Wild Metal Country F.A.Q. By governator99 10-04-06 **Disclaimer: This FAQ may not be used, redistributed, or copied on any other website without my expressed permission.** **Special thanks to Rockstar games for re-releasing this excellent game for free for personal use on newer version computers. I really enjoyed it.** **Note: This walkthrough is not a step by step, point A to point B walkthrough. Although there is a compass, the terrain has no landmarks and is basically just a bunch of hills and mountains, so it would be extremely tedious to try and create a standard walkthrough. Instead, I will focus on certain parts of the game that definitely could help some people with a little explaining. For example, hard enemies, strategy, secrets, etc.** Game: Wild Metal Country is a great little game about a tank robot stranded in a wasteland filled with other tank robots. Your goal is to kill them off with a variety of different weapons. The ambiance is very post-apocalyptic. It makes for a pretty addictive game. Goal: You must collect 8 power cores in each level, each usually guarded by several of the tougher tank robots. You have several tanks to choose from. I like Rhino the best, he seems to work great in almost every level. They all use the same weapons, but they look cool. Also, some of them go faster than others, and some climb hills easier. Cheetah is faster but has less armor. The rest have about the same armor but different speeds. There are 3 planets with several levels for each. You'll know when you're getting towards the end of a planet when it starts getting really hard. <+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<<+<+<+ I. Weapons You have 12 weapons to choose from, although you have to earn 9 of them, by beating the first 9 levels. You start out with the default wepon, plus the Barrel mines and the Homing beacon. Select your weapon by pressing 0 through 8, and mines: 9 through '+ key'. 1 -- Default weapon: Blaster missile: a good weapon, don't underestimate it if you run out of other weapons. Its also very easy to aim, unlike a lot of the others. 2 -- Bouncer Missile: It bounces along the ground toward your enemy. Packs a little more punch than the default weapon but it sometimes misses its target and its more difficult to aim. Definitely good to use when you need fire power though. 3 – Machine Gun: Okay weapon. Has limited range, but fun to use. 4 – Explosive missile: The first really powerful weapon you get. Really blows stuff up! Shrapnel kills damages tanks in surrounding area. 5 – Homing missile: Fire it into the air to shoot down flying robots. Has a mind of its own a little bit, but its powerful when it hits. 6 – Kablong! Missile – The most powerful missile in the game. Annihilates tough enemies with one shot. Has huge blast radius so even getting close will destroy a lot of stuff. Can't really see the blast radius though so don't fire it close to yourself. 7 – Long Range Missile – Another very powerful missile. This one really launches far when you shoot it like the Kablong missile so aim low at close enemies. Also is magnetic so has some homing capabilities but not much. 8 – Teleport Missile – Use this to teleport yourself on certain levels of the game. You have to shoot yourself though so aim at a wall when you right next to it. 9 – Barrel Mine – Rolls towards enemy and blows them up. Launches them through air on impact. 10 – Magnetic Mines – Draws enemy towards it and blows em up. Don't use them much, but I'm sure there good for an escape route. 11 – Flying Mines – Don't recommend using these. They're just as dangerous to you as they are to them. Once they go on the attack they don't stop until they've exploded. There's no escape for you or the enemy. 12 – Homing Beacons – Use these to mark locations in the game. I like to use them to mark weapons powerup spots. Or also for powercore collectors even though they show up on the radar. <+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+< II. Enemies Hyena: This little guy is like your twin. He looks like you but he's pretty easy once you get used the the game. Bull: Double-barreled tank. These guys are a little bit tough. If your good you can take them with just the default weapon Rat: Motorcycle tank bot. These guys don't do anything but roll out a pathetic barrel mine once in a while. Kill them easily to get back some energy. Viper: Machine Gun turret mounted tanks. These guys aren't that tough but watch it when they charge you. Buffalo: Missile Launcher turret-mounted tanks. These are tough, especially when they rain down missiles on your head. If you take out their probe they won't know your location. Bat: Little flying robots. They drop mines, including magnetic mines ,and steal away with what your entire goal is: power cores. They're a real pain in the butt. If you get good enough at aiming to hit them in the air, do it. It will save you a lot of trouble. Especially later in the game, it becomes really handy if you can do that. Lemming: These run towards you and blow themselves up. They can be tricky to fend off. They also latch on once they get to you so at least try to get them off you before they blow. If they latch on to your back fire off a barrel mine to avoid Firefly: These are little flying discs that look like Batteries not included. They fire either machine guns or teleport missiles. I like to take them out with bouncing missiles. Duck: Hovercrafts. Their missiles send you flying end over end when they fly anywhere near you. Take care of them quickly, starting with atleast 2 powerful shots. Otherwise, you'll just get blown around forever. Eagle: Flying airship. Drops bombs and machine guns. Deceptively hard to target for some reason. But I still don't always use homing missiles on them. Hawk: Flying craft. Drops bombs. Very hard to target. Use homing missiles on them, and after that just keep shooting until you finally hit them. Raven: Hovering Tank craft. Found in later levels of the game. Has impressive arsenal of weapons, including homing missiles that are very powerful and hard to avoid. Take them out quick if you can. +<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+ III. Strategy: Once you have most of the weapons, use them! Don't save them and never get to have fun with them. You'll end up dying less too. Also, you have a rescue button, default R, which calls one of those helicopters to come and restore all your life energy. Really comes in handy. Another trick is to learn to use your barrel mines when you're uphill from your enemy. Turn your turret facing backwards and just aim and fire. Watch as your enemy gets blown to bits. Takes a little practice but its effective. When you're looking for cores it helps to use the regeneration rings. Just drive under one of the