=================================== ==== ======= ================== === ===== == ================= == == ==== ===================== = ==== == ===== = ==== == = ==== === ====== = == = = === ====== ======= = = = ==== === ====== ======= = = = ==== === ====== ======= = = = ==== === ====== ======== == =================================== ====================================================== == ============================================== = ==== ============================================= = ==== ============================================= == ======== === = = === = == = ==== === = ==== ===== = == == = == = == = ===== ====== ====== == = = == = == ========== == = = ==== === == = = == = == ======== == = = ==== == = == = = == = == ======= = == = == ==== == = = === == ======== == = ====================================================== ================================================== 1. Introduction...(I1T) ================================================== A. Table of Contents 1. Introduction...............(I1T) 2. Controls...................(C2L) 3. Gameplay...................(G3P) A. Afro's Abilities......(AAB) B. Combat Strategies.....(CBS) 4. The Guide..................(T4G) A. Daimyo's Story........(DMS) B. School Invasion.......(SCI) C. Sword Master's Story..(SMS) D. Okiku's Story.........(OKS) E. Lowdown East Pass.....(LEP) F. Doppelganger..........(DPG) G. Kuma's Story..........(KMS) H. Empty Seven's Story...(ESS) I. Ninja Ninja's Story...(NNS) J. Justice's Story.......(JSS) 5. Closing/Legal/Contact info.(C5C) ==================== B. Introduction ==================== There exist in this world two sacred headbands, the number one and the number two. The number one headband bestows the powers of the gods on who ever wields it. The wielder of the number two headband is bestowed no special powers save one: the ability to challenge the number one. A great man once wielded the number one headband, but he was cut down in his prime by the villain Justice. Justice made quite the impact on the son of the former number one, and told the child to come back when he was ready to avenge his father. Twenty-some odd years later, that time has come. Afro Samurai has grown up into one of the most feared swordsmen in the world, and has finally learned the location of Justice. With the number two headband displayed proudly on his head, Afro sets off to avenge his father and become the holder of the number one headband. ==================== C. About Me ==================== This is my second guide, the first being for the Wii game No More Heroes. As it might be evident by the guides I've written, I'm a fan of uber-violent action fests. This guide started out as just a memento FAQ and slowly started to include boss strategies and general tips. By the time I'd completed the game, I had much more of a full FAQ than I had originally planned. I decided to finish off the guide and make it a full FAQ. If you need to contact me for any reason, be it new strategies or errors in this guide, you can contact me at wcrobars@hotmail.com ================================================== 2. Controls... (C2L) ================================================== PS3/Xbox 360 Left Analog Stick: Character movement Click in Left Analog Stick: Dash Right Analog Stick: Camera Control X/A: Jump Square/X: Light Attack Triangle/Y: Heavy Attack Circle/B: Kick L1/Left Bumper: Focus Mode L2/Left Trigger: Over-Focus R1/Right Bumper: Block D-Pad Up: Ninja Ninja Compass (tells you where to go) Start: Pause Select/Back: Move List ================================================== 3. Gameplay... (G3P) ================================================== Afro Samurai is by and large a hack and slash. To progress through the game, you'll have to master Afro's combat abilities. This section is devoted to learning and understanding Afro's moves, and which ones can help you in certain situations. ==================== A. Afro's Abilities...(AAB) ==================== I. Light/Heavy Attacks These are the bread and butter of combat. It's sort of a misnomer to call the light and heavy, as heavy attacks aren't really much slower than light attacks. Heavy attacks are more like alternate combo chain. Light attacks tend to be simpler sword slashes, with little flashiness or movement involved. Heavy attacks tend to be wilder and more varied, and a lot of them focus on movement and special attacks. There's no real reason to use one over the other except for variety's sake and combo potential. II. Combos The heart and soul of any action game, Afro has his fair share of combos. Combos in Afro Samurai start off as simple 3-4 hit moves at the game's start, but as you level up your combo potential will slowly increase. Eventually you will have access to crazy 14-15 hit combos, and others that will insta-kill enemies if certain strikes hit. Combos can be performed with both light attacks and heavy attacks, or you can mix them up to create more complex moves. III. Kicks Kicks are very weak moves. However, they're incredibly fast and have some decent combo potential. Kicks don't combo well with any other moves, so you really only need to use them when you're in a tight spot and need to get out of there fast. IV. Focus Mode Focus mode is the heart and soul of Afro Samurai's combat system. When activated, the world will slow down in a bullet time-esque sequence. You can perform a number of unique moves by entering this mode, but the big guns are perfect slices. There are two versions of perfect slices: vertical and horizontal, performed by heavy and light attacks respectively. When you start a slash like this, a gleam will travel down the blade of Afro's Katana. Upon reaching the end of the sword, release the button to perform a slash that will instantly kill any normal enemy that it hits. Focus slashed can further be aimed to chop off certain body parts from enemies: a white line will appear where you are going to slash, this can be aimed with the left stick either up/down for a horizontal slash or left/right for a vertical slash. V. Overfocus A special version of Focus mode, and Afro's ultimate attack. Time slows just like a normal focus attack, and all of Afro's moves are now special one hit kills that don't need to be charged at all. After a few seconds, the game will revert back to normal. You need to have full focus to do this, but it will kill ANY non-boss enemy in a single hit. VI. Dash Attacks Performed by attacking while clicking in the left analog stick, dash attacks are very fast moves that only hit once. There is a different dash attack for each of the different attack buttons: heavy, light, and kicks. VII. Blocking Blocking in Afro Samurai is fairly simple: just hold the block button. Afro can block pretty much indefinitely, but if he's hit too many times in a short enough period his guard will be broken and he'll be open for attack. VIII. Parrying Parry is a special move that will set enemies off balance and leave them open for attacks. To parry, you have to block right when an enemy's attack is about to hit. You cannot parry if you simply hold down the block button: you'll need to time the strike just right to reflect your enemy's move and set him off balance. IX. Pouncing The Natural progression of parrying, pouncing allows you to do all kinds of nasty things to enemies. To pounce, you need to parry an enemy and immediately press the jump button afterwards. Afro will jump on the foe's shoulders, and you will have a brief window to input commands for what Afro can do. Pressing any of the attack buttons will be an instant kill against the enemy, with a different style for each different attack. The other option when pouncing is to throw enemies. Instead of pressing another button, continue to hold jump and aim with the left analog stick to throw the enemy in that direction. This is usually an instant kill, and a few environmental puzzles require you to do this to continue through the game. X. Bullet Slicing/Reflecting Certain enemies in the game use guns and will try to hit you from long range. You could just run up and kill them as fast as you can, but this is a much more stylish and easier way to go about it. When you fight a gun wielding enemy, a part of the screen will show him aiming at you. When you see this, enter focus mode and hold there for a moment without don't press any buttons. When you here the shot fire from the gun, hold the horizontal focus attack button. It should go to a special animation: wait for the gleam to travel down the edge of the sword just like usual, and then release when it's at the end to reflect the bullet back at the enemy and instantly kill him. If you use a vertical attack to slice the bullet instead you will merely destroy it and not cause any damage to the shooter, except in a few select cases. ==================== B. Combat Strategies...