The Callisto Protocol

One of the most intense achivements I’ve been through. I just want to share my experience and some tips and tricks that you may not know and can give an extra hand if you're trying to get this.


Regarding weapons and upgrades:

A. Stun Baton

- 3rd tree – get the first 2 upgrades as soon as possible - Increased Velocity Alloy Sheath and Block Break. Block Break will get you easily past by many enemies as they start to block quite fast.

- 1st tree – get the first 2 upgrades depending on your playstyle - Riot Control Swing and Damage Upgrade Level 1 (if you are a more melee style – get it on chapter 2 or 3, more stealth and guns approach - then do it later. I think I did it at starting chapter 7 - Colony)

- didn’t touch 2nd tree and didn't bother with Damage Upgrade Level 2.

B. GRP

- 2nd tree - Energy – Get the first 2 upgrades as soon as possible (will help to have more energy - may be crucial in some parts of the game if you don't have batteries left)

- 3rd tree - Velocity – I just got the first upgrade and was enough for me.

- didn’t touch 1st tree, nor the last 2 velocity upgrades.

C. Hand Gun – I had it upgraded 100% at the the start of chapter 7. Prioritise ammo capacity and magnum rounds. I breezed through chapter 8 with alt fire and 60ish ammo capacity before final boss.

D. Riot Gun – I had it upgraded 100% by the end of chapter 8 before final boss / Ferris & SuperBiophage Ferris. Prioritise ammo capacity and magnum rounds if you want that final upgrade. Had like 50ish ammo capacity before final boss.

These were the upgrades that helped me, if you have another setup that worked for you in other playthroughs then go with that if you feel more confortable with it.

General tips and chapter threats:

- use cloud save (online when you have a save checkpoint, quit game, wait 30 seconds or so, restart game, then offline until next save checkpoint => repeat).

- if you experience crashes, I never had any before I tried this mode, and if you're using headphones, be sure to put all audio off before the part where you had your crash. I had one crash on chapter 4 - Habitat, the one with the FANS, and 3 in the last chapter. You may also try to get online just for that part and then get back offline after you passed it, I also did this and it worked.

- restart checkpoint if you’re about to die or use the cloud save if you died. Game saves instantly if you die so don’t risk it. You have NG+ so you can give it another shot then.

- you may have auto-dodge activated but I don't recommend. The quick time events button can also be set to auto but I found myself pressing Y or A so don’t know what to say about this. Aim assist on the 3rd level may help with hitting targets but you move harder the aim as it auto-hard-locks. Probably 2 or 1 is better.

- don’t get too close to FANS or other dangerous environments as it can get you instakilled. Two Head and SuperBiophage Ferris will also do that to you.

- loot everything in the first chapters and run back to the store and try to sell as much as you can. Try not to sell ammo, better to use it on the mf biophages. It will be easier after chapter 5 - Lost, as you know you'll have more space.

- use grp on big mouths (spitters), corruptors (invisible enemies) and on the basic ones if you still have energy or batteries. Single basic biophage or even mutated? Then show him the love of your baton. Not having checkpoints it's harder than any mode because grp becomes more important than ever. I found out that after some cutscenes you may get a refill on your grp, but don’t count on that, consider it a bonus.

- sell injectors or drop them for more valuable loot. (energy converter, decoder, cpu printer)

- maintain a green healthbar, even by using injectors. Their cost is cut down to 33 callisto credits so you don’t lose too much if you use them from time to time.

- if you get surrounded, stay focused on the enemy that is about to attack and keep right or left for dodging. After his attack, shoot, grp or hit him and move to the next one. I got crowded on chapter 6 - Below when trying to get to the 2nd breaker, ran out of grp when pushing a blind to the wall and alerted the others. What fun I had with my heart pumping and all the sweating but I managed to get past them.

- get all blue chests, except the one with alternate path at the beginning of chapter 6 – Below. It’s too risky for this mode. Don’t open any in chapter 8, they have a parasite in it like the first blue chest in chapter 1.

