Gold on Poison Core - Ancient Research

[reedjam99]

Picked this game up on XBLA over the weekend and have hardly stopped playing yet. Quick question though, does anyone have any tips on getting a gold on Poison Core mode on Ancient Research? I've been trying this one for days and just can't get it. I can get gold on pretty much every other level and mode I've tried so far, but not on this one.

I'd love to hear how anyone gets gold on this level. The closest I've gotten is a score of 7991, just 9pts shy of gold.

In my opinion, the key on poison core maps is not to be as stingy with tower money as in the other modes. The key is to kill as many enemies as possible before they get to the cores, because of the ripple death effect that a poison core can have when a leader alien carrying it is killed. None of the aliens behind him that the poison core kills give you any resources. If it takes 11-12 towers, so be it.

The other key is the crasher deaths. You pretty much need to kill them all, but you can let crasher 2 pass crashers 3 and 4 at the top of the map without having been killed. You just need adequate coverage at the bottom of the map to kill him after they pass. Crasher 1 should get killed before 3 and 4 reach the bend at the top of the map.

I think an inferno makes dealing with the pack aliens much easier, so use at least one in a location that maximizes the time it is in contact with the packs without sacrificing your absolute best locations that should have a laser or gun.

Last tip is that you should have coverage at both the top and bottom of the map. Don't try to load up the bottom ten tower spots, because it's not enough unless you way overspend on something like nine amber lasers and an amber inferno.

[iFireFly]

Yeah, guys! I've get it! 8221 pts. I'm happy +)))

[funwand]

I was able to get this by concentrating on the entrance. I upgraded this area first working my way up. 1 inferno and 2 lasers in the mix.

[Prolix]

I don't yet have the Master Strategist achievement (it is the last one I need), but I can say that -- of what I've played so far -- poison core Ancient Research has been the "tightest" gold to earn. I also fell short several times, and when I did end up getting it, it was only by about 40 points or so.
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I do not take credit for this -- this is not my video -- but this is the strategy that I copied to finally earn gold:
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QFGjQIOW8g
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There is a point around wave 6 or 7 where a few of the stronger enemies will make it to the core, and your results can be a bit random regarding how many of them will get destroyed by the core for 0 resources versus killed for full credit. If you lose more of them to the core than the player in this video did, you will not end up being able to make it! You will need to roll back and try again. The easy way to tell whether you did OK or not is if you have 400+ resources to upgrade the laser turret to yellow before the boss in wave 9. If you're under 400, you're never going to make it; if you can upgrade the tower, you're well on your way to gold. That was the trickiest part of following this plan that I ran into.
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Spend just a little time becoming intimately familiar with the video, and you'll have gold before you know it. There are a few places where you can optimize things by upgrading or building later than the video's author did (because enemies are a long way off still), and overall that will net you a few more resources in interest than he received. Of course, it's more important to make sure your turrets and upgrades are in place in time than it is to get one more resource, so don't cut it too close if there's any doubt: even a couple seconds of a tower not firing on the first alien in a wave is enough lost damage to come up short in the end. This strat is extremely tightly tuned!</P>

[Major Warrior]

Wow, this is an OLD level.

I'd tell you how me and my dad got the Gold for this level but since this is one of the first Golds that we got and now we are on our last 3 golds (all on roundabout) I can't seem to remember.

Like one guy said, just kill as many enemies as you can before they get to the cores otherwise that's a lot of resources that you COULD have gotten.

Since you can't get level 3 towers you just have to wing it with L2s. Try working around the locations where the Aliens will be in range of the towers the longest without doing to much of a Blocking disadvantage mainly at the corners of the road where they have to turn and up top where you can shape their pat try making it take the longest route possible with Lasers at L2.

This is kinda vague but this is the best I can remember because this is around when the game came out.