The sequel was first announced in a May 24th, 2011 blog post, announcing they would make a sequel for Test Subject Green, along with a spin-off title. Although stating that this "sequel" (not the spin-off) would be released in more than two months (and longer than the gap between Test Subject Blue and Test Subject Green), it would be a year and nearly nine months until anything was heard of the sequel again.
Finally, on February 15th 2013, Nitrome revealed a teaser image of the game — and also the game's name: Test Subject Complete. Notably, the sequel to Test Subject Green was greatly talked about in comments on Nitrome's Facebook page and emails — many fans asking Nitrome when then sequel to Test Subject Green will come.
Gameplay of Test Subject Complete varies a lot. From level one to six, the objective is to get the key card and then proceed to the food pill. On level seven, the objective is to shoot the hand of the guard. Levels eight to twenty-five task the player with having to get to a food container.
Spoiler
Levels twenty-six to thirty require that the player get to a designated elevator.
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The game opens with the ending of Test Subject Green — Doctor Nastidious entering his lab and injecting Blue into his suit. As soon as the game is started, the game enters into a first-person perspective of the glass helmet of the Rex209. The Rex209 talks in text to Blue, welcoming him to the Rex209 and (although probably unintentionally humorous) telling him that he (the Rex209) can be controlled with the keys or keys and can fire with the .
After level one, Rex209 tells Blue that Doctor Nastidious has gone to the Professor's base, and has hired mercenaries to run the projects. The mercenaries tend to not be that smart, as during these tests run by them, the soldiers tend to come close to the test chamber and watch Blue. These mercenaries also tend to be reckless when it comes to supervisions of the test.
Rex209 tells Blue how the mercenaries cooked an orange enzyme. At a certain point, Rex209 tells Blue how Doctor Nastidious is planning to return to his base, and that he destroyed the Professor's base, as he did not find what he wanted — Blue's formula. Rex209 decides that they have to escape, if they want to find the Professor.
During the test that follows this message, a solider begins to interfere with test, reaching his hand into the test chamber and deliberately killing Blue by crushing him (Blue) with his (the soldier's) finger. As Blue approaches the key card, the hand of the soldier comes from one side of that room, about to swipe and kill Blue. Blue reacts and shoots the hand of the soldier, surprising the solider, who appears to run away and accidentally knock over the test chamber.
Blue walks out unharmed, and begins his search for the professor. Blue manages to navigate each lab of Dr. Nastidious's base, moving from lab-to-lab via jumping into food containers. Rex209 tells Blue how he is looking for information regarding the professor's whereabouts. On one level, he says how he believes his messages are being intercepted by another object.
Rex209 finds a certain name constantly popping up in files, this name being "The Machine". He also discovers that while Dr. Nastidious did not find Blue's complete formula, he did find the Rex209 schematics and is using them to produce new Rex209 suits, these ones scaled up for humans. Rex209 on a certain level overhears a conversation between Doctor Nastidious and a soldier, a conversation about the professor. However, the conversation is blocked by another machine in the system. Blue eventually finds the professor — but finds out he is dead. Blue goes over and shakes the professor's face, only for his glasses to come off. Blue remembers memories of the professor, fond memories.
Suddenly, sirens sound, and a hand holding a glass cylinder appears at the top of the screen. Blue jumps into the Rex209 before the cylinder comes down. The screen then pans to Blue on a desk, still in the cylinder, and a constantly watching solider who constantly looks to see if the cylinder has moved. Blue escapes the level in a "I ♥ Tea" cup. The cup is dropped off at another area.
Blue peeks out, only to have a laser immediately come down and obliterate most of the cup. Blue realizes how there is a robot in the background that wants to kill Blue. Blue manages to avoid the robot's laser, and escape in another food container. Rex209 tells Blue that this is "The Machine", and how it is Doctor Nastidious's assistant. As Blue traverses more of Doctor Nastidious's lab, Rex209 finds that "The Machine" only wants to kill Blue.
At a later date, Rex209 discovers a secret encrypted file within its own hard drive — "Serum BLUE1207" — and begins to decode it. Rex209 makes a great discovery — where it (Rex209) is made for war, Blue is made to give life, and in essence, is life. With Blue being capable and resurrecting the professor, Rex209 and Blue decide to head back to the professor's dead body. Blue does so, and upon getting there, hops out of the Rex209, climbs up on to the professor, and jumps into his mouth. The Rex209 then deactivates.
The professor comes back to life. The professor then tries to find a way out of Doctor Nastidious's base, and while doing so, finds the human-sized Rex209 suits. The professor hops into a Rex209, and manages to get inside it and control it. The Rex209 has the memory of Blue's Rex209, and remembers the professor. The professor moves quickly, going through teleporters and killing guards who get in his way. The professor finds Doctor Nastidious at a door; Doctor Nastidious goes through the door and the professor follows him.
