Lord Malachi

Lord Malachi is an ancient vampire who was fettered to another realm during the Crimson War. The evil creature is inhuman in appearance and feeds off the souls of those who are sacrificed to him.

Information
Location: Malachi's Tomb Appearance: Giant, bull-like skeleton the size of a small elephant Attack Damage: 10 Speed: Fast Health: Special Repelled By Crucifix: No Hits to Kill: Special

Setup
The underground tomb you face Malachi in is pretty big, so you have lots of room to manuever. It's also pretty dark, but this really isn't a problem since Malachi is on fire and emits so much light it's very easy to see him. Health kits and ammo are scattered around the tomb, but you really should go into this battle with as much as possible. Also, if at any point in the fight Malachi gets you below about 40 or 50 health, you should disengage and run around trying to find health kits to replenish yourself.

When you first land in Malachi's tomb, you'll notice him standing in a pillar of light in the middle of a circular device. The 16 gems in this device represent your 16 relatives (not including Buster, your dog). The white gems represent relatives you saved, and the red ones represent relatives who have died. Malachi himself is your basic 9- foot-tall demonic-looking humanoid. Don't bother attacking him at this point. You can't hurt him, but you´ll speed awakening. Just run around collecting any health and ammo you need.

After several seconds, a cutscene will play in which Malachi will unfold into a large, flaming, skeleton beast about the size of a small elephant (there's actually a picture of him on the inside cover of the game box, minus the flames). As soon as the cutscene ends, the fight will be on.

Description
Malachi is limited to melee attacks with his huge claws. He can stand still and swipe at you with his right or left claw, or he can lunge forward at you with both claws and the front half of his body. If he lunges forward, he'll stand still for half a second afterwards. Unlike most of the game's other bosses, Malachi's hits don't do an extreme amount of damage, but he's able to knock your weapon out of your hand with his swipes if you're unlucky. He's also reasonably fast, and you'll need to run a lot to stay out of his grasp.

Malachi's weak spot is his yellow glowing crystal heart, located in his rib cage just behind his huge skull. To damage Malachi, you'll need to hit him directly in the heart (Malachi will flinch and emit a burst of blue electrical energy whenever you score a successful hit). Unfortunately, it can be tough to hit the heart accurately because Malachi's skull is in the way, and since he constantly turns to faces you head-on it's difficult to shoot him from the sides.

Strategy
If you've got the Chalice, you've got no worries. Just run up to Malachi and toss holy water on him when you're standing right in front of his face. The spray should go right through his skull and hit his heart. A few hits will kill him if you've managed to save all your relatives, and will severely weaken him even if he's been fed by several of their lives.

If you don't have the Chalice or if you run out of holy water, you'll just have to do things the hard way and try to shoot the heart. There are several ways to do this. You can try firing at him when he runs toward you, and with luck you'll be able to hit his heart by shooting him through his open mouth (aim at the center of his skull for best results).

You can also wait for Malachi to lunge forward at you, then sidestep his attack and fire at him from the side during the split second he stands still after lunging. Alternatively, you can wait for Malachi to take a swipe at you, and when he does this his head will turn slightly, allowing you to hit his heart if you fire just behind where his ears would be.

Finally, you can get really close to Malachi such that you "clip" through his skull and can shoot at his heart, but this isn't really effective since Malachi will constantly be hitting you and throwing your aim off. The easiest way to hit Malachi's heart is to use the machine gun. With all the lead you'll be throwing out, you're bound to score at least a few hits per clip. If you don't have the machine gun (very, very bad), the revolver will do in a pinch, but it will be tough since it's difficult to hit the heart even if you're very accurate. Don't even think about trying it with the flintlock pistol or musket, the rate of fire is simply too slow. If all else fails, run under Malachi's skull and whack at him with your cane sword. With luck he'll die before you do.