remember they don't take long to come around, either. 

After what seems like forever, the Prepper will say the door is open -- fly through it. If you like, you can then climb back up and kill the horde banging on the door, but be careful of the spitter if you haven't killed him yet, and don't waste ammo, just use a flare and a Molotov cocktail.

Sunday, March 22, 2015

ZombiU Hardcore -- To Vikram's Petrol Station

From the Hanbury Green Safe House manhole, turn toward the door leading towards the Safe House, not towards the market. Go through the door and gate beyond, then turn right and climb the ladder here that you dropped earlier. Go through the broken window into the room, equip a flare, and walk slowly through the door to just before where you would start going downstairs, then chuck the flare into the group of boxes just across from the break in the wall. Below you'll see three zombies -- one a flame zombie -- converge on the flare; just as they do so, chuck a grenade to kill them.

From here, hug the wall of the building and head towards the Safe House, then turn the corner and head through the opening at left. To your right you'll see large steel crates. On the other side of these is a screamer zombie -- it depends on how fast you kill him as to how many zombies he'll summon. You can tell a screamer-summoned zombie as it appears from nowhere with a slight spark. In the video walkthrough you'll see I had to fight two summoned zombies because I didn't shut the screamer up immediately.

Diagonally opposite from the screamer is a walkway you should not have been in before -- walk down it. At the end of it, turn left and you'll see a small shack ahead of you. On the wall next to the shack are two Enochian symbols -- use your scanner to find them. The other symbols are inside the shack on the back of the door. Together they give you the code for the locked door at the end of the walkway outside the shack. Continue past it briefly to a door that will load the rest of the sequence.

Through the Mines

Walk through until you reach a ladder up -- note that there is an item on the far side of this room near the water. When you reach the top of the ladder, stop and don't move. You're in a small alcove. You can back up and be okay, but the minute you walk forward the zombie nearest you on the ground will get up and attack you. Kill him with your bat to avoid attracting the nearby zombies, then continue past and throw a flare over the gate. When the zombies run for the flare, they should trigger mines and blow themselves up. If not, you'll have to kill them. There are mines (at least) in the four corners of the park. Avoid them. Take out the radar jammer with your bat if you like to save ammo.

If you walk around the fence outside the park you won't see anything you can get now; there's a room you can open but it just has a zombie in it. There is a secret wall in the shed, but it just leads to the front yard of the next home, which you can walk straight into anyway. At the end of the row, though, you'll see a locked gate that you cannot unlock, however, turn left and you'll see a radar jammer that you can't reach physically but that you can shoot. Take it out so you can see where the rest of the mines are.

Entering the gate furthest from the entrance to the level, directly diagonal from you is a brick wall that you can blow up. Within is another brick wall -- blow it up and stand clear. Inside you'll find the biggest backpack in the game and a weapon upgrade.

When you exit the holes in the wall, cruise down the wall that doesn't lead back to the entry gate and go up the stairs. Beware, as after you enter the hallway at right you'll attract one regular zombie and, if you step in far enough, an armored as well. It's best to take one at a time and run back out so you have the room to fight them in the park. You can also choose to run ahead and to the other side of a mine -- within safe distance -- so that the zombie walks towards you and triggers the mine in the process, killing himself. In the video walkthrough I tried to do this, but the zombie was on me and was very fast, so I gave up and shot his face off.

TIP: If you kill the first zombie and don't attract the armored, you can run in and kill the armored where he is kneeling over using just your bat.

With both zombies dead, continue down the path between buildings where the kneeling zombie was, noting that as you turn that corner there are two zombies feigning death just a bit down the next stretch, the first of which is an armored. It is very unlikely that you'll be able to kill the armored with the bat before the other gets up and hits you, but I've done it -- although not in the video; I gave up and shot them.

Final Approach to Vikram's

Turn the corner and, with a flare equipped, run right out into the open space filled with zombies in a diagonal direction towards the left, you'll be approaching the corner of the gate surrounding Vikram's. Throw the flare towards that corner, equip a grenade, and toss it as the zombies gather round it. Watch the video and you can see I screwed up the placement of the flare, throwing it too far. In that case I had to fight the rest of the zombies myself. You can always turn and run back where you came from to get some breathing space if you need to, as I did, then come back and finish the job.

Behind the car with the British flag on it up on the wall is the CCTV transmitter -- scan it. Turn right, away from Vikram's, and there is an armored zombie hanging out in the far hallway. Kill him and climb the stairs. The locked door has a code -- it's on top of the roof. Once on the roof, approach the further side and wait as a zombie climbs the ladder -- kill him. He was locked in the gate below. You can climb down and open the gate.

