Jak II/Second Seal

This page covers several unrelated mission between getting the first and third parts of Mar's Seal. This includes getting the second part of the Seal.

Mission: Win Class 3 Race at Stadium

 * Location: Haven City (Stadium)

Follow the wrench icon to the stadium and enter the mechanic's area.


 * Cutscene: Mission start
 * You start by saying you destroyed Krew's cargo. (Presumably this is about destroying the packages in the port, but it's not clear why you'd think the mechanic would be interested.) The mechanic says she's still busy and Jak starts to get angry, so Daxter interrupts. But the mechanic recognizes Daxter's voice and pulls back the curtain revealing that she's Keira. (If you've played the first game then you've already realized this of course. If you haven't then the only place you've seen Keira is the opening cutscene. Either way, as a reveal there's something to be desired.) She's glad to see Daxter again but shocked at the change in Jak's appearance, so Daxter fills her in on the Barons dark eco experiment with Jak. Keira says she's been working on a way to get back to their own time, and Jak says they've found Samos (Keira's father) but he's not the same. You're still trying to get to the Baron and Keira suggests racing for the championship since the Baron meets the winner. But she would rather get back home than deal with Haven City politics. Just then Krew appears and you turn over the Ruby Key.

Follow the flag icon to the stadium and start the first race. If you've never played a racing game then it's going to take a lot of practice to learn the skills needed to get through this. The first thing to learn is to corner well. The basics are to start from the outside, lift the accelerator and hug the inside of the curve, then accelerate out. There are turbo boosts you can pick up on the track, but if you're racing skillfully you shouldn't need to use more than two per lap. They won't do much good before a turn since they force you to take it too fast and you end up on the outside wall. The best times to use them are coming out of turn before a straightaway and when you screw up and need to get back up to speed.

There are five laps and there are pits you can fall into, so keep in mind that you need to finish the race if you want to win it. About midway through the course there is a ramp and you need to jump as you reach the end if you want to get over the gap.

There is a point where if you boost and jump you can cross a pit and cut across one of the curves. This isn't as big a help as you might think for two reasons. First, getting the timing and aim right is tricky, so you're probably better off spending the time improving your general racing skill. And second, once you do it the other cars in the race will copy you, and with everyone using the shortcut there's no advantage for you. The shortcut is important if you want to set time records, but you shouldn't need it just for winning the race.


 * Cutscene: Mission end
 * You stop by Keira's shop to celebrate and Ashelin comes in to congratulate you. Keira tries to make it clear that she has dibs on Jak. Ashelin finally thanks you for your help with the tanker, and explains how she got involved with the underground despite being the daughter of the Baron. As she leaves she warns you to watch out for Erol.

Mission: Hunt Haven Forest Metal Heads
Follow the martini glass to the Hip Hog and go in.


 * Cutscene: "Daxter's Tall Tale"
 * Daxter is bragging to Tess about a Metal Head battle he fought when Sig interrupts and says if you're so good you might want to try some new Metal Heads that have appeared in Haven Forest. They have special camouflage which makes them nearly impossible to see.

Follow the mountain icon to the Mountain Temple gate and go through, then warp to the top of the hill and use the platform to carry you to Haven Forest as before.

There are actually two types of Metal Heads to find here, smaller mobile ones and large stationary ones. The camouflage makes them invisible except for the eyes. The larger one become visible when they fire at you, and they come in groups of three, so they are relatively easy to spot. You can locate the smaller ones by backtracking where their shots come from. Your Blaster's auto-aim function still works so you an use that to pinpoint their position. They become partially visible when hit so once you get a shot in you should have the advantage. Finally, the Metal Heads show up as green circles on the area map, so use it to avoid being ambushed and to track down stragglers.

Mission: Blow Up Strip Mine Eco Wells
Follow the lightning bolt icon to the power station and go in.


 * Cutscene "We've Still Got Trouble"
 * Vin says there's still something wrong at the Strip Mine. Dark eco wells wer drilled but never tapped and they've been left uncapped. This is bound to attract Metal Heads so something must be done. He gives you a box of plasmite bombs to destroy the wells. Daxter looks at one of the bombs and accidentally activates it, then throws the bomb back with the others and they all get activated. You now have two minutes to throw bombs into the wells before they all blow up.

The first thing you have to master here is throwing the bombs into the well. They are the tall structures with blue flame coming out the top. They each have a curved ramps in front which you can use as a half pipe on the JET-Board. Jump just as you reach the top of the ramp to get a bit of extra height and the bomb will go in. This takes some practice to time it just right, and you must do it six times in two minutes. Once a well has a bomb in it the flame turns purple, so you can easily tell which ones still need to be done.

