Test Subject Arena 2

Test Subject Arena 2 is an arena shooter game that was released on October 16th 2013. It was first announced by Nitrome on August 14th 2013. The game is a sequel to Test Subject Arena, and is the second spin off in the Test Subject series. This game, on release, was Nitrome Touchy compatible for up to four people and features a new single player mode.
== Controls ==
Player 1
 - Jump (during gameplay), crouch (as Rex209 Professor or Rex209 Blue on ceiling), go up on to ceiling (if ceiling can be touched in one jump; only as Rex209 Professor or Rex209 Blue), move up (while selecting character)
 - Move left (during gameplay), move left (while on character selection screen)
 - Crouch (during gameplay), go down (on character selection screen)
 - Move right (during gameplay), move right (during character selection screen)
Q - Use weapon (during gameplay), use melee attack (during gameplay, when near a player), select character (on character selection screen)
Player 2
 - Jump (during gameplay), crouch (as Rex209 Professor or Rex209 Blue on ceiling), go up on to ceiling (if ceiling can be touched in one jump; only as Rex209 Professor or Rex209 Blue), move up (while selecting character)
 - Move left (during gameplay), move left (while on character selection screen)
 - Crouch (during gameplay), go down (on character selection screen)
 - Move right (during gameplay), move right (during character selection screen)
? - Use weapon (during gameplay), use melee attack (during gameplay, when near a player), select character (on character selection screen)
Player 3 (Nitrome Touchy only) 
D-pad - Move
Button one - Jump
Button two - shoot
Player 4 (Nitrome Touchy only)
D-pad - Move
Button one - Jump
Button two - shoot
=== Nitrome Touchy ===
D-pad - Move
Button one - Jump
Button two - shoot
== Gameplay ==
=== Single-player mode ===
Upon selecting one character from the character selection screen and continuing (pressing the ), the player is taken to a custom made stage for that player, with the objective of destroying forty targets in fifteen seconds. Two types of targets are encountered in these levels: a regular target and a key card. Regular targets (referred to here as just targets) are destroyed with a single bullet from the player, or a melee attack, and add two seconds to the player's time.
The second type of targets are key cards, which appear uncommonly and cannot be destroyed, but still have to be eliminated. In order to be eliminated, the player has to go up to them and physically touch them. Although they take up more time to destroy (they are unable to be destroyed from a distance, unlike regular targets), they add five seconds to the player's timer. As soon as the level starts, a target is placed at a certain point of the level, which the player has to eliminate. As soon as it is eliminated, another target will pop up in other part of the level.
Nitrome has stated that they made single player levels "fairly hard".[1]
If the player manages to destroy all the targets, an avatar with a picture corresponding to the character played with will be awarded.
==== General strategies ====
* Fired projectiles (bullets) move faster than the player, and also will go into and out of teleporters. With this in mind, the player should shoot projectiles at far away targets that they can hit, instead of walking close to the target and shooting it.
* If the player is a projectile shooting character, they should shoot at far away targets instead of going close up to them. If they do this, while the bullet is heading towards the destructible target, the player should head to where the next target will be.
* The player should only focus on destroying the targets and not pay attention to the remaining time they have left or how many targets hey have left to destroy.
=== Multi-player mode ===
==== Two players ====
In two player multiplayer mode, the objective of each level is to deplete the opposing player of all their points. Each level has multiple spawn points, chosen at random for the player to spawn. Levels are made up of an infinite amount of rounds. At the start of each round, the two combatants are spawned with the objective to kill the other. Players take one hit to kill, and upon one player dying, that player loses two points while the opposing player gains two points, and the round ends.
Once a round ends, another round commences, and the two players are assigned to different spawn points. This continues on until one player has lost all of their points. In order for a round to end, only one player has to die, and this death does not have to have been done by the opposing player; the player can kill him/herself by shooting him/herself with their own projectile, or by being killed by the The Machine (in the levels where it appears).
Two player multiplayer mode can either be played with both players using a computer's keyboard, both using Nitrome Touchy, or one using a keyboard while one uses Nitrome Touchy.
==== Three/four players ====
The only difference three/four player multiplayer has from two player multiplayer is the controls players can use and the combinations.
Three player multiplayer can either be played with two players using a computer's keyboard while one uses Nitrome Touchy, or two use Nitrome Touchy while one uses a computer's keyboard, or all three use Nitrome Touchy. Four player multiplayer can either be played with two players using a single keyboard while the remaining two use Nitrome Touchy, three use Touchy while one uses a keyboard, or all use Touchy.
== Characters and statistics ==
Test Subject Arena 2 has eight playable characters, each with their own single player stages. All characters are not the same, rather, each character (usually) has a special ability, and how good they perform certain universal actions measured by their statistics. All characters have four stats, how good the stat is for that character being measured by zero to seven bars. These stats are:
* Ability: How good a character's special ability is. More bars means a good ability, while less bars means a poor ability. Also, if the ability is high, the character is faster.
* Weapon Power: Weapon Power determines the strength of a character's bullet. In the situation where two characters are firing at each other so that both character's bullets are impacting each other, the character with the higher Weapon Power will cause their bullets to destroy the bullets of the character with the lower weapon power (opposing character). The higher Weapon Power character's bullet will destroy the bullet of an opposing character, and this remaining, higher Weapon Power bullet will be able to impact another lower Weapon Power character bullet before the higher Weapon Power bullet explodes.