- having hand gun upgraded to magnum will be helpful on sections where biophages start mutating because with 2 bullets they are totally dead.

- be careful with your upgrading, if you focus too much on stun baton or grp you may not have enough credits to upgrade your weapons and get softlocked.

- if possible kill bloodworms without using ammo. There's one in chapter 6 after descending some stairs and a blind will be sleeping in front of you. I shot him down, waited for another blind to come and also shot him down and then I shot the bloodworm. Not big of a deal if it harms you, usually there's an injector near by.

- I didn't test if some enemies despawn after reaching different cutscenes. I played it safe and cleared most of them.

- if you go berserk in chapter 8 and kill most of the enemies with the hand gun's alt fire be sure to stomp them quickly as they may mutate. This is available everytime you use the alt fire.


Regarding chapters:

1. Cargo – nothing mentionable.

2. Outbreak – just don’t rush the stealth part with the Security Unit/Robot. Prioritise grp on spitters. You have to melee the first spitter.

3. Aftermath – take your time with the robot by having a box in your left, take two shots then cover and then take another 2 and cover. Repeat until it falls. I had the magnum rounds so it only took 4 bullets.

4. Habitat – well, ladies and gents here you have the hardest part of the game. Water slide. With. FANS. I’ll get back to them. After the FANS you have another security robot. Wait for him to pass by then go and take cover after a box, I used the one at the entrance where your next objective is and also he turns around and continues his loop. At the bottom (helpful videos) you have a video that I tried to use with the water slide part. Getting back to FANS. I knew this would be something that will blow me over as they go random. So my first attempt went smoothly without dying but I had my first crash after 3.5 playthroughs at the cutscene where Ferris appears at the end of the level. Started again, and this time I died. Started again and died again. On my next attempt I used the xbox button – pause/dashboard when I was approaching the FANS and you can somewhat make an idea of where the FANS are going. You may have some seconds to move but it will be enough. It may help to raise brightness and contrast at maximum. Not a 100% bulletproof option but I did it on my first attempt with the xbox button/dashboard. Luckily, I didn't have another crash and I didn't do anything more at this point.

5. Lost – just keep an eye for combusters (explosive crawling ones) and use your 1 shot hand gun. After getting the riot gun you’ll have a spitter that will come from an elevator. Just shoot his leg, shoot again or stomp him. The next room has an instadeath spinner, don’t get too close but it’s very helpful to grp enemies in it. At the end you'll fly where you can get a instadeath if you're not paying attention. This part is easy - left, right, left, right, left then A.

6. Below – stealth all the way. I mean crouch on almost every part of it. Silently kill every blind one, almost all. With 3-4 you'll need to pull out your gun or baton.
You don’t want to get ambushed here, especially when they can mutate. There’s a section with a spitter that is walking so be crouched as if you alert him he’ll bring more blind ones. Grp him as soon as you see him. You'll get through a next section where you're on top of a collapsed floor and many blind enemies are sleeping, run for the exit and in the next room you'll have 2 spitters. Shoot their legs and they will instantly die. And next you'll have 2 crawling enemies coming to you - grp the explosive tank at them and grp or shoot the other one that will spawn. For the tram ride have at least 2 grp batteries, 3 is best and with the upgrades I wrote about you'll get by quite easily. With the Two Head I used CarcinogenSDA's strategy and pushed him down the drill.

7. Colony - Stealth where you have blind ones and get aggresive with the others grp/gun. Before 2nd Two Head buy ammo, I had the alt fire for the hand gun (40-50 ammo) and used like 4 alt-fire shots before he fell and another 2 and I switched to riot gun (magnum upgrade - 30 ammo in inventory) as I noticed in hardcore that is does more damage in his second phase than the alt-fire of hand gun. Well, just run around and shoot him on the long side of the box. If you by any chance get cornered and can't run, just dodge and shoot his heads/head. If a biophage appears, prioritise to get him killed and focus again on the Two Head. Don’t fight both of them, in hardcore as I was dodging the basic biophage, Two Head pinned me down. At the end you'll fight Ferris, dodge all the way 3, 4, 5 times as many as it takes and only when you see him retreat then beat the crap out of him. Dodge => Beat.