(CBS) ==================== Afro Samurai is a free form action game. The game focuses on fighting numerous enemies at the same time, and there are a staggering number of battles on the game. As such, I won't be giving specific strategies on how to beat every single minor conflict the game throws at you. I will provide relevant information that might help you during a fight, or strategies for particularly difficult fights. Keep in mind for these that this guide was written while playing on hard mode, which is unlocked after beating normal mode. These strategies will work for both modes of the game, but if you're playing on normal you really don't need to be as strict as some of these might seem. Hard mode requires you to be much more defensive than normal mode, and these strategies reflect that. If this is too much to read, here's a quick summary: -The best focus attack is a horizontal strike aimed at the legs -Don't use Overfocus -Do use Dash attacks -Collect Mementos -Vary your Fighting style I. Focus 101 Focus is Afro's ace in the hole, and the most important aspect of combat in the game is learning how to effectively use it. There are two focus attacks: horizontal and vertical. For the most part, there is very little reason to ever use vertical focus attacks: they have a much smaller window to hit someone and they rarely have a chance to take out more than one enemy at a time. They come in useful for a few enemies, but I'll mention them when those particular enemies show up. If focus slashes hit, they'll kill almost every time no matter what part of the body they hit. As such, the most effective part to aim for is the legs since they offer the largest area to hit. The only real way for an enemy to dodge one of these attacks is to jump to avoid it, and few enemies have the ability to do that. Against bosses, the same strategy applies except in situations that I mention where certain slashes either have to be used or are just plain better. II. Know Your Health and Focus This game doesn't have any menus, but there are still ways to tell how much damage you've taken and focus you have left. Your health is represented by the color of Afro's model: the darker red the model is tinted, the more damage you've taken. When you start to get really low on health, the sound effects in the game will begin to change to a strange pitch that almost sounds like you're underwater. At this point, you're very nearly dead and it's probably a good idea to go defensive or find a healing item. Your focus meter is actually the small pearl- like object attached to your sword. Depending on how much focus you have, it will glow different colors. The highest is a shining light, which means you're full and have enough focus to perform an over focus move. When you're absolutely empty, the pearl will have a dull black glow to it. III. Recovering Health and Focus There are numerous ways to recover your health and focus. The easiest way to recover your health is to slash at one of the teddy bears scattered around the game's levels, these will restore your health to full instantly. Killing enemies will restore your health as well, but not nearly as much. On hard mode, you will only receive health from a foe if you killed them by decapitation. Finally, you will receive health by performing a successful hand in "body-part poker"-more on that in a minute. Focus is much simpler to recover. Focus will recover both overtime and by hitting enemies with regular moves in combat. Focus is generally very easy to keep at a useable level, but it's hard to raise it all the way to an over-focus (and not really worth it). IV. Body Part Poker Body part poker is a sort of mini-game that will pop-up in certain fights. Ninja Ninja, Afro's companion, will appear on the battlefield. To start body part poker, touch Ninja Ninja to begin the timer which is represented as a cigarette on the bottom of the screen. Your goal in body part poker is to make a "hand" of three cards by chopping off certain limbs of the game's enemies. The hand is determined by two factors: the cards (the parts you cut off), and the suits (the enemies you kill.) To give you an example, here's a few hands: Ronin hand/Ronin legs/Ronin head This hand wins because each body part that was cut off belonged to a Ronin enemy. Ronin Head/Ninja Head/Drone Head This hand wins because each body part cut off was the same. Ninja Head/Ninja Head/Ninja Head This obviously wins, but a "three head" flush is the highest hand in the game, and there are a few achievements on the 360 version of the game based on getting this for different kinds of enemies. Sorry PS3 crowd, there aren't any trophies for this game. Ninja Head/Ronin Hand/Ninja Legs This is an example of a losing hand. All of the body parts that were cut off are different, and there are two different suits. A hand will only win if all the body parts sliced off or all the enemies killed match. V. Overfocus Overfocus would be Afro's "ultimate move", if it were any good that is. Sadly, overfocus has too many drawbacks to be useful in most situations. For one, you need to have full focus to use it. This requires extended periods of time in which you don't use your regular focus in order to save up the required energy. Secondly, using overfocus will drain all of the focus you have. This leaves you extremely vulnerable in a situation where you might need it. Finally, it's just not the great when compared to regular focus. A well placed focus attack can kill three or four enemies in a single hit, and a few hits later you will have charged up enough focus to do another focus slash. The amount of time and energy you have to put into overfocus makes it pointless in the long run. It's not useless-if you happen to have enough during a fight then by all means use it- but don't save up for one of these. VI. Use Dash Attacks Dash Attacks are some of your best moves. They're weak, but they're very fast and stun enemies. A stunned enemy is an enemy you can perform a combo on or kill with a focus attack. Use dash attacks constantly to set up combos and single out members of a group so you can eliminate them one by one. Dash attacks work on bosses too, and are a big part of learning how to fight well. VII. Mementos Mementos are secret collectibles in the game, and generally speaking there will be five in every level of the game that isn't just a boss fight. "Memento" is a slightly a misnomer, as the actual item itself is actually a small group of crows. Whenever you collect all the mementos in a level, Afro will gain a new move from the "Father's Legacy" set on the moves menu. For the most part, these are upgraded or more advanced forms of some of the combos you already have. Some of these moves are absolutely awesome to have and make the game quite a bit easier, so collect as many of them as you can as the game goes on. I will list where the mementos are located in each level. VII. Jump Attacks As you might suspect, Afro has a few jump attacks in this game. A simple warning: it's almost never a good idea to use them. Afro's jump is pretty slow, and performing any of the aerial moves causes you to stand still in the air as you fumble around trying desperately to hit something. Does being stuck in the air, unable to hit anything or even defend yourself sound like a good situation when hordes of heavily armed enemies are trying to kill you? The ONLY jump attack that's useful is one of the Father's Legacy moves, which lets you perform focus attacks in the air. Get the timing right on this, and you can leap into crowds with a vertical focus slash and kill enemies before the fight's even begun. Other than that, avoid these at all costs. IX. Fighting Crowds Combat in Afro Samurai is rarely difficult against a single enemy unless they're a boss. The challenge of this game's combat comes from trying to fight lots of foes at the same time. Knowing how to fight ten enemies at once is important to your survival, and there's a few tricks that can help you out. First, know what the hell you're doing. Button mashing might work in some of the game's easier portions, but later on you'll be dead in no time if you try it. Performing the right combos are important too: when fighting lots of enemies, it should be obvious to go with attacks that have a wider range and can hit more people at once over more damaging attacks that single out a foe. That being said, the two things you should focus on in combat are your own personal defense and the elimination of enemies one by one. It doesn't help if the ten enemies you're fighting are all low on health and you only have a tiny bit of health left. It's much better to be fighting two enemies at full health than it is to be fighting a range of weaker foes all at the same time. Use focus slashes to take down as many enemies as you can at once, but don't be afraid to target a specific foe if they're giving you trouble. If all else is failing, you can run away and try some hit and run tactics to try and cull the enemy forces. Running in and doing a single dash attack followed by a focus slice and then running out of range is an effective means of combat if you're in trouble. You can also try sticking back and parrying, though this doesn't always seem to work out as good as you might think- you're bound to mess up at some point. ================================================== 4. The Guide... (T4G) ================================================== This guide is set up so that you'll only have to look at the information you want. The sections for each level are set up like so: (Level Name) (Memento Locations) (New Enemies) (Level Strategy) (Boss Strategy) Generally speaking, I'm not going to give that much information for the main levels of the game. I will provide tips on how to get through some of the tougher battles, but for the most part you should be able to get through the non-boss fights fairly easily-providing you've read the combat strategy section above. I also won't be providing a strategy for the game's tutorial level, as it lasts for about five minutes and you're told every single thing you need to do. Anyway, here we go. ==================== A. The Daimyo's Story...