Shockwave: How to pass the different levels!

By David Liu <davidliu@husc8.harvard.edu>, George Cifrancis <gc3@infinet.com>, James A. Squires <jas@kaiwan.com>, Walter Horat <walter_horat@rasterops.com> and Castellan <dlericks@mailhost.ecn.uoknor.edu>.

COMMENT n TIPS:

Level 1:

Use missiles on scouts (the red dots on radar), guns on ground crawlers. At the end, you will meet an alien control center with a LOT of firepower. Start far far away, hold B when your gunsight locks on, fire 2 missiles, turn 180 degrees, afterburn out, and repeat. Takes about 3 passes this way.

(Be careful, you can shoot down your own missiles!)

Level 2:

Significantly tougher. Save missiles for the green bow-tie shaped interceptors; shoot scouts and ground units. Although lots of fighting, no real catches in this level.

Level 3 (LA):

Here are the five objectives:

This totals 5, your required number. If you finish with less than 5 points, you get a "pat on the back speech" and then get booted back to square one.

Back to David Liu's comments:

This one is a KILLER. However, it really becomes much easier as you practice. You start in Vegas, and end up in L.A. Save missiles for (in order)

You MUST MUST conserve missiles and lasers. If you miss even one or two aliens (actually, i believe you get a buffer of ONE alien in the first few areas of mission 3), you may have to restart.

Your objectives are the four power cells surrounding the dark pyramidal prisons. DO NOT shoot the prisons. Each power cell takes exactly 8 shots. Also, you must kill the round circular yellow balls that surround the prisons.

TIP#1:

You need only kill ONE of the balls per nest. Lure the others away, and afterburn away. THE "FAKE" YELLOW BALLS WILL DISAPPEAR AFTER CHASING YOU BRIEFLY. This leaves you with ONE yellow ball only per cluster. It takes 13 shots to kill.

About 2/3 of the way into the mission, you will come across a green force field fence composed of green balls. head SLOWLY towards the edge. If you've killed all aliens up to that point, the field should disappear. I don't think shooting the alien fence posts has anything to do with the forcefield. If you try to cross the forcefield before deactivation, you will automatically perish. (However, you can cheat by temporarily going off path around the fence).

TIP#2:

There are several "hidden" REFUELING DRUMS, not all of which appear on radar. As you approach a group of large rectangular prism-shaped buildings, look for a "cloaked" refueling drum on your right side. This one restores health totally, but not guns or fuel.

You also must take out the command center, a VERY fast and VERY beefy yellow flying machine. Takes about 20 shots. Dont try missiles; it can out turn and out run them.

You get 1 mission goal for clearing out Vegas of aliens You get 4 mission goals for clearing out 16 energy pods surrounding 4 prisons. This totals 5, your required number. If you finish with less than 5 points, you get a "pat on the back speech" and then get booted back to square one.

Secret refueling drone:

Just coming from <pbardis@uoft02.utoledo.edu>:

There's also a "secret" refueling drone on level 3. At some point towards the end, the alley widens way out (just wider than your radar), then takes a fairly sharp turn. At the very very tip of the point of this turn (the outside of the turn), there's a drone.

New this week (July 15 1994) A complete walkthrough of level 3:

Text by Castellan <dlericks@mailhost.ecn.uoknor.edu>:

I've noticed a lot of conflicting reports on how to beat LA in Shockwave, so, after playing this stage thoroughly and pausing to determine the number of mission goals completed, here is *exactly* how to do it.

I kept getting 4/5 because I was NOT getting the escaping aliens at RIverside. Blast through the fighter cover with afterburners and get to the end of Riverside ASAP, and take out ALL ground vehicles. Then pick off the fighters. Sure, you'll take some damage, but if you off a few interceptors as you burn toward the escaping aliens, you'll be in good shape. This also applies to Burbank.

Bad things: Destroying the reactor, destroying the actual prison facilities, destroying 40% of the radar dishes (or more).

To get through the force field easily, just afterburn and barrel roll through it. Works *perfectly*.

