GD: Mysteries of HELLSINKER and its scoring/secrets

[mjclark]

Ok- next question:
Why have I automatically skipp[ed Segment 3 Lead and ghone straight into Segment 4 the past couple of times playing with Minogame?

Edit: I have to do it on one credit don't I? lol

[RNGmaster]

Man, I wish mjclark was still on this board so we could hear how his progress is going.

A few scoring tricks i've picked up on that the OP doesn't mention:

- Deadliar and Fossilmaiden can hold down the bomb button to delay bombs and give them invulnerability for the all-important grazing. Fossilmaiden also has an alternate bomb (the blue circle) which is activated by tapping bomb very quickly. It does no damage but lets you stay invulnerable for a long time without cancelling bullets or lowering spirit values.

- Kill both of the flame-shooting sections on the bottom of Scarlet Queen and the 10 turrets on the sides are worth 20 spirits each. They increase value really quickly with Deadliar's aura or Fossilmaiden's yellow flame, so you can get up to 70 spirits from each of them if you do it right. Be sure to kill off the top part or it'll snipe you.

- 3 LEAD is amazing for score. The ships in the center that are chained are interesting because you should kill all of them except the master for a lot of spirits. Also the big side ships increase spirit value really quickly.

- Rex Cavalier (FAKE) gives you about 200 extra spirits if you shoot all its destructible bullets (kill each wing twice).

- Bomb each form of Perpetual Calendar in the center whenever you can. You get a huge number of spirits from each option.

- Grazing the stage 5 boss rush thing (I forget its name) actually gives very few spirits for some reason.

There's a lot of bombspam but scoring in this game is really addictive.

[Zaarock]

Nice, thanks for the info.

Ltc isn't around much anymore so idk if the OP will get updated or anything, but I don't think it's necessary since the thread isn't big yet or anything.

I need to get back to this and maybe try out fossil maiden since I barely ever used her. I don't currently have a computer that can run the game fullspeed all the time though so trying big scoring runs wouldn't be worth it since they wouldn't be legit and the replays would desync. Might be able to play on my dads comp every once in a while or something but might not bother.

edit: pro info found with terribad boss milking: your score gets halved if a boss timeouts.

the boss was disregarded you.

fossil maiden is fun, though lack of normal aura feels weird. also the slow button doesn't work with fossil maiden for some reason? :x

[RNGmaster]

fossil maiden is fun, though lack of normal aura feels weird. also the slow button doesn't work with fossil maiden for some reason?

You have the sword aura, a tiny normal aura when using the sword, and a normal-sized one when holding subweapon.

I don't use slow with Fossilmaiden, but you can ghetto focus by holding shot or subweapon, which is slower than sword.

[Zaarock]

Getting back to playing this a bit now.. liking playing fossil maiden a lot actually. she has a nice array of attacks. love the homing laser with tapping main shot and the sword is nice but wish it would be a little stronger. Love the technical weapon use in this game.

Ok, so slow button with Fossil Maiden actually works as an alternate way to set main shot direction: tapping slow while holding shot will make you shoot in the opposite way of where you're moving (works with sword as well probably) unlike tapping subweapon which aims where you're moving. was messing around and found it pretty useful when using yellow sword aura and then tapping slow and shot to finish off the enemy with the homing laser.

Also yeah wow Lead 3 enemies gain spirits ridiculously fast.. pretty fun score attack stage as well in a way with all the enemy waves.

Making a list of enemies that gain spirits fast would be very useful for scoring strategy so people can know which enemies are worth milking etc. a lot of enemies just aren't worth trying to raise spirit value on either and are better to speedkill.

If I want to do full runs at some point I'll definitely switch to playing on a comp that can run everything full speed so I can share replays and stuff.

Would be nice to see more runs of the game on youtube as well, there are hardly any competent scoring runs if any at least.

[RNGmaster]

Hah, I wondered how the nico scoreplayer was adjusting sword direction like that. I'm keyboard master race so it looks like I'll have to stick to the comparatively clumsy method of letting go of the buttons :V

I'll look into making a database of enemies with high spirit values.

[Zaarock]

I'm keyboard master race so it looks like I'll have to stick to the comparatively clumsy method of letting go of the buttons :V

you can have the slow button on keyboard.. just have to switch one button on the controller config to be slow instead (one of the defaults is pointless if I remember right) I have z x c v as the buttons with V as slow and using a keymapper for a pad because I'm playing on a mac.