rings and all the cores will usually appear on your radar. Try pointing at one and driving in that direction. It doesn't always work, there's a lot of hills in your way, but it definitely makes things easier a lot of the time. These are for the harder levels in the game, pretty much the level Lair onward. Always go back and deliver your cores to the regeneration ring. You'll just lose them if you don't. Trust me its worth it. Also, try taking out tougher enemies and groups of enemies quick. If there's two tough enemies, like a duck and a buffalo, hit both of them with a couple of Explosive shells. Then finish everyone off with whatever else you want to use. Otherwise, you'll keep have to keep dying and coming back for more. Another trick is to get good at beating the Bat robot. He's the little guy that hovers above you and drops mines. Just aim about as high as possible and aim at his shadow. Keep lining up where you shell is going in relation to the shadow. Killing those suckers really comes in handy later, when they start taking off with your cores! **Note: The keyboard controlsmakes you control the 2 tire tracks of the tank seperately. I think its easier just to use a gamepad. Then you can just move forward, backward, or turn left and right. Its funner that way. **Note: If you use a gamepad, try setting the turret movement to the L and R buttons (the buttons on top of the gamepad, left and right) if you have them. I think its easier than using the two control sticks, one for movement, one for the turret. <+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+<+< IV. Secrets: Last level of the Desert World: Lair: You'll have to face Minotaur robots. They can be tough but use powerful weapons and keep dying and going back. Its best to drive backwards as they chase you. I recommend the 5, homing missile, or the other three powerful weapons: 6, 7, and 4 (Long Range, Kablong, and Explosive). One of the minotaurs and one the of the cores are both hard to find. The tricky minotaur is located on one corner of the map where there doesn't seem to be anything there but sand. Its next to a pathway running between those raised platforms. And when you beat the minotaurs, you have to destroy what's left of them to get cores. One of them doesn't give you a core. And there's one core that's extremely hard to find, even with radar. To get to it you have to go to the pyramid where you defeated one of the Minotaurs. Looking for the core with radar should point you over there. Once you get there, you'll need to use the teleport weapon. Go to the backside of the pyramid. You'll see two blue stripes heading straight up the pyramid. Face them and then turn 180 degrees. Now fire the teleport missile against the mountain wall, and it will travel up the wall and hit an enemy tank high above. You will switch places with the enemy tank and now be on the small ridge high above where the last core is located. Final level of the Tundra Planet: On the level Warship: One of the most difficult things about beating the boss of this level is finding it. Pointing for the last core and driving straight for it doesn't really cut it this time. You just need to start remembering landmarks and try and figure out exactly the same way to get to it each time. Here's one way to get to it: First, find the regeneration ring that's nestled in between a ring of low mountain peaks. Now exit the ring to the north and follow the path to the east. You'll come to a big opening. There are two pathways to the right. Be careful and take the second one. Continue on staying on the left of the path. Now follow as it winds around. It will circle around the group of mountains in the center. When you get to the backside of the center mountains, there's an opening to the right. Its hard to spot though. Now go in that opening. Exit to the left, and you should be at the warship! As far as beating the warship, make sure you get on the side of it where you can see everything. The side where you first see it is the backside. Then, the 3 things you need to destroy are the 3 things that are shooting at you. There's 2 turrets that are shooting explosive missiles at you and on the third one is on the other side of the strip. Its up high. They all have a marking on them that looks sort of like an eye. The 2 turrets are hard which is frustrating because when you die its so hard to find the warship again . Use powerful weapons and shoot them really quick so you have a chance of winning before you die. After you defeat it, blow up the 2 green things in the middle to get the power cores. Final level of the Red Planet: On the level Core: you'll face 3 giant robots with all 8 weapons plus a wicked homing missile weapon. These dudes are really tough. 2 of them contain cores but you won't know which 2 so you might have to kill all 3. First, start driving close to where they can shoot you, by close I mean in there zone of influence which is huge, so you probably won't even see them a mile a way when they start shooting their missiles. You should do this so you can get used to dodging their homing missiles. This takes practice though. You need drive in arcs, but change direction a lot, I would say zig-zag but that doesn't always get it. First arc like in a circle one way, then arc in a circle in the other direction. Don't worry where they are. If you can get them to start missing you with their missiles your getting somewhere. When your ready to fight them you'll need to draw them into a huge section of land with some blue symbols on it. It looks like a huge alien landing pad. They each have one in their own areas. To do this, drive onto the blue landing pad and fire at them from a long distance until they come for you. While you doing this drive around in circles in the landing pad dodging the homing missiles. When they get to the landing pad it gets easier because if you right around or up underneath them, they can't shoot missiles at you. Of course then, you'll have their tiny little disc robots to deal with. Okay, when they get to the blue landing pad, start hitting them with the powerful weapons, 4,5, or 7 don't regain energy so keep coming at them. Find weapons powerups after each life. The secret of beating them is their 3 big legs that they spin around on. If you pick on leg and only shoot directly at it, they'll go down a lot quicker You can even do it with the default weapon once you've gotten some heavy shots in. If they move the leg you've picked, wait until it spins around again or try to get back over to it. Now you can see the point of the blue landing space. They can't get away and start firing their missiles. When you beat them, destroy what's left to get the core. After you've got all 3 of them and collected the 8 cores, you've beaten the game.