(DMS) ==================== I. Mementos ========== 1. Directly in front of you when you start. Can't miss em'. 2. After opening the main gate of the castle and defeating the enemies, go up the stairs. At the door of the castle, turn left and follow the path a bit and it will be at the end. 3. After stopping the clock hands, you will fight a large group of enemies in the central area of the castle. After that, you will have to across the clock hands and then wall run to get to the next area. After wall running, there will be a hallway in front of you and a path to your right. The memento is in a small room on the right path. 4. This one's a bit tricky. You will come to a giant elevator where you will have to fight the near-nude tattooed ninja women and regular mooks. After beating them and hitting all four switches, the elevator will move up. At the top, there will be some climbable pipes on one side of the elevator. Move along these around the top of the room to find the memento on a ledge above the elevator 5. After exiting the poison gas tower, you'll have to climb some stairs to get to the final area. About halfway up there is a landing, where the path splits to go up or down to the left. Go down to left and around the building to take you to the final memento. ========== II. New Enemies ========== I. Ronin Threat level: low Able to Pounce: yes ---------- Ronin are the most common enemies in Afro Samurai. They vary in appearance from level to level, but you can always spot a Ronin because of his ridiculous giant hat. Individually, Ronin are the most pathetic enemies imaginable. They're only a threat when facing large groups of them, but they're easy prey to well aimed focus slashes and combos. You don't really need any special strategies to take on Ronin, and if you find yourself consistently being beaten by what is essentially a sentient toothpick then this might not be the game for you. (Note: whenever I refer to a "basic enemy" in the guide, it's probably these.) II. Gunner Threat level: low Able to Pounce: probably, but what's the point when they die so easy? ---------- Gunners are the game's single ranged enemy. Up close they're incredibly weak: breathe too hard and you kill one. These enemies will attempt to attack you from a distance though. It would be challenging if you couldn't just hit their bullets right back at them with a bullet reflect move. These will kill them in one hit, and there are almost never other enemies around when you fight them. (You can find how to do a bullet reflect in the gameplay section if you don't know how). III. Samurai Threat Level: Medium Able to Pounce: No, they'll counterattack and damage you. ---------- Samurai can actually be fairly tough foes. They're the most defensive enemies in the game, and they'll block most of your attacks and then counteract with their own. This makes them very hard to take down when they're in a group with other enemies. It's best to kill off all the weaker foes and then take on the Samurai one-on-one using dash attacks and focus slashes to catch them off balance. For the best results, attack low with focus slashes to try and avoid their guards. They seem to be more vulnerable around their legs, but they're pretty susceptible to well aimed vertical strikes too. IV. Strippers Threat level: Medium/Low Able to Parry: Yes. They even have a special death animation. ---------- Strippers are only fought in the "Daimyo's Story" level, and they get replaced later in the game by a different type of enemy. The strippers are very fast, but deal relatively little damage. They will mainly jump around and try to dodge your attacks instead of outright attacking you. Their main strategy is to either rush in and hit you while you're fighting someone else, or do a jump kick from far away. The jump kick can be deadly: It deals almost no damage, but it will interrupt whatever combo you're in and leave you open for other enemies to attack you. The best thing to do is be aware of where they are while you fight the other enemies. They're much easier to deal with when they're the only enemies left in the room and they'll go down pretty quick if you just focus on them. ========== III. Level Strategy ========== Head forward to find the first memento, and continue along the street to fight a few Ronin. Afterwards, you have to open the gate by wall running up on the right side. This will put you on a ledge near a Gunner. After killing him, go inside and pull the lever by wall running up to it. Cross the wooden beam near where the gunner was, and then repeat the same process on this side to open the castle's main gate. After entering the gate, you will be confronted by a large group of enemies, and the first Samurai enemy. It might seem like a good idea to try and kill him first, but it's best to finish off the weaker enemies and then take him on one-on-one. After that fight advance up the castle steps. By going on either side, you can find a memento and a healing bear respectively. Upon entering the palace, you'll have to fight some more enemies. After killing them, take the door on the left side of the bottom floor around to a machinery area. Advance around the room until you hit a switch, which will stop the clock hand in the central room of the level. Make your way back to the central room to fight a larger wave of enemies, and then advance up the clock hands and wall run around to a small ledge. Before continuing, make sure you get memento here to the right. After heading down the hall, you'll fight some strippers. (No, really). After that, advance on until you get to another room where you'll have to fight a whole bunch of strippers and basic enemies. After doing so, you'll have to hit a switch in each corner of the room. This will raise the floor up to the next level, but don't forget the memento before you continue. Collect the bear if you need it, then continue forward into the poison gas room. The tower will flood with poison gas that will start to drain your health: the only way to go is up. The tower is actually pretty easy once you realize there are quite a good number of bears on the way up to heal. There is one in the first alcove after the single enemy, one in the alcove after the double enemies, and one in the corner where the gas is coming out after the two enemies. Still, avoid fighting the enemies for more than a few seconds each and just avoid them if possible. Try to take out two or three of the final group of four with a well place focus slash, and then just dash for the exit behind them. After the tower, advance up the stairs and grab the memento half way up. You'll have to fight some enemies at the top of the stairs, and after they're dead you'll fight the Boss. ========== IV. Boss: Daimyo ========== Difficulty: 1/5 The Daimyo is basically just a beefy version of the regular samurai you've been fighting up to this point. After a few basic strikes, you will lock swords and he'll talk about parrying. This becomes the only way to beat him after he says this. You must parry his attacks by blocking at the correct moment right before he hits you. This will set him off balance and you can hit him a few times before he flips away and regains his composure. Really, this fight is all about defense. Just stand in place and parry his attacks when he comes to you. The only move you can't parry is his big overhead strike, but you can block it no problem. Just stay on the defensive and you should be fine. If you're finding it's too hard to parry him, you can also hit him if he misses with his charging attack. Defeat him to collect Afro's rightful sword and move on to the school invasion. ==================== B. School Invasion...(SCI) ==================== I. Mementos ========== 1. After going outside and killing the enemies in the courtyard, the Sword master will tell you to ring the alarm bell. Before following the cliff path, go to the right of where he's standing down a short path to find the first memento. 2. Shortly after the first memento, you will come to a large training ground area where you will fight some enemies. On the left side of the arena there are some targets, and next to those is the second memento. 3. After defeating the club wielding enemy, you will have to outside the main gate to kill some enemies. After they're all dead, check the left side of the cliff right outside the main gate the find the third memento. 