Turn and open the door to your right -- your Ravens' safety spot is here. Leave and walk straight to the edge, then turn right and approach that edge and start scanning. Across from you are hanging tarps and if you get in just the right spot you'll see the code to unlock the door below.

Climb down the way the zombie climbed up to you so you can unlock that gate. Turn left; there are two zombies still down here who didn't see the flare, one is usually meandering around the car to your left and the other is right near the entrance to the Petrol station. Kill them, but instead of entering Vikram's, turn and go into the passageway beyond the car, climb up, drop the ladder to make your life easier later, and claim a weapon upgrade. Finally, turn back and go through the gate in front of the petrol station and enter its door, where an obviously whacked Vikram asks you to get medicine.



Wednesday, March 11, 2015

ZombiU Hardcore -- Tower of London

From the Safe House manhole, descend the stairs to the right and go out the door. If you didn't kill the spitter zombie before, do so now. Similarly, if you didn't kill the zombie sitting by the hole in the wall in the opposite corner of the courtyard, do so before you try and climb down into the hole or he'll grab you and at the very least scare the crap out of you.

After dropping through the hole in the wall, equip a flare, then move into the hallway and slowly turn to face into the darkness below. There are three living zombies down here. One is in the room at left, seemingly dead at the foot of a bed. Another is at the end of the hallway, and the last is two his right down that hall. The sneakiest way to kill all three with a single attack is to creep down the hall and approach the sleeping zombie until he wakes up and stands, then back up and chuck the flare to the end of the hall where the second zombie's shadow was. All three will descend on the flare and with a properly-timed thrown explosive all three will die there.

TIP: In the video, I instead entered the room where the sleeping zombie had been and slid under the wall, which is a safe haven if you need it -- it has only the one entrance and you can whack zombies as they come through.

Return to the first hallway where the second zombie's shadow was, turn right and go to the end of the hall, turn right again and move to the middle of the hall, and turn left and scan the CCTV junction. Retrace your steps to the end of the first hall, unlock the door, and continue down the hall.

Into Darkness

Continue down the hall and step into the room. Scan for items and then scan the wall at left to uncover a Raven passage. Travel down the passage and when you fall into water and stop right there -- half the battle of this very rotten level is to know what it is you're looking at before you go in. 

NOTE: The below bullets all start with three words describing where you are as you face forward from here. Attack them in the order listed.

  • Ahead of you is a tiny cage maze. There is one passage between you and a bombie directly on the other side. That bombie will sniff you out iummediately as you step forward into the hall, so you'll want to step slightly left so the third zombie (see below) doesn't hear and then shoot him while he's still on the other side of that cage passage to prevent damage. 
  • To your left is a hall with a waterfall in it with a dead-end corner at the end. Pass the corner wall and turn right and you'll see a gate wall and a zombie on the other side. This zombie will head to you in that corner when he sees you, so if you don't successfully kill him shooting through the cage wall, turn right and wait for him to come to you, then kill him with your back to the corner wall. 
  • To your right is another hallway that has a zombie in an alcove. He will not hear you if you kill the bombie as far away from him as you can and then head down the other hallway. Then you can come back and kill him last. Follow the wall leading out of his alcove and you'll find a weapon upgrade,

Go through the waterfall in the mini cage maze and scan the wall near where the second zombie was to open up another Raven passage -- a zombie is hiding in the water, so shoot him as he jumps up at you. Immediately a zombie up the stairs ahead will hear the shot and head down to you -- kill him, too.

Head upstairs and down the hall, turn left and approach and enter the hole next to the door -- then back up and out and use your bat to kill the zombie in that tunnel as he crawls out. Enter the tunnel and follow it around to enter the Ravens headquarters. 

Turn right and open the door. Scan the strange star symbol on the wall to find the Enochian alphabet and don't forget to pick up the the knight, the gun against the wall, and two documents lying on furniture. Lastly, move the chest of drawers against a column out of the way, scan the column wall for the code for the keypad on the exit door, and enter that code and go through the door to head up into the tower proper.

Climb the Tower

Climb the stairs but don't go forward into the pack of zombies approaching -- instead, turn right at the top of the stairs and then turn right again, then run to the other end of the courtyard and then turn around to watch as the Ravens lay waste to all zombies on the ground in front of you. 

When she says that's all she can help with, rush through the dead bodies and intercept the zombie that comes out of the door above you and jumps down to your level -- if you catch him when he lands you can shove him and just ZR smash him to kill him. Move forward from there and open the gate you couldn't get through earlier to make your life easier later.

