Time To 1000 - 6-10 Hours

Ease Of Game - 3/10 (Easy)

Number Of Playthroughs Required - 1 (although 2 playthroughs are HIGHLY recommended)

Total Number Of People Needed To Boost Online Achievements - no online achievements

 

Iron Man 2 is a third person action game released by Sega. It is the utter definition of why most movie based games are hated, as it feels very cheaply made on all fronts (especially the camera). However, it is also one of the easiest and shortest 1000s of 2010 and due to the fact it has NO collectibles we must consider it an early contender for Game of the Year

 

Notes:

 

While this game can be completed in one playthrough, it will be very difficult as you will have to start on the Hard (called Formidable in this game) difficulty with no upgrades. If you do a playthrough first on Easy difficulty, you can carry all your upgrades over to Formidable and make the game laughably easy. Difficulty related achievements DO stack, so you will also unlock beating the game on Normal when you beat it on Formidable

 

Every level has a level-specific objective to complete for an achievement. Thankfully this game has a level select so nothing is missable

 

Every level also awards you a new suit of armour (and in turn an achievement) for getting a high score on each mission. To earn a high score basically kill everything in sight and don't leave a single enemy alive. If you complete a level and don't get an achievement for unlocking a suit of armour, play it again and be very thorough with destroying your foes

 

PLAYTHROUGH 1 - EASY

 

MISSION 1

 

Begin your first playthrough on EASY difficulty and ONLY use Iron Man for the missions (as basically you have to do a playthrough each with Iron Man and War Machine). There are a few missions where the game will make you play as War Machine, but this doesn't count against you. The mission begins with you having to escape Stark Tower and functions as the tutorial for the game. Upon exiting the tower you will earn the:

 

Shake It Off - 3 points

Recover from the Roxxon EMP attack

 

Now outside, you have to defend the tower from attacking dropships. The second you gain control of Iron Man, fly straight ahead and destory the dropship in front of you as fast as you can before it can deploy any troops. Once it is gone turn around and destroy the other approaching dropships. As long as you can destroy them all without them deploying a single troop you will earn the:

 

Not In My House - 15 points

Prevent the first wave of Roxxon dropships from deploying their drones

 

You will battle a few more waves of attackers, upon killing them all the level ends and you will earn these achievements:

 

Access Denied - 10 points

Prevent Roxxon from stealing the Stark Archives

Mark VI - 10 points

Unlock the Mark VI Iron Man armor

 

 

In-between Missions

 

After every mission you are awarded points which you can spend for weapon and armour upgrades at Stark Tower. I recommend saving all of these for your Formidable playthrough so you can buy the really expensive upgrades right from the beginning and breeze through the game. Since you are on Easy currently you will have no problems killing things with your default weapons

 

Note: DO NOT buy the Melee Combat upgrades, these are a complete waste of credits and have nothing to do with achievements

 

 

MISSION 2

 

This mission has you protecting a fleet of 6 SHIELD transports. Fly ahead of them (not too far ahead or you automatically fail the mission for abandoning them) and kill everything in sight before they can hurt the transports. After you pass a checkpoint one of the transports is automatically destroyed, but don't worry about this as it's part of the story. As long as you can reach the end of the canyon with the remaining 5 transports still alive you will earn the:

 

Full Flight - 15 points

Only one S.H.I.E.L.D. transport lost in the canyon run

 

The next section has you entering a warzone where you now have to defend ground based SHIELD units. Kill everything in sight as fast as you can so that no harm comes to the majority of the units and you will unlock the:

 

Area Secured - 20 points

At least 10 S.H.I.E.L.D. units survive the battle for the docks

 

Also as you are killing the ground enemy troops, you will see several soldiers not in vehicles. Kill one of them with your Unibeam Attack (hold and release both Triggers at the same time) for the:

 

Unnecessary Force - 7 points

Defeat a soldier with Iron Man's unibeam

 

If you happen to accidently kill these footsoldiers before you can Unibeam them, there are more in later levels

 

Continue through the level. Upon completing it you will unlock the achievements:

 

Deportation - 15 points

Prevent the Russian separatists from deploying Roxxon Armigers

 

Mark II - 10 points

Unlock the Mark II Iron Man armor

 