[RNGmaster]

I use V for ragequits :V

Anyways, I can think of 4 categories of enemies that do strange things to spirit value:

1: Enemies that have high spirit gain via scratch damage. These include the chaff in Seg. 1 LEAD (with certain attacks), coffins in Seg. 1, the brown monowings before the Seg. 1 LEAD boss, the invulnerable missiles in 2 LEAD that the large enemies drop downwards, Sunken Bishop's arms, the segments of the large ships in 3 LEAD, the large ships in Seg. 8 that you can stand inside, and a few others.

2: Enemies with high spirit count when you kill them at close range. Thse include the laser turrets in Seg. 5, the ships at the end of Seg. 6 Part 2, and the winged laser-shooting ships in Seg. 7 (value increases from 2 to 20 at close range). These enemies also build spirit very quickly.

3: Enemies that build spirit fast. These include the coffins in Seg. 1 that flash red, the Quetzalcouatl in 1 LEAD (3 large ships with 4 parts each), Scarlet Queen's turrets, the Seg. 3 LEAD ships, Sunken Bishop's head, some (Passing Phrase) enemies, and many others.

4: Miscellaneous (unsorted). The Kaname Stones in Seg. 2 LEAD which double in value each time you kill one, Scarlet Queen's turrets, unchainable enemies in 3 LEAD which are worth 7 spirits if you kill them individually, and many others which change value according to moon-logic.

And, um, I just killed Rusted Dragon and didn't get a Revive. What gives?

[LtC]

Ltc isn't around much anymore so idk if the OP will get updated or anything, but I don't think it's necessary since the thread isn't big yet or anything.

If there's anything you want me to change please let me know. But I'm lazy and I haven't played this in a long time so I don't know if there's much I can do for this thread anymore by myself unless I somehow end up getting back into this game.

If anyone wants to salvage the information from this thread and make a new and better guide then feel free to. Otherwise I'll probably take a look at the thread later and see what I can add/fix.

[RNGmaster]

Hmm, I beat Way of All Flesh and didn't get the 4th menu screen. That's odd.

[Cadrin]

RNG, apparently the Rusted Dragon drops a revive token only if you keep at least one of its wings undestroyed by the time you kill the main body of the boss.

If you time out the Rusted Dragon without destroying any of its parts (need confirmation on that), it will drop multiple revive tokens for no good reason (ReVIVES, as in whole extra lives, not just heart tokens - five or six, I think, definitely enough to easily bring you from 1 life to Immortal if your life max is set to 6). At least it did when I timed it out as Minogame in Segment Selection.

Of course timing it out will halve all your score (Terra(?), Tokens, Kills, Spirits). But it might be a good idea if you're going for survival. Most of the Rusted Dragon's baseline attacks aren't that hard if you focus solely on dodging them.

From what I've noticed it drops the revive tokens moments before flying away, so it might be a viable strategy to bring the main body to 0% and destroy it in the last second to avoid the "The boss has disregarded you." sequence. That's just speculation, though. I only tried it two times and I did not save any replays, but it shouldn't be hard to reproduce that, so I'll probably post a replay of me timing out the Dragon and receiving tons of revives later.

EDIT: okay, took me a while. Here it is. (How WinRAR managed to compress two 170KB replays to 3KB is beyond me...)
Recorded on 1.009. Minogame, Distorted, Noobstate. You will probably need to have Segment Location unlocked on him up to Segment 4 in order to access the boss replays. The readme file inside should explain things clear enough.

I've written down some of the more obscure stuff that I've found in game, but it's quite a block of text, so I think I'll publish it in bite-sized chunks as to not discourage you from reading this topic.

[Noah!]

Just tested this out on my own, and yeah it's okay to damage the boss. I managed to get him down to just one damaged wing and he still pooped out like four extends.

I'm kinda wondering if this could be a viable boss milking strategy. On one hand you miss out on the big unchain festival at the end, but considering the Immortality bonuses are worth like 2,000 or more apiece...milking this way sets you up for like a 10K CASH ☆ IN if you don't blow it. And since revive tokens give you like a ton of terra, this could be a good way for LEAD-players to recover from terra loss.

[RNGmaster]

The downside to grabbing the revives and increasing immortality bonuses is that it also increases the number of hearts you need for each successive extend. It's much safer than the insane unchain milking but slightly less lucrative I think. OFC it would be good for Lead players but I generally have about 200 terra by the end of Rusted Dragon so... I don't think it's worth it.

