Overview
How to kick butt and take names as Ace, our intrepid LASER swordsman and official clearer-of-the-way. Describes both co-op and single player, but doesn’t describe how to be good at Nina/Shooter.
The Basics
Ace here is the sword user in 20xx. His primary goal is to get up close, never let up, swing and twitch like crazy, and overall blaze a path leaving piles of bodies in his wake. In co-op this means you’re out front hack and slashing everything that moves to keep Nina (the ranged shooter) safe until she’s an unstoppable overpowered behemoth. In single player this means your best defense is a good offense and your playstyle should reflect that!
Initially Ace is significantly stronger than Nina and this power gap will persist until Nina gets some suit and shot upgrades. But since this guide isn’t about Nina, I’m going to stfu about her for now.
To play Ace you must have the following skillset
- Fast reflexes
- Twitchy fingers
- Focused upgrade decisions
- Mega-ultra dash jump technique
If you don’t have great platforming skills and are more comfortable NOT putting yourself in harm’s way to fight every enemy, you should pick the ranged fighter instead. But from my experience and observations, a good Ace player will run circles around a good Nina player as he has a higher skill ceiling.
I personally find Ace more fun to play in “Casual Mode” (where you get to choose three free augments) since you can enable some sickeningly powerful augments to power your way through a run. He’s great in normal and skull modes of course, but I always wish I had my choice three augments at hand!
Basic Playstyle
With Ace you should always have your finger on the dash button, and veritably all of your jumps will and should be dash-jumps. Get comfortable dash-jumping into sword swings, jumping off walls at high speed, and generally aiming to be a flurry of murder to slaughter everything in your path.
Sometimes at high levels you will find a section with tons of projectiles (mortars or whatever) and getting up close is a real challenge. It is in these times that you must calm your inherent bloodlust and survey the situation. Find the enemy you can (barely) hit and take them out, slowly begin to plow your way through the mayhem, do not get hit (or you’re a peasant). Not every enemy has to die, know when to ditch an enemy and move on.
Augments to Live By
These three augments are your best choices when starting a Casual Game and should be chosen by default. You can disagree, and I want to hear your favorite builds and why!
I forget the names for some of these and the wiki doesn’t have everything fully updated, so I’m going to list these by what they do – then explain why they’re the optimal choices.
The best augments to start with are:
- Extended Invulnerability Frames
- Core Augment Booths on Every Level
- Attacks Ignore Shields+Walls
Extended Invulnerability Frames
This upgrade is optimal due to the added seconds you’re undamageable after being hit. Normally, when Ace is hit he will flicker red for about 1s and after flickering he is able to be hit again. With this augment (and it stacks btw, I’ve gotten it as high as 5s!) engaged, you will flicker for closer to 2s! Leaving you invincible and able to hack n’ slash a boss unto death!
This may be my choice augment due to my personal playstyle when it comes to this game’s boss mechanics. So often it seems to me it’s best to just run up on a boss and never let up the attack. I will chase them around the arena and attack them as constantly as I’m able. By taking this approach I limit the amount of time the boss has to damage me. With this augment engaged, my strategy is enhanced significantly! Allowing Ace to attack freely without the fear of losing so many health bars. A bit of a barbarian approach perhaps, but it is effective.
Core Augment Booths on Every Level
A no brainer. The suit upgrades are some of the most potent upgrades available in 20xx, enabling you to jump high, attack harder, and gain life faster. For Ace and my personal playstyle, I like the pink and yellow suits. Screw the green suit, powers are stupid compared to a hyper enhanced sword! Screw the red suit, mobility is nothing compared to supreme damage!
The augment tells the game to place an suit upgrade booth on every level, giving you 8 chances to get the exact items you want. It doesn’t always get you a complete suit, but it greatly increases your chances. I’d argue this is an “auto include” augment when building a casual game.
Attacks Ignore Shields+Walls
A somewhat deceptive choice, but one that opens the door to exploits and speed. With this augment your sword/shots/powers will pass through all shields and walls allowing you to kill what’s on the other side as if that shield/wall doesn’t exist. This makes bosses like the Clown child’s play, and decreases your overall risk on level enemies. Having to wait for a shield to drop often opens the enemy’s opportunity to damage you (like with turrets or those mortar guns). It’s better to be unhindered and able to slash your way through a level!
Bonus points that this augment gives Nina a huge power increase due to versatility. Now she can clear the path around corners, saving you time and HP!
Conclusion
Choosing these three augments will allow you to run through a level at top speed, slowed only by the patience platforms require. I consider these three auto-includes and have tried numerous alternatives, always coming back to these three.