Note: From Mission 2 onward, Iron Man now has the ability to go invincible for a short amount of time. Press down on the D-Pad to activate this, however it can only be done ONCE a level. Anytime you're on a level surrounded by a lot of enemies it's a good idea to activate this and melee kill them all, as this will work towards several of the kill related achievements in the game

 

 

MISSION 3

 

More robot killing. Early on one of your objectives will be to destroy a Tesla reactor in a room. To do so, you must destroy the four stabilizers in each corner of the room. Ignoring the enemies, blow all four of these up in under sixty seconds and you will unlock the:

 

Pulling The Plug - 15 points

Destroy all four Tesla reactor stabilizers in under 60 seconds

 

 

Continue on through the level until you get to the base of a man named Shatalov. You are given a series of marked buildings on the screen you have to search to find a console. Kill everything on the base and destroy every building, silo, and structure you possibly can (including ALL roof panels on the marked buildings) until this achievement pops:

 

Anger Management - 15 points

Destroy most of the structures in Shatalov's base

 

Soon you will enter into a boss battle with the Crimson Dynamo atop a tower. When it begins, blow up the three marked points on the tower to cut off his super powers and then just keep shooting him until he's dead. Completing this level will earn you the following achievements:

 

Power Outage - 15 points

Defeat the Crimson Dynamo

 

Classic Mark I - 10 points

Unlock the Classic Mark I Iron Man armor

 

 

MISSION 4

 

This mission begins with you having to descend down a massive elevator shaft full of laser beams. Move up against a wall as far as you can and SLOWLY descend down (taking care to watch out for the few moving beams) until you hit the bottom. As long as you hit the floor without touching a single laser beam you will earn the:

 

Entrapment - 15 points

Reach the bottom of the elevator shaft without touching a laser tripline

 

Soon after you will enter into another boss battle, this time with the Protean. In the room there are three energy terminals you have to charge up by rapidly pressing the B button. In order to full charge them without being interrupted, keep shooting the Protean until he goes into a state where he doesn't attack you and recharges his health. Once all three are charged up, shoot him again until he goes into his recharge state and then quickly dash into the next room and activate the console.

 

As long as the Protean is outside the doors when you activate the console, it will flood the room with energy and kill him to end the level. You will then earn the achievements:

 

Anti-PROTEAN - 20 points

Destroy Project PROTEAN

 

Extremis - 10 points

Unlock the Extremis Iron Man armor

 

 

MISSION 5

 

This mission has you defending the SHIELD helicarrier in the air from an onslaught of attacking robots. As always, kill everything in sight as fast as you can. Also when you damage an enemy enough, a B icon will appear over their head. If you approach them and press B, you will hack them so they fight on your side. As long as you kill everything quickly without the helicarrier getting damaged you will unlock the following achievements:

 

Defensive Player Of The Year - 20 points

Save all four repulsor lifts and all four stabilizers on the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier

 

Improvisation Under Fire - 20 points

Save Rhodey and the Stark mobile armory from the A.I.M. attack

 

Mark III - 10 points

Unlock the Mark III Iron Man armor

 

 

MISSION 6

 

This entire level is basically one big boss battle, your goal to destory the giant AIM Armiger robot before it can destroy the SHIELD helicarrier.

 

Note: this is the only level where you can miss the high score requirement due to the fact if you only focus on killing the Armiger you won't earn enough points. So make sure you kill plenty of the other robots flying around the level as you work on the Armiger and you should have no problem getting a high score

 

The Armiger has an attack where it will launch a volley of missiles at you and will get an on-screen prompt to press the B button to deflect them. DO NOT do this, as it will void the level specific achievement, instead simply dodge the missiles or just let them hit you since you are almost immortal on Easy. As long as you can destroy the Armiger without pressing the B button and killing plenty of other enemies you will earn the achievements:

 

Brute Force - 30 points

Destroy the A.I.M. Arc Armiger without using missile deflection

 

Operation Daybreak - 20 points

Defeat A.I.M. and save the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier

 

Classic Iron Man - 10 points

Unlock the Classic Iron Man armor

 

 

MISSION 7

 

This is another escort mission, this time you have to protect an Armiger to the end of the level. Like before, fly a little ahead and destroy everything in sight because the level specific achievement requires you to get the Armiger to the end without it needing repaired. On Easy this will not be an issue, as it will barely take a scratch as long as you are flying ahead guns blazing.

