Countdown

Countdown is the eleventh mission in the console version of 007: Nightfire. It takes place in a missile silo at Drake's island in the South Pacific.

Speedrun Routes
Countdown can be a very difficult mission depending on the category you're playing as well as your skill level. It has two important tricks called Silo Skip and Kiko Skip. Silo Skip saves around 20 seconds and Kiko Skip saves a little over 2 minutes. If you are just learning to speedrun 007: Nightfire, it is not recommended that you try Silo Skip since it's one of the hardest tricks in the run. It's up to you if you want to do Kiko Skip. Kiko Skip can be tricky at first but it's significantly easier than Silo Skip and it saves a lot more time.

Optimal Any% Route =The first section of Countdown is a maze of hallways and corridors. It is recommended that you practice this until you know exactly where to go.

As soon as you spawn, move forward and open the vent. Drop into the room and run for the door. Turn left and strafe through the hallway until you start a cutscene. Skip it and select your remote mines. Turn left at the next corner and you will see 3 doors at the end of that hallway. One on the left, one in the middle, and one on the right. Throw two mines on the wall to the left of the middle door then go through the middle door. Now you should see a door on your left. Place two mines on the ground in front of that door. These four mines will be used to kill Rook as soon as he spawns. Now move through the hallway and enter the door on the left when you see the delta sector door. Keep going through this hallway and enter the first door on your left. On the right side of this hallway, you should see two large doors that will open up if you press A on them. There will usually be two guards standing in front of each door. Sometimes you can get lucky and the doors will already be open when you get there. Go through the second large door on your right and enter the next door you see. Now turn right when you go through that door and run past the enemy in that hallway. The security room will be down a very short hallway on the left. You will see a cutscene when you get close to the door. At the end of the room, there are two terminals you need to break with your watch laser. Break the one on the left side of the room first, then the one on the right. Move toward the computer at the start of the room and press A to blow everything up. You can actually activate the computer by pressing A behind the computer. This saves time because you don't have to waste time walking around the computer. When the door opens, go back to the delta sector door. The optimal route is the inverse of the route you took to get to the security room. When you get to the delta sector door, select your remote mines and press the alternate fire button to switch to the detonator. Detonate the mies as soon as you see Rook walk through the door. Turn around and enter the delta sector door.

Section 2 is very tricky. Move forward through the first and second silo. You will then be in a room with body armor in front of a locked door. This is the room where you do SIlo Skip. Go toward the body armor and perform a clip on the corner between the wall and the locked door. Turn to the right (perpendicular to the hallway) and move until you touch an invisible wall. Move left slowly until you feel a pressure point, then move slightly past that pressure point. Aim slightly to the right and jump while moving forward. If you did it right, you should be standing on an invisible platform just barely out of bounds. Look to the left of the omega sector door and jump forward. If you did it right, you should land in the silo with the omega sector door, allowing you to get to section 3. A more detailed explaination of Silo Skip can be found in its article or in these videos: "How to clip out of bounds in Countdown", "Nightfire: Silo Skip".

Section 3 is really straightforward compared to sections 1 and 2. Just go through the first door and walk up the slope to your right to get to the second floor. There is a button on the left side of the room that unlocks a door you need to go through. You can save a little bit of time by pressing the button through the wall instead of going in that room. Now jump down to the ground floor and go through the door you unlocked. Go to the next set of rooms and perform Kiko Skip. This clip is done in the room after passing by the box of frag grenades in the hallway. After going through the door, carefully move to the corner on the right side of the room and do a clip. This clip can be tricky to do since the control stick should not be pressed all the way forward. Clip while holding the control stick slightly in the direction of the corner. You should land on a seam where you can walk around the room, bypassing a trigger that prevents you from ending the mission early. Move along the seam and jump back inbounds. There is a button on the right side of the next room you can press to end the mission. A detailed explaination of Kiko Skip can be seen in its article on this website. You can also see a video of Kiko Skip with an input display here.


 * -|No Clipping/OoB Route =The route for No Clipping/OoB is very similar to the Any% route. The biggest differences in No Clipping/OoB for this level include getting extra remote mines and not doing Silo Skip or Kiko Skip. It is recommended that you stock up on grenade rounds for the AIMS Assault Rifle since they will be very useful in Section 2. You can easily get grenade rounds by killing certain guards after exiting the security room. You can also find grenade rounds in section 2 but it is faster to get them in section 1 since you don't need to deviate from the normal route.

