Upon defeating Kale and clearing the main story, Hi-Fi Rush presents you with a new task. Hidden in most of the game’s tracks is a numbered Spectra Door leading to a special challenge that puts your knowledge of the combat system to the test. Think of like the secret missions from Devil May Cry or the Alfheim challenges in Bayonetta. You have likely already come across at least one of these doors on your initial playthrough, but the game prevents you from entering them until after the credits roll. If you wish to squeeze more mileage out of the game and tackle this postgame quest, this guide will go over how to find every Spectra Door in Hi-Fi Rush and beat the challenges within.
Hi-Fi Rush: How to find and complete all Spectra Door challenges
Track 1 Spectra Door
You can access this Spectra Door soon after you finish Chorus 4 — the fight on the rooftop, to be more specific. Make your way to the first building where Smidge is located, head to the right, and look down. You should see a ledge you can hop down to, at which point you can enter the Spectra Door and tackle your first challenge, assuming you play in order.
This challenge tasks you with defeating five of the flying bomb-throwing enemies while remaining airborne as much as possible. Simply use your Magnet Grab to zip yourself toward the enemies and perform your standard aerial light attack combo. Don’t worry if you accidentally fall to the ground a couple of times; you only fail the challenge once the timer hits zero, and the timer only depletes when you land on the ground.
Although the timer depletes incredibly rapidly, this should not pose much of a problem as long as you quickly jump back up and Magnet Grab again if you fall.
Track 2 Spectra Door
After the fight that introduces you to the blue-shielded enemies that require Peppermint to deal with, jump up the shipping containers and dash to the ledge up above. The door should be clearly visible.
For this challenge, you need to defeat four enemies, with the catch being that you can only deal damage to them within 12 beats after you land a successful parry. It’s likely that you have already gotten used to parrying by this point, especially since the final boss practically demands it. But regardless: don’t panic. Patiently wait for the enemy to flash, and then time the parry button a beat later. Keep in mind that the bigger sword enemy has an attack in which he strikes for two beats in a row after the flash.
Upon landing the parry, a counter on the upper right will show you how many beats you have left to deal damage before you have to parry again. When using those 12 beats to attack, try not to get too fancy with your combos, as you only have about a minute and 25 seconds to finish the challenge.
From my experience, even just using the standard light attack combo should be enough to deal decent damage to enemies before your beats run out. And by landing your Beat Hits, you can build your Reverb Gauge enough to perform your special Jam Combos with your partner for more damage. If you have not bought at least one of these from the shop, definitely do so and note that you perform them by hitting the partner button for the Beat Hit prompt instead of the light or heavy attack buttons.
If you still have beats left in the counter while an enemy moves in to attack you, parrying it will reset the counter, so keep an eye out as you attack. Additionally, note that the same 12-beat rule applies to Peppermint’s blaster when dealing with the shielded enemy, so make sure to parry it before sending her out.
Track 3 Spectra Door
In the room after the one where the robot congratulates you for surviving Zanzo’s tests, head right to find some ledges on a cliff you can climb up. The Spectra Door is waiting for you on the other side.
The description for this challenge tells you that you need to buy one of the parry counter moves you can perform with your partner (i.e. Kick Shot, Love Tap, or High Alert) to complete it. Do that if you haven’t already. In practice, though, Korsica’s High Alert is the least useful of the three due to its low damage output, so stick to the other ones.
This challenge forces you to exclusively use these parry counters to damage enemies, otherwise you will have to start over. To perform a parry counters, press the partner button exactly one beat after you parry an enemy attack. The timing for this is pretty specific, as you pretty much need to be dead on with the beat for it to work. Although this can be tricky, it will likely only take a little bit of practice for you to land it consistently.
Track 4 Spectra Door
Upon entering the big room with the staircase shortly after going through the AR Labs entrance, move to the upper floor to find a generator for Korsica to activate. This will trigger a platforming sequence you have to complete before reaching the Spectra Door.
This challenge is almost exactly the same as the previous one, except that you activate one of those three moves by hitting the partner button a beat after a perfect dodge rather than a parry. This is actually a bit trickier to do than it is with the parry, as you have to pay closer attention to your positioning when performing a perfect dodge. Make sure to reposition yourself after a dodge so that you stay close to the enemy when preparing to dodge again. Otherwise, you may end up dodging too far away from the attack for it to count as a perfect dodge. If it looks like you dodged far from the enemy, refrain from using the partner button so that you don’t accidentally fail the challenge.