 

At the end of the level you have to shut down a power transmitter by moving three of its power relays. Make sure you kill everything in this area, as another level specific achievement requires you to move all three without getting hit while doing so. After every relay move more enemies will spawn, so kill them all before moving to the next one. Beating this level and meeting the criteria for the level specific achievements will earn you:

 

Guardian - 25 points

Shut down GREENGRID without needing to repair the Arc Armiger

 

Stormbreaker - 20 points

Shut down the GREENGRID power transmitter

 

Switchboard Operator - 20 points

Reposition all of the GREENGRID relays without being interrupted

 

Silver Centurion - 10 points

Unlock the Silver Centurion armor

 

 

MISSION 8

 

Another all boss battle level, this one has you switching off between Iron Man and War Machine to defeat different parts of the boss Ultimo. The first section has you playing as War Machine, where you are battling a giant form of Ultimo. You have to fly around and shoot discs on Ultimo's chest and back until a B icon pops up next to them, at which point fly up to them and press B to tear them off. After you've removed two of them, you will then switch to Iron Man where you battle a smaller form of Ultimo.

 

The level specific achievement requires you to defeat this smaller Ultimo WITHOUT GETTING HIT ONCE BY HIM. If at any point you get hit reload the checkpoint and try again. Ultimo will fly at you and try to hit you with his tentacles, which have a fairly long range. The way to not get hit is fly high above him while you lock onto him with the Right Bumper and keep shooting at him. The instant you see him flying up towards you, fly down and then shoot up at him. Keep repeating this process. Because he continues the game's theme of terrible AI, he will never stop midflight while flying up or down at you, he will just go up or down to a set point and try to attack

 

After several attacks, he will go into a recharge state like the Protean and unleash three metal orbs upon you. The orbs fire a volley of energy blasts at you, you can get hit by these and not void the achievement. It is only a hit by Ultimo himself that voids the achievement.

 

Once you destroy the third orb, you switch back to War Machine. As War Machine you can also get hit and it will not void the level specific achievement. This time you have to remove four of the discs on the Ultimo giant.

 

When the fourth disc is gone, you will switch back to Iron Man again. Repeat the up/down attack process being VERY careful to not get hit until he unleashes three more orbs. Destroying all three will revert back to War Machine.

 

This time you have to target the giant Ultimo's head and keep shooting it until it dies, making sure you do it faster than the countdown timer in the lower corner of the screen. Upon his defeat and if the smaller Ultimo never hit Iron Man, you will complete your first playthrough and unlock the following:

 

The Bigger They Are - 30 points

Defeat ULTIMO

 

Not A Scratch - 40 points

Defeat ULTIMO with no armor damage

 

Ultimate Iron Man - 10 points

Unlock the Ultimate Iron Man armor

 

Hall Of Armors - 35 points

Unlock all armor suits

 

Ultimatum - 15 points

Complete every mission on Easy difficulty

 

 

In-between Missions

 

Before you begin your second playthrough, it is now a good idea to spend all of the upgrade points you've been hoarding. The Ultimate Module is the first thing you want to buy, as it vastly increases your killing powers. Buying the Armour Piercing Bullets is a must as well, as the combination of these two items turns Hard Difficulty into easy. After you have these, just start buying all Ammo, Weapons, and Modules (again, completely ignore the Melee Combat upgrades) to work towards the:

 

Technical Genius - 50 points

Invent every module, ammunition, and weapon upgrade

 

You will likely not have enough points to buy all of these after your first playthrough, but by the time you've finished a good portion of your second playthrough you will.

 

 

PLAYTHROUGH 2 - FORMIDABLE

 

Make sure when you start this, you are using the same save file as your easy playthrough so you can carry all your upgrades and upgrade points over. While in the Stark Tower mission hub, press Start to bring up the Options Menu and change the difficulty to Formidable.

