TIPS THE MERCENARIES IN RESIDENT EVIL 4

I know a lot of people have been having problems with the Mercenaries mini-
game that you get for beating RE4, and so I thought I'd offer up a few tips 
and tricks to getting those beloved 5 Star rankings on every stage...

The characters rank in this order, from easiest to hardest:

1) Krauser
2) Wesker
3) Ada (almost the same as Wesker, but less health)
4) Leon
5) Hunk


Krauser: This guy is a beast! A maxed out health bar, a very strong weapon, 
AND a one hit kill move--broken! His bow might take you a little bit to get 
used to, but once you do, you'll realize how powerful it is--a hit to the 
chest is enough to kill pretty much any baddie with a single shot; you'll also 
never run out of ammo, as bad guys frequently drop 5 to 10 arrows at a time. 
When it gets time to go on a killing spree (explained further on), just go 
quickly from shooting one guy in the chest to the next; save his special move 
for the big bad guys.

Wesker: Another very strong character. He comes equipped with a Killer7, a 
Rifle, and a special pistol, that has 5x chance of blowing heads off (not that 
useful actually, since it's risky to blow heads off when they might spawn 
those creatures). Instead of a kick, he has this awesome ultra punch move you 
can use with A, if the situation ever arises. Wesker is also loaded with 
grenades of all kinds. Keep two things in mind with Wesker: 1) His rifle is 
AWESOME--a hit to the chest will kill ANY normal bad guy in one hit, no 
questions asked; plus, it will shoot through multiple baddies, allowing you to 
potentially kill two, three, or even four bad guys with a single shot. 2) 
Wesker does not start with an extra ammo; this means that you'll need to 
conserve ammo, especailly in the early game. Use your pistol until you get to 
the first "setup" (explained below, don't worry), and shoot crates and barrels 
to stock up on ammo; finding ten Rifle ammo is a goldmine.

Ada: Ada plays almost exactly the same as Wesker, except that she uses a TMP 
instead of a magnum, and has less health. Do the same thing with her as you 
did with Wesker--her Rifle is just as good, her grenades are numerous, etc; 
use her pistol in the early game, and save up ammo in your Rifle and TMP for 
the setup.

Leon: Teh old skool! Leon is fairly well rounded, which in someways makes him 
hard. You've got your pistol, your shotgun, and 'nades, along with a decent 
amount of health. Do your best to use your pistol for medium to long range 
combat, your shotgun for the big bad guys, and your TMP for swarms.

Hunk: For being a Hunk, he sure does suck. Hunk will easily prove to be the 
hardest character for most people, mainly because he ONLY has one gun: his 
TMP. He's fairly stocked on grenades, but the fact that his sole gun eats 
through ammo can make playing as Hunk fairly challenging--you've really got to 
be careful not to spray ammo like a madman, you've GOT to destroy 
crates/barrels when you see them to get more ammo, and you need to save your 
grenades for the big bad guys (only use them on common bad guys in an 
extremely desperate situation).


So there's a little about each character, now for some general tips as well as 
stage specific strategies:

--to get a five star ranking, you need to score at least 60,000 points.

--to unlock the Handcannon, the most powerful weapon in the game, you need to 
get Five Star ranks on every stage with EACH character

--picking up the Bonus point thing (there are three in each stage; you 
absolutely MUST learn where all three are, they're found in treasure chests) 
will give you an extra thousand points for each badguy you kill in the next 
thirty seconds

--don't pick up Time Extensions like a madman! Once you to get to 60,000 
points, you want the stage to end (unless you're going for highscores); it 
doesn't do you any good to break 60,000 and then have to wait two minutes, and 
end up getting killed, because you went rabid with picking up every one you 
saw.

--each common bad guy in a stage is worth the same amount of points; the 'big' 
bad guys though, are worth a great deal more, and are well worth your time to 
kill.

--long combos are going to generate you the most points; ideally, you'd like 
to get ones that are infinite in length, but honestly, twenty is around the 
number you're aiming for. You'll probably be able to get longer ones with Ada 
and Wesker, but you might struggle to even get to 12 with Hunk.


The Village: Perhaps not surprisingly, but this is the easiest stage. Your 
main bad guys are just standard villagers, there are tons of ammo crates and 
barrels lying around, etc; the 'big' bad guy for this stage are the chainsaw 
wielding women (generally two or three at a time). For the set-up, I generally 
ran to the southern most building (at least I think it's to the south--it's 
the one to your left immediately after you enter the village, if you were 
actually playing through the game); make sure plenty of bad guys see you 
running for it, and if you see a time extension, pick one up along the way. 
Don't kill anyone! Once you get into the barn, pick up the time extension on 
the ground, then climb the ladder to the loft; knock the ladder down. Then you 
wait (make you dodge any axes that get thrown up towards you; and knock the 
ladder down if they try to put it up)... wait for as many guys to enter the 
room as possible, then open the chest, pick up the bonus point thing, and 
shoot the nuke barrel. You should be able to get between five and ten kills 
instantly from that, with 1000 points extra for each kill. Now the chainsaw 
women are going to be coming soon; hop down, pick up any ammo or health things 
that got dropped in the barn, and try to keep your chain going, by opening the 
door and killing a villager or two; you may want to use a gernade if there's a 
bunch of them... once the women draw near, get back of the ladder, and knock 
it down again. Your chain will almost certainly break here, but that's ok. 
Focus on killing the chainsaw women while they can't reach you--use gernades 
with Hunk along with TMP fire to the head, with Ada or Wesker, the rifle will 
kill them fast, with Krauser, just fire some arrows, etc; they'll die fairly 
fast, and you'll get their points. Now you should have somewhere between 
20,000-30,000 points--you rock! Now it's time to run from the barn; you're 
basically going to repeat this process at either of the other two spots where 
there is a bonus point thing (make sure you hunt down a time extension or two 
along the way); wait for guys to be around you before you pick them up, then 
try to do the same thing, by scoring a long combo (10-25) while having the 
bonus points; a second wave of chainsaw women will come, and you should beat 
them while on top of a roof or something. By using the bonus point things, and 
going for decent combos, and killing the chainsaw women, you should be able to 
break 60,000 without too much trouble.