[Cadrin]

Are you serious? You can get as many as 2000 spirits per immortality bonus? I'd love to see a replay of someone getting a bonus that high, because I'm bad at this game and the most I've ever gotten is something around 520. I die a lot, even with my bootleg ghost radiance set to solidstate.

it also increases the number of hearts you need for each successive extend

I tested around a bit and that doesn't seem to be correct. Revives only give you an extra life and some terra, no immortality bonuses or adding the "EXPAND" value to the number of required heart tokens.

EDIT: HA! I was right. As said in the translated manual: "REVIVE relics, which appear in certain areas, grant 1 extra life. They have no other effects, positive or negative." And further in: "Is not affected by and has no effect on heart container expansion or immortality or the like."

Speaking of which, it seems that going to the Shrine of Farewell resets the amount of hearts you need for a next extend to the base value. Tested on Minogame, short mission mode. Now to check if it's the same in full sequence order. || EDIT: no wait, only the breakthroughs have such effects, or so says the manual...

Then there is scoring... oh lord, don't get me started on that. It barely makes any sense. It's often so hard to tell how things work and it requires plenty of testing to confirm... But we'll get it down sooner or later. I'll try to start putting up replays of fun stuff that can be done in Hellsinker on YouTube once I figure out how to record video from my computer. Because watching replays by me and other people actually helped me spot many of the little things that affect score. (And besides, nobody wants to download replays if they can watch them on YT.)

Oh, and while Kagura usually has very limited firing modes, her Infernal Sabbath equipment actually has something that lets you increase the spirit value. I found out that shooting while bombing skyrocketed the value of some of the enemies. Specifically I tried that on coral stars in Segment 4, getting over 50 spirits per a star. I'm not sure how it works - if it is the bomb that increases the spirit, or your main shot, or both combined, but it works somehow.

[RNGmaster]

Thanks for the info. I was wondering about Kagura spirit-building - it seems that Moon Cradle's aimed laser also increases values a fair bit.

[Cadrin]

Heh, with the translation being released many of my finds became redundant, as the manual explains a lot - and I mean, A LOT of things. I am kinda discombobulated by the surge of new information and have to rearrange the data I want to share with you, as some of it can now be found there. This is gonna take a while.

The scoring is still a great mystery, though. As I am re-reading the manual, it does not even tell you which of your attacks can increase the spirit value of affected units. One thing to keep in mind, though: what it says about the target flash color when hit. I still don't get it. It says that targets flashing green are indestructible, but the invulnerable Coffins in Segment 1 actually flash blue... Well they DO give you plenty of spirits if you keep attacking them despite their invulnerability, so maybe that makes sense... And the laser cannons on the Quiet Minstrel flash blue when hit, for whatever reason, and I have completely no idea what that means.

I was wondering about Kagura spirit-building - it seems that Moon Cradle's aimed laser also increases values a fair bit.

Yes. And by the way, did you notice that the Free Grenade (trying to get used to the Eng[l/r]ish names for all the things now that the game is translated ) actually has three charge levels? The targeting cursor turns red after about 2,5 seconds of waiting, then, after another 2,5 sec, it turns white.
Note, however, that while its graphics look more impressive than those of a moderately-charged Grenade (the lasers are even thicker and the screen flashes upon their convergence at the designated area), they are misleading, as the supercharged version actually does LESS damage than the moderately-charged one. For some reason.
Seriously, try it on the Shell Batteries in Segment 1 BEHIND to see the difference for yourself. It has never been fixed despite the graphical dissonance, so maybe Tonnor thought it'd be a cool thing to punish people for "overcooking" the Grenade...

I'd like to help you with Kagura, but I'm afraid I don't have much info. I don't think that the Xanthez ordnance package has any way of building up spirit. (None that I'm aware of. It seems to be more of a for-fun weapon setup designed for dishing out major damage in short intervals. Also, people say it's a nod towards Radiant Silvergun, but I haven't played that game.) Not sure about the Ecliptic Chariot. Its short, purple flame-like beam that it emits when the Gunner unit is not deployed and you hold the main shot button might be doing something, but I need to test things some more.

[RNGmaster]

I did see a score on the 7-iro scoreboard with about 80k spirits as Xanthez, so there must be some sort of secret technique.

[Noah!]