Turn around and move towards the stairs leading up; loot as you can, then climb the stairs and approach the door the zombie opened earlier. Equip a weapon and enter the doorway; shoot the zombie down the hall and then go to the far end of the hall and turn left into the room beyond. As you look forward, there's a zombie on the other side of the wall in front of you. Look left and you'll see a door, approach that door and turn right and you'll see a bombie in a room at the end of the wall at left -- shoot him from there, then run around the desk, grab the ammo on it, and shoot the zombie coming at you from the other side of the wall from the door you came in. Enter the door beyond him, grab the ammo there, and then go into the staircase beyond, climb the stairs, and then drop into the stairwell.

Oh, Heck...

Equip a flare, rocket out of the stairs and toss the flare up past the spitter -- not too far past or you'll lose it. Follow it up with a molotov cocktail. You can then run back up the stairs and turn around to see if anyone comes to eat you and shoot them if they do.

Climb the stairs and then turn left; get onto the roof and kill two or three zombies or just throw a flare at the wall and let the Ravens kill them.

Watch the cutscene and kill the remaining two zombies who come at you on the rooftop, then follow the other exit off of the rooftop to open the door that leads back to the Safe House manhole.


Wednesday, April 23, 2014

ZombiU Hardcore -- Approach to Tower of London

Dropping down from the tube, head left up the staircase. Loot the two prone zombies and approach the end of the boardwalk and wait a moment for a zombie to climb the ladder -- kill him. Pick up the rifle to the right.

From your vantage point here, you can use the rifle or the crossbow to take out two zombies from here, one that's under the further boardwalk and one that's roaming around on top of it.

TIP: You can use the rifle to take out the radar jammer on the further boardwalk.

IN SIGHT OF THE TOWER
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Climb down the ladder and walk under the second boardwalk; there should be no zombies left alive.

Climb the ladder up to the further boardwalk if you need to loot the dead zombie or take out the radar jammer; otherwise turn left at the corner of the boardwalk, scan up and left to scan the CCTV junction.

Turn right and look across the water from you -- you can see the tower in the background beyond the massive walls and the Traitor's Gate arch. In front of the gate are three zombies roaming around; use your rifle to blow up the bombie and all three will die.

Watch for a moment -- there's a zombie further down that will cry out and he may run up to where the three just blew up. If he does, use the rifle to kill him from where you stand. If he doesn't, cross the water and kill him however you want.

TIP: On the other side of the boat beyond this zombie is a chest with five handgun bullets.

UNDER THE TRAITOR'S GATE
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Enter under the Traitor's Gate -- you can see the C4 location in front of you, but to the right just past the gate is a zombie -- take him out before using the C4.

TIP: Equip your bat and then use the C4, standing far enough back to not get killed but close enough to run through quickly through the newly opened gate as soon as the fire clears. Once through, trip the spitter that's just getting up from laying on the ground and ZR smash him for an easy kill.

Loot the zombie lying on the ground and kill the zombie that's half sitting up on the far side of the courtyard leaning up against the wall by a small arch -- he'll grab as you try to go through the arch if you don't kill him first.

The single wooden door in the courtyard takes you to a now-useless ladder and a manhole back to the Safe House.

Friday, April 18, 2014

ZombiU Hardcore -- Blasting Out of Victoria Memorial

When you arrive back at Victoria Memorial, Sondra, your pseudo-contact with the Ravens of Dee, announces over the comm an evac at the Tower of London. The Prepper blusters a bit -- it's clear he's "John" from the letters you've been reading and he and Sondra were once a "thing" -- and tells you to blow her off. You don't have a choice, however.

INTO THE AQUATIC PARK
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Cruise down the stairs ahead of you just as you leave the door to the Safe House, unlock the gate, and turn right. Cruise all the way to the end of the hall and go through the gate at left -- it was locked before but is now open.

Close the gate behind you, as a flame zombie will appear when you pick up the key card and you don't want him roaming around -- you want to know where he is.

Head left along the wall and you'll come to a crouch-in tunnel -- crouch in. Crawl through and grab the weapon upgrade.

SAFE SPOTS: If you need to run from someone, run here if near the entrance. On the further side of the tent (as you're standing here) is a crouch-in entrance to the underground entrance to the palace sewers, run there if you're nearer to it; you can turn around again and bash them as they come in after you or keep running, run through the door, and heal up.

Crawl back through. You may have to kill a single zombie now or before you crawl in -- it's over the rise to your right as you came in the gate and within sniffing distance of you.

