Training

“If you get hit, it’ll sting like hell!”

You have to know how to walk before you can run, and you need to know how to crawl even before that, so this starts out pretty simple. Hit the Y button to jump over the first yellow rail, then click L3 to crawl under the fence.

Yes, it’s tedious, but it has to be done before we get to the good stuff.

Now to learn how to shoot your weapon.  Pull the left trigger to go into Precision Aiming mode and aim at one of the four targets set before you.  They are pretty close to you so don’t go looking for them off in the distance.  Pull the right trigger to fire and knock all four targets down to proceed to the next lesson.

You’ll be killing noobs very soon.

Now for some stuff that shoots back.  Click L3 to duck behind the wall. Once down, pull the right trigger to fire blindly over the wall toward the turret in the distance to lay down suppressive fire.  (See the note below if you’d like a quick way to knock out your first Achievement for the game) The next step here is to talk to your partner and have him take up an aggressive hold position so that the turret gunner focuses his fire on him instead of you.  Press right on the D-pad to tell your partner to hold, then press it again to put him in aggressive mode. 

You’ll notice that when you fire, the meter at the top of the screen begins to fill in your direction.  This is your “Aggro” and this is what the enemy will focus on when firing.  The more Aggro you have, the more of a target you become and you will begin to glow red. As your partner takes on Aggro, your meter drops and you become less visible to the enemy. But putting your partner in an aggressive hold position, you have essentially made yourself invisible to the turret gunner. Now you can proceed across this area of the training facility and walk up behind the turret gunner to dispose of him.

Like fishing in a bucket.

NOTE:  You can easily get the Achievement “Fear is The Mind Killer” here simply by firing continuously for a full minute. Just duck behind the wall, pull the right trigger and wait until you get your much coveted “blink” noise indicating your newly aquired 45GP Achievement.

The next task is to simply slide in behind cover. Run toward the low wall and press the Y button as you approach and you’ll slide right into place like it was home plate. Once that is done, you’ll move on to the next section where all you have to do is toss a grenade through the door.  Access your weapon menu by holding LB and choose the grenades by pushing down on the D-pad. When you have the grenade in your hand, pull the left trigger to go into precision aiming mode, put the arc through the doorway and throw the grenade by pulling the right trigger.

Now we can get to making this training a little more interesting.

Now it’s time to put some of these things to work. Switch back to your primary weapon. Walk up to the wall in front of you and go into precision aiming mode. You are currently trapped in a cage and you are depending on your partner to get to the switch that will let you out. You’ll get some enemies that come out and they are blocking the path your partner needs to take to get to the switch. Help him eliminate them by either killing them or at least getting your aggro up so they focus on you so he can get them unawares. When you’ve successfully cleared the area, your partner will hit the switch and the two of you can move on.

Don’t worry, you can’t be killed.

The next thing you learn is mostly just fluff, but it is certainly good for some entertainment. By walking up to your partner and pressing the A button, you can show appreciation for his efforts. There are quite a few variants as to what will happen, so press it a few times to see what will happen. Using your weapon as an air guitar does provide with a brief moment of amusement. By the same token, you can also let your partner know when he’s been a dork. Walk up to him and press the right trigger button. This will allow you to display your displeasure with his performance, or the fact that he didn’t take a shower this morning.

Either way, it’s all just fluff, but you have to do both before you can move on so get it out of the way. One last thing to do here before you can move on is to learn how to switch weapons with your partner. Press and hold the RB button to bring up the co-op menu and push right on the D-pad to switch weapons. Not a big deal in here, but during the game this can come in handy if you and your partner want to trade places in tactical positions.

They behave like true brothers.

Now you are going to meet your first “Heavy”. You will see these guys many times throughout the campaign. You will know when you are looking at them by their yellow health meter over their heads when you aim at them. You’ll also notice that when you aim at them, the reticle is blue. This means you can’t hurt them, at least not from the front. The Heavies must be shot from behind so lets put some of our skills to work here. Put your partner in an aggressive hold position to keep the attention of the Heavy off of you. While those two are occupied, you are virtually invisible to the Heavy, so run around behind him and lay a few rounds into him to put him down.

Clueless doesn’t begin to describe it.

Push left on the D-pad to have your partner regroup with you. You’ll now get a quick lesson on your GPS. Push the Back button to activate your GPS. The screen will turn a bluish color and all the necessary info will show up for you. The path you need to take will be indicated by an orange arrow and different objectives will glow green. You’ll notice that the co-op sniper targets will be glowing as well as have a marker indicating what they are. You’ll find your GPS quite handy many times during the game, so get yourself accustomed to using it.

You’ll never have to say to yourself, “Where do I have to go?”

Probably one of the coolest features of Army of Two is the co-op snipe and this is where you’ll get your first chance to try it out. To enter co-op snipe mode, hold RB to bring up the co-op menu and then push left on the D-pad. The screen will split into three views. You’ll have a GPS view on the top, your partners scope view on the bottom right and your scope view on the bottom left. Although you won’t see it in this training exercise, during the campaign you will also have an option to start a “countdown” so that you both fire at the same time. In this case, your partner is aimed in at the target on the left, so take aim at the target on the right and fire. Your partner will automatically fire at the same time as you and you will have completed this exercise.

Just when you thought sniping by yourself was fun.

As we continue our co-op lessons, you’ll find yourself in a large round “arena” type area. Step to the circle in the middle and you will automatically enter “back to back” mode. You and your partner will stand back to back in the middle and time will slow down. Enemies will come at you from all sides and up on the walls around you. Work with your partner to take them all down and complete this exercise.

Brings new meaning to the phrase “I got your back”!

This will be your last exercise in training and also provides an easy way to knock out three more achievements if you are willing to go through the entire training sequence again a few more times. See the note below for the tip on how to do that. Proceed forward and walk around the corner. There is a proximity mine on the wall to your right as you go around and it will go off and take you down. Don’t worry too much, its supposed to do that so that you can learn stuff.

Once you are down, you can’t move but you can still fire at your enemies. Your partner will grab you (if you are the one doing the dragging you grab your partner by pushing the A button) and drag you back around the corner where he can heal you (when you are the one healing this is done by pushing and holding the A button) behind cover. As he drags you, continue to fire at the enemies to provide him with cover. Once in a safe area you’ll be healed and your controlled training for Army of Two will be complete.

Don’t worry, this will only hurt for a second.

NOTE:  You can get three Achievements right here but it is a little time consuming. Most importantly you have to force your partner to go around the corner so he is the one that walks into the proximity mine. Just get him near the corner and toss a grenade behind him so he is forced to run forward. Once he is down, don’t heal him or grab him. Use your primary weapon to just continuously kill the enemies that show up. You may or may not get this on the first try because eventually the enemies just stop coming, but we have established that over 100 enemies will pass by before they finally stop. If they stop, just go to the start menu and click “Restart from Checkpoint”. This will make you start all of training over again, but the game will remember how many you have already killed so your kill count will not start over. Repeat this with your primary weapon, your secondary weapon and with your sniper rifle until you get the Achievements “Seven-six-two Millimeter”, “Dead Man’s Hand” and “One Shot, One Kill” for a total of 60GP.

 

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