Obviously, the part of Control where you have to defend Natalya is tense, exciting and nerve wracking (not to mention wonderfully creative, a great way of adding variety to a game that plays the same throughout its length). But all the little details of that stage are great, too. For instance, the first three enemies of the stage (after you destroy the first sentry gun). Even on 00 Agent mode, one enemy usually isn't much of a threat. But these enemies together can get some hits in if you're not careful, and since this is a difficult, long marathon stage, you can't afford to take any hits, certainly not this early. There's such little time to take out the enemies here that I found it pretty necessary to kill them all with head shots. That skill - being able to instantly target a head shot - is a lot of fun, once you have it. And the stakes are really high when you have to use it. (If I'd take a hit at the beginning of this stage, I'd abort and try again).

My strategy for this stage on 00A is nearly identical to my strategy on SA, but things like that make it require more skill on 00A.

The stage is slightly relaxed right before you have to defend Natalya, but to me that just seems to enhance the tension by way of anticipation.

A question for people: Do you normally blow up the desks in the computer area, or keep them there? I used to blow them up, so I'd have clearer shots at the enemies but I eventually let them be. I don't know if it's true, but it seems like they might make it a little harder for the enemies to hit their targets, too. Maybe more importantly, not destroying them just saves me ammo.


I changed one element of my strategy when I finally beat this stage. After destroying the final mainframe, I would go through that room to the final room. However, the path to the stage-ending elevator is rather long and treacherous on that route. This time, after blowing the main frames, I went back the way I came earlier in the stage (that is, towards that big room with that big piece of machinery in the middle). It seems as though the body armor isn't there on 00 Agent, but the final elevator is right outside that room, and I had suffiecent life left, so it didn't make a difference.

I notice that I have said several times in this topic of certain Goldeneye challenges, "That wasn't too tough." But I should stress that even if some stages weren't too tough on 00 Agent, perhaps because beating the earlier difficulty levels gave me sufficient pratice for it, virtually every stage gave me some challenge at some time. And then when a stage is tough, like 00A Control, it's one of the tougher game stages around.
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