The professor and the scientist arrive in a room with a giant picture of himself (Doctor Nastidious) on the wall and a map lower down, a map that has red targets on it. Doctor Nastidous cause The Machine to lower down, all the way on to the floor. Doctor Nastidious gets into it, and proceeds to kill the professor. The professor nimbly avoids the attempts of the Doctor, and shoots the read weak spot of "The Machine" when the weak spot comes out.
The professor manages to destroy The Machine. Doctor Nastidious is flung out of the machine on to the ground, landing on his stomach. Nastidious turns so that he is on his back, and begins to breathe heavily. He then laughs, raising up a device held in his hand. He presses the button on the device, whereby his entire base enters a self destruct sequence. The professor exits through the other door in the room, and proceeds to escape the doomed base.
As he leaps through teleporters to get to the elevator, upon reaching the elevator, a solider steps out and points his (the soldier's) gun at the professor. As the soldier and professor stare at each other, the professor takes a few steps back. Just then, the self destruct sequence ends and the professor and the solider are blown out of the base by the power of the explosion (presumably blown out, based on the next scene).
In the next scene, the professor looks from a cliff at the doomed base of Doctor Nastidious, seeing the explosions happening on it. The base then collapses into the water. The scene then changes to a computer where the professor is writing his log. He states how Serum BLUE1207 has caused all his cells to regenerate. The professor writes how all his research has been destroyed, and the "the world is not ready for the elixir of life", alluding to how the elixir of life was what he was working on.
The professor writes how he will now cease to work on the elixir of life, and that if anyone is to read this ("this" referring to his log), that they should "not attempt to find me" (the word "me" referring to the professor). The professor then ends his log.
The messages Rex209 and the other mech suit present to Blue and the professor are shown below.
This section is incomplete. You can help by adding the missing info.
Blue and Rex209 decide to escape the test chamber in this level. When Rex209 starts moving, a mercenary will sometimes put his hand into the chamber. The player should shoot the hand once with a proton bullet. The test chamber will then be knocked over by the hurt mercenary, allowing Blue and Rex209 to escape. In order to escape, the player should navigate Blue and Rex209 to the right of the knocked over test chamber, where there is no wall.
This level is the first one out of the test chamber. The player needs to reach the item at the end of the level, in this case it is Wong's Take Out. Follow the most logical way up the platforms and teleporters. Destroy the crawling green enzyme, and if possible, the spinning green one. Get to the checkpoint. Shoot Blue's bullets through the teleporters to make sure they are dead. Then crawl upside down through the teleporter and use the bottom one to get to Wong's Take Out.
This collapsible box contains a video walkthrough for this level in Test Subject Complete. If you would like to view it, click the[show]tag.
When the player jumps out of the teacup, fire at the button quickly and pass through the teleporter to Blue's right. Destroy the two guns with three shots. This makes the level much easier than risking to run fast through the level. Try and dodge the green enzyme that throws green enzymes, and shoot at it. Go where it is and go through the teleporter on the platform. Go down and enter the box of floral tissues.
This collapsible box contains a video walkthrough for this level in Test Subject Complete. If you would like to view it, click the[show]tag.
This is the first level that includes The Machine. It homes in on the player and when it "locks the target [reticule]", it begins to fire its laser, instantly killing Blue if it hits him. It will continue to fire its laser and move around its reticule, until it stops; it will fire again if the reticule hovers over Blue.
When the laser blasts Blue out of the cup, run left through the teleporter. Once Blue reaches the other side, jump through the other teleporter and fire a bullet at the switch button.
This button turns on or off the blue and orange teleporters. Make sure it turns on the orange teleporter. Go back to the other side and jump through the orange teleporter. Now, things get complicated because Blue needs to be fast. The player needs to jump nimbly across the four platforms and make sure Blue hits the button on the top left, hitting this button once. Make sure Blue does not fall off and go back to the left side.
Go through the blue teleporter to get to the floral tissues.
This collapsible box contains a video walkthrough for this level in Test Subject Complete. If you would like to view it, click the[show]tag.
This navigational box contains a spoiler. To open the box, click the [show] tag.
In this level, the player fights Doctor Nastidious in The Machine. Nastidous's first phase of attacking is backing up to the wall and tp thrust forward with a drill. It can be dodged by going through the teleporter at the bottom left corner. When he crashes to the wall, his weak spot - which is the red orb - will stick out. The player has to duck and shoot at it, letting him recover.
Immediately, a soldier will come out of the middle elevator. The player needs to kill him to make things easier. Nastidous's second phase is climbing the wall, around the side, while firing a laser diagonally. The player needs to hide under the platforms, so they will not get hit.
