Challenges

Challenges are an additional Arena mode added in the Downpour DLC, pitting the player against preset arenas with special goals.

Beating all 70 challenges will award the player with the achievement 'The Champion'. This cannot be bypassed by using cheats, as the option merely unlocks every challenge, as opposed to marking them as beaten.

= Challenge 70 =



Challenge 70 features a surprise boss fight against, the Iterator that sent out the triple affirmative, as the ascended.

To begin the fight, the player must attempt to use Saint's ascension ability on Sliver of Straw. After hitting her once, she begins vocalizing and charging up her attacks. The fight consists of six main phases, each ending with her gravity field fading out, indicating another opportunity to attempt an ascension.

The fight is also generally considered non-canon, including by the developers, though nothing in the game explicitly states as such.

Phase 1
Sliver of Straw will shoot energy beams at the player. Despite what it looks like, if the player is in the middle of the beam when it goes off, the attack does not kill. Instead, it will push the Saint into the wall. If Saint is hit by the laser while against a wall, it creates a blast that will kill them.

Phase 2
Sliver of Straw will draw a large grid throughout the chamber, creating a square that generally lands somewhere on the middle. On each of the four corners of the square, a large version of the ten karma symbol pops up. If the player is not in the radius of the symbol, nothing will happen but a small pop. If the player is caught in the middle of one, a loud pang will sound and Saint will be killed. (It should be noted that these effects are near identical to Saint's own ascension abilities, including the sounds made upon success or failure.)

Phase 3
Sliver of Straw surrounds the arena in a circle of lasers that radiate outwards from her body. While they are initially harmless, after a few seconds they will rapidly fire off one after the other, requiring the player to keep up and outrun these. She will do this four times.

Phase 4
This phase combines the first and second phase. Both the karma symbols and beams are slower to appear than in their individual phases, but attempting to avoid them both while keeping the Saint powered up enough to ascend Sliver of Straw at the end of this phase is difficult.

Phase 5
Sliver of Straw fills the arena with orbs of electricity that form a safe circle in the middle. Slowly at first, this safe zone will begin to shift in a figure eight pattern (top left, bottom right, top right, bottom left). The pace quickens, and at the same time the safe zone gets smaller and smaller, requiring the player to anticipate the pattern before the circle actually begins changing directions. Unlike the other phases, when her gravity field goes down the attack does not stop.

Phase 6
Sliver of Straw will utilize the electric orbs, having them cover the top and bottom third of the chamber. Lasers similar to phase three will slide in from either the right or left, and activate after a short time. This phase increases in difficulty as the orbs form a wavelike pattern, requiring the player to manage vertical movement while avoiding the incoming lasers.

Ending
After all six phases have been passed, Saint must perform two more ascensions. The first one ends phase six, and Sliver of Straw will continue vocalizing, with red sparks eminating from her body. Upon ascending her one last time, the chamber goes pitch black, and Sliver of Straw's puppet falls to the floor.

From here, the entrance turns into a shelter symbol, and Saint is able to exit.