You might think that that's all there is to this mission, so you learn to place the bombs and do four in good time, but then where are the last two? Turns out they're pretty hard to find and get to. The hardest one, and therefore the one you should do first, is in the northwest corner. You need to get on top of the same cable cars you used to get to Vin when you were here to rescue him. You could take the same route but it's faster to shred up a supporting beam and hop hop to a car from there. Then hop to the ledge and go through the passage left of the building where you found Vin, this passage was blocked before. You should be able to spot the well now. To get back you need to go on the other side of the building; there are some grindable pipes here but it's not necessary to use them.

For the second well, start by going up the ramp to the left of the ledge where you rescued Vin. This leads to a short obstacle course starting with a chainsaw blade moving back and forth across the path. There are a gap and one or two rotating drills to hop over, and finally you must jump to a moving platform and then to the ledge beyond where the well is waiting. To get back to the main area quickly, look for another chainsaw blade to the right of the well and jump off the ledge next to it.

The other wells should be easy to find, but for completeness there are one at either end of the bridge going diagonally across the area, one at the end of a dark eco pool south of the entrance, and one on a hill further south. It will probably take at least a minute to do the first two wells, leaving the remaining minute to do the other four. When you've bombed the last well, there is a short cutscene ("The Wells Go Boom!") showing the effects.

Destroy Ship at Drilling Platform

 * Location: Drilling Plaform

This starts automatically when you return from the previous mission.


 * Cutscene: "Kor Is Upset"
 * Kor enters the power station and starts talking about what would happen if the Metal Heads get into the city, stressing how important it is to remove Baron Praxis and replace him with the rightful heir. Daxter notices Kor shift uncomfortably but Kor says it's just old age. Kor then asks you to go out to the drilling platform again and shoot down one of the Baron's eco transport ships.

Hop into the Warp Gate to get to the Drilling Platform. You come out where you left off in the previous mission here. Now there is a anti-aircraft gun waiting for you similar to the ones you used to destroy Metal Head eggs, but this times it's on rails and it starts to move when you get in.

The KG, in flying jet-pack suits suspiciously similar to the ones the Metal Heads had, start to attack, so shoot them down as in the earlier mission. You travel to an electric gate but then stop and you must shoot down an additional 40 KG before it opens. Though you will have learned the basics of the gun before, surviving this trip will require that you master it.

When the gate opens you go through to the end of the track. There are a few Metal Heads here but they should be easy to handle. There is another gun on rails here so mount it to start a new trip. There are fewer KG now but this time you face the transport ship itself. It has a number of guns that appear in various places, shoot back at them to make them explode. When there are no guns on the ship to fire at shoot at the KG, the guns do more damage so give them higher priority. You need to destroy about ten guns to open the electric gate at then end of the track.

Now there is a third gun and track to do, but this is basically a mirror image copy of the previous track since you're destroying the remaining half of the ship. When the ship finally goes down for good you hear Kor's voice congratulate you. Use the warp gate here to get back to the power station.

Mission: Get Seal Piece at Dig

 * Location: Dig

Follow the tent icon to Onin's tent and go in.


 * Cutscene: "The Legend of Mar's Tomb"
 * Samos is there with Onin and Pecker and says they've figured out what you need to do to. Inside Mar's Tomb is a Precursor artifact of tremendous power, the Precursor Stone. The Baron is looking for it so he can rule the worldm so you must find the tomb first to prevent that. There is a prophecy that says only the true heir to the city can pass the tests of manhood needed to open the tomb. Samos tells you that you can find a piece of the Seal of Mar at the Dig inside an ancient totem.

Follow the transport icon to the port and board the transport on one of the small islands to get to the Landing Pad area. Enter the Dig as before.

The area is very different now. There are now Metal Heads all over the place and they have been doing their own remodeling since there are new structures as well. The area where the drill was is now blocked off. Follow an elevated walkway to a grindable rail and use it to reach a tunnel. Follow the tunnel, keeping to the left, to find the first of five brown buttons you must press in this area. Use the Dive attack to activate it and you get a view of a log being raised somewhere else in the cavern. Note, there is nothing that tells you to press them other than that they're marked as green circles on the area map.