4. When you enter the burning building to rescue the third child, the memento is to the right in front of some burning timbers right after you see the scene showing the third child. You have to get it as soon as you enter the building, otherwise a scene will force you to miss it if you try and come back after saving the girl. 5. When you start off to rescue the sword master, you will fight a small group of enemies on the rocky path. After killing them, jump on the rock on the left of the path, then hop along the tops of two more rocks to reach the last memento. ========== II. New Enemies ========== V. Ninja Threat level: Low/Medium Able to pounce: If you're really fast ---------- Ninja are the second most common enemy in the game. They come in two variations: black/red and black/blue. The differences appear to be just cosmetic, as the two different colors fight exactly the same. Ninjas are faster and more powerful than Ronin, but they die just as fast as Ronin do. The strength of a Ninja is in its speed: this enemy if very offensive and has a lot of attacks that can catch you off balance if you aren't careful. Of particular note is a dash attack that a Ninja will start about ten feet away from Afro. They'll charge at you very quickly, and they really like to use this move when you're preoccupied with another enemy. Ninja's like to dodge a lot too, but this actually work's to your advantage: they'll often "dodge" right into a focus slash. VI. Giant (Clubber) Threat Level: High Able to pounce: No ---------- Like the Ninja, this enemy has two models with identical moves: A white giant and a black giant. This enemy is a tank: they have incredible stamina and huge amounts of damage, but they're slow. Really slow. The best strategy to use on these guys is the good ol' hit and run. Use a dash attack to hit them once, do a short combo and maybe a focus attack, and then back off. These enemies have a lot of health, and it'll usually take a good five or six focus slashes to down them. They have a nasty range of moves too. The worst is that they have the ability to beat you when you're on the ground after you've been knocked over, which will all but kill you on hard mode. They also have a sort of counter move they'll do if you get them in too long of a combo that will knock you backwards. The best way to deal with them is to just keep your distance until the big guy tires himself out, and then rush in and deal as much damage as possible before he recovers. ========== III. Level Strategy ========== Follow the Sword Master as you descend the building, fighting enemies along the way. Kill all of the enemies outside, and the Master will direct you to sound the alarm bell. Don't forget the memento near him before you go. Advance along the cliff path to reach the training grounds, where you will have to fight more enemies and you can find a new memento. This is also the first time you'll encounter the Ninja enemy type, which will become very common as the game progresses. After killing all the enemies here, take the wooden path on the far side of the training grounds down along the cliff side. Kill any enemies you meet along the way. On the other side, you will have to navigate some cliffs to get access to where the bell is, but it isn't anything confusing. Upon reaching the bell, you will first have to fight some enemies before you can ring it. Kill all of them, and then kick the bell to ring it and warn the other students. After that you will have to defend to main gate. First take out the two Ninja, and the giant after them. There's a bear in one corner of the area here if you need it. The courtyard will then be flooded with enemies, kill them and move outside of the gate to trigger a cutscene. Kill all the enemies outside, but don't forget the memento before you go back inside of the gates. You now have to close the gates by pulling the levers on either side of them. Pull them, and then kill the last few enemies to move on to the next part of the level. In this portion of the level, your goal will be to rescue three children that have been trapped various places around the Dojo. Your top priority during this section of the level is to defend the kids: leave them unattended for too long and the enemies will kill them and you will have to start over just like if you had died. The children die very quickly on the Number one difficulty, so stay near them and make sure all of the enemies are focused on attacking you and not the child. In sections where Jinno fights with you he can die as well, so your role here is to be more of a babysitter than a warrior. The first child is located in the middle of the training grounds. You should stay on the central platform the entire time to ensure that the child remains safe, but it's fine to leave for a few seconds you have to save Jinno. You will then have to take the cliff path to get to the central courtyard again. Like with the first child, you should stay near the kid at all times to ensure he doesn't get attacked. The final child is inside the burning building. Make your way around the building, fighting enemies as you go. Upon entering the building, grab the memento shown in the cutscene and then make your way around the building as fast as you can in order to save the final child. After Jinno saves her, you will have to fight a few waves of enemies in the central courtyard. There is a bear if you need to heal during the fight. Finally, make your way up the main building to save Jinno. You'll then notice that the Sword Master is getting his ass kicked out on the small island near you, which will prompt Afro to go off and try to rescue him. On the rock path you start on, collect the level's final memento and then proceed down the rock path to the island. Upon reaching the island, you will go to a new level. ========== IV. Boss ========== This level does not have a boss. ==================== C. The Sword Master's Story...(SMS) ==================== This level consists entirely of a boss fight. There are no new enemies, mementos, or level to cover. Boss: The Sword Master Difficulty: 2/5 The sword master is much like the Daimyo: he doesn't really have any flashy or special moves, just powerful combos and single strikes. He's really offensive, and won't let up at all throughout the fight. He has a few combos that can shave quite a bit of health off, but there are two bears in the arena to heal with of you need them. If you caught the line from the Daimyo fight, you'll know that the sword master is weak to parrying, and that rings true. The best way to take him down is to parry his attacks, and then hit him 3-4 times with a focus attack on the end. If you're confident in your abilities, he's easy enough that you can just go all out on him as well; especially since he's vulnerable to well placed focus attacks, which will do tons of damage. ==================== D. Okiku's Story...(OKS) ==================== I. Mementos ========== 1. Right after the level starts, go outside the house and circle around to the other side. The memento is against the far side of the little field behind the house. 2. This one's a little tricky. On the first night, you will eventually come to a bamboo grove area (you will see Okiku cross a bamboo bridge when you reach here.) After the cutscene ends, go the left under a different bamboo bridge. After following this path for a ways, you will come to a small house; the memento is outside this house. 3. This is another tricky one. The memento is on the path as you're going to the first drone hole in the bamboo grove, but it's kind of hard to see. Shortly after leaving Okiku's house, you will have to hop across a few rocks over a bottomless pit. The memento is on the path under a branch just after getting through this part, but the lighting makes is sort of hard to see. 4. When you're back in the village to close the drone hole, stay against the right wall and walk as far as possible down the street. After the bar from the first level of the game, turn left and head down the alleyway to find the memento. 5. Thankfully, this one's easy. It's on a ledge right above the third drone tunnel- seriously, it's like five feet away from the tunnel entrance. Jump up to claim it. ========== II. New Enemies ========== VII. Heavy Swordsman Threat Level: Medium/High Able to Pounce: Yes ---------- Heavy Swordsmen are probably the most formidable of the game's basic enemies. They're powerful, have long range, and are actually pretty fast despite their size. If you're not careful these enemies can easily kill you if you let them. However, they're really only dangerous in a crowd of enemies. One-on-one they can be repeatedly hit and focus slashed without fear, as they have no counterattack to speak of. They can also be pounced on for a one hit kill, but the timing can be hard to get down. In combat you should mostly just try to avoid these guys while you take out lesser enemies to the point where you can easily focus on fighting just the Heavy Swordsman. VIII. Android (Drone) Threat level: Low Able to pounce: Yes ---------- These enemies are pretty sad really. They have all the power of a sad little Ronin combined with a Ninja's uncanny ability to jump in front of focus slashes. These guys are really the lowest of the low, and require no strategy to defeat other than "attack them". Even in numbers they present little challenge, so just go crazy on these guys. IX. Exploding Android (Orange Drone) Threat level: Medium Able to pounce: Yes ---------- These enemies are just palette swaps of the regular drones into orange jumpsuits. This doesn't make them any more dangerous in combat, but it gives them one very clear trait to avoid: when they die, they explode. This can cause a lot of damage to a pretty bug area, so it's best to kill these and then run away from the dead body. ========== III. Level Strategy ========== The first memento is right around the side