Anthophobia: How to Beat 2.5 Boss (All You Should Know)

Shield: The boss crosses its arms, gaining a shield while attacking those close to it.

• The shield, from what I can tell does not have a set duration. In a rare instance where neither I nor Jake attacked it, I timed it lasting for at least 10 seconds.
• The shield does go away after a set amount of damage has been taken, either from you or Jake. A few bullets should be enough, but more testing is needed.
• The damage done by the move is negligible. The real threat comes from it instantly stripping a layer of clothes from your body.
• The range of the attack is about half the screen on both sides.

Dash: The boss dashes across the screen towards its target, dealing damage to those it passes. There is a variation where it seems to slide towards the end and takes a knee, but further testing is needed to determine if you cause this and/or if it affects anything.

• The range of the dash is about the entire length of the screen, maybe a little less. This is only in the direction of the dash.
• Anywhere behind him to the spot directly under his center is safe.

Rock Throw: The boss reaches down and flings up chunks of concrete, creating a damaging rain of rocks soon after.

• Any contact with the rocks deals damage, including when they’re pulled from the ground, directly under his center.
• The number of rocks thrown appears random, but as they fall upon the entire level, it could be the same amount every time.
• The locations the rocks will fall will be preceded by red markers for a short period of time. Lighting up the arena, either through flares, glowsticks, or your screen brightness, makes it possible to see all locations visible on your screen, but even in the dark you would be able to see if your current location was safe or not.

Boulder: The boss throws a larger spherical rock at its target, damaging anything as it bounces until it reaches the end of the level.

• The sound cue of the boulder bouncing on the pavement will be your best warning of it happening when it’s off-screen.
• The hitbox appears to be slightly larger than the boulder itself.

Tail Whip: The boss lashes out with its tail, damaging those in the surrounding area.

• The range of the attack covers a bit more than the length of its body.
• The delay between attacks if you’re in range can be short, so it is not advisable to try and tank the attacks.
• For the purposes of this guide, this attack is the same as the one used while it’s moving quickly. Further testing as to whether or not the damage values are different will be needed.

♥♥♥ Bomb: The boss releases damaging white globs as it moves, sending them bouncing off in your direction.

• The delay can be similarly short
• It is possible to jump over them
• They are most commonly seen exiting in the direction it skitters away from, but it’s possible that they are never seen coming from the front due to how quick it is.
• The speed of the globs appears to vary. It’s possible they are affected by the physics of the boss as it moves.

Explosive (the entity): An enemy generated by the Boomer that explodes upon hitting the ground, upon reaching the target midair destination after a short delay, or upon being destroyed.

• Upon being destroyed by the player or another Explosive, they have been known to drop small health kits and clothes. Drop rates unknown. It’s also unknown as to whether or not these will be dropped if they explode naturally.
• The range of the explosion is about twice the size of the Explosive.

Ranged Explosive: The boss sends out 1-2 Explosives set to go to a specific midair destination and explode shortly after arriving there.

• When two are sent out, one will go low (crouch to shoot) and one will go high (aim up to shoot inconsistently).
• The low Explosive will only go a short distance away, maybe half a screen’s length.
• The high Explosive will go further, maybe a full screen’s length.
• This will be used with an abnormally short delay in the beginning to remove obstacles between it and you.

Self-Detonate: The boss creates a swarm of Explosives centered around its own body, generating a vacuum effect that pulls the player towards it.

• Ranged Explosive may be used in combination with this move.
• The strength of the vacuum is dependent on your distance from the boss. A full screen away will not move you at all. A half screen away will have you sliding towards it if you’re standing still. If you’re within blast radius/whip range, the pull will be near inescapable.
• Six Explosives are created for the noncombination attack. Four normal Explosives are in the center, while two black Explosives are on either side of the four, above them. Destroying any of the six will destroy the rest, but there appears to be a small delay when doing it with the regular Explosives, whereas the black ones trigger it instantly.

Sumire’s Second Worst Fingering: The boss plunges its arms into the ground, sending out its tentacles to pop up and attack you at the spot you were in when they began the attack.

• If you’re wearing clothes, a single small instance of damage is dealt.
• If you’re naked, a grab attack is initiated that can deal a lot of damage quickly.
• The sound cue from this is a kind of rumbling sound, allowing you to predict when they’re being sent out.
• As the tentacle travels towards you, it will be visible part of the way through before going back under. This deals no damage and indicates an area safe from that tentacle.
• The attack targets the location you were when it began, even with travel time, so if you’re far away from the boss, there will be little chance of it hitting you if you keep moving. Conversely, if you’re close to it, avoiding it is harder.
• The number of sequential tentacle attacks sent out seems to be random. More testing is needed to see if this is based on anything like the damage done to the boss.

Tentacle Whip: The boss moves around a little before unleashing a tentacle whip on nearby targets.

• The range is very short and doesn’t seem to be used as often. If you aren’t touching the boss, you’re out of its range.
• The boss appears to pace back and forth a bit as it executes the attack.

Bomb From Above: The boss flings up an Explosive, which will hit near your location after a medium delay.

• The delay is long enough that it will throw a second Explosive into the air before the first comes down.
• The size of the explosion means that standing next to the spot it’s predicted to land will damage you.
• An arrow indicator predicting its trajectory will track you for a period of time, before locking onto a single location that you can move away from.

As the most popular and only other guide suggests, your best option is to target Dandelion 1 > Dandelion 2 > Boomer 1 > Boomer 2. Here’s why you don’t pick the others.

