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What's it going to be, son? Die in the water, or show me what you got? - Evil Augustus
Trouble with boss fights in Psychonauts, Psychonauts in the Rhombus of Ruin, or Psychonauts 2? |
–Raz.
The Blueprint Brain Tank is the second boss fight of Psychonauts, originally encountered in the Brain Tumbler Experiment and working as a mental version of the real Brain Tank.
Background[]
The mental figure of the brain tank came to be thanks to Oleander’s obsession on his plan to take over the world. Thanks to his unachieved goal of entering the military, he designed his machine of world conquering as a tank but not just a regular one, but instead, a tank which could be powered by the psychic energy of whoever piloted said tank. He employees Dr. Caligosto Loboto to help him build this army to which he accepts though before that he works on the creation of a minion that could recollect the brains of the campers at Whispering Rock. What Raz faces is in simple terms is the a scheme of a weapon which Oleander wishes to make it come to life.
Psychonauts[]
The first hint to this scheme and more concretely Oleander’s plan was seen only by Razputin after reaching the end of the last course in Basic Braining. A mysterious door lead to a white room with strange bunny trim patterns on the walls and a red curtain which kept a blueprint hidden; before Raz could take a closer look into it, Oleander stops and levitates him out of the room. Some long time later after acquiring the respective merit badges from each course Razputin had to complete, he returns one last time to his own mind to save the mental version of his friend Dogen. The vision of the mad dentist unfortunately completes his task to pull out Dogen’s brain with the brain sneezing powder from his claw and followed by that, he dumps the brain into a chute which Razputin of course follows once he makes it inside the room.
After following the brain through the chute Raz lands on a small room covered by blueprints, in that very room in one of the walls, the blueprint of a tank makes itself noticeable among everything else. The young boy attempts to pick it but a claw grabs the brain quickly and makes it get inside the blueprint of the tank, which leads to the brain enter the tank and pilot it; the Blueprint Brain Tank using its psychic power transports Raz into a battlefield made of blueprints and the two fight. Razputin confronts the Blueprint Brain Tank and since the machine It's powered by Dogen's brain it seems to be very powerful, more so than the real Dogen. After a long fight where Raz must fight the tank as well as the brain of dogen, the brain explodes making raz get teleported back to the white room in basic braining revealing to him that the tank is part of Coach Oleander's plot to take over the world.
Appearance[]
Both Blueprint and Psychoblaster Tank have the same features: 10 spikes on top of the first 3 shells composing the body of the vehicle, inside of said shells a generator can be spotted which in the lower part connects a greenish gelatinous belly as well as three different symbols around it with a red, purple and white colors. Other things to point are a brain suspended by a claw inside a bullet-proof glass dome, double continuous tracks which have their own mudguards and lastly, in the middle of the top part a little hatch can be spotted where the brain itself can be introduced. Its major difference with the real Brain Tank aside from the color scheme: is the vibe of being made up of literal paper thanks to its evident capacity to split many parts by being damage.
Strategy[]
–Ford Cruller advising Raz from the bacon for phase 1.
–Ford Cruller advising Raz from the bacon for phase 2.
This boss fight features two unique phases which unlike most other bosses said phases aren’t done once a certain amount of the health bar is depleted. The tank will fire psychic energy and confusion grenades; the less health the tank it has, the more frequent it will use said attacks, although the tank will at most shoot Raz two times. The tank has a special attack where it rear up on its tracks, to which the player must use this opening to blast it on its weak spot that turns upside down the tank and then beat it enough until it flips back. It’s worth to point that when the tank flips back on its wheels; if raz uses Invisibility at the right moment and reveals himself in front of the tank, it will charge again, however, it will only let the player hit the tank once.
After enough beating, it explodes into many pieces and then the player must fight the final round which is against the brain powering the last remaining of the tank. The recommendation for the brain phase is to use the Levitation Ball to dodge the lasers a bit more easily or even use Invisibility which will make the boss stop performing the laser attack. The dodge roll works too but the precision is frankly hard and there’s a probability of a glitch where Raz can be hit at random.
Abilities and Health[]
- Target Lock Beam: The Blueprint Brain Tank projects a long dotted arrow which upon touching it locks its view into the target, taking around 4 seconds to release a powerful energy beam which for Raz it’ll cost him 3 hit points of his mental health. Turning invisible while getting aimed by the tank will cancel this attack immediately.
- Confusion Grenade: The Blueprint Brain Tank creates a big green question mark which crumples to throw it at Razputin’s past position or sometimes current one. While not dealing damage, it inverts the controls of the player and covers the screen with a greenish filter for a few seconds.
- The Charge: The Blueprint Brain Tank rears up on its tracks for 2 seconds and attempts to run over Raz; if this is dodged, the tank will move at a high speed until crashing into one of the walls of the battlefield but if crashing with Raz it’ll cost him 3 hit points of his mental health.
- Sweeping Laser: The Blueprint Brain Tank summons a huge green laser which functions as a radar that switches from fast to slow rotations (2 quick and 1 slow). Touching this laser it’ll cost Raz 3 hit points of his mental health.
- Super Jump: The Blueprint Brain Tank can jump and move from a spot to spot all over the battlefield; and said jumps can be as floaty and high as Raz using levitation.
- High Resistance: The Blueprint Brain Tank is armored to the point not a single attack can harm its shell; and even so, its weak spot can still take a good amount of hits before overloading.
- PSI-Powers Amplifier: The Blueprint Brain Tank and by consequence the real Brain Tank can amplify the powers of whoever is piloting them. Additionally, it seems the blueprint intended to also grant powers the user didn’t originally had or hasn’t learn yet.
For the second boss fight of the game, the blueprint brain tank is the boss with most quantity of health in the game and possibly the hardest boss to face in Psychonauts. In phase 1 the tank itself requires 4 shoots (to make it flip) and when the belly is exposed the boss can receive 7 punches (6 only in the last flip) and considering this is done 4 times it gives a total of 27 hits to defeat it. Phase 2 on the other hand it only requires 8 punches to defeat the brain, in total counting both phases, this boss fight requires a total of 39 hits to be taken down. (It can be even higher but depends on how often you use PSI-blast to flip the tank if you miss hits).
Trivia[]
- The Blueprint Brain Tank appears in the Psychonauts recap animation in Psychonauts 2.
- This is one of two other bosses in the first game where the boss theme has a second variant. The others being Linda and Jasper respectively
- This idea would evolve in Psychonauts 2 by adding variants that lacks or even adds specific instruments, reaching the point where some bosses even have more than 4 variations.
- The Laser used for phase 2 has rare chance to have continuously fast spin (Gameplay by Materwelonz demonstrating this behavior of attack).
- This is a glitch that can occur mostly on the PC version if the Vsync are turned off.
- If one takes a moment to look at the sky of the battle arena, at the center of it what looks to be a cardinal direction surrounded by a bunch of stars can be seen.
- This is the only boss fight which its second phase features a new icon in its health bar, The Butcher or The Final Boss doesn’t on the other hand.
- Similar to many things from the Brain Tumbler Experiment, the second phase for this boss fight could be a foreshadowing to the Jarred Brains.
Video Battle Walkthrough[]
Psychonauts - All Bosses -No Damage-
Gameplay by Gellot. (2:31 for the fight)