The Lovers

The Lovers
Basic information
Featured in	The House of the Dead 4
Encounters	THoTD 4 - Chapter 2
Weapon	Two spiked legs and thick lips

Lovers (Type 6805) is one of the bosses in The House of the Dead 4. This boss consists of a small male tarantula riding on top of a larger female tarantula, which together pursue James Taylor and Kate Green, the player characters, through an elevator shaft. As the female climbs the girders, the players must shoot the male tarantula to knock them down, or get bitten and slashed by its fierce jaws. The female spider, in addition to carrying the male (the main offensive force of the pair,) also has the ability to make baby spiders to threaten the player.

Introduction

While using an underground maintenace lift, it stops and Kate guesses that it's an earthquake. When they turn around, however, two huge spiky legs latch on the lift. The players must shake their gun to open the door before the legs can hack them, and James and Kate flee before holding onto another lift for dear life. As they look down, the boss shows itself: a huge mutant spider with a smaller mutant spider on top of it. The female is the huge spider with huge legs, and the male is latched onto her with two spiked legs and thick lips.

Strategy

[ THE LOVERS Type 6805 ]

WEAK POINT: The male's head

NO DAMAGE: The female's body and legs

• ROUND 1

The female spider climbs from below the elevator, using the shafts for support. Your aim's simple: Prevent them from climbing by shooting the male head. If they reach you, the male hacks both players. Once stunned, they'll fall down.

• ROUND 2

The Lovers will climb up through the other side of the lift. The female spider climbs from below the elevator, using the shafts for support. Your aim's quite simple: Prevent them from climbing by shooting the male head. If they do reach you, the male hacks both players. Once stunned, they'll fall down.

• ROUND 3

The Lovers won't suffer damage this time around. The female large spider shoots minute offspring into the hole beneath the elevator plate. This is like a worms swarm. Kill all the spiders before they had the chance to sting. You have about 2 seconds before a spider bites you after latching on your face.

• ROUND 4

The Lovers will quickly climb up to the top of the elevator. Shoot its buttocks to inflict little but good amount of damage before it reaches the top. It then targets you from above (shoot the male for initial damage) and vomits a stream of webbing. Break free once again to avoid being squeezed. Then shoot the head once again before he slashes you. When stunned, the Lovers fall down but holds onto the platform shafts in front of you. The hard part has begun.

• ROUND 5

The male sways its legs right and left, deflecting any direct gunfire intended for his head. Be sure you pounded him with about 60% damage. The moment he will rise his legs to slash you, toss a grenade to deplete more of the CANCEL Gauge and fire all the way to stun him in time before he attacks, for they are most vulnerable at this point.

• ROUND 6

The male sways its legs right and left, deflecting any direct gunfire intended for his head. Be sure you pounded him with about 60% damage. The moment he will rise his legs to slash you, toss a grenade to deplete more of the CANCEL Gauge and fire all the way to stun him in time before he attacks, for they are most vulnerable at this point.

Once you successfully stop it the second time around, The Lovers will fall from the platform and plummet to their deaths (Picture how the Fool died in THOTD3).

JAMES: I kinda like being an action hero.

KATE: Sorry, I really don't have time for you right now.

Author's Notes

BOSS' MAIN POINT OF VULNERABILITY / HOW TO "OWN" THE LOVERS

For the first 3 rounds (1,2,4 except 3 where the Lovers release offspring) the male head is very open to players' gunfire. So there must be no problems on stunning this Boss unless you have poor accuracy. For the last 2 rounds, shoot the male head to damage the Boss as much as you can for about 50% of the CANCEL Gauge, then as the male raises his leg, chuck in a grenade and continually shoot the small head. With this barrage of attacks, you are guaranteed to survive both "Slash Dance" rounds, given you have 2 Grenades.

BOSS' HIGH ACCURACY TRICK

Shoot the Lovers as they release their offspring below the elevator plate. While fighting the small spiders, shoot the Lovers' legs visible from the sides of the elevator shafts. As the Lovers climbs way up above you (before vomiting web fluid), shoot the huge rear for good initial damage. If you do these tricks against the Lovers your accuracy can boost by about 5 to 10%.

Trivia

• Their type number is almost similar to Hermit's (6803) as they are both mutant spider creatures.
• They appear in the Graveyard Gig track in Sonic an All Stars Racing Transformed, releasing their offspring into the track as obstacles for the racers to avoid. You can see Death before them, too.