Everyone Needs A FriendWhile security bots are fairly weak in combat, they can be a helpful companion if you can bend them to your will. If you feel like you want some friends to fight alongside you, there's a simple way to get them. Find a hostile security camera, then run in front of it and trigger the alarm. When the security bots appear, check your map for the nearest Bot Shutdown Panel, then run to it and flip the switch. That'll cost you 20 bucks, but the bots will fall to the ground and will be hackable. Early on this will only net you one bot companion, but for the latter two-thirds of the game, most security alarms will summon two bots. You can only have two bot helpers at a time, so that's pretty convenient. Your bots will be destroyed quickly, but can still take out most splicer enemies on their own.
Researching EnemiesEarly on in the game, you'll obtain the research camera. When used on your enemies, you'll be able to proceed through five levels of research for each kind of foe you face. For example, if you consistently take snapshots of a single type of enemy, you'd proceed through the ranks like so:
- First Rank: Increases all damage you deal to that enemy by a small amount, and reveals what kinds of ammo they're weak against. (Your first snapshot of an enemy will automatically let you hit this rank.)
- Second Rank: Unique bonus for each enemy.
- Third Rank: Higher damage increase.
- Fourth Rank: Second unique bonus.
- Fifth Rank: Final damage bonus.
To research an enemy, all you need to do is center your camera on them and start snapping away. Each enemy can only be photographed so many times before you don't get any points for it; you can only extract so much information from a single specimen, after all. When you stop getting points for an enemy, you can kill it and move on to the next one.
After you obtain your research camera, you'll want to have it on pretty much all the time. Since you can survive most firefights without too many problems, just start snapping away at enemies as they approach you or fire on you; you can snap out four or five photos on an enemy relatively quickly, and since time pauses while the photo is being developed, you should only be exposed to a relatively minor amount of enemy offense. Just stand there and take the beating; everyone has to suffer for their art. Of course, if you can sneak up on an enemy without their being aware of your presence, you can simply film them from behind for the bulk of the available points. You can also get your photos from a good distance away, if you like. They won't be worth as much as an in-your-face action shot, but you'll have plenty of targets to choose from as the game progresses, so you don't need to worry too much.
You can get bonuses to your picture scores by taking pictures of multiple enemies in one frame (corpses count!) and by taking pictures of enemies as they actively attack you. Keep in mind that you can zoom in by clicking the right analog stick on the 360 controller for a tighter shot.
Search EverythingIt's a pretty simple suggestion, but just to be explicit: be sure to search every container that you see. Doing so isn't difficult, at least on the 360; just look at a container and tap A as quickly as you can to perform a quick search and pick up everything inside the container.
Searching is important to keep your ammo reserves up, and will also eventually net you huge amounts of junk items that you can convert into items at the U-Invent. Even if you don't wind up inventing a lot of ammo, you'll still want the parts to invent Autohack devices, which will let you instantly hack difficult locks.
