Control
67 Achievements
1,390
31-39h
Vending Spree
Destroy 80% of the Altered Vending Machine instances Details for this achievement will be revealed once unlocked
15
0.4%
How to unlock the Vending Spree achievement in Control - Definitive Guide
When playing through the AWE DLC be sure to shoot or lift all vending machines you come across because there is a small chance one of them will be Altered. It will be obvious since it will turn red and start to waddle away quickly. If killed it will then drop tons of loot and materials.
Bug
This achievement is buggy and has the chance to never spawn an Altered Vending Machine when playing through the AWE DLC. You may never encounter them due to your save being bugged. There are two workarounds at the moment. The first fix according to Guile132 down in the comments said, “To die by a hiss if the vending machines aren't appearing as altered.” Note that he had already seen two and then the AVMs stopped spawning. The second workaround that worked for me after never seeing any AVMs spawn after several hours of gameplay and searching requires resetting your save. You should finish all the other achievements and then restart your save by selecting Mission select>Endgame at the main menu. This will put you back at the end of the base game and reset the DLC's progression. I recommend using the newly added assist mode to have infinite health and one hit kills (Start>options>gameplay tab> scroll all the way down to enable). You only need to run up to the control point "Active Investigations" to use this method of farming kills. Resetting the DLC will take away some of your abilities and deselect your personal mods and weapon mods, that's why I recommend assist mode.
Resetting your save should be a last resort option. However, you could utilize the cloud save trick method to do this and then revert back to your old save. Pressing start on the application and going to mange game, then your saves, delete from console without closing the game once you have your achievement post reset. This will force a download from the cloud for your most recent save file. The bug appears to be happening in either the case of seeing a couple AVM then none and fixing it by dying by a hiss, or never seeing them and having to reset your save. The most recent update that happened may have also increased the spawning rates making this easier.
Method
From the Active Investigations control point you will want to turn around and make your way backwards through "Operations Center" to damage the three Vending machines on the second floor. Then continue to run south through the "Operations Corridor" and to the "Abandoned Offices" via the service tunnel. There are another three in the abandoned offices one on the right after first entering the offices then two more closer to the control point leading to the firebreak. Once you've damaged those six just return to the main menu and reload which will spawn you back at Active Investigations to run the path again.
Note: Something Tarot B pointed out in the comments. If you haven’t reset your progress again due to the glitch you can get a 7th vending machine along this route right at the start of the run. In the “Active Investigations” area you spawn at, run forward and to the left, you should find the Vending Machine next to the SHÜM arcade cabinets. Finding this extra one will increase your odds at finding an AVM making this hunt slightly shorter.
This is a clip of the run before I realized my game was bugged showing the locations and path to take.
Clip including Altered Vending Machines post reset via mission select.
You should be finding at least one Altered Vending Machine every 10 minutes using this method. It took less than 30 mins for me to run through the first 5 minutes of the game again and farm the 4 kills needed.
Delay
I only had to destroy 4 vending machines, but the achievement took over a minute to pop after killing my fourth.
Credit
Huge thanks to katana409 and GFreire for their guide and comments. They were a huge help in finding a great path for farming these kills. I didn't discover the bug or workaround either, I only suffered from it and wasted 5-6 hours before I had realized they were never going to spawn.
Good Luck Hunting!
The easiest way to get this trophy is to turn on invincibility and one shot kills, fast travel to the abandoned offices:
1) run back towards the fire break for 2 vending machines at security, then proceed through the offices for 1 more (right as you enter).
2) run to the next section (Operations center) and there is another 1 before the control room and 2 through the other side. That makes 6 opportunities in only a few minutes.
3) if you dont get an AWE vending machine, quit to main menu and then continue (back @ abandoned offices). If you did then fast travel back to save progress and repeat.
This method only took me 4 restarts to get 5 vending machines and popping the trophy. You MAY only need 4 machines I hear. I got 1-2 every run. Maybe I'm the luckiest SOB ever, but I think the spawn rates have been adjusted.
https://gamepretty.com/control-ultimate-edition-all-vending-...
Some things not explicitly mentioned in this guide that I found useful are:
- This achievement must be done in the Investigations Sector (requires the AWE expansion).
- You will have to back out to the main menu multiple times so the vending machines can reset (I had to do this 4x times, but that's because 1x ran away before I could destroy it). The luckiest I got was 2x in a single run through and there are 5x total (you will only need 4x to get the achievement).
- It helps once you've gone all the way through the list to respawn back to Sealed Firebreak (called Sector Head Office on the map) before backing out to the main menu and jumping back in the game to reset the vending machines.
- I recommend stopping by #14 after grabbing #9 to make the run through quicker. It took me about 10 minutes a run through once I knew where they were.
This trophy was the last one I had to obtain. I'd managed to discover three possessed vending machines in a short space of time, and had killed two of them... on the third I died from the Hiss before I had chance to destroy it. I do wonder if it was this that glitched it, as afterwards, no matter how many times I traipsed around the DLC area, I could not find another possessed one.
I had read that you should quit the game and load the chapter 'End Game' - doing this actually wipes all progress from the DLC's and so is a difficult call to make. However, as this was my last trophy, and as I had backed up my save game to the cloud, I decided to give it a go. Given that you lose a lot of progress, and my level of frustration at the time, I turned on one hit kills and invincibility within the new Assist Mode found in the options. I then made my way into the AWE DLC section. The first vending machine I came up to was possessed, but then the next handful I found were not. After a while I decided to quit out and reload. Suffice to say, the next vending machine I hit was possessed - having shot it (with the assisted one shot) the trophy popped. I've seen different numbers from the various posts out there, but for me, I only needed to destroy 4 in total (although I've read it can take as many as 6 though).
Hope this helps.
Fra Mauro AWE Entrance -
1 directly in front of you at control point
Go through debris/door *1 machine to right of security gate
Through security gate 1 at top of right stairs
Operations center -
Run through doors in front of you, turn right into Operations Center
*1 machine around corner on left (still upstairs)
Just past this go immediately through control room and there are *2 outside the second doors
AWE Loading Bay -
Go through door to loading bay, 1 on left down the short stairs
Sealed firebreak -
1 at control point
Through security gate 1 immediately on left
Abandoned offices -
Turn around, veer right into central hallway, first right, turn left. *1 machine
There are quite a few of vending machines in the AWE DLC. Basically, just attack them. If the machine reveals to be altered (random and it'll be glowing red), kill it. Just follow the map below for their locations. If you happen to find them all and the achievement didn't pop, fast travel to the closest control points and re-attack them. Also note that if the lights are on on the machines, the random altered spawn MAY occur. And if this didn't work, close the game out then relaunch it. There are also two more vending machines in the Shifted Passage hidden location (HERE) but the location closes after you've exited the hotel sequence hence why it is not on the map below. The clock code to open said passage is 17716497 (special thanks to YouTube user Kaiser Ryu for this).
Restarting the DLC by selecting the "Final" mission helped (don't forget to copy your saves before doing this). Then I went to the entrance of Fra Mauro, namely clearing the corridor, where to activate the elevator you need to kill mobs and illuminate the cube with a nest for it. After that, I jumped to the central administration (where our allies are located) to reset the location, then to the Control Center, from where I shot at the machine guns at the entrance and exit of the room, and then at the rest of the machine guns. One machine gun at the Abandoned Offices security post. One machine gun at the Fra Mauro guard post. When the possessed did not appear for a very long time, I restarted the game.