Damage > Powers
Powers are useless compared to a sword.
There I said it.
Ace in particular doesn’t need powers to fight any of the bosses, any of the guys on a level, he straight doesn’t need powers at all to be exceptional. As Ace all you need is attack damage, pick up every augment that boosts your attack damage! Even going as far as to sacrifice HP or speed or jump height (given proper circumstances).
A normal sword swing will deal ~12 damage. An attack power swing at +25 upgrades will deal something like ~24 damage! That’s a huge difference, especially when combined with the “Extended Invuln Frames” augment.
If you go deep into attack damage, your whole strategy becomes simple. Catch the enemy, attack it non stop, brute force your way to victory. You’ll feel a little barbaric playing this way as compared to the beautiful dodging victories which this game offers, but my god is it effective. Once I figured out this strategy (a simple one at that) there was no turning back.
At the end of every boss fight you are given a choice of upgrade. You can grab that boss’ power, +10 nuts, or some random augment. If that augment boosts your HP or Attack Power, choose that augment.
Alright I’m man enough to admit it, SOME POWERS are ok. The fire shield is pretty neato and helps with speed and protection. But I still wouldn’t pick the powers over damage buffs in veritably all cases. I will take the +10 nuts over powers in many cases, electing to get the added currency to buy upgrades at the shop.
Nina can keep her precious powers, all I want is a bigger sword!
Change Your Weapon?
Until you unlock the glaive (long handled axe/spear thing) do not change your weapon. The spear is useless, the flurry weapon is cool but paltry compared to the sword, the axe is a huge pain in the butt (a liability…), only the glaive is worthy of your obvious skill and excellence!
During gameplay you will occasionally find “Diamond Crates” which offer weapon changes.
- Normal Sword (best overall choice)
- Spear (no vertical swing, screw that)
- Axe (no moving while swinging, yeah no)
- Glaive (become a whirling dirvish of death)
The sword truly is your best choice overall. It swings quickly, it damages well, it hits above and a little below you, it just is the best choice. Only the glaive offers a potentially superior choice.
The glaive allows you to swing in murder circles while jumping. If you have hover boots on you can swing the full 2s you’re hovering. While I have the glaive I’m constantly roaring at the screen at how scary Ace is, how much damage he’s doing, how crazy the controls start to feel. The glaive is amazing, but shouldn’t always be chosen over the sword.
Glaive >= Sword
Glaive gives you two swings on the ground, and they’re both a little slow and only deal damage about one body length ahead of you. Whereas the sword hits anything and everything in your range AND swings three times. On the ground the sword does better, in the air the glaive does better. Glaive looks cooler, sword is more stable.
Since the Glaive shows its potency best in the air, you will find yourself jumping like a wild man to get those circular swings going. By jumping all the time you’ll find you lose a bit (ok, a lot) of control in exchange for pure power. If you feel like going on a friggin’ rampage, the glaive is fun but perhaps a smidge more dangerous. It IS great for attacking enemies above and below you, and often is an excellent choice to upgrade. I’m often torn when it’s offered to me… follow your hopes and dreams and play as you would!
Conclusion & Bosses
How to Play Ace like a Boss
- Be a whirling dirvish of death
- Go deep into attack damage
- You don’t need powers to be awesome
- Nina is a wimp, attacking from afar *psh*
- Dashing is your friend
- Patience is your friend
- Berserking is your friend
Bosses
OH! And watch out for the turret boss, he’s hard to get up close to and you’ll eat damage like a buffet. When possible, choose to fight him early/first.
Some bosses are easier than others for Ace, here is the order I’d play these.
The first three are the only truly difficult ones for Ace:
The Perforator (turret)
Rollster (the bounce around guy like Armadillo from MMX)
Twin Astrals (sun+moon guys)
Death Lotus (flower guy, his level is hard for Ace)
Eternal Star (bat guy, he’s a wimp)
Kur (shoots big yellow squares, just hack n’ slash)
Shatterbeak (penguin, only hard because he moves a lot)
Vile Visage (clown, attack through his shield, easiest boss ever)
Conclusion
That’s basically it. Just be a murder bot, play those three choice augments I mentioned, aim for the pink or yellow suits, and have lightning quick reflexes. If you don’t know about the suits… full upgraded pink suit turns all your attacks into charged up versions (dps x2), and the yellow suit is pure utility giving you invincibility against hazards like lazers or spikes. The yellow suit might be better overall, but the pink suit is 10x as satisfying.
I may update this guide as my progress continues, but these are my thoughts on how to optimally play our intrepid swordsman <3