And so I finished both chapters 5-3 and 5-4. After coming out of the cave and shooting some explosive barrels to expedite the process of clearing camps of Ganados (seriously, why do they have those all hanging around?), I found another "Tomb Raider" area that seemed perfectly fit for a firefight. Instead...OH COME ON, KRAUSER!!! I retrieved both chimaera pieces and somehow relieved Krauser of his cap and shirt along the way, but after retrieving the second chimaera piece, he challenged me to a fight on the towers, and...great, there are time bombs on the towers.
Stupid Death #34: Failed to kill Krauser in time.
Stupid Death #35: Once again, somehow my Wii-mote didn't register me as having pressed the A and B buttons simultaneously in time for a QTE.
Stupid Death #36: Don't remember.
It turned out the solution was to stun Krauser and then CUT HIM UP WITH THAT KNIFE!!! Once that was all said and done, I was able to escape from the towers...and into an entire base of bad guys. Wow. Fortunately there's a helicopter here to save the day! Thus begins a very cool and unique section of the game, where Leon must not only navigate his way through the wartime encampments (...is it sad that I enjoyed the "wartime" atmosphere here?), but also avoid copter fire and take cover when the copter instructs him to, which signals that the copter is about to cause an explosion by destroying a building. This culminates in an amazing cutscene where Leon is surrounded by Ganados on all sides, only to dodge all the copter fire and witness the death of all the bad guys who were near him. Then only to watch a guy with a rocket launcher shoot down Leon's copter friend, at which point Leon notices Saddler with the rocket guy and breaks down into quite possibly his most negative emotions all game. At least he didn't pull off a Samus on me, thank god.
After navigating through some ruins for whatever reason and entering a cutscene featuring Leon attacking Ada thanks to the parasites, I entered what seemed to be a prison.
Stupid Death #37: I did not look in one prison which had rifle ammo, and since I had stupidly depleted it all earlier, I was now left facing a regenerator without a rifle. Also, I was keeping myself in the yellow zone so as to conserve health items, and unfortunately the stupid Regenerator was able to take me from yellow to death instantly. Fortunately on the next run I found the rifle ammo and killed it using that and one lucky Killer7 shot.
Then it's time for another firefight, this time taking place in an outdoor area with...well, I'm not good at describing, so let's just say "chain stairs leading up to suspended chain platforms which contained switches". I managed to make it out of this one alive, although the hulking machine gunner caused lots of trouble as usual.
After another room with some shield-bearing enemies, who were dispatched easily using rifle shells, an awesome cutscene ensued where Leon, after being knocked to near death, was ultimately able to rise back up and rescue Ashley from suspended animation thanks to Ms. Wong distracting Saddler for long enough. We all get out safely, and at the end of chapter 5-4, Leon and Ashley found a "doctor's office" where they were able to relieve each other of the Las Plagas.
And that brings me to the final chapter! I'll be back tomorrow evening, and then I'll be taking a break from video games for at least a few days.
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Currently Playing - Resident Evil 4