Ultra-bitter spray
Ultra-bitter spray is the purple colored spray in Pikmin 2 that the player can get from ten purple Burgeoning Spiderwort berries, or by finding a concentrated dose. When used, it temporarily turns any nearby enemy or bomb-rock into stone, rendering them unable to do anything.
There are fewer ultra-bitter berry carrying Burgeoning Spiderworts, which makes the spray harder to obtain in comparison to ultra-spicy sprays. In addition, this spray is normally discovered after the ultra-spicy spray, because while ultra-spicy spray is found on the required path in the Awakening Wood, ultra-bitter spray is not found until after the acquisition of White Pikmin, near the Bulblax Kingdom. Unlike the ultra-spicy spray, this spray type does not return in Pikmin 3.
Petrification
This spray can be deployed by pressing 
/ 
. Any enemy or bomb-rock in the direction of the cursor instantly becomes immobilized and slowly turns into stone. In the case of New Play Control! Pikmin 2, the leader will spray in front of them, but the cursor's direction is still what matters. The enemy is only temporarily immobilized and will eventually break free. Before reaching this point, the enemy begins shaking, as an indication that the petrification is wearing off. In total, this effect lasts for nine seconds – one second for the stones to form, and eight seconds of complete encasement.
Any regular enemy that becomes petrified will have its defense decreased, such that all Pikmin and leader attacks cause 150% normal damage. However, any petrified boss will have its defense increased, and all attacks will cause only 25% normal damage. Purple Pikmin stomps and bomb-rock damage is not changed either way.
Petrifying enemies that are in the process of eating any Pikmin will make it possible to save those Pikmin from dying. Likewise, bomb-rocks that were in the middle of their countdown will freeze, allowing the leaders and Pikmin a chance of reaching safety. It should also be noted that a petrified dormant bomb-rock will become active after the petrification ends, even if it wasn't attacked during.
If there are no enemies nearby, the leader will still spray it in the air, wasting one dosage. In the Piklopedia, the player can deploy ultra-bitter spray by pressing 
/ . This does not affect the ultra-bitter spray quantity in the main story mode, and can be used before the sprays are even discovered during the adventure.
Petrified enemy spoils
When an enemy is defeated while petrified, it will crumble to dust and leave behind some drops of liquid – each one can either be nectar, or either type of spray drop. It still relinquishes whichever treasures or pellets it would normally drop. The amount of blobs, and the chances of what type they will be depend on the petrified entity[1], as explained in the following table, although it is possible the chances could be different in practice.[2]
| Category | Drops | Chances | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nectar | Spicy spray | Bitter spray | ||
Normal
|
1 | 90% | 5% | 5% |
Empty
|
0 | |||
| Weak | 1 | 99% | 0.5% | 0.5% |
| Strong | 5 | 85% | 7.5% | 7.5% |
| Final boss | 10 | 0% | 50% | 50% |
| Spectralids | 1 | See below | ||
Unmarked Spectralids internally belong to the "empty" group, but they are forced to run the drop generation code on death regardless of how they die. When underground, this code has an 80% chance of quitting out without the Spectralid dropping anything, but in the overworld, they will always successfully drop their blob. Their drop will always match their color.
Other uses
In 2-Player Battle, this spray can also be used to disarm the opponent's Pikmin by planting them in the ground, and reverting all flower and bud Pikmin to leaves. Although the Pikmin will automatically jump back out of the ground after ten seconds, they will not regain their buds or flowers.
For some reason, hitting spicy Pikmin with the ultra-bitter spray will reset their spicy timer. This can be used to extend the duration of one spicy frenzy, at the cost of using up bitter sprays.[3]
Glitches
- Fragile Hermit Crawmad: oddly, by petrifying a Hermit Crawmad, it can be damaged just by walking into it.
- Volatile Dweevil suicide: petrifying a Volatile Dweevil just as it's blowing up can cause it to kill itself while petrified.
- Spray nectar swap: if a bitter spray nectar drop is absorbed while a nectar or a spicy spray drop show up, the game will count the spray nectar as if it were spicy nectar. Although rarer, the opposite can also happen, if a bitter spray drop appears.
Gallery
- Bitter drop.jpg
A drop of ultra-bitter spray.
A Ranging Bloyster being petrified.
The same creature completely petrified.
A Yellow Wollywog breaking out of petrification.
The same creature defeated while petrified.
The pause menu item for the spray and berry count.
Trivia
- Each enemy type has an individual multiplier setting for how long the petrification should last, but it is never given any use, as all of them have this value set to 1.0.
- Likewise, there is code for enemies with a "petrification type" of
3, that would make them drop 3 drops (90% nectar chance, 5% for either spray type), but nothing in the final game has this value.
- Likewise, there is code for enemies with a "petrification type" of
Names in other languages
| Language | Name | Meaning | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
 French |
Spray amer | Bitter spray | |
 French (NoA) |
Brume amère | Bitter mist | Taken from the manual of New Play Control! Pikmin 2. |
 Italian |
Spray ultra-amaro | Ultra-bitter spray | |
 Spanish (NoA) |
Atomizador superamargo | Super-bitter atomizer |
See also
References
- ^ From instruction
0x80102224to0x80102348of the European Pikmin 2 DOL; functionGame::EnemyBase::onKill()with debugging symbols. - ^ Values obtained from a fan-driven experiment.
- ^ Video on Twitter, published on March 25th, 2018, retrieved on March 25th, 2018