On a side note, is anybody else impressed with the sprawling variety of enemies in this game? I'm only on mission 4, and I count:

Back to David Liu's original message:

Level 4:

A very nice idea. You are doing a search and rescue mission for one of your fellow pilots (the annoying female one...wish I could just let her die so she'll stop talking to me during missions). This one has FABULOUS graphics (southern england), rolling hills, and FIVE NEW TYPES of aliens.

(Normally i don't like revealing hint publically [TE's level select an exception], but since this game is so very challenging and demanding on the precision and coordination depts, i have no qualms now)

To finish level 4, you must

  1. Kill all the bird-like transport ships at start
  2. kill all transport ground vehicles in the next area
  3. "Pass through" the area with "a great number" of aliens: TRANSLATION: Kill most of em, including the ground transports and birdies.
  4. Clear the next area for the British military and your rescue ship.
At the end, you see the following arrangement of Bad Guys (tm): 

     x   x

  x    x    x
  1   23 4  5
Kill 3 with guns only

Kill 5 with guns only

Kill 4 with missiles only

Each time, you must fire for a second, then RETREAT and turn around and repeat.

Shockwave is the finest game to come out for the 3do. Simply amazing.

David

Level 5 by George Cifrancis, James A. Squires and Walter Horat:

George Cifrancis:

Listen carefully to ICE, always do what she tells you to do. On 5 as I recall (I am on 8) you must destroy all the radars. Keep in mind they don't show up on YOUR radar screen so you must do a visual search for them. This is especially important when you nail the ones in the water! You need to sweep the whole area! I think there are at least 4 radars that are away from everything else so you must hunt for them. If ICE tells you that you missed some, you might as well start over. As a matter of fact whenever ICE says you missed ANYTHING, there is a good bet that you missed an objective and you might as well start over. On the prison barges that ICE tells you to hit the lead ship, I believe it is the ship furtherest away as you come up on it. If ICE says you missed it or killed people, start over you, funked up. Obviously don't sink the Kennedy or let it be sinked and kill that tower that comes out at the end.

James A. Squires:

There are two key objectives in level 5:

  1. Hit all those damn radar sites.
  2. Get all four 'Special Targets'(I know three of 'em, who knows the third?)
First key objective:

Remember back in 'cake-walk' level 3, Los Angeles (why save it?), when you would hit the prison power supplies, and your special monitor would beep and say: "OK-GOOD-BETTER-PERFECT"?

Well, it does that on level 5, but very quickly the message is gone (like we have lots of time to study the Heads Down display). I'm a little shaky on the order, I know 3 of 4, but not the 4th (I got it, but don't know when/what it was - HELP).

Here's my best shot:

Anyway, *I'm* done with those damn islands!

Walter Horat:

The solution to level five is:

Get all of the hidden radar units. When ICE tells you that you should be looking for radar, do it. The units are not visible on your radar screen... You will get a message telling you whether or not you have killed all of the radar or not. If you miss any, there goes a mission objective. There are 4 radar areas.

This will score 4/5 goals.

The fifth goal, and the one that took me about 15-20 plays of level 5 to figure out is to SAVE THE PRISONERS ON THE BARGES!!! When ICE tells you to pick off the lead barges, you have to kill the AA towers positioned around the barges, the fast moving cruisers that flank the barges, and the LEAD BARGE of each convoy. This is the barge that is FARTHEST from you, as the barges are moving in the same direction that you are.

You can sink the friendly planes; I have a hard time keeping them from crashing into me. Except that you feel guilty for doing it, it wont prevent you from solving the level.

I haven't gotten off of the level by sinking the aircraft carrier, but you seem to be able to score your mission goals whether or not it lives.

To kill the bad boy at the end of the level, keep turning in circles around the same position as your refeuling tanker, letting a missle loose as soon as you have it in your gunsights and turn and fly away before it can hit you too many times. It takes between 3-6 missiles to kill it, as your missiles are occasionally shot down...

Good luck!

Now, I have to get off of level 8! Damned evil gravity sucking things!!!