Track 5 Spectra Door
You can access this Spectra Door as soon as you enter tha central hub area where you speak with TEC-78. At the entrance, go right and drop down to the ledge below. Then, you will have to hop across several disc-shaped platforms that slowly orbit the central pillar. Jumping toward the left side will take you to the Spectra Door.
For this challenge, you have to land two Overkill Bonuses, accomplished by finishing off an enemy with a Jam Combo. You need to fill up one segment of your Reverb Gauge to perform a Jam Combo, so you will need to land Beat Hits to build it up without killing more than one of the three enemies in the challenge. If you bought the Quick Beat Hit from the shop, you can spam it to fill your gauge more quickly than you can with a standard Beat Hit at the end of a combo. Alternatively, you can collect a reserve battery somewhere in Track 5 and then bring it to this fight to use when you need it.
Whichever method you choose, space your attacks carefully so you don’t end accidentally killing more than one enemy with a move other than the Jam Combo.
Track 7 Spectra Door
Go to the room with the big pillars and before heading through the exit door near the shop, head to the right and walk upstairs. You will see the Spectra Door behind the two robots.
This challenge asks that you beat all of the enemies within a minute and 30 seconds without moving the left stick (or the WASD keys if using a keyboard). This may sound tricky, except that you can still use your Magnet Grab to move close to the enemy as well as your dodges and parries to avoid attacks. As long as you keep track of enemy tells and remember not to touch the stick or WASD keys, this should be fairly easy.
Track 8 Spectra Door
In the underground area shortly after the room where Mimosa says “Ugh, you are just as annoying as Kale’s been saying,” use Korsica on the generator to activate the platforming sequence. Complete it, then head backward once you reach the breakable wall. Hop across the pipes and go past the pendulum onto the ledge where the Spectra Door awaits.
This next challenge simply has you defeating three enemies in a little over two minutes without taking a single hit. Even just a basic grasp on Hi-Fi Rush‘s combat fundamentals will help you greatly here. But to stay safe, you can keep your distance while whittling the enemies down with partner attacks. You may especially want to do this with the bike enemy, as its attacks can be pretty intimidating to deal with up close. After filling up the enemy’s stun gauge with your partners, feel free to get close and unload on them with whatever moves and combos you prefer. Be careful not to let any enemies sneak in hits on you while attempting to destroy the bike enemy’s shield generators.
Track 10 Spectra Door
As soon as you head into the atrium, go right and hop up the platforms to get to the upper ledge. Once there, go through the holes in the walls and jump on the small light near the third wall to get past it. Move a bit further to reach the Spectra Door.
For this challenge, you will really need to make sure you have spot-on rhythm. You’re required to achieve a 85% Just-Timing rating or higher by the time you complete it. Once again, it helps to avoid mixing up your combos too much, as it will make consistently timing your inputs on beat more difficult than it has to be. Keep an eye on the counter in the upper right and make sure that the left number stays above 85. If it’s a little bit below, don’t panic. Focus on staying on beat so the number can go up.
Of course, it’s important to note that this challenge has you fighting the phoenix and the green four-legged robot, which are some of the trickier enemies in the game. When the phoenix is on fire and in the air, go ahead and use your Magnet Grab on it. The phoenix will attempt to counter it by triggering a dodge prompt, but immediately afterward, its flames will be extinguished, leaving it open to attack. Exploiting this in addition to using Korsica to blow out the flames when it gets closer to the ground will go a long way.
For the four-legged enemy, don’t be afraid to use your special attack right away if you have one stored up to get rid of its armor in one fell swoop. Once it fires its blue projectiles, don’t stray too far away from them. You’ll want to quickly close in and chuck one of the projectiles back at the robot with Macaron once they land.
You found and completed the Spectra Door challenges in Hi-Fi Rush – What next?
After you find and clear all eight of these Spectra Door challenges in Hi-Fi Rush, you will gain access to an area called the Spectra Hub Room. This area contains eight more challenges that are more difficult than the ones you did previously. We will put out a guide for this section once we get past it.
Published: Jan 31, 2023 07:41 pm