TIP: Kill all zombies here now or you'll have to kill them when you come back to use C4, and at that point they'll be among more zombies (the ones that Sondra kills for you) and the chore will be much harder.  Kill everybody now and she'll kill everybody later.

EXTERMINATION
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With a flare equipped, sneak into the water a bit and then cut around onto the higher ground -- but not near the tent, as there are two zombies over there. You can either kill them both now and then chuck the flare to the island or chuck the flare first and kill these two then -- one can be killed with a ZR smash, but the other will smack you before you can.

Chuck a flare to the island, wait a moment, and then shoot one of the red-and-white barrels on the island to set off a chain reaction of explosions. The zombies flambé will approach you and you may have missed some -- avoid and/or kill them as necessary.

The dead colonel and the key card are in the tent; get the key card after everybody nearby is dead.

When the zombies on the island are dead, get to the island and move to the left (ignore everything to the right, there isn't anything over there except the second safe spot). There may be a zombie or two left alive over this way and the CCTV junction box is over here.

TIP: The CCTV junction box has two zombies playing dead beneath it, but you don't need to approach them if you don't want to kill them. They're far enough out of the way to not matter in the whole drama going on back where you came from.

Between the island and the CCTV box is a place you can climb out of the water and use C4 -- take note of this place as you'll need to beeline for it in your second trip into the aquatic park.

FLAME ON, MY BROTHER
---------------------------------
As soon as you grab the key card, a flaming zombie appears near the entrance to the aquatic part of the park -- that gate you just opened.

CAUTION: In Survival Mode, flaming zombies can kill you with a single hit, and this one is in a really ugly location.

Be prepared with a shotgun, cocktail, or some other method of wiping this thing out -- even if it's just running to the safe spot mentioned earlier and crushing his flaming head as he crawls after you. Luckily, this zombie often gets stuck on the railing just as he reaches the stairs, but this can also be a bad thing -- as in the following tip, if he gets stuck out of range of your mine, you then have to deal with both.

TIP: A mine placed on the stairs on the landing leading to the swampy part of green park will take out the flaming zombie whether he gets stuck or not. Place the mine before you grab the key card, not after! However, on rare occasions he doesn't appear, and you don't want to block yourself off -- leave enough room so if the zombie doesn't appear you can shoot and blow up the mine from afar or cross over on the railing to the very right as you enter the gate.

ARMORY AND DEE LETTER
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The armory is next to the door you unlocked in the beginning of the level. Enter it, grab all the ammo in the loot box, at least, pick up the weapon upgrade, loot your first Dee letter, and pick up the three charges of C4 -- picking up the C4 specifically triggers the upcoming battle in the aquatic park. You're near the Safe House door, so it's not a bad idea to go save, heal up, and refresh your items.

TIP: Leave items in the rack where you find them for later if you want, regardless of what the Prepper says. You may be pretty desperate when you come through this way in the game's ending sequence, so leaving a flare, cocktail, and medpack at least can help -- especially given when you come through here at that point there will be five zombies in the hall past the door you unlocked earlier.

C4 GO BOOM
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Be careful to stay near the wall when you come back through the gate into the aquatic park, running towards the safe spot crawl-in tunnel to avoid being blown up. Sondra is now covering you and there are a whole slew of new zombies about. She blows up two bombies near the entrance just as you come out and you don't want to be hurt by either explosion.

TIP: If you cleared all zombies when you grabbed the key card, Sondra will kill all these zombies.

TIP: Pay attention to where her red sightline is. It indicates where she is focused at the moment.

TIP: You can save yourself a ton of running by chucking a flare to the island right after she warns you about being a "sitting duck" and letting her play with all of the zombies over there -- away from you.

CAUTION: Sondra might not kill all these zombies before they smack you -- take care of yourself, even if it means killing a zombie she'd kill.

After the zombies on the island are dead, head to the island and wait for her to take out the zombies between you and the place you need to use C4. You may need to venture into the water to get some of them to perk up, including the one near the C4 location. If you didn't get the CCTV junction box on the previous run-through, grab it now while you wait for Sondra to waste the last handful of zombies.

Use your C4, turn completely around, and run back to the water to get out of the range of the explosion. You can see the range of the explosion on your map -- it's a circle about twice the size that a mine has.

RUN.
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After the explosion, turn and run into the pipe you just opened access to and keep running. The Prepper will chastise you as you do -- you can't do anything to make him happy so ignore him and keep running until you find the exit. There is nothing in any of these rooms that I've seen, so just run through.