Background Boss: Rangda Bangda and Sigma's One-Winged Angel form.As an added bit of laser-guided karma, he's also the only one of the former Maverick Hunters that defected to Sigma's side to not have any of his unit go with him, although given the setting where he is fought, he probably didn't need them anyways. Bad Boss: It is heavily implied that Flame Mammoth spends most of his time in his unit mocking those inferior to him in terms of strength.
Unfortunately, it can only be used if X has full health, it can only be fired while on the ground, and it's somewhat difficult to land it, particularly against fast-moving targets. It can kill anything in a single shot, including bosses. Awesome, but Impractical: The Hadouken.Launch Octopus' stage has miniboss fights that use suction to either blow you away or pull you towards them, a warmup for a similar attack the boss fight uses.The Hotarian enemies that try to blindside you in the darker areas are a warm up for Mandrill's fast punch attack as well. Spark Mandrill's stage has electrical volts that travel across the floor and harm you note beating Storm Eagle's stage makes this easier, since his ship crashes into the level and cuts off the power, just like an attack he uses.This is also meant to tip you off that Sting Chameleon is not going to be an easy fight, and that he also loves to attack you with spikes that fall from his ceiling. Without them, the stage gets much more frustrating due to the falling rocks and enemies that come with them. Sting Chameleon's stage has a crumbling cave section that encourages you to get both the Dash and Helmet upgrades.It's supposed to be a clue to the player to come back with the dash upgrade, which not only makes the platforming a cinch, but also makes the fight against Storm Eagle much easier. Storm Eagle's stage is loaded with tight platforming, with very small platforms that X can barely jump across on his own.Antepiece: Most of the levels are designed in a way that tips you off to what you're up against.The area immediately before the Final Boss has a place which infinitely spawns weak enemies, allowing you to 'farm' them to fill your subtanks if you die against him after emptying them.
If the conveyor belt is moving away from the wall, you can lock Flame Mammoth into jumping after you by sticking to the top corner and use his landings to get free shots.This is such an effective strategy that most high-level speedrunners choose to tackle his stage second and buster duel him to death. Boomer Kuwanger can also be stuck in a loop by an extremely risky dance of death at the center of the boss arena-he'll try to teleport in to bull rush X and slam him into the ceiling, but if you dart out of range while he attempts this, you get a bunch of free shots on him.Chill Penguin goes up in flames, Spark Mandrill is literally frozen in place, and Sting Chameleon will bounce back and forth between two corners of the ceiling easily reached by X's boomerangs. Lots of bosses in this game can have their behavior broken by their weaknesses.Advancing Boss of Doom: The first Mole Borer in Armored Armadillo's stage will chase down X with its One-Hit Kill spiked roller drill, forcing X to either kill it, outrun it (it will fall into a spiked pit and die), or find a method to get behind it.