8. Tower - I mostly used my hand gun's alt fire on all enemies where I didn't use grp. Those all saved credits made life easier on this chapter. Before the 3rd Two Head stock up on ammo like on Colony and you know the drill, run in a circle and shoot when you are far away. If you're cocky you can put one shot on the turn side but don’t get too cocky. Before the 4th Two Head you will have 1 spitter and another biophage sleeping. Run near the first fan on the left, wait for the spitter to jump in front of you and grp him into the FANS, next shoot the sleeping one that's in your left, he'll pop in front of you and again, grp him also into the FANS. If you just walk a little you'll hear a combustor and the last Two Head will come to salute you. I usually run to FANS in front of me and walk a little to make him come through the last hallway and I'm waiting for him in the corner next to the FANS. Stay where you are, but if you want the alt fire for the riot gun I suggest doing what I did, and push him to the FANS to save ammo. Else shoot that mf. And when I was riding the lift with Dani to get to Ferris, guess what? I had my 2nd crash. Then my 3rd crash. Then my 4th crash and also my 2nd death as I was pushing the Two Head to the FANS he lost one head and when his animation stopped and attacked me, somehow he went to my left and I dodged directly in to the FANS. Did I tell how much I love FANS? On my 5th attempt I found out that putting audio to off may help with the crashes as I'm playing with headphones and I also went online just to get by this part. It worked. Looted everything, upgraded my riot gun's alt fire and it was not quite a walk in the park as Ferris may give you 7-8 hits to dodge and when he transforms you need to look after the combusters to throw at him or just kill them. After 2 alt fires the first 2 appeared and I just had to keep him walking and not letting him run. The alt fire of hand gun or riot gun will stop him when he gets running. I also threw at him the explosive barrel, because why not?

Special mention and thanks to BlitzGreg89. Visit the thread he made for alternative solutions and other great ideas. Contagion Mode Playthroughs

Helpful videos:

Water slide section. With FANS. Even though it's random, it may help you get an idea of where to position yourself.

CarcinogenSDA's video is on maximum security and he uses checkpoints for his grp recharge. You won't use the grp as he does and won't upgrade it either to max. But he has sections that will help you if you're struggling. You also can see how to deal with 1st and 4th Two Heads.

I didn't try this but if it helps, why not?


So that's it, you'll probably win one of the hardest achievements. Probably.

If I may, when you finish, play Survivor - The Eye of The Tyger. You'll get it.

Don’t worry. You've got this. FANS.

The guide from Aurelian88 is great and that was the starting point for my run, but I would like to share with you a different point of view and summarize all the possible way to force the game to unlock both the contagion achievement, in case none of them unlock for you, like happened to me. Most of this guide is already written in previous comments here and there, and also in the forum, but having everything together I believe it can help a lot saving time.

PLAYSTYLE: full melee
The following guide is for players who like going full melee.

SECRET ROOMS AND ALTERNATIVE PATHS: get all of them till chapter 5 (lost), avoid them starting from chapter 6 (lost), not worth the risk. If you get all the previous, you have plenty of credits by the end of chapter 5.

SAVING METHOD: online
I played the whole game while being online. If you die (i died many times, see below), pause the game during the death animation, do not close the game (if you do it accidentally do not panic, just be fast and everything's good, it happened to me and still got the achievement for the no death run, the cloud saving is not immediate), open the dashboard, manage game and delete the local saves. The game will automatically close. Enter the game, let it synchronize and you restart from the beginning of the chapter, using the cloud save. Do this everytime you die and you'll unlock both the achievements at the end of your first run.