 

For this difficulty, use ONLY War Machine. You can now play the missions in any order you want, as long as you defeat all eight on Formidable you will get the achievement for doing so. When playing as War Machine, equip both his primary weapons as Miniguns and make sure you equip the Armour Piercing Bullets and the Ultimate Module as soon as you can afford them. This is the ultimate offensive combination in the game and you will find enemies die very fast.

 

This playthrough you want to make a speed run, just killing everything as fast as you can to get through the game as there are no more level specific achievements you have to worry about. With your offense upgraded, you should be able to breeze through Formidable in under two hours

 

Note: Just like Iron Man, War Machine has an invincible attack he can activate once per mission. On each level when you are surrounded by a lot of enemies activate it and kill them with whatever weapon you prefer, as this will work towards several of the kill related achievements in the game

 

 

MISSION 1 - FORMIDABLE

MISSION 2 - FORMIDABLE

 

As long as you completed this mission on your Easy playthrough with Iron Man, you will unlock the:

 

Two Man Army - 10 points

Defeat the Russian separatists as both Iron Man and War Machine

 

MISSION 3 - FORMIDABLE

 

As long as you completed this mission on your Easy playthrough with Iron Man, you will unlock the:

 

It Takes Two To Tangle - 10 points

Defeat Crimson Dynamo as both Iron Man and War Machine

 

 

MISSION 4 - FORMIDABLE

 

As long as you completed this mission on your Easy playthrough with Iron Man, you will unlock the:

 

Man And Machine - 10 points

Destroy Project PROTEAN as both Iron Man and War Machine

 

MISSION 5 - FORMIDABLE

MISSION 6 - FORMIDABLE

MISSION 7 - FORMIDABLE

 

As long as you completed this mission on your Easy playthrough with Iron Man, you will unlock the:

 

Bipolar - 10 points

Shut down the GREENGRID power transmitter as both Iron Man and War Machine

 

MISSION 8 - FORMIDABLE

 

Upon beating the game for a second time, you will unlock the following achievements:

 

Iron Man - 30 points

Complete every mission on Normal difficulty

 

Invincible - 100 points

Complete every mission on Formidable difficulty

 

THE KILLING ACHIEVEMENTS

 

By the time you've finished two playthroughs of this game, you will easily have killed over 1,000 enemies for the:

 

Gonna Need Some More Bad Guys - 30 points

Defeat more than 1,000 enemies

 

Now all that's left is getting a certain number of kills with each weapon in the game you will have your 1000 in this game. It is very likely you will have unlocked several of these already, but in case you haven't there is an excellent level in the game to farm kills.

 

Using the same save file you've beat the game twice on, change the game's difficulty back to Easy from the Stark Tower mission hub. Load up Mission 4 and choose whichever character you want to begin grinding kills with.

 

You will remember the section where you had to descend the elevator shaft while avoiding the lasers, this time make sure you hit every single laser you can on the way down. This will trigger three waves of robots that you can kill with the weapon of your choice.

 

After you've killed all waves, a door will open and more enemies will attack. Kill them all and enter a room with eight missile turrets shooting at you. After you destory all of these, a door will open and you will hit a checkpoint, thus saving all the kills you just got. Now quit out to Stark Tower and load up the level again, repeating this process over and over until every single kill related achievement in the game has unlocked.

 

War Machine Killing Achievements

 

Storm Of Lead - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies with War Machine's minigun

 

Room Broom - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies with War Machine's shotgun

 

Omega Man - 30 points

Defeat 100 enemies as War Machine while using the Omega System

 

Iron Man Killing Achievements

 

Bulletproof - 30 points

Defeat 50 enemies in melee as Iron Man while Invincible

 

Pushback - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies with Iron Man's repulsor

 

Up Close And Personal - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies with Iron Man's blaster

 

Extra Crispy - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies with Iron Man's laser

 

Overkill - 25 points

Defeat 100 enemies with Iron Man's unibeam

 

 

Either Hero Killing Achievements

 

Note: these can be done with the hero of your choice, or a combination of the two over your playthroughs

 

Fists Of Iron - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies in close combat

 

Subtle Like A Rocket - 15 points

Defeat 100 enemies with the rocket launcher

 

Fire And Forget - 10 points

Defeat 100 enemies with homing missiles

 

 

 

