EXTREME!!!!

There it is. The little image that means I finally mastered Lost Planet's rather brutal Extreme difficulty and made it my bitch. To be honest it was a smoother ride than I ever could have expected and I am a bit surprised that more people haven't given it a go.

I'm not saying it was easy by any means, but assuming you have time and patience then it shouldn't be a problem. It also helps to learn the maps and where checkpoints are placed - then to exploit them to your own wicked ends. Did you realise that if you get to a checkpoint and then die, all of the T-ENG containers, VS suits and weapons up to that point will reappear? You do now. Using that little trick is the key to amassing tons of energy and making your life that much easier. If you just blitz through certain areas, hit a checkpoint and then kill yourself you can then back track to the previous area and scour it for useful items and target marks. What is better is the fact that pretty much every enemy vanishes too. Bliss.

Obviously some areas do not let you go back, so you can only use this is key spots but it can often be the difference between life and death. Plus, it makes getting certain taget marks that much easier.

What I would say as well is that you may as well tackle Extreme mode as soon as you unlock it. Some people might look at the fact you need all target marks on each difficulty and say that you should build up to it, but I disagree. It might seem logical to work your way up the difficulties and leave Extreme until last - but by doing so you may well waste some of your own time.

I say this because the difference between Hard and Extreme is massive. Hard mode was a joke in comparison and I breezed through it even faster than I did on Easy, though obviously that will partly be down to my familiarity with the maps. You lose T-ENG at a much slower rate, there are less enemies and they take far fewer bullets to kill off. The three big differences though are the fact that bosses are far easier (less damage given out and more taken), the target marks aren't as well hidden (so less time/energy wasted getting them) and you have access to data posts on each map. These posts give you upwards of 1k in T-ENG when you activate them and are completely absent on Extreme mode. The massive amount of T-ENG you have available on Hard means you can abuse VS suits more often and take way more damge. It took me eleven days, on and off, to clear Extreme mode whereas Hard mode took me two days. That was how big the difference was.

However, I appreciate that Extreme mode is not for everyone. A lot of people struggle on the first boss and give up there, which would be especially galling if you had gone all the way through Easy, Normal and Hard without breaking a sweat (which you won't). So I would recommend Easy first to get the lay of the land and then Extreme with a decent guide to hand if you can - especially for the marks. Then clearing up the other two difficulties will be a walk in the park.

I'm cruising through Normal now, in fact I've done the first four missions in about an hour. Due to how easy it is I can literally just run through and snag the target marks while pretty much ignoring anything else. As long as I snag the odd data post or energy tank then T-ENG is never an issue. It is amazingly satisfying to go back to the menu and start to see levels with every single mark full up, once that pioneer badge pops up I'll be extremely (ha!) happy.

In other news I've been playing Call of Juarez: The Cartel. It is shit. Please don't buy it. Don't even rent it. Hell, don't even look at it.