Zeta Base is a massive side mission for Episode 2.
Mission Summary[]
A Martian base has gone silent - investigate and find out what happened at the Zeta base facility.
Note: This is an optional mission, and is not required for completing the episode.
Story[]
Zeta Base was created with absolutely no story in mind, and instead focuses on exploration, gun play and architecture.
As it is in the game, the story is that the EAF discovered several octabrain precursors and brought them into the bio-labs on Zeta Base to examine. One of the precursors was dead, but the other was thawed. Immediately afterwards weird events began happening and the cults, already active, began to cause major unrest. Within days, civil order collapsed and the facility was ordered to evacuate.
Gameplay[]
Zeta Base is a massive mission that takes place on the planet Mars in the northern parts of Valles Marineris, the largest known canyon system in our solar system. Zeta Base contains a large amount of back rooms and offshoot areas for the player to explore, along with 21 secrets in total to be found, and a wide range of monsters to fight. Puzzles consist mostly of finding keycards and opening doors to proceed through a variety of different areas.
Walkthrough[]
Zeta Base Lower
Immediately get inside as your are wearing a survival suit and your oxygen in limited. Take off the suit and proceed inside. Make your way to the "Restricted Area" dark bluish server room and look for a vent. Out of the vent, you will encounter lots of enemies (zombies, shades, flesh wizards) constantly so watch you back at all times. Head to the left. In the control room, hit the switch. It opens a large green door further down.
Head through the living areas and grab a jetpack around the end near a box. Use the jetpack to go up to the 3rd floor resident and get a blue keycard. Backtrack to the control room and use the blue keycard to deactivate forcefields on all elevators. There is more than one elevator you can take. Look at your map to see. These elevators will take you to the upper levels.
Upper Levels
Depending on which elevator you took previously, you can start in different areas. Make your way to the Central Command in the map. There's a blue switch on one of the desks. It opens a hallway leading to the elevator. At the top of the elevator, hit the switch. This place also requires a blue (not used) and yellow key. Head back to and go through the opened bulhead the security camera showed. Head down one of the elevators to reach the bio-labs.
Zeta Base Bio-Lab
Head to the center of the map, then go south-southeast to a red containment airlock. Inside is a purple keycard. From the center, head slight southeast and up a slope to control room with several switches. This will unlock the aquariums in the east. Make your way east to the aquariums. Take the cargo elevator up. One of the aquariums in the south holds the grey keycard (it also has a dead soldier inside). Go back to the central area and open the grey door access to the north. Proceed north, then find your way to a blue area that goes downstairs. Use the purple keycard on the security computer. This will release a Mister Hyde-like monster from the containment as well as the yellow key.
Now you need to head back to the upper floor. However the way the came back will be blocked off so head west and there will be a hallways transition to the lower floor. From there backtrack to one of the elevators to the upper floor. Go up the Central Command elevator and insert the yellow keycard. This will open the large bulkhead to the west. Make your way down. You will encounter a lot of enemies including a Cyberdemon. At the end, head northeast and upstairs to the control room. Hit the lever to release the exit. Continue going east. When you reach another door, go south and press 2 switches. Head to the nearest opened door and up the elevator. Go down the corridor and take the smaller elevator up.
Fight your way down to another elevator finally leading to the control room with windows to the outside. Hit the 2 switches and head back down. Hallways have opened up on your left and right. Head right and go all the way down. You'll find a half-opened door. Go through and you'll eventually find a blue key. Head back, then go down the other hallway. All the way down, there's a blue door. Be careful as there are 2 bruisers there. Keep going and the mission will finally be over.
Development[]
Development of Zeta Base started in February of 2014 and completed in November of 2014. it was created by a maker with the name of Snowfall. It consists of two interconnected maps, one for the lower bio-labs and residential living spaces, and the other consisting of the top floors with the Bio-lab entrance, control tower and docking bay. Large parts of the base are inaccessible to the player in order to create a large sense of scale.
During creation, Zeta Base reached a critical wall limit in which no more points could be added and thus halting the creation of the map. A beta version of Zeta Base was released on June 21st 2014 in this unfinished state. Later it was discovered by a developer of the AMC Squad and included into the game for Episode 2. During this, development was continued and many improvements were added that we see in the final version and went from two interconnected maps to three.
Secrets[]
Lower Levels:
- In the first server-room before entering a vent, one server is openable, you can find it with your PDU.
- In the ventilation shaft from the server room, there's an different traditional vent texture on the left. Break it. It will lead to the first aid kit. Non-secret area visible from vent room is accessible via breaking the door to it, after the forcefields are deactivated.
- In a half-opened server room beside the cafeteria, there is an interactable holoscreen which opens a door to office nearby upstairs.
- In the Cafeteria room in the archway there is a locked door, which becomes unlocked after you use the passage from the Bio-Labs (inner area) back to the starting zone.
- In the control room in the food court, there's a hand switch on the wall. It opens a door on the left side marked "Clear." Note that you will be locked and will need to use a barrel and vent to get out. Leading to secret 6.
- In same secret there is a vent which is reachable via barrels in same room
- In the Garden-Apartment area at the back end to the right, one of the upper black windows is breakable with a room behind.
- In the visible Garden-Apartment area apartment there is a locked bathroom, which needs to be kicked open.
- Locker by the starting airlock is opened later on, after the Blue Key lockdown is lifted. Non-secret Super armour accessible near gym area after Blue key lockdown.
Upper Levels:
- South from the Central Command, by the toilets, break the vents and fly with jetpack in them up to an office.
- Armory near the lift locked from outside has a shootable switch inside.
- Bulkhead between Security checkpoint and Hospital can be blown up (toolbox can be found there).
- In Security-checkpoint mentioned above, broken switch for the armory can be repaired.
- (Later after heading towards the end) Drop down broken elevator shaft. You will need the jetpack to soften your fall.
- Hub before the shuttles has a camouflaged vent by a sort of balcony.
The Bio-Lab:
- At the main crossroad there is a ceiling area reachable with jetpack.
- In the Science lab with journal, the malfunctioning airlock can be entered when playing around with the door controls.
- When heading up to the control room for the Beyonder, halfway you can hit a hidden switch on the red box on the wall to reveal compartment on the same wall.
- Radiated sector behind the half-open bulkhead is reachable with the barrel.
- In the aquarium, one of the tanks has a coral brain. Remove it and there's a vent behind it.
- In the Abomination Lab, PDU scanner reveals footprints to an openable red vent cover.
Evidence / Lore[]
- Zeta Base Research Report (Pages 1-10): Located in the Bio-lab area, in the science lab behind the airlock, lying on the desk with the purple keycard and the Beyonder carcass.
Other Items of Interest[]
- In the bio-labs, if you go south from the center, you will find a Beyonder in the container. Don't be fooled though. It can unpleasantly attack you if it sees you long enough.
- In the upper base, a research project can be unlocked in one of the side areas beyond the first gate.
- In the bio-labs, playing as Sang in the Anniversary edition, there is a Blood Sigil he can remove. Inside are lots of items but also a Shambler.
- In Zeta Base Lower, playing as James in the Anniversary edition, there is a Time Portal at the end of the corridor. You can only access it after unlocking the blue keycard switch.
- In the upper base, there's a VR hack you can use in the corner near the weapon vendor to hack the weapon vendors to give you ammo.
Trivia[]
- The name "Zeta Base" was chosen randomly by the creator simply for the letter "Z" so that it could be found easily in the list of maps.
- In early development Zeta Base was created for Duke Nukem 3D, then later adapted to use AMC assets.