The Leviathan

The Leviathan
Description:	Massive, gaping mouth, surrounded by three orifices from which tentacles sprout out.
Attack(s):	The Leviathan uses three tentacles in a bashing, sweeping attack. It can produce organic bombs.

"I've got more intel on the atmosphere. A survivor's report says that a massive creature entered the Hydroponics deck from outside the ship. That's when the air quality began degrading. The survivor called it... the Leviathan."

—Kendra Daniels

The Leviathan was a massive, amorphous Necromorph encountered in the USG Ishimura's food storage facility during the outbreak aboard the vessel.

Background

The Leviathan collided with the USG Ishimura while drifting through space, after which it made its way into the Hydroponics deck of the ship and barricaded itself inside the Food Storage facility. Shortly after, tracts of the Corruption began to spread at an exponential rate in close proximity to the Leviathan, and proceeded to overtake much of the deck.

Shipboard oxygen levels became critical as a result and, with the creation of poison-exuding Necromorphs known as Wheezers, the Hydroponics Deck became unable to support human life. A crew member encountered the beast and dubbed it with its name.

CEC agent Zach Hammond also encountered the Leviathan as the Hydroponics Deck lost all breathable air. Shortly after this, Isaac Clarke, having been advised about the Leviathan by Kendra Daniels, arrived on the deck, and was informed by Hammond of the creature's whereabouts. Clarke was successful in cleansing the air on the deck and also mixing a poisonous substance capable of killing the beast; however, the poison was short of truly effective, and Clarke was propelled to solve the matter by force.

Entering the Food Storage area, which the poison had granted Clarke access to by weakening the Leviathan to some extent, Clarke drew arms and killed the creature.

Strategy

• The Leviathan has two methods of attacking. Firstly, it uses one of its three tentacles to sweep across the area Isaac is standing on. Since the fight occurs in Zero-G, he can dodge the attack from jumping from floor to ceiling or vice versa. Isaac can also reliably dodge tentacle attacks by moving continuously left or right as the Leviathan swings them at him.
  • The trick here is to make Isaac's jumps as short as possible to allow more time to fire at the tentacle's weak spot. Aiming just above the tentacle when it begins its attack is a good tactic. The Contact Beam weapon is also a worthy choice for this.
    • After destroying a tentacle, the Leviathan will use a new attack, which consists of spitting out organic bombs through its central mouth where its core, that resides within, becomes briefly exposed.
• The Leviathan usually spits out five pods at a time. It is possible to use Kinesis on the first and third pods to destroy the second and fourth pods, but it is usually easier to strafe from the left and right. The fifth pod can be used as a projectile to hit the Leviathan's mouth in order to save ammo.
  • Shooting at the core after it finishes spitting out a bomb-volley, or using Kinesis to grab a pod and hurl it back into the Leviathan's mouth, is a good strategy. The pod will either collide with another pod the Leviathan has fired, causing an explosion, or will collide with the Leviathan's core, dealing damage. There are also Gas Canisters floating around the chamber that can be hurled with Kinesis.
  • Alternatively, shooting directly at the pods themselves will also hurl them back, if not outright detonating them inside the creature's mouth, dealing massive damage.
• The Flamethrower's secondary fire seems to cause extreme damage to the Leviathan's mouth.
• The Ripper's primary fire has too short a range to hit the Leviathan, and the projectiles of its secondary fire are too slow to be reliable. The Ripper is, in consequence, not a good choice against the Leviathan.
• Likewise, the Force Gun is also poor against the Leviathan, due to the primary fire being way too short-ranged and the secondary fire's bombs being too slow (unless if you are fast enough to launch a grenade).
• The Contact Beam's high damage is devastating against this boss. One blow will sever a tentacle instantly and a few shots to the mouth will kill it quickly, especially if the weapon is maxed out.
• A more direct tactic that can quickly defeat the Leviathan is to attack with a fully upgraded Pulse Rifle, easily dispatching both the tentacle pustules and explosive pods with quick aim.
• A second set of tentacles will spawn when the Leviathan is near death. Isaac's primary concern is still to shoot the explosive pods while they are in its mouth.
• Before engaging the Leviathan, which occurs when Isaac leaves the airlock to Food Storage, items in the area—boxed and otherwise—can be retrieved using Kinesis. Even a stock Kinesis module can reach all items inside.

Trivia

• The term leviathan is often used synonymously with sea monster, referring to the monster of the same name from the Old Testament of the Bible, which is said to have been the "big fish" that swallowed the Biblical character, Jonah. In Modern Hebrew, the word simply means "Whale." Certain esoteric and occult literature have described it as the Gatekeeper of Hell, and one of the seven princes of it.
• The Leviathan likely came from space, as evidenced by one of Dr. Elizabeth Cross's logs which states that the Necromorph crashed into the Ishimura from outer space. If this is the case then the origin of the creature and how it ended up in space is a big mystery.
• Almost nothing is shown about the Leviathan's biological structure besides its fleshy front.
• The Leviathan is extraordinarily heavy, weighing over 10 kilotons (10000 tons/22,046,000 Ibs.); assuming it is made entirely of recombined humans, basic math dictates that it would be composed of roughly 169,492 people of average weight.
• However given that the Leviathan is located in an empty food storage bay which was described as containing a food surplus in one of the audio logs left by Elizabeth Cross it seems clear that the Leviathan, though initially large, likely grew to 10 kilotons by incorporating the biomass from the food storage area into the original biomass.
• The Leviathan is the first Necromorph boss that Isaac faces.
• The Leviathan is one of the few life forms of Necromorph in the entire series to be directly referred to by its name; the others are the Hive Mind, the Moons, and the Nexus.
• There is a glitch that causes the Leviathan's animation to reset to its "alive" animation after it has been killed. After Isaac kills it and exits to the Air Quality Control room, then returns to food storage, the Leviathan will appear as if it is alive. It is not, however. This also happens with the Slug boss.
  • If you get close enough to it, however, it reanimates and begins the first phase of the battle again. However, once the tentacles are destroyed, the cysts do not come out like before. It remains in the state prior to the mouth-cysts and stays that way until you leave and reactivate the glitch. The player is fully capable of entering and exiting the room when the "battle" starts again. (This has only been tried after loading up a save file).
• It is possible to unlock an achievement for hitting 50 enemies with Kinesis here, as long as the player has killed an appropriate amount of enemies before hand. This can be done even if the Leviathan itself is dead, or if it is in the "glitched respawn" form.

Gallery

The Leviathan with its tentacles retracted and mouth open, exposing its core.

The Leviathan's tentacle attack.

Death Scenes

• Should Isaac be hit or swept with one of the Leviathan's tentacles while he has low health, he will be utterly ripped apart with nothing left of him.
• If Isaac is hit with one of the Leviathan's explosive projectiles with low health, he will either be dismembered or completely torn in half.

Appearances

• Dead Space
  • Chapter 6: Environmental Hazard (Only appearance)