The Castle: Break the two barrels behind you, and run out of the room (it's 
important you go fast here), going the only way you can; fly up the stairs and 
take a right. It's a dead end, and bad guys are going to be near you, but you 
want that time extension, and the ammo; with a little bit of practice you 
should be able to do all this without getting hit, nor firing at any of the 
bad guys. Once you have the stuff, turn around, and run straight down the 
corridor; at the end, you can either turn right up the wider staircase, or 
turn left into a doorway. Turn left. Go up the flight of stairs, break the 
boxes for more loot, grab the plant on the table, and run out the door (don't 
go up the second set of stairs yet!); you'll be at the spot where the cannon 
was. Do your best to run past the two snipers, and head into the little 
alcove, and pick up the bonus point thing; turn around and kill the two 
snipers who are on the same platform as yourself. If you're Ada or Wesker, 
whip out your snipe gun, and take down the snipers on the far wall; you can 
still kill them with Leon or Krauser, but it'll be tougher. Guys should be 
coming through the door by now, so try to get a decent combo going--it may 
only go to five or ten, or you may be lucky and hit twenty. Your next task is 
to go through that doorway, and go up the stairway (try to run past the guys 
you'll certainly see in this room, you want them alive for now). Once you 
reach the top, you'll notice that there is the second bonus point thing. Wait 
until guys start coming into the room (from both the stairway you just 
climbed, and from the doorway you'll leave by), then pick it up; try to do a 
big massive killing spree. Use gernades, Ada and Wesker's rifles (on a 
sidenote, their rifles are the main way to get large combos with their 
characters; use the rifles at CLOSE range, and try to hit two or three guys 
with each bullet). I've built up a twenty-seven combo in this room before. 
When your combo breaks, it's time to move on. Head through the doorway, take a 
right, and head straight, picking up the items along the way. Keep going, and 
eventually a little cinema will happen with three or four guys running out of 
the big doors--once they get close to the nuke barrel, blow it up and them 
along with it (this barrel is vital, lol so don't nuke it earlier). Take out 
the snipers that will be along the low road, then enter the main room behind 
the big doors. Wait until guys appear, then grab the bonus point thing from 
the chest; you should be able to easily break the 60,000 point range, although 
you may need to kill guys for awhile. Watch out for the blind claw guy!! He 
will appear in the room after a certain amount of time, and it's vital he dies 
fast--use gernades (incinderary are awesome because they explode on impact and 
so can stun him), Rifles, Krauser's ultra move (kills him instantly), etc.

War Zone: This stage can be kinda tricky, mainly cause you need different 
strategies depending upon where you start out. There are basically two main 
hold up points (remember the barn in the village, the big room in the Castle, 
etc); one is at the top of the building... sometimes you START up there, in 
which case you're already set up; just wait a little while for guys to start 
coming, and then grab the bonus point thing and start killing. The other is on 
the ocean side; this spot is nice because you're essentially protected from 
the machinegun man. Basically, you just want to get a big killing combo in 
each of those two spots, and pick up a few extra points here and there (on the 
journey between one spot and the other, be sure to pick up ammo and plenty of 
time extensions)... the other bonus point thing is in a pretty nasty location, 
although you can get a decent amount of points with it if you're using 
Ada/Wesker and their rifle. Watch out for the machinegun man! When he appears, 
it's an immediate priority to kill him--use gernades with Hunk combined with 
TMP fire to the head, the Rifles on Ada and Wesker, the one hit kill move with 
Krauser (see why he's so damn awesome?), and the shotgun with Leon; if you 
time it right, he'll never even get an attack out if you keep firing at his 
head. You'll almost certainly fight him twice in this stage, but it's worth 
it, since he gives you a nice bunch of points. Occasionally, a guy will be 
carrying a rocket launcher on this stage; make sure you kill him fast.

Waterworld: There's really not much left to say on this one; by the time 
you're working on getting five stars on this stage, you know the general plan 
(get a bunch of guys after you, pick up a bonus point thing, get a large 
combo, kill the big guy, repeat); the good thing about this stage is that 
there is a lot of health and ammo lying around... the bad thing is the giant 
chainsaw man! But fear not, he's quite killable! With Hunk, you really need to 
save your gernades; just chuck a nuke or two at him, blow up a barrel, and 
unleash machinegun shots into his head. With Ada/Wesker, he dies quite easily 
from just a handful of Rifle shots to the head; Leon will need to use the 
shotgun and nukes to kill him. And Krauser? Well, he's got that stinkin' one 
hit kill move for a reason! It's worth it to kill the giant chainsaw man cause 
he gives you a lot of points. Because this area is so open ended, it's really 
easy to generate HUGE combos, even with Hunk... I had a 38 chain going with 
Ada and her rifle, and have broken twenty with Hunk many many times.


So there's some offical Wampa tips, all the info you need to get that beloved 
Handcannon! Keep in mind that once you buy it, you'll need approximately 
800,000 bucks to transform it into the ultimate weapon it truly is.

Hope you enjoyed this quick FAQ and that it was helpful; if you need further 
tips just ask. If you want to thank me, there's always the WUL button!