Big Dog is the second boss of the game, located in the Scrapyards. It initially lays dormant, but will be awoken if one of several conditions are met:
- The Player gets too close;
- The Player maintains line of sight for a total of 5 seconds (150 frames);
- 30 or more damage is dealt to it while it is asleep;
- There are fewer than 3 enemies left on the level.
Phases[]
- Big Dog has three behavior phases and will cycle between them in random order. Big Dog explodes upon death, covering a wide area. Be careful where you stand when it dies!
Walk Phase
- Big Dog follows the player, but cannot deal contact damage.
Spin Phase
- Big Dog spins very quickly, and 6 lines of slow moving red projectiles spiral out of its body. The projectile pattern will have randomly placed gaps.
- Upon waking, Big Dog will always start with this phase.
Missile Phase
- Big Dog shoots volleys of 3 homing Big Dog Missiles around it. Note that Big Dog can repeat this phase multiple times in a row.
Big Dog Missile[]
- Will target the player and slowly move towards them.
- They deal 5 contact damage.
- They bounce off of any solid objects or walls and take damage whenever they do so.
- When hit, they will turn around and be pushed back.
- After taking enough damage, they will explode. The explosion deals 5-10 damage to everything nearby, including Big Dog itself.
- They don't drop rads, but have a higher chance to drop ammo and health pickups.
- A portal won't open if one is left after Big Dog is defeated.
- They don't count towards your kill count.
- Attracted by Eyes' active ability.
Loop Version
Looping the game causes Big Dog Missiles to constantly fire red projectiles, each projectile dealing 3 damage. An extra Missile is fired and Missiles will shoot out projectiles faster with each loop.
While spinning, Big Dog will fire two additional lines of projectiles each loop.
Big Dog's health increases by 80% with each loop, which is more than for other bosses.
Trivia[]
- Big Dog is a machine built by humans, which originally wasn't suited for combat and destruction. Currently, he will attack whoever disturbs his sleep.
- Big Dog's design was inspired by Cerberus, a three-headed dog that guards the gates to the Underworld in Greek Mythology.
- Big Dog is one of two enemies in the game that split into several parts when killed, the other being Throne II.
- Big Dog was added as a playable character on 1st of April 2015, as an April Fools joke, and removed a week after in update #67.
- Big Dog Missiles used to be a gray colored, static sprite which made them difficult to see in the heat of battle. That was changed in update #72 and they got animated in update #81.
- Big Dog's boss theme is "Dogs".