To get to the second button, step up to the ledge behind the first one, go right, then continue over a rotating split log. Follow the path left to find the button guarded by a horsey Metal Head like the ones seen earlier in Dead Town. There is a very interesting looking balloon visible here but ignore it for now.

For the third button, go back to the tunnel but this time take a side passage on the right and cross two rotating split log going east. Drop down to the right after crossing the second one and explore the area under the walkway to find the button.

Go southwest into a tunnel with patches of lava. There are stepping stones in the lava but, of course, they sink if you stand on them too long. If you follow the tunnel southeast it leads back to the start, but if you follow the side passage left you'll find the fourth button.

The final button is tricky to find, though you may come across it accidentally if you fall off a ledge. Go back to the place where you crossed the two split logs, but this time continue to follow the walkway east. Bear left up a ramp, Scale the ledges to the top of a platform, but before you do note the ledges on the other side. There is a grindable rail starting on the platform but ignore it for the moment. Instead look for the ledges on the far side; you may have to go to first person view to actually see them now but when you do locate them, start dropping down to ground level. Follow the path over the lava to the door of a building, watching out for the perpetually respawning Metal Heads, then go inside to find the fifth button.

Go back to the top of the platform and grind on the rail to a new platform, the balloon mentioned earlier is flying nearby and it's time to do something with it. It's got a trapeze swinging from the bottom and the idea is to jump from the platform to grab the trapeze. This may be difficult to time because the trapeze is swinging while the balloon is moving back and forth, but if you catch the trapeze, then let go when you reach the other end of its course, you will land in a new section of the cavern.

Scale the ledges here to reach the log which all the fuss with the buttons was about. With the log raised you can use it to reach a ledge and enter the passage beyond. There is a pool of lava here and two thin stepping stones; either roll jump or use the JET-Board to get over this. On the left is a platform with another balloon with trapeze. This takes you to a ledge with a third one, which takes you a passage.

You now reach more ledges and obstacles, but it's a linear path so there's not much chance of getting lost, thought there's a particularly difficult to hit horsey Metal Head about half way. Below this is the area where the drill used to be, but it's almost empty now. It's worth exploring if you're after Skull Gems and Orbs though, and it's not too hard to get back once you're down there. Near the top are two doors which shoot out spike covered spheres; time your way past them, up the ledges on the left, to finally reach the totem. There is a short cutscene ("It's a Curse, Isn't It?") where Daxter makes Jak do the collecting this time, but it still doesn't work out for him.

Check the area behind the totem for a shortcut back to the city.

Mission: Destroy 5 HellCat Cruisers

 * Location: Haven City

Follow the dagger icon to the Underground HQ and go in.
 * Cutscene: "The HellCat Mission"
 * Torn says the Baron is really starting to notice what you're doing. So he's brought in 5 new HellCat cruisers the help the KG and they been hitting the Underground. Torn wants you to destroy them to send the Baron a message.

The HellCats look like the large red KG vehicles you're already familiar with only they're yellow and grey. The mechanics here are pretty basic; follow a green circle until you find a HellCat cruiser, shoot it down, and repeat this four more times. But there are a few tricks to staying alive while doing this.

First, make sure you've got a good supply of Vulcan ammo. You get 80 rounds in KG crates at the start, but that's probably less than you will use up. You also get Blaster ammo but, while it's possible to use the Blaster, your rate of fire is much less.

Don't use the single-seat model zoomer unless absolutely necessary. There will often be one parked conveniently next to Underground HQ, but only use until you can locate a larger model.

As with the Lurker rescue mission, make sure you're not too close to your target when you shoot it down, otherwise the explosion will damage, possibly destroy, your vehicle.

When you fire at the HellCat the KG will go into alert mode of course, and they won't be kidding around this time. So whenever an alert is active stay in a vehicle, getting out only to change to a fresh one. Start looking for a fresh vehicle when the one you're in starts to smoke.

In general, after shooting down a HellCat find a safe place to wait for the alert to blow over before doing the next one. Then you can find a new vehicle and track down your next victim in peace. Of course if a HellCat just happens to be in front of you as you're trying to get away it would be silly to waste a good opportunity.

Since you'll have lot's of time without the alert mode, take a moment to stalk your prey and pick the best place to attack. Good places are long strait narrow streets since the HellCat won't be able to avoid you by turning a corner. Sometimes you may catch the HellCat in a dead end and they will have no escape. Bad places are open areas, especially if there's a turret gun in range.

Doing all these things will make the mission take longer, but there's no time limit and trying to rush it will often result in multiple failures which take end up taking up more time anyway.