Secret refueling drone on level 5:

From Jeff TJ <jefftj@aol.com>:

There is a refueling drone that doesn't show up on your radar. It appears with 112 clicks remaining on the far right side of your flight area.

level 6:

The only thing ICE cares about besides killing the final boss is to destroy all the excavators. Each excavator takes one LONG LONG stream of lasers, or one NUKE and about 5 seconds of lasers, or TWO NUKES and about 1 second of lasers. Even though ICE tells you not to trash the city as you kill the last boss (who is easy since he has a pea shooter for a weapon), you CAN get by if you crunch say 4 buildings or so.

Just don't try levelling the city.

level 7:

David Liu writes:

Same as level 6, but there are green energy cylos that support the alien eggs. These must be destroyed.

The best way I've been able to find for killing the command post in the middle of Mission 7 (mine was on WINGMAN, however, so this may or may not be applicable):

  1. Take out the left green/grey pylon.
  2. Turn around, and approach the right pylon slowly.
  3. Just as you get within laser range to axe the pylon, three interceptors (red dots on radar) should approach.
  4. The key is to coax one of the red dots into COLLIDING WITH THE COMMAND POST!

    Just make sure the command post is BETWEEN you and the interceptor. The command post is so bulky, that the interceptor will easily hit it and explode if you manuver appropriately, lining up the interceptor and post.

  5. This does two Good Things. It destroys the interceptor (which only takes 3-4 hits anyway but packs an offensive wallop), and it does TWO MISSILE HITS worth of damage on the command post. Another 2 missiles and 3 laser hits (on Wingman level) finishes off the command post.
In general, one can easily lure the red dots away from big dangerous bosses and pick them off one by one. Often the red dots have a circling pattern, and the most distant point in their path places them at risk of being hit by your lasers but keeps you safe from the boss ahead. It's just a matter of figuring out the range of the boss's weapons and the range of your lasers.

Level 8:

I don't remember who posted this:

Mission Objectives:

  1. Get all eggs in silos 1 & 2.
  2. Get all eggs in silos 3 & 4 (I have made it through without getting the flaps, so they aren't an objective).
  3. Get all the landing pads (step 21).
  4. Kill the spider-like machine.
In this mission it has been determined that the Aliens have made silos (tunnels) that go to eggs they have stored underground. It is imperative that you destroy the eggs. This means you'll have to fly into the small silo entrance which is protected by a force field and maneuver through the tunnel and blast all the eggs.

This is how the mission goes:

  1. Turbo past the heavily armored tanks.
  2. Kill bird-like machines and the ground monster while using afterburners.
  3. Lure away the fuzzy balls and kill the fixed one.
  4. 3 missiles takes out the excavator.
  5. Laser the 3 tanks.
  6. Missiles and lasers on anti-aircraft batteries (do this in multiple passes, one missile per pass) I get 3 out of the 4 and then stay to one side.
  7. Turbo past enemies on ocean with lasers killing what you can. Note that it is possible to just use afterburners from step 5 to step 9 with lasers shooting what you can, but you'll take a lot of damage.
  8. Destroy walkers on land (1 missile each).
  9. When the refueling drone comes into view destroy the gravity pad in front of it aiming low so as not to hit the drone. Then take out the walker. Also get the other two ground things past the drone before refueling.
  10. Refuel! (finally) Come in from the side and don't worry about the air mines.
  11. Take out landing pads and birdlike machines at the silos (I usually also get the ones just past the first silo or else they'll blast you when you come out. To enter the silo, make sure the targetting indicators are centered on the entrance.
  12. Get the eggs in the tunnel and get at least one of the flappers with lasers. There are 2 silos in this area, so don't forget the second one. Refuel afterwards (might want to fly a little forward and kill some stuff).
  13. Blast the incoming fighters and two walkers before being sucked in by the gravity pad. Shoot the pad with lasers and turbo back. Do the same with the other gravity pads and fighters. If you are trapped by a pad uses lasers firing down to destroy it.
  14. Destroy the Juggernaut with missiles (7 missiles) flying multiple passes. Sometimes the enemy fighters fly into the big juggernaut, but otherwise you'll have to get them with lasers.
  15. Also kill the battle fortress just past the refueling drone before re- fueling (also 7 missiles). Don't get too close to this guy! Refuel. Things get harder after this point.
  16. Next are the heavily armored fighters (this is a real dogfight). It is easier to fight them over flatter ground because they stay a certain height above the ground all the time. If you are not an expert dogfighter, you may want to turbo past this area (ICE's comments seem to indicate the game designers assumed you'll have to).
  17. Two more silos are next. These are the ones with the killer flaps at the entrance and exits. Laser the flaps on entrance and exit. You can get through if you concentrate your fire on the bottom one and have enough shields and time it just right and use turbos and get lucky and are damn good at it and... I have tried doing a barrel roll through them (can't roll in the tunnels) and I've tried blasting the exit point before entering the tunnel with no effect. If you make it past this point you will probably win.
  18. Beware of the Juggernaut when coming out of this tunnel. Kill it and don't forget about the other silo! Refuel.
  19. More gravity pads and fighters.
  20. Get ALL of the landing pads in the next area.
  21. There is a BIG spider-like machine with heavy firepower near you next refueling drone. I have killed it without needing to refuel, but beware of the gravity pad near it. Getting trapped by that pad could be the end for you.
<pbardis@uoft02.utoledo.edu> writes a Hint about level 8 (Congo):