of Okiku's house after you start the level. After that, just follow Okiku as and listen to what she says. When you reach the waterfall area, you'll fight a new enemy, the Heavy Swordsman. After killing him, you'll have to fight a few more basic enemies mixed in with a gunner. The best way to proceed here is to kill the gunner, then fight the rest of the enemies while standing on the platform where he was. You'll only have to fight two or three enemies at a time this way. Continue following Okiku until you reach the bamboo grove, where you can find another memento. Follow her around the path until she leaves. You will now have to follow the android as it tries to run away from you. This will eventually lead you to the village from the tutorial level of the game, where you will have to fight a gang of enemies. Take out the gunners first to make it easier on yourself. After killing all the enemies, you will move on to the next part of the level. Make your way back to the waterfall area that you went to the first night, whore you fought the Heavy Swordsman. Okiku will be there, and this will end the second part of the level. Quick, huh? You don't have to fight any enemies, and there aren't any mementos. This will then lead to the next night. Your goal will now be to destroy the Android hive that spawns the robot like enemies that you had to chase before. There are four hives that you need to destroy. The first is in the well outside of Okiku's house. The enemy that comes out is actually different from the one you saw before. To destroy the holes, you will have to kill these enemies when they are very close to them. These enemies explode when they die, and the explosion will destroy the burrows. The easiest way to do this is by throwing them at the holes, which is done by parrying and then pressing jump to get on the drone's shoulders. Pressing any of the normal attack buttons will kill the drone, but holding the jump button and a direction will throw the enemy in that direction. You can throw the orange drones into the burrows to collapse them. The second burrow is in the bamboo grove. You can get there by going forward after you jump over the rocks outside of Okiku's house instead of over the fallen tree. At the intersection, get the memento and then head left and up to get to the bamboo grove. The next tunnel is in the village, which you can get to via a bridge on the other end of the bamboo grove. Make sure to get the memento before you leave the village. The final tunnel is near the waterfall, and after closing that the drone's main nest will open up near the river area near the middle of the level. Jumping down into the hole, you'll see a large generator like object. This is what's powering the drones, and you came here to destroy it. To do so, you'll have to throw three exploding drones at it until it breaks down. There are bears around the perimeter of the area of you to heal. After destroying the hive, you'll be placed back at Okiku's house. The final night some Drones will attack the house. After you beat them, the boss shows up. ========== IV. Boss: Brother Six, with Flamethrower. ========== Difficulty: 4/5 In all honesty, this is probably one of the hardest fights in the game. None of his attacks are blockable, and most of them do lots of damage. His attacks also have great range and cover a wide area, making approaching him difficult. However, there's a trick to this fight: the dash attack. Whenever you hit the boss with a combo, he'll counter after three hits with an unblockable physical attack that will knock you down. To avoid this, use repeated dash attacks instead: hit him once with a dash attack and then run away just far enough to do another dash attack and hit him again. If you get the timing down right, he'll be permanently stunned and since you're technically not comboing him he'll never retaliate with his unblockable attack. If you're playing normal mode, his counter attack will deal virtually no damage. It's faster in normal mode to just start a combo with a dash attack and then keep hitting him until he knocks you down. You should easily have enough time to do another dash attack combo before he has the chance to attack you again. Even with that strategy, he can still be hard. After the first phase, he'll start using a shockwave attack. This is mostly easy to avoid, but the wave will still do damage even when the flames are so tiny they're barely visible so make sue you're jumping over it. The attack will also do a ton of damage, even enough to kill you at full health if you get hit at the center of it. You could still easily lose this fight even if you know what you're doing, so just keep it up and you'll get down the rhythm for the dash combo. If you need health, and you probably will, there are two bears in the corners on the right hand side of the arena. ==================== E. The Lowdown East Path...(LEP) ==================== I. Mementos ========== 1. In the first quarry area away from the statue, you will be attacked by a sniper on a high ledge. After killing him, search the small area to the right of his perch on GROUND level to find the first memento. 2. When you come to the second quarry, you will have to destroy two machineguns. After destroying the first, turn around and look at the wall you used to climb up to the platform. There will be a ledge you can grab on to. Jump over and move up the small wall and then wall run to the wooden platform to find the memento. 3. In the third quarry, this one is on the far side of the ground level from where you start. It's right in the middle of the path, so it's hard to miss. 4. Another easy one, it's right next to one of the ropes you have to cut on the fourth and final quarry. Can't miss it really. 5. After the huge fight in the fourth quarry, you will have moved the statue's head. The final memento is right next to the moved head on the statue's right shoulder, you can even see it in the cutscene. ========== II. New Enemies ========== X. Kunoichi (The female ninja, or as Ninja Ninja says "The god of Ass") Threat level: Medium Able to Pounce: Yes ---------- Remember when I said that the stripper enemies from the first level would show up again? It's these girls. They share the same moves as the strippers from the Daimyo's Story, except they can now throw Shurikens (Ninja Ninja will warn you when they do this) and their attacks do more damage than before. Otherwise they're the same: They will mainly jump around and try to dodge your attacks instead of outright attacking you. Their main strategy is to either rush in and hit you while you're fighting someone else, or do a jump kick from far away. The jump kick can be deadly: It deals almost no damage, but it will interrupt whatever combo you're in and leave you open for other enemies to attack you. The best thing to do is be aware of where they are while you fight the other enemies. They're much easier to deal with when they're the only enemies left in the room and they'll go down pretty quick if you just focus on them. ========== III. Level Strategy ========== The goal of this level is move the statue's head so you can progress through the area. To do this, you'll have to cut ropes that hold parts of the statue in place so you can use them to continue through the level. As the level begins, kill the Gunner and then cut the rope on the ground. To cut the ropes in this level, perform a vertical perfect slice on the rope. Make sure it's the rope you're hitting and not the chain, some people have had problems with cutting the ropes in this level. Advance up the statue and cross the hand, then head through the cave to reach the first quarry area. (Beware the boxes here, they're explosive. You'll need to use them in a minute for something, but they'll damage you if you touch them so don't attack them.) Kill the sniper and get the memento first, then set about killing all of the enemies in here. After that's done, grab the bear in the small passage if you need it. Kick the switches at the base of each crane to move the blocks into place so you can jump across to where the rope is that you need to cut. Before you can cut the rope, a few more ninja will show up for you to kill. After killing them and cutting the rope, follow the stone path back to the central area. You'll have to fight a pretty big wave of enemies here. Just try to take out as many as you can with area attacks, and don't stay in the middle of the area to leave yourself open. After you kill all the regular enemies, a Giant will show up. Take him down and then proceed to the area he came from. In this area, you'll be faced with two machine gun turrets. You can't charge them, so go down to the right. In this area, a bunch of weaker enemies will spawn. Remember the exploding boxes from before? Here you have to toss enemies into the exploding crate near the construction equipment to rise up a block. After that, wall run up the opposite side of the canyon to get to the first machine gun nest and destroy it. Get the memento by the first turret, and then continue on until you get a bridge. Kill the two enemies, then wall run up the planks here and cross over the stone bridge to get to the second machine gun and destroy it. Then cut the rope, and head back to the central area. Thankfully, there's no battle in the central area this