Dr. Nastidous will stop at the middle of the ceiling. Once the player passes him, Nastidious will fall with drills charging down at the player. Once he impacts the floor, the red orb will come out from the machine, this orb the player has to shoot before Dr. Nastidious becomes conscious.
Nastidious's last phase is crawling around the room and firing lasers horizontally and vertically. The player has to be strategic on where they have to hide before they get hit, although the places they hid before in the previous phase always work this time. Soldiers will keep entering the room at intervals. After Nastidious has lapped the room once and stays on the middle of the ceiling, he will fall down when the player runs under him.
However, instead of becoming stuck in the ground, he will get up on his legs and use the drill (used in the first phase) extremely fast and his weak spot will be shown once he impacts the wall. After the player shoots it, The Machine collapses and flings Dr. Nastidious out. Nastidious will move on to his back and set off a time bomb to blow up his base.
After going through the door, the player has thirty second to reach a door at the other side of the room. The ending will be shown once the player reaches this door.
This navigational box contains a spoiler. To open the box, click the [show] tag.
The following enemies only appear in Test Subject Complete:
Throwing orange enzymes — These enzymes appear as a mound with two heads, one that is living and the other that is used for defense; the non-living head is thrown at Blue when he comes near
Rhino orange enzymes — Big, armored enzymes that move slowly towards Blue. These enzymes have armour plating on their face, armour that comes off the more damage they take
Worm orange enzymes — Orange enzymes dropped into the tank by guards. These orange enzymes explode upon contact with any surface, but will release worms that will crawl in one direction.
Cooked orange enzymes — Containers that hold liquid orange enzymes. Enzymes in the container will jump or move up and try to hit Blue if it is above them.
Enzyme tubes - Shiny silver tubes which drip orange goo droplets that are dangerous on contact. The droplets, upon hitting a platform, will slide along until they fall off.
Nitrome announced the sequel, along with announcing that it would take longer to release than Test subject Green. The previewed image was an image from Test Subject Arena, and not the sequel to Test Subject Green.
Nitrome released another blog post about Test Subject Complete. This blog post revealed that the Rex209 may walk on all sides of the walls and it also revealed one of Dr. Nastidious's soldiers tampering with Blue.
If the player presses the "R" button to reset the level, and holds it down, then a glitch will occur. Doctor Nastidious' laboratory will be shown without anything in front of it except for the red cog in the top right corner. Also, the music will play its beginning note over and over again until the player stops pressing the "R" button. This glitch can occur in any level of the game.
If the player is on a level with moving green teleporters that they have moved, and they reset the level, the teleporters will not reset, but instead stay where they were.
If the player dies on a level, and then hits the reset button before they are fully reconstructed, the player will stay alive but the beginning cut-scene of the level will also play. Blue will jump out of his hiding place, while the original Blue can still be controlled by the player. The original Blue will disappear and the new Blue will become controllable to the player once the cut-scene is over, and the level officially "starts".
The player's Blue next to the reset one, shortly before the cut-scene ends
If The Machine's laser is being fired while the player resets the level, the sound of his laser going can still be heard. The sound will not go away until the new Machine fires its laser, or if if the player quits the game.
In the beginning of level 22, if the player goes to the left of the tissue box they spawn at, they will find what seems to be a stack of invisible platforms. If the player presses the jump button (↑) while on the platforms, they will go downwards instead of up. The player can continue to go down even into the cabinet that that they start on, but the platforms end after going two steps down into the cabinet. On the last platform, pressing up will cause Blue to go upside-down onto it. Attempting to move left or right while in the cabinet will result in Blue glitching back and forth, but still staying in the same place.
Unfortunately, The Machine is able to shoot the player while they are exploiting this glitch. This glitch is also possible in other levels.
If the player pauses the game and exits to the menu while a sound is being played (e.g. The Machine's laser sound), that sound will still be heard in the menu. This sound often clashes with the menu music and sounds, making it quite easy to detect when the glitch is occurring.
In level four, if Blue walks over to the food pill capsule, stands in front of it, and jumps, Blue will stand underneath an invisible platform. Blue can turn around and fire enzyme bullets normally. If Blue jumps into the invisible platform from either side, then it will move into it and fall slowly down to the below platform.
On May 13th 2013, Nitrome fixed many of the major glitches in the game. These glitches included some of the reset level glitches, the invisible steps glitches, and the laser sound loop issues.
Many Nitromians thought that the game will be named "Test Subject Red", Rex209, Test Subject Rex(209) or Test Subject Blue 2[citation needed].
The teaser image for the May 21st, 2011, update is the same image used for the menu of Test Subject Arena.
The voice for Rex209 is likely some sort of text-to-speech program, and not an actual voice actor, as in the second cutscene in the game, when Rex209 mentions Dr. Nastidious's name, the spoken word "Nastidious" is almost completely inaudible.