I did see a score on the 7-iro scoreboard with about 80k spirits as Xanthez, so there must be some sort of secret technique.

Would you mind linking to it? The highest one I see on that scoreboard is a 50K run. Anyway, after watching that replay, it seems like a pretty straightforward scoring run. No special tricks or anything, just all the usual scoring methods (mainly the ones that rhyme with "silk"), but Xanthez-style.

The thing that makes Xanthez suck for score is that its milkin' zone is that flashy spark when firing the main shot. Yeah, the one in front of Kagura, and the zone doesn't extend behind her either. So in order to milk anything, you pretty much have to place it directly in Kagura's line of fire. Even worse, it seems like the potency of the area depends on the power of the shot, so trying to milk on no ammo doesn't work out that well. Full auto, on the other hand, does a pretty good job during the 0.25 seconds anything in front of it is alive.

Granted, the 50K run wasn't that good (duder takes one to the hitbox like every level), so I wouldn't be surprised to see someone pull 80K out of Xanthez. Still, I think that setup is just too powerful for top-tier action.

--

Also, if I may make a request of my own: Does anyone know what's up with THE LAST PRESENT and INHERITED SP at the end of Segment 7? It seems to be a kind of bonus, but sometimes it cancels out to 0, and other times it gives out a good chunk of change.

[RNGmaster]

Hmm, I remember one on the old scoreboard that said in the comments something like "It's not impossible to score well with this type, you know!" I dunno where it went though.

The Moon Cradle replay on the scoreboard is insane though Milking thousands of scratch damage from the Shell Batteries in 1 BEHIND? That's crazy shit.

[cuttingagent]

Can someone tell me which weapons for each character will get the quickest kill on Glorious Symbol?
I keep reading that it's "harder for newer players" so I am to assume there's something I'm missing.
I'm pretty sure I can clear Segment 4 without continuing if I can just waste a few less lives on this one.

[RNGmaster]

Minogame is probably best for that. Just bomb constantly and use Reality Hedge (the black lasers) and the aura attack.

[daliscar]

In spite of reading the manual in English I'm still a bit confused about the relation between luna token level (the hexagonal purple gem counter in bottom right HUD) and token count (the large numerical values for "TOKEN" below purple gem counter).
Is it that the purple gem level depends on the number of gems collected whereas token count indicates the value of gems collected?
Also the gem level maxes out at 16 (allegedly) but what does the gem level actually affect?
What's the advantage of increasing the gem level?
And is TOKEN simply an alternative achievement to SPIRIT or is there a hidden relationship between them?
The scoreboards are ranked by SPIRIT but wouldn't it be equally valid to rank them by TOKEN?

[Cadrin]

Is it that the purple gem level depends on the number of gems collected whereas token count indicates the value of gems collected?

That is correct. The level increases by 1 for every luna gem you collect, luna chips included - and likewise, it decreases by 1 for every luna gem that floats up from the screen.

I think the gem level affects two things: the size and value of luna gems. No single luna gem counts as 1 full token, it's always something less.

It seems that collecting the gems (maybe also chips, maybe not) has the added benefit in that every 256 gems or so (maybe 128) you collect you are awarded a single heart token.
Also letting enough luna gems float off the screen reduces your terra by 1, it seems...

The game really has three different scoreboards for a reason. Getting as many kills and luna gems as possible is slightly tricky. I watched the replays and aiming for a high score in each one of the three requires a very different play style.

But spirits are usually obtained through what fits the definition of "just playing well" the closest. That means not getting hit, grazing those needles and in general doing crazy stuff that involves lots and lots of bullets getting in an uncomfortably close proximity to your core (hitbox). Which is why most people think of spirits as the closest thing Hellsinker has to score.

Now you made me want to download that replay of Kagura getting over 20000 kills during the course of the game. That's twice as many things as you usually get to kill.

[daliscar]

...I think the gem level affects two things: the size and value of luna gems. No single luna gem counts as 1 full token, it's always something less.
It seems that collecting the gems (maybe also chips, maybe not) has the added benefit in that every 256 gems or so (maybe 128) you collect you are awarded a single heart token.
Also letting enough luna gems float off the screen reduces your terra by 1, I think... Or maybe it actually trades 1 terra for 1 heart token. In which case calling them farewell tokens would actually make some more sense as collecting them would inadvertently draw the Shrine closer to you...

Thankyou
The more I learn about Hellsinker the more beautiful it becomes.

