Masako's Lair
Masako's Lair is the 19th and final level/chapter in the Red Faction single player campaign. It consists of three individual maps and begins as Parker and Hendrix enter a large room with a shuttle inside it.
L20S1: Docking Bay Entrance
The final level of the game starts as Hendrix and Parker rush into a room with a shuttle. This room is guarded by multiple Mercs who will immediately start shooting at you. The Merc closest to you has a Rail Driver so you'll want to deal with him first. Hendrix will run up a ramp to an elevated walkway which leads to a control room. You can either follow him up there or stay on the bottom floor to fight the Mercs.
Hendrix will reach a console in the control room and appear to start working on it before the console explodes, engulfing Hendrix in flames. With his last breath Hendrix will plead with you to make sure Ultor doesn't get away with it all. Immediately after Hendrix's death Masako will contact you to taunt you and tell you more Mercs are coming for you. From here, you have two routes to progress through this area. The more obvious way is to go through the door at the back of the room on the bottom floor. This door opens to a hallway guarded by more Mercs which leads to a room with multiple Aesirs stored on posts connected to a delivery system on the ceiling.
The other way forward is through a vent that is in the back of the control room that held the console that exploded to kill Hendrix. Even though your hidden in this vent, the Mercs will still detect you and a Rail Driver Merc will try to shoot you through the vent walls. This vent eventually drops down where it will connect to a booth with a console in the same overall area that you reach if you go through the hallway.
This Aesir garage/room is guarded by multiple Mercs throughout the room, including on top of the booth with the console in it. The console in the booth has a button that will move an Aesir from it's parked position to a landing pad outside the booth. Using an Aesir will make the next section much easier but it is not outright mandatory. When you're ready, head toward the large door in the room that is on the opposite side from the booth. Shortly after proceeding through the door, you'll load into L20S2: Masako's Lair.
L20S2: Masako's Lair
You should start this section in an Aesir. The way forward will be much more difficult without an Aesir but it is not completely mandatory. If you're on foot when you start this section, you should head back to L20S1 to get an Aesir.
You will load into L20S2 at the start of a long corridor with multiple Mercs and an enemy Aesir. You don't need to kill all of them to progress. There is a room with a shuttle at the end of this first long corridor where Masako will contact you again to taunt you. This room is guarded by several Mercs, including two inside the shuttle. The shuttle does not have any pickups in it but you can get out of the Aesir at any point in this section if you want to explore or pickup some dropped weapons or ammo. On higher difficulties you may have trouble getting to the end of this section with a decent amount of "health" on your Aesir. If your Aesir is low on health, you can head back to L20S1 to pick up another Aesir (there are three parked there before you get in any of them) but additional enemies may spawn on your repeated trips.
The room with the shuttle has a door on the backwall which opens to another corridor similar to one earlier in this section. This corridor will have more Mercs and enemy Aesirs in your way but toward the end of this corridor, there's a door on the right that leads to Masako. The door at the end of this second corridor does not open.
When you enter the room on the right of the corridor, you'll fight two enemy Aesirs. When you successfully destroy both Aesirs a cutscene will start as Masako enters in her own Aesir, mocking you once more before the cutscene ends. When the cutscene ends you'll start an aerial fight until you destroy her Aesir. When her Aesir explodes, yours will also be destroyed (regardless of how much health it may have). At this point, Masako will start hovering in the same kind of purple/pink nanoshield Capek had and shooting you with her Precision Rifle. Just like the fight with Capek, you'll need to do enough damage to her shield before she'll fall to the floor and continue fighting. If you're having trouble staying alive during her nanoshield phase you could use a flamethrower. A bug in the game causes nanoshields to take damage from flamethrowers regardless of your proximity to the target. Once she falls to the floor, she'll run around until you do enough damage to defeat her for good.
When Masako is defeated, you'll need to descend a platform next to the one Masako came from. It can be a little difficult to see but there's a small handrail on one corner of the platform that has the button you need to press to descend. You'll find Eos sitting on the floor tied up below a window and she'll give you instructions on what to do to defuse the bomb that's next to her. You don't actually need to do anything but press the "Use" button when you're next to the bomb and facing it.
It's good practice to save at this point before pressing "Use" on the bomb so you don't lose any progress or have to fight Masako again.
Pressing your "Use" button on the bomb will load you into the final section of the game.
L20S3: Finale
After pressing "Use" on the bomb, L20S3 will load up a sequence where you need to defuse the bomb by guessing the combination of button presses. The button combinations are random so it's not possible to just give you the answer. On PlayStation, the bomb inputs are the face buttons ( X , ◯ , △ , ◻ ). On PC or Mac you input the combination using the arrow keys or clicking on the symbols on the screen. Once you figure out the four entry combination, a panel will open below revealing a second input screen requiring six inputs. On PC this level locks the player out from opening the console menu or opening the menu to save but on the PlayStation version you're still able to pause and open the menu (but not save).
Fortunately for us, Masako didn't think to implement a lockout or automatic detonation so you're free to try combinations as many times as you can within the time limit. The time limit to defuse the bomb is different depending on which difficulty you chose.
| Difficulty | Approximate Time Limit (seconds) |
|---|---|
| Easy | 63 |
| Medium | 47 |
| Hard | 41 |
| Impossible | 30 |
When you complete the sequence, the ending cutscene will start followed by the credits. Well done!