BCM195 - Sparking stuck Warthog

(6:26) Level 5 ('The Silent Cartographer') on Heroic. This shows an interesting phenomenon I found by accident over two years ago when I tried to cut a corner too tightly. You can quite easily get a Warthog stuck beneath the main facility's outer platform, resulting in continuous sparking and sometimes also a stream of rubble! See my new article Sparking stuck Warthog for details.

Released August 31st 2016, gameplay recorded July 23rd 2016.

Commentary

00:02 This first example features excellent rubble, and when I get Stacker off the gun, he's standing right in its path, giving me some amusing footage. Although he's rubble resistant however, he's not hog resistant, and gets splattered when I free the hog with a plasma blast.

01:27 This next section starts off with a bad arrival. The hog goes a bit further left than I'd planned, and fails to get stuck. That's corrected on my second try though. This time there's no rubble. The hog gets freed with melee, and Stacker does a better job of leaping clear than last time.

02:27 In this example the right of the hog gets trapped, which I think wasn't intended (I just deviated further left than intended). Good rubble, and you can briefly see it hitting the pillar. There's a flip prompt at the hog, but when I repeatedly try flipping, nothing happens. A whack frees it up immediately though.

02:59 In this example, hitting the back of the hog doesn't free it, nor hitting the side, but a whack at the front does the job.

03:20 As with melee, a flip can work, though it may depend where you stand.

03:31 One thing you can notice here is that the sparks flow over the ground. It seems like each spark is modelled as a particle, getting deflected appropriately. I also demonstrate being unable to back the hog out. That seems to be the usual situation.

04:15 In this example with Hunters present, the spark source is actually visible, which in my experience is rare. I also have some fun with the Hunters of course. Once they're both dead, I try rocket power to see if it'll free the hog. But as you can see, it doesn't do much unless you blast appropriately.

05:56 To give the movie a little kick at the end, here's a bit of fun in which I've provided myself a second hog to switch to after getting the first one stuck. Driving into the back of the stuck hog gives me a bit of a launch, that's all. Incidentally, that wasn't my first attempt, as you may've noticed from the second hog's angle when I board. There were three failed stunt attempts before the 'success'. Conveniently, the nearest Hunter gets killed during the stunt, and the seated Marine gives a good line on which to end.

Closing remarks This footage was from July 23rd over a month ago, when I tried to make a start on the topic. I was planning to record more, and the movie was going to be BCM192. However, the very next day I encountered my 'harlequin Grunt' in level 5, and that was so interesting that I immediately dropped the hog business. Even after three movies I'm still not finished with that Grunt, but I thought I'd finally get the hog movie done to give viewers a change. Contrary to what I'd been planning a month ago, I haven't used any further recording after all. I explored what I could make with just the existing footage, and came up with something pleasing enough, so I settled for that. In fact, all this footage was recorded in under an hour, which makes this movie quite unusual for one of my tutorial affairs. Usually I'd be recording a lot more, over multiple days. So I guess you can count this as one of my less fussy efforts.