Come and see the freaky spinny toy a Shade gunner left behind!

(6:37) Level 5 ('Assault on the Control Room') on Legendary. One day when attempting a kill 'em all run on foot with assault rifle and rocket launcher, I backtracked to the cavern and found something freaky. Originally I thought it was just going to provide a nice clip for one of my 'freakiness and fun' movies, but later I realized how much fun you could have with it - so it's getting a movie of its own! See my article Spinning plasma pistol for the whole story.

Released August 16th 2014, gameplay recorded August 4th-14th 2014.

00:02 (Initial view) This clip gives a general look at the plasma pistol, grinding on the turret barrel. When I found this oddity I was actually carrying an AR, but here I'm using a save (derived from a copy of my original save) in which I've equipped myself with a pistol. At the end I jump onto the tip of the barrel and edge forward for a closer look, but my presence causes the plasma pistol to dislodge. This opening clip was originally recorded as being something for a 'freakiness and fun' movie; but when I realized how much fun I could have, it became the opener for this dedicated movie instead.

00:50 (Dislodging the plasma pistol) Next, a sequence of three short clips showing three ways the plasma pistol is easily dislodged. Stepping near it, whacking the Shade, and boarding the Shade. When you step near it doesn't always dislodge though.

01:06 (Flying off by itself) After a certain length of time (see my article for details), the plasma pistol will fly off by itself, landing in the same spot with the same orientation. This is just a clip to demonstrate (amusingly I hope).

01:29 (Making weapons spin) Leading into the main part of the movie, I demonstrate some weapon spinning using various weapons. I deliberately got a couple of dead covies and a Marine into shot to make the views more interesting (and amusing, in the case of the Jackal). That Marine body was one of the ones scripted for the cavern, and the AR was beside him. However, the AR had to be handled before it would spin. Supply weapons are completely fixed until handled. I assume Bungie didn't want them to be able to get blasted away by explosions.

01:49 (Spinny fun) Now we get to the core business of the movie: shooting at the plasma pistol to alter the spin, sometimes producing pretty strobing effects. I've put together a 4-minute montage of close-range action with various weapons and viewpoints, but especially the AR which is best. In fact the AR clips alternate with the others. The montage mainly focuses on some of the prettier effects I got during my recording, but it starts with a relatively slow introductory clip using a pistol, because that's the weapon I was using for quite a while when I started playing around with shooting.

I've matched up the clips so the clicking rhythm continues across the clip joins. There's a click every 11 frames, except that some of the heavier needling causes the clicking to pause. Talking of which, I almost didn't have any needling in the movie because I hadn't thought to try the needler. But luckily I gave it a go; and when I saw the spinning needles, it was clear that some needling would have to be included.

The two plasma weapons are quite poor for doing spin adjustment but I've included them for variety. Actually, the clip where I use a plasma pistol also serves as a bit of comedy. I miss three times (or seem to) with the usual pulsed fire, so I blast it with a plasma ball instead - which works very nicely!

05:54 (Sniping send-off) To bring the movie to an end, I decided to try and use a sniper rifle to adjust the plasma pistol's spin, then blast it up and shoot it in mid-air. However, hitting it in mid-air is easier said than done! To begin with (when repeatedly trying to get a good clip) I think my success rate for that was under 25%, and quite often my preliminary spin adjustment wasn't good enough anyway, e.g. because too many shots missed or because the spinning wasn't appealing enough. Put all that together and it meant that I was typically only getting a couple of candidate clips per hour. I later improved though, and in one good spell I got ten decent clips in about half an hour's play. In this clip you can see the plasma pistol's spin get adjusted by the mid-air shot, which is something I wanted. It seemed appropriate, given the theme of the preceding sequence. I also did a decent job of tracking the target, and it came down in suitably spinny fashion, which I liked. On the minus side I missed one of my spin adjustment shots by getting my timing slightly wrong; but at least I got it next go.

06:27 (Thanks grunty) Originally I was thinking to end the movie with the sniping, but then I thought it would be nice for this Grunt to have a little guest spot, since we've got him to thank for all the fun. This is definitely the guy who dropped the plasma pistol, as the other two Grunts assigned to this area are elsewhere. This clip also re-introduces the grinding noise, which I thought would make a better ending than the quiet end of the sniping. Plus it makes for a humorous ending of course. This isn't my first movie to end with a view of a dead Grunt, and I doubt it'll be the last!

Closing remarks I created various saves to get these clips. They were all derived from a copy of my original save (in which I'd had a checkpoint up the tunnel) and used a delayed tunnel checkpoint. As detailed in my article, the grinding volume varies. In these clips you hear it at its maximum, or as near as makes no difference. Obviously I wanted to make things nice and noisy for you!

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