[Cadrin]

Yeah... ain't she a beaut.

I tested some more and it might be that you gain a heart for approximately every 100 GEMS you collect (it doesn't matter how much they contribute to your TOKEN score, just 100 luna gems - as in, items. I mean the ones that float UP the screen, not the luna shards that fall down or micro gems that get automatically sucked in by your executor and that appear when a bullet is cancelled by destroying an enemy that clears the screen from bullets). And likewise, allowing 100 gems to escape the screen by floating up causes you to lose 1 terra. So the gems seem to function like one hundredth of a regular heart token. It's probably not very important for survival.

EDIT: removed the info on the Apostles because nobody asked for it and it's pretty easy to figure out by yourself.

By the way, Noah, from what I've seen, the bonus for handling Rex Cavalier's Memory Transfer never gets above 500 spirits anyway... I'm saying that because I can't figure out for the life of me how it works. And neither what exactly are the prerequisites for you to get the Spirit Overload. I think the attack must be left uninterrupted (no bombing allowed, though dying or at least letting the protective talisman take the hit seems okay for some reason) and Rex' spirit kernel has to have a certain amount of health left in the end of the attack. There's probably more to that than just these two, though.

[RNGmaster]

All of the scoreplays I've seen wait until the absolute last moment to defeat the Cavalier kernel, reinforcing the theory that The Last Present and/or Inherited SP depend on letting the memory transfer sequence almost complete.

I think the whole "conversation sphere" gimmick about not going above Rex Cavalier might play a role in the end-of-stage bonus too - it doesn't seem to have any negative effects but score runs avoid using the top safespot like the plague.

[daliscar]

Why is it important to delay entering the Shrine Of Farewell for as long as possible? Do the spirit crystals values relate somehow to the initial number of spirits you enter the Shrine with?

[Noah!]

Yep, you're dead-on. Each spirit crystal is worth a direct percentage (according to the manual, 1/200th or 0.5%) of the spirit value you had upon entering the Shrine.

[Cadrin]

It seems to me that the absolute max number of crystallized spirits you can get in the Shrine is 422. Yeah it's 1/200 of the spirits you had while entering the shrine, so do the math.

You can still hang at the top of the screen regardless of what executor you chose and appreciate the otherworldly physics of the spirit shards. If you go all the way up top, then the shards beneath you will come to a complete halt directly below you and just hang there slightly above the abyss that is the bottom of the screen... for about five seconds before disappearing. That's exactly the behavior that Fossil Maiden and Dead Liar players exploit by placing their misteltoes down there to catch all the stationary shards. Unfair? Why, very much so. But still, somehow the world second score belongs to Minogame who cannot catch all of the crystals, so do not lose hope and KEEP YOUR DIGNITY.

Just a quick note: kaname stones give up to 18 crystallized spirits each. BUT bombing makes them go all red and angry. They won't drop any terra chips or won't give you any crystals if you use a bomb on them (the only bomb that doesn't count is Fossil Maiden's Bacillus Cloak). Normally bombing is encouraged because auto rejection doesn't work. But not on the keystones.

(Please tell me: are those cat people in the Shrine boys or girls? I am utterly confused still. Fan arts seem to imply that they are actually girls, so I'll stick with that.)

EDIT: the problem with information on the net is this: the most trivial pieces of information will get repeated over and over. So I just cut some of the most obvious things.

[Zaarock]

Starting to play this again, sure been a while. Starting to play with Fossil Maiden and solidstate which I never really used before. Wow does solidstate make things easier for survival. Great strat discussions I didn't read here before, nice stuff.

Any fossil maiden players got tips on how to use her effectively and/or advanced tricks? (RNG?)

Mainly wondering how to kill Rusted Dragon without losing a life right now, that would net me a lot of points. Right now I'm assuming the quickest way of causing damage is something like dropping the mistletoe on the top of the screen to charge and fire the laser repeatedly.. still takes a lot more time than with minogame for me though.

edit2: pretty much got it down now, speedkilling the wings as fast as possible works well because the final form is quite easy. Now for perpetual calendar bossrush, heh.. also, never really used bombs in the game before but they're a nice weapon to add to your arsenal & it comes with the risk of having no autobomb.

If I get some good scores going I'll start doing runs on a computer that runs the game at 100% all the time so I can share replays. Only segment 5 and seg 8 boss rush get a little lag on this but it'll cause desync.