time around. Climb up the statue and run the opposite direction from where you ran the last time to enter the third quarry. Grab the memento on the far side of the area, and then find a spot to wall jump off onto the scaffolding. Make your way around the scaffolding, fighting enemies as you go, to wind up in a small crevasse with the rope you need to cut. Defeat the Giant and the Ninja that show up, and then cut the rope and move to the final quarry by moving behind the statue. The final quarry is pretty straight forward. Cut the three ropes here out in the open, getting the memento along the way. After doing this, a pretty bug fight will ensue with one new enemy added into the mix (sort of). The first waves should be easy to take down with well placed focus slashed, but you'll have to go on the defensive when the Samurai and the new Kunoichi enemies show up. Leave the Heavy Swordsman for last so you can focus on him alone. He tends to get caught on pieces of the environment so it shouldn't be too hard. There's both a bear and a game of Body part poker if you need to heal during the match. After clearing that fight, head back to the statue and get the final memento on the statue's shoulder before going inside to face the Boss. ========== IV. Boss: Brother Six with RPG and Brother Two ========== Difficulty: 2/5 This is more of a puzzle fight than a real boss, and the puzzle is easy to figure out. Brother Six will stand on that rock out in front and fire rockets at you. You have to focus slice them to destroy them and damage brother two. The timing is the only thing you might have a hard time getting down: enter into focus mode right before you think he's going to fire. Don't start your attack until he actually fires the rocket: charge a vertical focus attack and Afro should go into a special position with his katana sheathed. When the rocket gets close enough, unleash your strike. Every time you do this, Brother Two will then summon three weak enemies for you to kill to get your focus back up. Kill them, but watch out: Brother Six will throw grenades at you while you attempt to kill them, but they're easy to dodge. This is an easy fight, and after you've sliced four rockets you'll be all done. ==================== F. Doppelganger...(DPG) ==================== I. Mementos ========== 1. When you start the level, follow the path behind you all the way down to the broken bridge to find the first memento. 2. After climbing up the first elevator, the memento is on the left side opposite the ledge where you jump up. Pretty hard to miss. 3. Almost right after that, you'll fight a gun wielding enemy. After killing him, look in one of the corners of the platform he was standing on. 4. After fighting the boss, you will fight a few enemies on the other side of the broken bridge. After killing them all (the final wave is Ninjas), jump up to the cliff to continue and then turn around. There is a wooden platform you can jump to, and from there you can jump to another wooden platform that has the memento on it. 5. After going up the second elevator, the memento will be right out in the open on the platform in front of you. ========== II. New Enemies ========== XI.: Electric Drone (Blue Drone) Threat level: Low Able to pounce: No ---------- Yet another variation on the Drone, these ones are electrified. That means they're invulnerable to any attacks in which Afro actually touches the Drone: Kicks and Pounces will damage Afro instead of the Drone. Other than that, they're identical to the regular grey Drones. These enemies are also incredibly rare: there's probably only about 15 in the entire game. ========== III. Level Strategy ========== There's actually a pretty tough fight up ahead, but there's a way you can make it a lot easier. When you get the first memento a few enemies will show up: don't focus attack any of the enemies and just kill them with normal moves. There's only four of the weakest type, and there's a bear here for any damage you might take. Do that, and you should have enough focus ready for an overfocus attack during the next battle. The fight consists of around ten ninja enemies intermixed with a Giant and a Heavy swordsman, and all of them can be killed in a single overfoucs if used correctly-though you might want to go for the big boys first to make things easier on yourself. After you've won the fight, Brother Six will show up with his RPG and blow up the bridge. Run towards the camera to escape the explosion, otherwise you have to start the whole level over again. After landing safely on the other side, kill the weak enemies that show up and move up the cliff by cutting the rope on the elevator and then wall jumping up the shaft. Get the memento and then head up the path to find a gunner. Reflect his shot before you go across the gap, and then get the memento near him. Next you'll have to fight some drones, and among them is a new enemy. After the fight, make your way out onto the bridge to find... ===== Boss: Doppelganger ===== Difficulty: 3/5 This fight is very difficult if you don't know the trick to it. It might seem like the Afro Droid knows all of your moves, but that isn't the case. He doesn't know any of the Father's Legacy moves (that you've been getting from the mementos if you've been collecting them, which you should really be doing.) There are also a few select moves he just doesn't know, and those are the keys to defeating him. The easiest of these moves to use is "The Heart Attack" (3x heavy slash then 4x light slash). This move works well in that its animation makes Afro all but invincible if you just stand in front of the Doppelganger and continually use it, which makes the fight extremely easy. If you don't have any of those moves, which you should by now since the Heart attack is learned relatively early, attack him from behind with hit and run tactics. He can be hit like normal from behind, but it makes the fight a lot harder to have to do this. ------ After the boss battle, you'll have to repeat the bridge running sequence from earlier. On the other side, take out the enemies as you progress along the cliff, and make sure to get the memento after they're all dead. Continue along the path, traveling up the cliff and across a beam to fight some drones. After killing the drones, cut the rope to the elevator and climb it just like before. Collect the final memento before heading out onto the bridge. On the bridge you'll have to fight five Samurai, followed by some ninja. When fighting the five Samurai, use hit and run tactics and attempt to get them off balance to focus slash them and kill them. After killing all the enemies, you'll face another boss: ========== IV. Boss: Aerial Doppelganger ========== Difficulty: 2/5 Yes, you are in fact fighting the boss as you fall thousands of feet through the sky. This fight is honestly hard to give a decent strategy for: all you really need to do is dodge his attacks and get close enough to hit him. When the fight begins, spend a few seconds orienting yourself and figuring out how the controls work in free fall. Your strategy for this fight should be simple: charge towards the Doppelganger at full speed until you're in range of him, and then attack with a combination of regular moves and focus attacks. He almost never hits you at close range, but his projectiles can be hard to dodge from range and deal a lot of damage so it's best to just stay close to him as much as possible. This fight isn't so much hard as it is disorienting; once you've gotten the hang of it it's quite easy. ==================== G. Kuma's Story...(KMS) ==================== I. Mementos ========== 1. Right at the onset of the level, head right to find the first memento. 2. After you've encountered kuma a few times, it will be on the main path as you continue to follow him. Really hard to miss. 3. You will fight Kuma in a large snow field shortly after the second memento. The memento is on the left side of the field from where you entered, but an invisible wall prevents you from accessing it during the fight so you can only get to it after you fight Kuma. 4. After you fight Kuma in the shrine, it will be on the far end of the shrine out in the open. 5. Right after you get memento four, turn around and look at the shrine. The memento is on the right side of the shrine perched on the ledge. ========== II. New Enemies ========== There are no new enemies in this level. ========== III. Level Strategy ========== There really doesn't need to be a strategy for this level: it's essentially one long boss fight. There's only a single enemy in the level, but here's a short guide anyway. Whenever you have to fight the boss in this level, refer to the boss section below for strategies. Right when the level starts, head right to pick up the first memento. After fighting Kuma a couple times, the second memento will be right on the path in front of you. Right after that, you'll fight Kuma in the large snow field. After beating him there, collect the third memento that was blocked during the fight by an invisible wall. Proceed up the Shrine, and inside avoid Kuma's attacks to eventually destabilize the shrine enough to go up a floor and fight Kuma again. After this fight, collect the two mementos near the top of the shrine, then hop up the wooden planks to see a cutscene where the shrine will