GENERAL TIPS: Being a full melee player, do not waste credit in weapons. Use only the hand gun and the shotgun and do not upgrade them before chapter 6 (more details below). Always sell the ammo before chapter 6, you literally do not need them. Keep 1-2 injectors with you, sell the others. If evading properly (activate the dodge assist and the QTE auto-completion) you don't need to use injectors. Just be careful with spitters, they can hit you while in melee combo with another enemy and this can easily turn in a game over. Focus on them first (if possible avoid to throw them out of the map, they drop 100% a decent amount of credits), get close to melee them (they are dumb at melee) or insta-kill them using GRP and traps. Shoot them if no other options are available. Skip cutscenes to speed up the run and avoid crashes.

LIST OF UPGRADES: I report them in the order I got them. The chapters are here just to give an idea when you need to do the upgrades. It is possible that you will have more/less credits and get them earlier/later.

Chapter 2&3:
STUN BATON - 3rd tree – get the first 2 upgrades. You need the second one to break the limbs when the monsters block, making everything easier.
GRP - 2nd tree - get the first upgrade for battery capacity.
GRP - 3rd tree - get the first upgrade to push further the enemies into traps.

Chapter 3&4:
STUN BATON - 1st tree – get the first 2 upgrades. Do not use the heavy attack, it's too risky. You only want more damage to kill the enemies faster, especially if you get sorrounded and you don't want to risk missing a hit because of a bug.
GRP - 2nd tree - get the second upgrade for battery capacity.

Chapter 4&5:
GRP - 3rd tree - get the second upgrade to push further the enemies into traps.

Chapter 5&6:
STUN BATON - 1st tree – get the last upgrade. You want more damage to kill the enemies faster. When they have tentacles, do not risk shooting them when you are facing 2+ enemies at the same time - things get messy too easily -, just let them transform. Keep evading and then hit them. With this upgrade you will kill them fast and safe. Moreover, if surrounded by many enemies, only 1 of them will attack you each time. If you keep evading, his attacks will damage the other enemies, making everything faster. So, do not panic and be relaxed, don't rush your attacks, just evade and then eventually take your turn if you feel it's a good moment.

Chapter 6&7&8:
RIOT GUN - get all the upgrades except the alternate fire - totally useless. You want more damage and ammo capacity to kill faster the two-head in chapter 7.
GRP - 1st tree - get the first upgrade to regenerate faster the charge.
HAND GUN - get all the upgrades except the alternate fire - totally useless. You want more damage and ammo capacity to kill faster the two-head in case you run out of ammo for the shotgun or to kill spitters from the distance.
GRP - 2nd tree - get the last upgrade for battery capacity, it's very useful in the last boss fight in chapter 8.

DETAILED TIPS FOR EACH CHAPTER:

Chapter 1&2&3: nothing to say, just don't rush (especially with the security robot) and explore every alternative path. Sell everything at the machine and buy upgrades.

Chapter 4: here is where you probably die. Repeatedly (I died 5-6 times). The water slide is the hardest part of the game. Just watch videos before starting the sequence. There are many ways to do this part, but just be sure to know where are the columns. If you hit them in the middle, it's an insta-death. The fans also kill you one-shot. Even if annoying, everytime you restart, do all the alternative paths. You need those credits and you don't know when you will make it past the water slide. After the water slide, there is the security bot patrolling the zone. Do not risk shooting it, it can be an easy death and you do not want to do again the water slide. Let it pass and follow it sneaking behind it. Be careful with the fog part, there are spitters. Use the GRP here and at the end of the chapter. Do not fight near traps (fans, grinders, etc.), you can get killed. Let the enemies follow you and always melee in a safe zone.

Chapter 5: easy chapter, here is where you need to use your weapons for the first time. Don't rush the tunnel part, use the hand gun to kill the explosive enemies. GRP them if they get too close. Do not use explosive barrels in any fight, it's too risky. Just melee and dogde. You can die at the end, during the free fall. Just watch a video before doing the sequence. I died a couple of times at the 3rd obstacle where you need to pass left. If you wait to long to go left, you will not make it in time. If you go too left it's the same, you need to move slightly right when inside the cylinder.