Dandelion 1 > Boomer 1 > Boomer 2 > Dandelion 2
Probably the worst option. Dandelion 2 has the highest unavoidable damage output, so unleashing it early and letting it run all over you as you focus Boomer is really bad. Feel free to send me a video of you doing this on the hardest difficulty, though.Dandelion 1 > Boomer 1 > Dandelion 2 > Boomer 2
Only marginally better because Boomer 2 is the lowest priority target in all situations.

Boomer 1 > Dandelion 1 > Boomer 2 > Dandelion 2 / Boomer 1 > Dandelion 1 > Dandelion 2 > Boomer 2
There’s an argument to be made for targeting Boomer 1 first. The Explosives can potentially kill Jake while Dandelion 1 is still alive, and getting rid of the attack that deals more damage when you’re clothes-less makes sense to do while you’re still clothed. But odds are, in the time it takes to kill Boomer 1, you’ll still be more likely to lose Jake before Dandelion 1 is dead.

Boomer 1 > Boomer 2 > Dandelion 1 > Dandelion 2
The least terrible “bad idea” is still not great. Even if you’ve effectively reduced the total number of enemies on screen from 2 to 1, the enemy that’s left was always the biggest threat. And now, you’re facing him without a Jake for him to target. It’s still theoretically possible to kite him by keeping him just off-screen, but now that all of his focus is on you, you’ll find yourself having far few chances to reload.

Once the fight begins, go to the right side of Jake, your big meatshield that works both ways. Dandelion 1 won’t be vulnerable until his health bar appears, so it’s best to get into the safest place to attack where you know he’ll be. His first Dash will be in the direction of Jake (so, to the right, where you should be), so keep in on just the edge of your screen and hold your fire. Remember your bullets damage Jake too, and you want him alive a little longer. Once he dashes towards you, just unload your gun into him while standing in his back leg. This is the safest spot you can be in with an almost guaranteed line of sight. If he uses Shield, just keep shooting through it. If he uses Dash, reposition yourself to be under that back leg again. Staying under that leg and shooting until you run out of bullets is the quickest way of dealing damage while taking the least amount of damage. Technically, you could take less damage by going to the edge of the screen, where you’re just outside the range of his Dash and can avoid theoretically all damage, but with how often he uses Dash, you’ll be stuck with Jake between you and him more often than not, meaning Jake will die before Dandelion 1 does. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ Jake. By sticking by his back leg, you run the risk of getting hit by his Shield, but the actual damage there is minimal, and you can afford to lose the layer of clothing for now.

Once he’s down, take a moment to restock on ammunition, pick up that health kit if you need it, and pray that Jake, if he’s still alive will die in a corner instead of the middle of the level. At this point, you should still have all six molotovs available, with three on your person and three on a shelf by Boomer 1’s location. If you have a rough estimation of his spawn time, feel free to preemptively throw one on Boomer 1’s corpse. You’re likely going to be using every single one on him. Boomer 2’s attack patterns, once he spawns, will be as follows. Skitter to one end of the level, throwing ♥♥♥ Bombs behind him as he goes and striking you as he goes past, and pacing back and forth at the end for a small period of time. Afterwards, he’ll skitter back towards the other side of the level, repeating the whole process. Your best bet will be to stand near (but not in) the section he pauses in, shooting him as he comes in. Once he begins pacing, immediately throw a molotov, get out of his range, and begin unloading your gun into him. Dodge the ♥♥♥ Bombs and Boomer 1 attacks (because you’re likely low on clothes by now, meaning that it’s now an active threat to your survival) when applicable, and repeat until he dies. This is arguably the most difficult section of the fight, so once you kill Dandelion 2, you’re home free.

Kind of. You do have to kill Boomer 1 & 2 first, which isn’t that difficult when compared to Dandelion. Keep your distance, shoot the Explosives if you need health and there’s nothing lying around, and just watch to make sure you’re not about to be fingered. Remember, if you need to reload and he’s trying to finger you, there is not enough time to reload and you need to stop trying because this is the third time in the same sequence.

Once he’s down, get that sweet, sweet, unnecessary health kit and wait for Boomer 2 to spawn. After he does, toss any remaining molotovs you have on him to speed it up a bit, sit back, and kill it until it dies.

Finally, it’s over for real. Wait for the cutscene to hit, and pat yourself on the back.

• When Jake takes a knee after an attack, one leg will be outside his hitbox. Feel free to shoot a boss through that.
• Thrown glowsticks do despawn eventually. This is probably the only place where that will ever be relevant.
• Turning up the brightness all the way stops you from having to run back and forth activating flares, and technically isn’t cheating. At least that’s what I tell myself here.
• You effectively have infinite ammo for this fight, so in most cases it’s more important to have a full clip than it is to conserve ammo.

This is very much a “rough draft” of a guide. While I’m fairly confident in things like Dandelion 1 and Boomer 1’s attack patterns, I’m less confident in things like how Boomer’s Explosives work and Dandelion 2’s attack patterns. Without cheats, testing takes more time. Once I beat the game again, I’ll go back and test this boss with cheats so I can verify things like “does Dandelion 2 actually only stop at the ends of the level, or will he stop to attack you if you’re standing in the middle of the level”.

If you have any observations you’ve made that I haven’t listed, feel free to mention it in the comments and I’ll add it. If there’s any errors in this guide, mention it in the comments and I’ll fix it.