be destroyed. After that you'll wind up in another snow field where you will-take a wild guess- fight Kuma one last time before the level ends. ========== IV. Boss: Kuma ========== Difficulty: 5/5 I'm betting that about half the people who are looking at this guide are doing it for this one fight. Kuma is an absolutely brutal boss. He's fast, powerful, and has some really nasty moves that he'll use on you as much as you let him. He can seem near impossible at first, especially on hard mode where a single one of his combos can kill you if he lands the whole thing. Thankfully, there are a few decent strategies that can help you with the fight. The first is to simply parry like mad. This is probably the safest method of fighting him, though it's also the longest and a one or two screw ups could mean you death. The best way to parry Kuma's attacks is to get extremely close to him, almost to the point of touching him. This will prompt him to do a combo, which you will have to parry. Note that I did say combo, not hit: you will have to parry every single hit to be able to attack him fast enough so that he can't block. This becomes progressively harder as Kuma will add more attacks to his basic combo throughout the level, and this becomes very difficult by the end of the match. After you hit Kuma three times, he will hit you almost instantly with a high damage multi-sword slash that will do a ton of damage if all of the strikes hit, so you'll need to be sure and block immediately after attacking. As the fight goes on, he will also add a second heavy attack onto his counter attack, so you will need to avoid that as well by either blocking or just getting out of the way. Another tactic that is much more dangerous, but much more damaging, is to get Kuma off balance by repeatedly attacking him. After you've gotten 2-3 hits on him, he will cross his arms across his chest and attempt to do a very fast dashing counter attack. After you hit him a few times, go into focus mode and aim a horizontal perfect slash at his legs. Timed right, this will hit and stagger him before he has a chance to attack and hit you. You can pretty much continually do this if you get the timing right, but messing up by even a few tenths of a second will completely throw you off balance. However, focus slashes do ridiculous amounts of damage to Kuma: six or seven focus slashes is enough to finish him off in any of the phases you fight him. You'll fight him three separate times: once in a snow field at the onset of the level, once inside of the shrine, and at the end of the level in another snow field. The first two times, it'll essentially be the same fight. The final fight is mostly the same, but for the final phase Kuma will ditch his second sword and bear head. This gives him new moves, and makes him insanely fast. Trying to parry him at this point is pointless; you'll have to parry a ridiculous number of powerful and fast attacks and he now has unblockable moves to mix into his style. Your best bet now is to try and get a hit or two in a long combo chain (try the Afronado category 7, which you got from collecting the mementos for this level) and then focus slash him. This boss might seem insurmountable at first, but once you figure out how to take him down in the first phase you should be able to play the next fights fairly similarly. ==================== H. The Empty Seven's Story...(ESS) ==================== I. Mementos ========== 1. After killing the Drones at the beginning of the level, the memento is in the upper right corner of the starting room, before taking the elevator down. 2. On the left path after climbing the tower, the memento is located to right of you behind some gears when you reach the top. 3. On the middle path, you will fight a gunner enemy. After you kill him, you move across a couple of platforms to one with a bear on it. Look down from where the bear is to find a hidden platform that holds the memento. 4. On the right path, some enemies will spawn right after you start climbing up the tower. Kill them, and then check the doors they spawned from. The one furthest away will have the fourth memento right outside of it. 5. On the right path, the memento is located just to the left after you've climbed up to where the cube is located. ========== II. New Enemies ========== There are no new Enemies in this level. ========== III. Level Strategy ========== This level is a loooong one. You'll start out in a square room with some drones, there aren't that many and they're pretty easy. There is a bear in one of the corners if you need it and the first memento after you finish the fight. After you get it, take the elevator downwards to fight some more drones, only with some exploding ones this time. Kill them to continue into a tunnel with a Clubber, and kill him to continue onto the second part of the level. This is where the difficulty ramps up for this level. You now have to fight an absolutely massive wave of enemies: the first six will be six to eight ninjas apiece with a heavy swordsman in the final wave, the next two will be six kunoichi, and the final four will each be two Heavy Swordsmen at once. Ninja Ninja will be there for body part poker, and there is a single bear to heal with during the fight. When fighting the ninjas, focus on taking out two or three before you start trying to kill more than one or two at once. The sheer amount of them makes it difficult to get a bug focus slash off due to their speed. As always, vertical focus attacks work well against ninja enemies. I would recommend getting the Body Part Poker during this stretch of the match and attempting to get a leg-flush by the time all the ninjas are gone to regain any health you may have lost. For the kunoichi, don't charge into them. Run to the other side of the arena and try to get them to funnel towards you, and then attack the group with focus attacks to kill off lots of them at once. (After Killing all the kunoichi, make sure you're standing away from the door to this area. Enemies will come in that door, and if you're too close they'll hit you during the cutscene when you can't defend). For the final waves of Heavy Swordsman, you can either use hit and run tactics or attempt to parry their strikes. Pounces are one hit kills off of these guys, but it's hard to get the timing right and they have quite a few attacks. You can also try using the brilliant new move you have called "The ring of death", which will instant kill them if you land the combo's final hit on them regardless of their health. (It looks totally awesome too.) After that, you'll be faced with a giant cube that you need to climb to. Facing away from the door you entered the arena from, take the left path first by pulling the now accessible lever to move the rock out. The wall climb is simple platforming, and there's a bear towards the top if you need it. At the very top, Ninja Ninja will speak to you about not going in the cube. This is where you find the second memento of the level tucked away to the right side. After entering the cube, you will fight a boss: ===== Boss: Brother Six, Bo Staff ===== Difficulty: 3/5 A lot of people seem to have problems with this boss, but he's not really that bad. This time around he has a staff like in your very first encounter all the way back in the tutorial level. His attacks consist mostly of basic staff combos, and a few unblockable hits. He also has the grenades from your previous fight and will start to use them as his health lowers. Brother Six is very defense oriented in this boss fight: his attacks do relatively little damage compared to other bosses, and he is completely invulnerable unless you attack his back. The strategy in this fight is actually quite simple. The best way to fight him is to run circles just out his staff range while dashing. Bait him into attacking, then dash around behind him and him with a dash attack and then a single focus attack. Not all of his staff attacks will allow him to be hit in this way, but a pretty good portion of them allow you to do this and-as always-focus attacks do a lot of damage. Get this strategy down and you shouldn't even have to heal during the fight. ----- After that, you'll be on the bottom of the tower again. Pull the central switch, and head up that path all the way to the top again. Along the way, look out for the third memento. After entering the cube for the second time you'll face more ninjas and kunoichis, just what you wanted to see. You won't have any healing items, but the enemies only come three at a time. This fight should be a piece of cake after the giant brawl you just finished downstairs. Take the final path to the right this time, which has two mementos along the way. One is at the bottom, one is at the top. After getting the game's final memento, proceed into the cube to fight the rest of the Empty seven. ========== IV. Boss: The Empty Seven (The ones you haven't killed at least) ========== Difficulty: 1/5 This is another puzzle boss, and once you know the strategy you shouldn't even get hit during the fight. One of the brothers has a gun for an arm, and will hop around the arena firing bullets at you. These do a lot of damage, but they're also the only way to kill the boss. When the boss readies his gun to fire at you, enter focus mode. When you hear the gun fire, charge a horizontal focus slash. When the gleam on the sword reaches the tip of the blade, let go to reflect the bullet back at the shooter. This will set the Empty Seven member next to the one with the gun on fire, and he will fall down and start chasing you. You can't do any damage to him with your attacks here: to kill him, you have to get him to run across the circle in the center of the arena so he'll fall in and get killed by the grinding gears of the machinery. Repeat this pattern three more times to finish off the boss for good. ----- After the boss is finished, you'll have to fight against some drones. You can't actually win this fight, but stick it out for as long as you want to hear what the remaining Brother has to say about their organization. ==================== I. Ninja Ninja's Story...