Chapter 6: easiest chapter if you do not rush. Stealth for the whole time (take your time) and avoid alternative paths, that's too risky. For the final fight on the platform, enemies come in group of 4 on each side. GRP the first 3 and melee the fourth. Rinse and repeat till you get the two-head fight. Do not bother with glitches, that's too risky. Kill him with the shotgun, even if you have not upgraded the damage yet, you can easily kill him. Just be sure to have enough ammo (30 are enough).

Chapter 7: I died a couple of times in the upper part of the colony, just before the two-head fight. Enemies here can easily bug is stairs, not locking them in melee combo. Just be sure to fight them on a plane surface or throw them away with GRP if things get messy. Avoid glitching the two-head, it's too risky. Just kill him with the shotgun. Be careful for the smaller ones spawning with him. Use GRP and throw them at him, then keep firing to kill everything. Do not go melee, if the two-head hits you, it's game over. For Ferris at the end, just take it easy. Let him attack and keep dodging. When he stops and starts talking, hit him. Repeat till the fight ends.

Chapter 8: Kill the first two-head with weapons, just run in circle using the server's wall till he dies. The second two-head can be pushed to fans for an instant kill. Very easy, watch a video if you don't know how to do. For the final boss fight, get plenty of ammo for the shotgun. Save few ammo for the hand gun just in case. Fight in the middle room, do not bother for his spitting attack, it does really poor damage. Mind the noise of the exploding enemies, just throw them at the boss when they approach. There are always 2. Shoot them if it gets messy. I died a couple of times here because Jacob bugged inside the table in the middle of the room and I was not able to dodge the charge of the boss. Just be sure to stay away from the table and focus only on dodging when the boss approaches.

ACHIEVEMENTS NOT UNLOCKING: if like me, you do not get the achievements during the credits, do not panic. Just do the following: skip credits and go to the main menu. You will unlock NG+ for contagion. Close the game. Shut down / hard reset console. Turn on the console and switch to offline. Open the game and load the last contagion save where you run to the escape pod. Reach the escape pod. When "The Callisto Protocol" starts to appear, open dashboard a go online (without exiting the game). You will unlock both the achievements during the credits. This is how I got them.
If this is not working for you, try to start a normal game, complete the first chapter and when you get control of Jacob inside the cell, quit to main menu. Start a NG+ contagion using your last contagion save. DO NOT skeep cutscene. You should get the achievements here. If not popping, wait to get control of Jacob and quit to main menu. Reload the contagion save where you escape to pods that you used for NG+. You should get the achievements immediately.
If none of this is working for you, delete local saves, unistall and reinstall the game. Delete all saves from normal runs and complete the NG+ run. This run will be very fast since you don't need any upgrade, so just rush.
Unfortunately there is not a single solution for this problem, but most of the players unlock the achievements with one of the first 2 methods.

I just wanted to add this as well because the guide above is great but because it worked very well for me I thought I should at least share my experience with this. I never needed to restart or anything using this method but if you can save your hardcore playthrough or new game+ hardcore playthrough when you do this achievement and go through each chapter one at a time on hardcore and learn the enemy locations, practice the tough sections particularly in chapter 5 where you have you try to save the worker, all the two head fights, the final boss fight of course, or just any section you have trouble with on your hardcore run just find a strategy that works for you because contagion will give you plenty of money to upgrade what you need to get you through the game and is significantly easier gameplay wise than hardcore so when you finish a chapter on hardcore immediately start the same chapter you just did on contagion you will be surprised how much easier you will get through it without even needing to restart a checkpoint or anything and it will knock your hardcore playthrough out as well because you will be doing them simultaneously pretty much. I only came a little close to death once on my playthrough and that was in chapter 5 because I accidentally through an explosive crate to close to me and it almost killed me but other than that I really had no problems all the way through the game.