It appears that you have to shoot everything in the tunnels, including those flapping fishbone obstacles. I finished that level a few times with less 4 objectives met and I know I wiped out all of the eggs in the tunnels and got the other outside objectives. I couldn't finish the level until I went back and got every last cuttlefish thingy in the tunnels.

On the upside, on these subsequent tunnel passes, you get to afterburn thru the tunnels until you get to the last couple of fishbones and the afterburning trip thru the tunnels is pretty spectacular, with just the right amount of banking to make it look neater than TE tunnels!

Correction by <wemagor@fms0.cca.rockwell.com>: No, those aren't objectives. I finished without destroying all of them. Trouble is, you almost have to kill them or they'll kill you. You probably got some- thing you missed the other time. ICE will tell you almost right away if you didn't get all the eggs.

Level 10:

<wemagor@fms0.cca.rockwell.com> writes:

Just turbo through most everything. Once I got to the mother ship I killed the first big thing (at the edge of the ship) with missiles. After that, I didn't kill hardly anything. I just tried to run-like-hell! There are several refueling drones above the mother ship (3 or 4 I think). Stay fairly close to the center (I was just to the right of the trough).

There's another hint I could give, but that much should get you farther. I don't want to give away the whole thing...

Q: ICE said that all of the things on the ship's surface are organic parts of the whole and no shot will be wasted then...this doesn't mean I have to wipe out everything sticking out of the ship, does it?

A: No, you don't. I thought that too, but it's just too damn hard with all the things firing on you. Like I said, just run like hell until you reach some- thing significant.

Q: Is there one main thing at the end of this level--I see there's only one objective, but even just trying to get by and shoot only what's dogging me still gets me overburdened.

A: Ah, very observant.

James A. Squires:

When you get up on the Mudder ship, (killing of course that decoy drone), immediatly kill the two strange flower like objects that home in on you (and I think there is a second set shortly following).

Dodge and outrun everything else, then look in the left trench for a drone. Zoom to it, because you'll be under attack and low on shelds. As soon as you leave, take out the robot guys with missles (and I think you can go back for refuling again...).

Skip the tunnel (tho it looks very cool).

If my info is way off, tell me, and I'll refly it and update my info.

There is two ways I know of to kill da brain...

  1. Kill all bad guys around the brain site. Then take your time picking off the brain - don't run into it, make multiple passes.
  2. Kill the bad guys that bug you, then fire missiles from the outside of the brain's pit. (You should know this trick by know... The missile-locking radar can 'see-thru' ground, and the missile will 'terrain-follow' to hit the target - just don't target the wrong target).
Good luck!

-JAS

michel.buffa@cmu.edu