Der Riese Declassified:
Easter Egg

Step 2: the overloaded teleporters

Teleporters Z-A and Z-B each have a task, in either order. When a task is done, the panel in front of the teleporter blinks red; using it overloads the teleporter, and every player has to stand inside to travel. Each trip gives one half of the Wunderwaffe DG-Scharfschütze, and the first one also leaves the second part of the Ragnarok DG-5 in the spawn.

Teleporter Z-B: the boilers

Turn the four valves of the two boilers in front of the teleporter, two on each, until all four pipes bubble. Not So Serious Gaming hears a voice line when it is done. Neon Slice warns not to turn them too far, or the step fails and has to be redone.

The laboratory and the bedroom

Z-B leads to a workshop of cryopods where the new Wunderwaffe sits in a glass case, with its half on a table; Z-A leads to Samantha’s bedroom, where Doctor Monty can be heard behind the door and the other half waits in a wardrobe.

Teleporter Z-A: the electrical boxes

Three boxes marked with a yellow triangle, each fed by a different number of cables from above. Shoot them with a Pack-a-Punched weapon, from one cable to three, as Ayyden and a commenter on IweZix’s guide explain. Flapix says instead that the order changes from game to game; either way, a wrong box plays a failure sound and the right order a success sound.

Step 3: the lights of Teleporter Z-C

Four lights hang on the walls around Teleporter Z-C, three green and one red. With the Wunderwaffe DG-2 or the DG-Scharfschütze, shoot them so that a beam of lightning bounces between them and forms a cross: back left, front right, front left, then back right, the red one. Then shoot the middle of the cross, at the teleporter. The panel blinks red; overload the teleporter and travel.

The cross of lightning

The four lights linked, the beams crossing above Teleporter Z-C.

The forest

The trees and the campfire of the Black Ops III main menu, where the crystal appears.

This teleporter leads to the forest of the Black Ops III main menu. Within 30 seconds a blue crystal, the elemental shard, appears over the campfire. Picking it up plays a long cutscene: the forest turns into the Dark Aether, an Apothicon roars in the distance, and a dark Samantha warns Richtofen that he will never succeed. After a minute the players are sent back to the spawn.

Step 4: the crystal escort

The crystal in the spawn

It floats on the mainframe, next to the Pack-a-Punch. The prompt reads « Initiate Temporal Anomaly » and needs every player. It gives a Max Ammo and a Full Power, all zombies sprint, and the round no longer ends until the escort is over.

The lockdowns

The crystal only moves while a player is near it, slowly, along a set path. At each stop it turns red, fire closes the area, and it has to be filled with souls: 20 kills at first, up to 40. Not So Serious Gaming keeps a crawler alive each time it moves.

The routes

Three paths, as Flapix shows them: from the spawn to the furnace, then Quick Revive, then into Teleporter Z-C; from the spawn to its left side, the Trench Gun and the front of Teleporter Z-A, then into Z-A; and from the spawn to the Wunderfizz and the electric trap by the power, then up to the catwalk of Teleporter Z-C. Each teleport brings the players back to the spawn with a Max Ammo. That makes two teleports and seven lockdowns before the last one.

The last lockdown

On the catwalk, use the crystal to start it. When it ends, every player gets every perk for the rest of the game, Quick Revive aside in solo, where it is still lost on a down. Not So Serious Gaming calls this reward Perkaholic.

Along the way, flashbacks tell the story of the factory: Maxis asking the Nazi party for funding in November 1939, Richtofen locking Maxis and his daughter in the teleporter in October 1945, and the Soviet and American soldiers who reached the factory in December 1945. Tinhorn puts the whole escort at about twenty minutes. The patch of October 29, 2020 disabled the traps during the escort, and listed a known issue: starting the escort during a dog round locked the quest. Ayyden adds that the crystal can turn invisible after a teleport, and that escorting it to the next lockdown area brings it back. Several players report on Steam that the last crystal can still bug out.

Step 5: Samantha

When the last lockdown ends, the screen fades to white. The panel in front of Teleporter Z-C then sends the players straight to the boss fight, with no way back: the game ends when the quest is over. A cutscene shows the crew face to face with a shadowy Samantha in a frozen arena, where zombies and Ice zombies attack.

The arena

A frozen clearing ringed by carved stone blocks, with an altar in the middle.

Her shield

Samantha floats inside a blue bubble that blocks all damage. At one point red glowing teddy bears appear around her, and they have to be killed or the shield never drops again.

Her attacks

Burning boulders that hover over the ground before they slam down, a frozen floor that leaves only a small ring of safety, an electric orb that chases the players, and Hellhounds.

The guides disagree on the weapon: STARMASTER458 finds the Mustang & Sally the strongest against her, along with the DG-3 JZ and a Pack-a-Punched Panzerschreck or machine gun, while Not So Serious Gaming found neither Wunderwaffe useful against her and advises a powerful bullet weapon, such as a shotgun. When she dies, a cutscene plays and the crew is sent on to Kino der Toten, in an ending that mirrors the opening of that map, before the game closes. The update of November 5, 2020 made that last white flash kill every zombie.