As soon as you spawn, move forward and open the vent. Drop into the room and run for the door. Turn left and strafe through the hallway until you start a cutscene. Skip it and select your remote mines. Turn left at the next corner and you will see 3 doors at the end of that hallway. One on the left, one in the middle, and one on the right. Throw two mines on the wall to the left of the middle door then go through the middle door. Now you should see a door on your left. Place two mines on the ground in front of that door. These four mines will be used to kill Rook as soon as he spawns. Now move down the hallway and you should see a large door with two guards standing in front of it. Ignore those guards, open the large door, and go inside. You should see another door in this room. Go through that and you should see an explosive barrel to your right at the very beginning of the next room. Jump on it and you will be able to see an extra set of remote mines on top of some boxes. Jump onto those boxes to grab the extra remote mines. Now move back into the hallway and enter the door on the left when you see the delta sector door. Keep going through this hallway and enter the first door on your left. On the right side of this hallway, you should see two large doors that will open up if you press A on them. There will usually be two guards standing in front of each door. Sometimes you can get lucky and the doors will already be open when you get there. Go through the second large door on your right and enter the next door you see. Now turn right when you go through that door and run past the enemy in that hallway. The security room will be down a very short hallway on the left. You will see a cutscene when you get close to the door. At the end of the room, there are two terminals you need to break with your watch laser. Break the one on the left side of the room first, then the one on the right. Move toward the computer at the start of the room and press A to blow everything up. You can actually activate the computer by pressing A behind the computer. This saves time because you don't have to waste time walking around the computer. When the door opens, go back to the delta sector door. The optimal route is the inverse of the route you took to get to the security room. When you get to the delta sector door, select your remote mines and press the alternate fire button to switch to the detonator. Detonate the mies as soon as you see Rook walk through the door. Turn around and enter the delta sector door.

Section 2 is very different from the optimal any% route. Move forward through the first silo and use the AIMS grenade rounds to blow up the laser trip mines from a distance. Go through the left door in the second silo and blow up the array of trip mines in that hallway. Move forward through the next silo then turn right. There is a hidden laser trip mine in the next hallway. It is hidden behind a box in front of the door. Shoot the door with a grenade round to blow up the trip mine. You have two choices on what to do in the next silo. You need to go through a door on your right to progress, but there is another trip mine right behind the door. You can shoot the door with a grenade round from a distance or you can simply go through the door and crouch under the laser. Crouching under the laser is slightly slower but you won't take any damage and you won't have to use a grenade round. If you are low on health, you should crouch under the laser since its explosion radius is huge. Otherwise, simply blow up the trip mine from a distance. Move through the hallway and go forward through the next silo. You can shoot the explosive barrels on the other side of the room to kill some enemies if you are low on health or if you need more grenade rounds. Open the next door and shoot a grenade through it to blow up another array of trip mines. Now move forward through the last silo room and enter the omega sector door to go to section 3.

Section 3 is really straightforward compared to sections 1 and 2. Just go through the first door and walk up the slope to your right to get to the second floor. There is a button on the left side of the room that unlocks a door you need to go through. You can save a little bit of time by pressing the button through the wall instead of going in that room. Now jump down to the ground floor and go through the door you unlocked. Move through the next set of hallways until you get to the rocket launch sequence. Unfortunately this is a part of the game where you have to wait for 2 minutes and there is nothing you can do to speed it up. Just stay behind the blast doors when the rockets launch and kill the first set of enemies that spawn. There is one thing you can do after that to speed up the section just a little bit. You can place remote mines where the second set of enemies will be and detonate them as soon as they spawn. Killing the second group of enemies is what triggers the end of the level so you want to kill them as soon as possible. After that, simply skip the cutscene with Kiko and press the button in front of you to complete the mission.


 * -|100% Route =To do: add

Trivia

 * The security room door is opened by pressing a button on a nearby computer. The door usually opens in 18 seconds but can sometimes open in half that time if you are very lucky. Clipping through the security room door would save at least 9 seconds.