* Weapon Speed: How fast a fired bullet moves. This stat does not apply to the Professor, and also applies to the orange enzyme's thrown projectiles. More bars means faster moving bullet speed, less bars means slower moving bullet speed.
* Melee: How fast the character respond to attack the character near it. More bars means a faster response rate, while less bars means a slower response rate. If the melee of a character is higher than that of an opposing character near the first, the opposing character will be killed in the event of two simultaneous melee attacks.
The characters in Test Subject Arena 2 are:
* Professor
* Professor in Rex209
* Mercenary
* Orange enzyme	
* Blue in Rex209
* Blue in the Proto-Suit
* Doctor Nastidious
* Green
== PreviewsEdit ==
=== August 14 2013 ===
On August 14 2013, Nitrome released a preview image of the game on their blog. They also announced that the player would be able to choose from eight different characters to play as.
The preview image (click for animation)
=== September 25 2013 ===
On September 25 2013, Nitrome announced more information about the game in a blog post. They announced that the game will be Nitrome Touchy compatible for up to four players, and that certain characters will have special abilities. For example, Rex209 will be able to hang on ceilings. They also stated that they would be looking into a single player mode for this game, something they didn't have in the original game, Test Subject Arena. They also released a preview image for the game.
The blog image
== Gallery ==
The blog image on the release of the game
== Nitrome Touchy ==
Test Subject Arena 2 was made Nitrome Touchy compatible on October 16 2013.
=== Single player score of zero ===
Destroying a level's final target while the timer reaches zero immediately causes the player to win with a score of zero. This score is not 00.00, but just 0.
=== Falling player glitch ===
If the character falls off of a platform without jumping, and the player presses the crouch button and the fire button simultaneously, it will start to have weird behaviour. It will change between its falling and firing animations very quickly until the player stops pressing the buttons or it reaches the ground. This glitch doesn't work with Blue in Rex209 or the Professor in Rex209. If the Professor tries this glitch, he will have his normal falling animation but will play his attack sound without attacking.
=== Mercenary glitch ===
If the player pauses the game in Test Subject Arena 2, the animation the mercenary is doing, it will do the same animation all over again.
=== Rex209 block glitches ===
These glitches act very similarly and are due to Rex209's ability to walk on the ceiling. They are mainly caused by the bottom hitbocks of some platforms being glitched, allowing the player to colide inside the block.
==== Boxes ====
This glitch can only be performed by Blue in Rex209 or the Professor in Rex209. The character has to move near a place where there is a small block on a big block next to a small block. If the character stands onto the bottom small block and jumps, they will get stuck in the block.
If the player jumps again, the character will be on the floor. Jumping once again will cause the character to fall off the level (this will only work if the blocks are on the bottom of the level). This glitch can also serve as a shortcut in some occasions.
==== Level 18 ====
On level 18, if the player plays as either Blue or the Professor in a Rex209 and goes to the small alcove that has the bottom left lower spawn point, walking against the left wall and jumping will cause the player to fall through the floor and stand inside it. Jumping again will cause the player to fall off the screen. This glitch is cause by invisible blocks that can only be interacted with by using Rex209's property of walking on the ceiling.
By landing diagonally on the edge of the top platform, the player can be boosted upwards due to the collision between two blocks (the ledge and the invisible glitched blocks), and therefore reach the ceiling above.
The player on the ceiling, after receiving a boost by the invisible blocks.
== Unused content ==
=== Unused score ===
If the player fails a level, internally in the game's coding, they are assigned a score of zero (0, not 00.00). However, completing a level by destroying the final target simultaneously as the timer reaches zero causes the player to win the level with a score of zero. A score of zero is not obtainable without glitches. Submitting this score to the game high scores causes the player's name for that score and the score to not come up.
== Exclusion of The Machine ==
Although Test Subject Arena 2 incorporated all small sprites from Test Subject Complete, the only character that had a small sprite who was not included in the game was The Machine. John Kennedy has explained that it was not included in the game due to it being too overpowered, likely due to its speed, constant firing and its moving laser that moves in a half-circle (there is no character weapon in Test Subject Arena 2 that is comparable to this). Because of this, The Machine's weapon would have to be toned down somehow.
Along with this, The Machine's walking sprite is much bigger than regular character sprites, causing it to not fit in some levels. Furthermore, taking this into consideration would more restrict the creation of arenas. It was because of this that The Machine was excluded from Test Subject Arena 2. It is also notable to point out that The Machine was never coded into the game, and as such, does not constitute as unused content.
== Trivia ==
* On the release of the game, several high scores were already placed on the high scores tables by Nitrome. These scores read out messages, supposedly written by each of the corresponding characters. These messages can be distinguished by looking at the scores that are at the end of the high scores table and are descending from n seconds to 0.00.
* Blue's Rex209's challenge resembles Level 5 of Test Subject Complete.
* Green's challenge resembles level 10 from Test Subject Blue, this level in Test Subject Arena 2 changed slightly from its Test Subject Blue version.
* Unusually, the image for the game's page displayed on search engine results such as Google's has exclusive art not used anywhere else in the game.