hive mind

What the hive mind is

The hive mind is a titan: the biggest enemy in the game, which replaces the boss every ten levels. It is family 4 of 4 and has a single form, built in layers that change every run.

• Shell: dodecahedron, icosahedron, cuboctahedron or octahedron, with shutters on its faces and spikes or plates.
• Heart: merkaba, three octahedra, spiral or eye.
• Swarm: 70 shards in bands, a cloud, a spiral or a ring, which sometimes form a lance, a wall or a pincer.

It has 4 phases: 3 stages and the core. It comes apart from the outside in, from the shards to the heart.

How a titan fight works

You can't beat a titan with ordinary goals: it never reaches the table, so you have to send the ball through the reticle in its goal.

• Lanes with a reticle. Its goal is split into 5 lanes. 2 have a reticle (3 on easy), marked by a column of amber light. The reticles switch lanes every 7.5 s (5.5 s on hard) or when the weak point they target falls.
• Comet shot. If the ball goes in through a lane with a reticle, it turns into a comet that flies for 0.75 s into a weak point: it takes 1 life off it (2 with the giant ball) and gives you 150 points and 1 s on the clock. A goal through a lane without a reticle does no damage, and the game reminds you: aim for the reticle.
• Weak points. They pulse between fuchsia and white. Each stage has up to 3; the core is a single one with more life.
• Probes. Every so often it drops a probe onto the table. Break it with the ball before it leaves: it takes life off a weak point of the current stage.
• It catches your ball. If you shoot at its goal outside the reticle lanes and the ball passes close, most of the time it holds it for a moment (1.0 s on easy, 0.8 s on normal, 0.6 s on hard) and sends it back with spin, curving sideways. It then needs 7 to 15 s before it can do it again. It never touches the giant ball.
• Finishers. Breaking each stage opens a finisher, and when the core drops below 30% life the final finisher comes: perfect center = titan destroyed.
• Extra speed. Against a titan, the ball and the CPU are 15% faster.

What to break in each stage

Each stage has its own weak points; once you break them all, that part of the titan falls apart in a 2.4 s slow motion with a screen shake, and you move on to the next one.

Life on normal: each stage weak point takes 1 hit (2 from level 40). The core takes 4 at level 10, 5 at level 20, 6 at level 30 and 7 at level 40. On easy life is multiplied by 0.7 and on hard by 1.15, rounded and never below 1.

Probe: the swarm shield

The hive mind drops a swarm shield: a row of 5 nodes that swing in front of its goal and cover the reticles. You have to break all 5; only the last one takes 2 life off a weak point.

life

1 hit per node

lasts

15 s on easy, 13 s on normal and hard

damage to the titan

2, only when all 5 are broken

points

100 per node, 400 for the last

It drops one batch at a time: the first at 9 s, then 11 to 15 s after the previous one ends (a bit more spaced out on easy). If you don't break it in time, it shoots at you once and goes back to the titan.

How to beat the hive mind

1. Aim for the reticle. Send the ball down the lanes with an amber light column: every comet shot takes 1 life off a shard, spike or shutter.
2. Clear the shield. While the nodes cover the reticles, comet shots are hard to land. Break all 5: the last one takes 2 life off at once.
3. Read the spiral. It's its first attack and it sweeps the table from side to side for 1.8 s: move before it crosses your row.
4. Watch the craters. From stage 3 it adds the meteor shower: the reticle marks where they land and the ball bounces in the crater for a few seconds.
5. Dodge the collapse. At the core your row splits into 5 lanes and only 2 adjacent ones stay free: get there, then stop the final finisher's needle in the center.

Hive mind attacks

The hive mind adds one of its own attacks per stage: spiral in stage 1, spiral and burst in stage 2, and all three from stage 3. It also uses the tilted table from stage 2 and the vortex from stage 3. The final attack first comes 7 s into the core and repeats every 20 s (26 s on easy).

When it appears

The hive mind can be the titan of any level that is a multiple of 10: titans replace the boss every second boss.

• Campaign: levels 10, 20, 30, 40…
• Boss rush: the 2nd, 4th, 6th boss…, every other one.
• Different families: the 4 families are shuffled every run, so the first four titans (levels 10, 20, 30 and 40) are always from different families. After that the order repeats.
• Never in endless or 2 players.
• Web demo: the campaign goes up to level 10, the first titan, so you can meet it there.

The titan level lasts 99 s and goals don't count toward clearing it: it ends when the titan dies. The clock freezes during the intro, which lasts 6 s and can be skipped by holding for 0.9 s (tap, space, OK or A).

Size comparison

A titan measures 40 to 52 u, more than five times the width of the table. That's why it doesn't fit on it: it floats far away, behind the rival goal.

u = game units (the table is 9 × 16). On a phone in portrait the titan moves up and back a little so it fits on screen.

Rewards

Beating a titan pays more than a regular boss.

• Points: double a boss: 10,000 at level 10, 20,000 at level 20, 30,000 at level 30. On top of that, 300 per weak point, 500 for the core, 100 per shield node (400 for the last) and 150 per comet shot.
• Coins: the ones from a boss (20 + 5 per 10 levels, plus the level's own) and 15 extra.
• Lives: +1, and another one if you lost no lives in the level (max 7).
• Titan radio: beating a titan unlocks the titan radio in the jukebox.
• Missions and achievements: it counts as a defeated boss, but not for the collector achievement (beat all 8 boss types).

When it dies it blows up in a 2.2 s chain of explosions and the titan defeated screen appears.

Music

Every titan has its own theme of epic drum n' bass and jungle, at 172–176 BPM, in Phrygian, natural minor or harmonic minor.

The theme is built in sections that follow the fight: the intro opens with big drums and low brass, every broken stage comes in with a kick, a cymbal and a brass hit, and the music moves to a new section until the core, where jungle and drum n' bass merge. Beating a titan unlocks the titan radio, which plays that theme on loop.

In the retro view

In the retro view, the hive mind is drawn from above, outside the table, with the same warnings in the same order as in 3D. There the vortex turns the table 90° and the game reframes so it stays playable.

Name and epithet

Every titan gets a name and an epithet made up for your run, shown on the intro card (warning · titan).

• Name: 2 or 3 syllables, -Ω and a number from 2 to 99, followed by the family. For example: luxmorion-Ω63 · hive mind.
• Epithet: two random parts, like eye of the nebula, anvil of cold iron or beacon of a thousand orbits, followed by the family and 4 phases.

The Ω in the name is just style: titans are never a secret boss Ω.

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