DLC #101 - RAGE : The Scorchers

Definitely a 2 for 1 offer...

The Scorchers DLC adds a new sub-story to the RAGE package, complete with 10 new trophies, mostly geared towards completion of the new plot, which sees you complete a number of new missions as you bring down the Scorchers and their plan to create a weapon of mass destruction through farming feltrite.

The story is quite short, clocking in at around 3-4 hours, and can be tackled on whichever level you wish, since there are no trophy requirements tied to difficulty. (Not for the DLC, at least...)

Exactly half of the trophies in this list are progression based, spread across the 7 new quests on offer, and unlocked en route towards completion of the questline.

It's a relatively easy list, and even the other non-progression related trophies have very relaxed requirements relating to some luck-based, casino dabbling and a few combat tasks using the new featured weapon, the Nailgun. These make up the 4 non-progression trophies in the package.

But that's 9 out of the 10 trophies accounted for;

Night Terrors - Finish the Campaign on Ultra Nightmare difficulty

The "Night Terrors" trophy, awarded for finishing the campaign on Ultra Nightmare difficulty, in an unusual move, requires you to go back over the entire main game and beat it the newly added and increased difficulty level of Ultra Nightmare.

Ultra Nightmare difficulty isn't as bad as it may sound. There are a few tougher areas later on in the game that may require a few attempts to get through and it can take a seemingly infinite amount of time for the health regeneration process to complete, which are the two noticable differences with this new difficulty mode. Enemies don't seem tougher to kill, money doesn't seem to be harder to come across and you can still expect to beat the game in roughly the same amount of time as you did before when chasing down the Platinum trophy. There is also that small issue that previously existed of having to be constantly aware of manually saving your game, and not potentially losing alot of hard work that may set you back some time, but that's more of a something to note, rather than a direct reflection on the difficulty of the trophy itself. It is important to be regulary saving the game though, because the game won't do it for you.

Given the fact this is an entire playthrough of the main story, this will add another 8-10 hours on top of what was just merely 3-4 hours for the rest of the DLC package, and if your circumstances were like mine, this will be the third time you've played through the game in an attempt to fully complete the list.

I do personally question the neccesity of adding such a trophy for a game that already desirably requires a couple of playthroughs in order to achieve the Platinum trophy, especially amongst a majority of trophies attached directly to the DLC and it's questline. However, it is mostly just an extra time-sink, rather than any sort of genuine challenge, turning this package from a couple of passing hours, into a 12-14 hour offering.

NOTE : If you start a new game to access the DLC having already beaten the game previously, you'll have to play up to, and complete, the "Mutant Bash TV" quest in order to advance the plot for the Scorchers DLC too. This is because the latter stages of the Scorchers story require you to earn a ticket to Oasis, which can only be obtained by completing a second episode of Mutant Bash TV.