Access Denied - 10 points

Prevent Roxxon from stealing the Stark Archives

 

Deportation - 15 points

Prevent the Russian separatists from deploying Roxxon Armigers

 

Power Outage - 15 points

Defeat the Crimson Dynamo

 

Anti-PROTEAN - 20 points

Destroy Project PROTEAN

 

Improvisation Under Fire - 20 points

Save Rhodey and the Stark mobile armory from the A.I.M. attack

 

Operation Daybreak - 20 points

Defeat A.I.M. and save the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier

 

Stormbreaker - 20 points

Shut down the GREENGRID power transmitter

 

The Bigger They Are - 30 points

Defeat ULTIMO

 

Shake It Off - 3 points

Recover from the Roxxon EMP attack

 

Not In My House - 15 points

Prevent the first wave of Roxxon dropships from deploying their drones

 

Full Flight - 15 points

Only one S.H.I.E.L.D. transport lost in the canyon run

 

Area Secured - 20 points

At least 10 S.H.I.E.L.D. units survive the battle for the docks

 

Pulling The Plug - 15 points

Destroy all four Tesla reactor stabilizers in under 60 seconds

 

Anger Management - 15 points

Destroy most of the structures in Shatalov's base

 

Entrapment - 15 points

Reach the bottom of the elevator shaft without touching a laser tripline.

 

Defensive Player Of The Year - 20 points

Save all four repulsor lifts and all four stabilizers on the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier

 

Brute Force - 30 points

Destroy the A.I.M. Arc Armiger without using missile deflection

 

Guardian - 25 points

Shut down GREENGRID without needing to repair the Arc Armiger

 

Switchboard Operator - 20 points

Reposition all of the GREENGRID relays without being interrupted

 

Not A Scratch - 40 points

Defeat ULTIMO with no armor damage

 

Ultimatum - 15 points

Complete every mission on Easy difficulty

 

Iron Man - 30 points

Complete every mission on Normal difficulty

 

Invincible - 100 points

Complete every mission on Formidable difficulty

 

Fists Of Iron - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies in close combat

 

Storm Of Lead - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies with War Machine's minigun

 

Fire And Forget - 10 points

Defeat 100 enemies with homing missiles

 

Subtle Like A Rocket - 15 points

Defeat 100 enemies with the rocket launcher

 

Room Broom - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies with War Machine's shotgun

 

Extra Crispy - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies with Iron Man's laser

 

Pushback - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies with Iron Man's repulsor

 

Up Close And Personal - 20 points

Defeat 100 enemies with Iron Man's blaster

 

Overkill - 25 points

Defeat 100 enemies with Iron Man's unibeam

 

Hall Of Armors - 35 points

Unlock all armor suits

 

Technical Genius - 50 points

Invent every module, ammunition, and weapon upgrade

 

Gonna Need Some More Bad Guys - 30 points

Defeat more than 1,000 enemies

 

Unnecessary Force - 7 points

Defeat a soldier with Iron Man's unibeam

 

Bulletproof - 30 points

Defeat 50 enemies in melee as Iron Man while Invincible

 

Ultimate Iron Man - 10 points

Unlock the Ultimate Iron Man armor

 

Classic Iron Man - 10 points

Unlock the Classic Iron Man armor

 

Classic Mark I - 10 points

Unlock the Classic Mark I Iron Man armor

 

Extremis - 10 points

Unlock the Extremis Iron Man armor

 

Mark III - 10 points

Unlock the Mark III Iron Man armor

 

Mark II - 10 points

Unlock the Mark II Iron Man armor

 

Mark VI - 10 points

Unlock the Mark VI Iron Man armor

 

Silver Centurion - 10 points

Unlock the Silver Centurion armor

 

Two Man Army - 10 points

Defeat the Russian separatists as both Iron Man and War Machine

 

It Takes Two To Tangle - 10 points

Defeat Crimson Dynamo as both Iron Man and War Machine

 

Man And Machine - 10 points

Destroy Project PROTEAN as both Iron Man and War Machine

 

Bipolar - 10 points

Shut down the GREENGRID power transmitter as both Iron Man and War Machine

 

Omega Man - 30 points

Defeat 100 enemies as War Machine while using the Omega System