(NNS) ==================== There are no mementos in Ninja Ninja's story, and there's really no level either. The entire stage is just a boss fight against... Boss: Ninja Ninja Difficulty: 2/5 Ninja Ninja is a bit of a puzzle boss, but for the most part he's just like fighting lots and lots of regular Ninja enemies. Ninja Ninja's clones can only be killed by hitting them with perfect slices. If you hit any one of the clones more than once with a regular attack, they will simply regenerate after you "kill" them and come back just as strong as before. The only real "strategy" to this fight is to just continually use focus slashes against the clones until they're all dead. Their fighting style is identical to the regular Ninja enemies of the game, so you're really just fighting a bunch on ninjas that can all be killed in one hit. Easy as pie. ==================== J. Justice's Story...(JSS) ==================== This is the final level; the showdown between the Number One and the Number Two. So you think there's going to be anything other than a massive boss fight? ===== Boss: Justice, The Number One ===== Difficulty: 5/5 Justice is fought in multiple parts, so I'm splitting up the boss strategy into three sections In this portion of the fight, Justice will fight you with a combination of physical attacks and his pistols. You're going to have to get used to fighting Justice, as he's a but different from other bosses you've faced up to this point. His primary attack is to shoot at you with his twin pistols in rapid succession. These shots can all be blocked, but blocking too many shots in a row can unbalance you and cause you to get hit. He'll also fire a single two shot volley at the beginning and end of certain combos. This shot can be blocked, but it can also be reflected if you have absolutely incredible timing. Finally, Justice has a fairly large pool of physical moves. Most of these are hard to dodge, and many of them are unblockable. You really have to be on your toes for this fight and change around your strategies a lot. As a general guideline, you'll want to try and stay between the throne in the middle of the map and the spiky tree things. This allows you to use the spikes as cover from Justice's shots so you can approach him. There's really no "best" way to fight Justice: it's possible to damage him with dash attacks, focus attacks, and longer combos. Don't let that make you think the fight is easy though, as you'll have to use all three to effectively attack Justice. At the start of the match, take cover behind some nearby spikes and wait for Justice to get close before circling around and using a dash attack against him. (Side note: whenever you die you'll start way back from Justice instead of right next to him. Use the trees to your right for cover, then dash up to another tree to use as cover before going in to try and hit Justice.) This brings up a special point about this fight: there are no bears to heal yourself with. However, whenever you damage Justice enough for him to start one of his monologues you will be fully healed. After any monologue, Justice will appear a few feet behind you. Your strategy for this fight is to be as offensive as possible. Justice simply has too many unblockable attacks to sit and wait for him to make a mistake; you have to continually be on the offensive to prevent him from doing his more damaging moves. When justice is any more than ten feet from you, hold block. His ranged attacks can all be blocked, and you need to try and bait him to get closer to you so you can attack him. When he starts to run towards you, drop your guard and start a combo before he gets to you. He'll run into your combo, and whole he might block a few of the hits he'll probably get hit at least a couple times. After you've hit him a few times this way, continue the combo in focus mode and attempt to slash him. No one focus attack will work here, as Justice will start dodging them if use all of one kind, so mix up your focus attacks between vertical and horizontal to prevent that. After you've hit him like that, keep the hits going as much as possible by going strait into another short combo and then attempting to focus slash him again. If after any of these attacks Justice is too far away to immediately attack, use a dash attack to get closer again and attack him some more. If you're too far away so that a dash attack won't work, resort to blocking his shots again until he comes close enough to hit. There's only two different things you should be doing in this fight: blocking bullets or furiously attacking Justice. Justice's attacks are fast, powerful, and for the most part unblockable. The best way around them is to just prevent him from using them by constantly being on the offensive and forcing him to try and dodge your attacks instead of the other way around. After you deal enough damage to Justice, Afro will cut off his arms in a cutscene. Justice then move to the center of the area behind a shield, mutating his arms into the strange tentacle things in the arena this begins phase two. ===== Boss: Mutant Justice, The Number One ===== Difficulty: 2/5 This fight is much easier than the pervious one, primarily because Justice only has two attacks. He's in the center of the area behind an invisible wall, so you can't get to him to attack him. He will attack by shoving his now mutated arms into the ground, which will shoot out below you as spikes to try and damage you. This attack is easy to avoid, and it's also how you damage Justice. Run in circles around the arena. When a spike shoots out of the ground, turn around and perform a horizontal focus slash to cut it in half. That's really all there is to this fight. After you damage him a bit, he'll occasionally use a beefed up version of the attack that's almost impossible to dodge but doesn't really seem to do much damage. After cutting off quite a few of the tentacle spikes, you'll enter the last phase of the fight ===== Boss: Crazed Justice, The Number One ===== Difficulty: 3/5 This fight bares a lot of similarity to the first stage, except that Justice no longer has his pistols. He instead has his crazy mutant arms this time around, and they've become the primary means of his attack. First off, don't even bother blocking in this final stretch of the match: it's totally pointless. I'm not positive if ALL of Justice's attacks in this form are unblockable, but at the very least enough of them are to make it functionally pointless. Justice will most attack by flailing his arms around wildly during this fight. He also has a few projectile attacks, as well as the tentacle move he had from the previous fight. Fighting Justice in this portion of the fight is actually very close to the first stage: dash in to attack him, do a combo, and then focus attack him. There are a few little tweaks to that formula though. For one, Justice appears to be invincible whenever he has the black aura around him so don't even bother attacking him then. You also don't have to worry about pistols this time around, but he still has a few easy to dodge projectile moves. Crazed Justice will also hit you pretty far with his attacks, so you really don't have to worry about being repeatedly hit like in the first stage. Other than those factors, play the fight just like the first stage. Keep up the extreme offense, but back off when he glows black or you run out of focus. His attacks in this form are certainly flashy, but they don't do as much damage as the one's he's been using in the previous stages so you can afford to be a little less cautious than you were in the previous fight. Take down the final form of Justice to complete the game and view and ending that's very different from the show's ending. Congratulations, you've just beat Afro Samurai. ================================================== 5. Closing...(C5C) ================================================== I hope this guide has been helpful and has been enjoyable to read. Well, as enjoyable as a guide can be. All the standard Legal rhetoric goes here: this guide is my property, and it is only by the grace of my goodwill that you allowed to view it. As such, I must insist that you not profit from this guide in any way. Currently, the only site allowed to this guide is Gamefaqs, but I'm very accommodating if any other sites wished to use this guide. If you have any questions, you can contact me at wcrobars@hotmail.com. This guide is dedicated to cats, because cats are awesome. Copyright Woody Crobar, February 18, 2009.