WayOfLoci

A guide/commentary on how to beat Phantom Express from the Railroad Wrath stage without taking damage in Cuphead.

This is on the Regular difficulty in Cuphead, using the Peashooter weapon and the Smoke Dash charm.

Phantom Express tips

Phase 1

– Eye projectiles 0:17, shoots numerous eyes which bounce towards your position. Try to get rid of before they reach, using EX attacks for increased hitbox helps. Would highly recommend the Spread weapon for this phase.

– Pumpkins 0:28, pumpkins will fly overhead carrying parryable bricks which when dropping on the wheels of your platform will move you in that direction. To avoid this you can; shoot the pumpkins down before they reach you, parry the bricks before they hit the wheel or parry the opposite wheel as it causes a timeout on the wheels so it won’t be affected when the brick hits the other wheel.

Phase 2

– Skull hands 1:05, the skull head which can do damage on will appear in one compartment and two hands in the others which then slam down. The hands won’t hit you if you are on the edge of you platform, and so the most dangerous part of this phase is the pumpkins dropping the bricks and moving you whilst the hand slams are happening. The pumpkins alternate from left and right, so try to shoot them down as they appear.

Phase 3

– Position 1:55, at the start of the fight with bosses on either side stay in the centre and wait for one to telegraph an attack before moving to the opposite side. If you are directly underneath one of the bosses when it telegraphs you may not have time to get to the other side of the arena due the parryable wheel’s cooldown time.

– At the start focus all attacks on one of the bosses as you can then stay on one side for the remainder of the phase.

– Lightning 1:58, boss will shoot a continuous lightning column which travels across the screen. Move the platform to the opposite side staying on the furthermost side from the lightning.

– Ghosts 2:02, ghost mobs will spawn from the centre which home towards you and when killed spawn parryable skulls which if they hit the wheels of the platform will move in that direction. If using peashooter using an EX attack is a great way for getting rid of these due to increased hitbox as normal attacks can miss due to the ghosts potentially awkward approach angle, this is also a part where I would recommend the spread weapon. Be careful of the drop of the skulls especially when the boss is doing it’s lightning attack that the ghost isn’t directly above the platform wheel.

Phase 4

– Damage 2:51, you can only do damage by striking the heart which requires parrying the tail. After parrying the tail would recommend using an EX attack (with the peashooter at least) due to the horizontal angle.

– Fireballs 2:54, after the heart is revealed fireballs will reign down. These will be the main focus to walk between to avoid, and would try to jump as little as possible only for the bone frisbee. You can also use the smoke dash into the left side wall for i-frames if needed.

– Bone frisbee 3:18, a sound cue similar to a horn will sound and a bone frisbee will appear drop down to your position and travel horizontally across the screen. Keep note of when it spawns from the sound cue and ready to jump as it appears, or smoke dash if needed if in the air.