Everything you need to know about unlocking the hidden Psychiatrist boss fight in Katana Zero.
Despite Zero’s prowess, you’re up against a roster of powerful and dangerous opponents who can take you out in one hit.
The title contains an intense story littered with difficult battles but also hides a hidden encounter. In order to fight the hero’s psychiatrist, certain conditions need to be met. Once triggered, you’ll need to be prepared for one of the longest and most challenging fights in the game.
The Location and Role Of The Psychiatrist
At multiple points in the game, the protagonist Zero will meet with an NPC simply known as the Psychiatrist. The two will meet in his office and these moments act as interactable cutscenes. During these scenes, the Psychiatrist will ask Zero a number of questions and you’ll have multiple responses to choose from in the dialogue. After the interview finishes, the Psychiatrist will give Zero a dose of Chronos, a plot-important drug mentioned frequently in-game. He’s also the character who provides Zero with his assignments. Very little is known about the Psychiatrist but he will occasionally call Zero on the phone, will reveal things about himself if you behave cordially, and is implied to be a high-ranking government official.
The Psychiatrist is one of the last characters you’ll interact with and depending on your behavior, your encounter with him will end in one of two ways: Zero will beat him to death without input from you or he’ll transform into a boss to fight you.
Getting The Psychiatrist To Fight You
In order to trigger the Psychiatrist’s boss fight, you’ll need to make him angry. Whenever dialogue options come up, some choices will be highlighted in red. These indicate aggressive or rude responses which will be key in enraging the good doctor. You’ll need to take every opportunity to anger him at various moments throughout the game.
During the Factory Hideout mission, the Psychiatrist will call you on the phone. You’ll need to hang up multiple times then answer with “Hello?” when prompted.
During your sessions with him, don’t waste time with small talk and simply demand the medicine. Do this following the Murdower Hotel mission as well.
In Club Neon when you encounter the target DJ Electrohead, allow him to talk about the drugs.
Next time you see the Psychiatrist, question him about the drugs then refuse the medicine.
When you’re in Mutual-Nil Prison, you’ll need to kill all of the police officers.
In the session before Chinatown, tell the Psychiatrist “♥♥♥♥ you.”
Once you’ve followed all these steps, you’ll have one last session with the Psychiatrist after completing the Bunker mission. This time instead of the beating cutscene, the doctor will inject himself with a special drug and attack you. This will begin a four-phase boss fight with each phase granting you a checkpoint as the Psychiatrist grows more and more monstrous.
How To Defeat The Psychiatrist
After injecting himself, the Psychiatrist will transform into a superpowered being who gets less and less human as the battle progresses. Each phase has a different form and attack pattern that you need to learn.
Phase 1: The Psychiatrist will float towards the ceiling in the center of the room. He will then spawn portals on either the left, right, or both sides of the screen. Only two portals will spawn at once and a long arm will shoot out of each one, one at a time. These can be avoided by dodging or by attacking the hand as it lunges at you. This will destroy the arm and hurt the boss.
Phase 2: The Psychiatrist will create a ring of 9 small sparks towards the ceiling. Each spark represents a clone of himself that will activate periodically. When a clone appears, it will shoot an energy ball at Zero’s current location. You’ll need to strike the ball so it bounces back and destroys the clone that shot it. Once there are only four sparks left, the remaining clones will spawn in various spots around the room and attack at the same time. Simply dodge and hit the energy balls when you can to take out the clones.
Phase 3: A very trippy and disorienting part of the fight in which the screen goes dark and large multicolor eyes appear around the room. You simply need to slash them all to hurt the boss. The eyes will constantly change the camera and screen appearance to mess with you so you need to stay focused. The eyes can’t harm you, but if you take too long to destroy them, they’ll explode Zero with an unavoidable attack.
Phase 4: In the final and most horrific part of the fight, the Psychiatrist mutates into a large Akira-like monster. Thankfully, the form is mainly for aesthetics and can’t actually harm you. The boss gets access to three distinct attacks and you’ll need to react quickly in order to avoid them. The first is a syringe tentacle that stabs downward from the ceiling on Zero’s location and follows him to make multiple attempts. He can also create three portals (left, center and right) which will each spawn a brain-like growth that can shoot energy balls, but both can be attacked. Lastly, he will spawn portals in either an arc or across the ceiling which each shooting out a syringe, just watch for the one that appears first to dodge effectively. To defeat this form, you’ll need to wait for a tentacle holding the Psychiatrist’s body to appear from a ground portal. Hit it three times and the boss will be defeated.
After this form, Zero will appear back in the office in his chair across from the impaled Psychiatrist. You can then get up to search his body and desk to get the item “New Mecca Government Key.” This allows you to access the Government Lab area where you can switch out swords and access upcoming DLC missions.