Overview
- Estimated achievement difficulty: 6/10
- Offline: 44 (925)
- Online: 3 (75)
- Approximate amount of time to 1000: 20-30 hours
- Minimum number of playthroughs needed: 1
- Number of missable achievements: 1
- Glitched achievements: None
- Do cheat codes disable achievements?: No cheats
- Does difficulty affect achievements?: Yes
Introduction
Welcome to ODST. Most of your time will be split between campaign, and the new firefight mode. Most of the achievements can be done in co-op, which will make them that much faster and easier to obtain.
There is 1 missable achievement, Good Samaritan, which requires you to complete the campaign without killing any engineers. These are the flying creatures you'll occasionally see above the Mombosa Streets. The first time you encounter one will be fairly early in the game, while in the Hub (Mombosa streets). A group of brutes will be holding it, and you'll hear one of them say "hold it still!" Do not kill any of these. Suicide/respawn if you do. Doing this will ensure you won't have to do a second playthrough. Naughty Naughty is for killing 10 engineers. This one unlocks as soon as you've killed the 10th engineer, so save this for after you've unlocked Good Samaritan.
Step 1: Campaign
Start a campaign on Legendary difficulty. The difficulty achievements are stackable, so doing this will minimize the number of playthroughs needed. Co-op will make it much easier, and much faster. The campaign is fairly straight-forward, and shouldn't give you too much trouble. This should take you no more than 6 hours at the very most. Find some people in the achievement trading thread here. When you've completed the campaign on Legendary, you'll have unlocked 16 unmissable achievements, worth 620.
IMPORTANT NOTES:
- DO NOT change hosts, or any campaign settings, after you've started. This will reset everyone's current co-op campaign.
- You must complete each mission from start to finish in one sitting in order to receive credit for achievements. DO NOT quit in the middle of a mission, and make sure no one leaves in the middle of a mission. It is safe to quit in the Hub.
- Do not assume that you can simply choose "replay mission" and continue from there like in Halo 3. In ODST you find missions in the Hub, which is a free-roaming area, meaning you can do the missions in any order. So, if you choose replay mission, you'll have to replay any other missions you've already completed before you can complete the campaign.
- Make sure no one kills any engineers. If one person kills an engineer, it counts for everyone within the party.
- There is no auto-save. Be sure to hit start to save & quit/end game before you quit to dashboard, or turn off your console.
It can become messy, and confusing if you're not careful. To avoid any potential headaches, I recommend that you, and your co-op partners commit 4-6 hours to the campaign, and complete it in one sitting. 6 hours isn't too long. Much less if you've got more players, and players who know what they're doing.
Step 2a: Audio Logs
Save these for after you've completed the campaign. From the main menu, choose Campaign, and make sure you're doing it in a SOLO game. Choose Replay Mission -> Mombosa Streets. You'll be dropped into the Hub, and you'll be able to obtain all the first 29 audio logs from here. Use NOTswaggers map here. After you've collected the first 29 in the Hub, hit start, and choose SAVE & QUIT. From the lobby, choose Replay Mission -> Data Hive, and refer to the map above to find the last audio log.
IMPORTANT NOTES:
1. The reason why you should save these for after the campaign is that, you must complete certain missions before you'll be able to collect some of the audio logs. If you try to get them all before you've completed the campaign, you'll find many that aren't yet obtainable, and you'll have to come back to them later. You'll save some time by completing all the missions first, so that you can obtain all the audio logs in one go.
2. After you've completed the campaign, DO NOT attempt to collect all 30 audio logs in co-op. Any progress you make towards audio logs in co-op won't carry over to your single-player game. Also, the last audio log must be obtained in the Data Hive mission, and if you choose to end game in co-op, and then replay mission from the lobby, you'll erase your co-op data INCLUDING AUDIO LOGS. You've been warned. So make sure you do these in a solo game. You can save & quit in solo, then replay Data Hive, and your audio log progress will still be saved.
Step 2b: Naughty Naughty, and My Clothes!
While you're collecting audio logs, you should also be going for the Naughty Naughty achievement, for killing 10 engineers in the Hub. Use Mr.Smackdown's map here. If one explodes before you kill it, you can suicide/respawn. Even if you miss 1-2, you'll encounter quite a few more that aren't on this map, while looking for audio logs.
While we're in the Hub, doing that, this is also a good time to get the My Clothes! achievement. You'll encounter quite a few brutes that you're pretty much required to fight. Pick up a plasma pistol, charge it, and hit a brute so their armor comes off. Immediately switch to your automag, or any other gun capable of getting headshots, and pop it in the head. Do this 10 times.
Step 3: Weapon/Level Specific Achievements
Now, it's time to go replay a few levels for the weapon/level specific achievements you may have missed during the campaign. Go to replay mission from the campaign lobby, and it'll only take a few minutes to do each one. Take note of the achievements listed below, and refer to the achievement guide for help, if you need it.
- Dark Times
- Boom, Headshot
- Trading Down
- Stunning!
- Pink and Deadly
- Ewww, Sticky
- Both Tubes
- Wraith Killer
- Laser Blaster
- Dome Inspector
- I Like Fire
- Headcase
Step 4: Firefight
By now, you should be pretty familiar with the ins and outs of the game, making your run through firefight fairly easy. Again, you'll want to co-op to make these as fast, and easy as possible. Find some people in the Firefight Online Matches thread here. Start a firefight game, and go through each of the 8 maps (Crater and Rally can be done in either night or day), and play on normal difficulty. You should be able to earn 200,000 points within 40-60 minutes on each map. Refer to the achievement guide for more help.
Step 5: Vidmaster Challenges
Vidmaster Challenge: Classic - Load Uplift Reserve, on Legendary difficulty. Grab the Warthog, drive past everything until you reach the Ghost. Grab the Ghost, and boost past everything you see until the end of the level. Should take about 10 minutes. Make sure you're connected to LIVE.
You CAN:
- Skip cut-scenes
- Splatter enemies
- Boost on Ghosts
- Die
- Have a NPC gunner in the Warthog to kill enemies
You CANNOT:
- Press
AT ALL. This includes honking the horn with the Warthog.
- Throw grenades
- Powerslide with
in the Warthog
- Co-op
- Quit mid-mission & resume
Vidmaster Challenge: Déjà Vu - Load Coastal Highway, invite your 3 co-op partners. Set the difficulty to Legendary, and turn the Iron skull on. Once you get on the highway, go down into the first underground passage to find 2 Mongooses, and 4 rocket launchers with 1000 rockets each. 2 people drive, 2 people blow stuff up. Easy. You'll die a lot, but there are more than enough checkpoints to keep you from getting frustrated. Like all other mission achievements, the mission must be done start to finish in one sitting. Do not quit & resume. If anyone drops out, you must start from the beginning of the mission. Should take about 1-2 hours.
Vidmaster Challenge: Endure - Load up firefight, and invite your 3 co-op partners. Set the difficulty to Heroic. You can do this on any stage. Most people recommend Alpha Site, or Lost Platoon. There is a good Lost Platoon guide here. And a good Alpha Site guide here. Pay special attention to the information on the bonus round to make this a lot easier. Should take 2-3 hours to complete the 4 sets.
Conclusion
Hopefully, you'll have all the achievements by now. If not, refer to the achievement guide, and forums for more help.
[X360A would like to thank bs000 for this Road Map]