Overview
-Estimated achievement difficulty: 4/10
-Offline: 50 (1000)
-Online: 0 (0)
-Approximate amount of time to 1000: 12-15 hours
-Minimum number of playthroughs needed: 1 and some Flashbacks
-Number of missable achievements: 3 (Path of Flesh / Path of Blood and Compassion)
-Do cheat codes disable achievements: No
-Does difficulty affect achievements: Yes, puzzle related
-Glitched achievements: None
-Unobtainable achievements: None
-Extra equipment needed: None
Introduction:
Saw 2 is a fairly simple but amusing game with a few tricky puzzles, and some clunky button press sequences. If you follow both my guide and Jeffy x360a's collectible guide, you should have little to no trouble getting the full 1000.
Step 1 - Get the easy stuff out of the way
Disconnect from XBox Live and do the Christmas and Halloween date related achievements. Then reconnect to XBox Live and punch in the classic Konami code. Finally, select Credits and watch the entire game credits (this can also be done once you complete the game for the first time).
Step 2 - First playthrough - Normal difficulty
To minimize the amount of time you will spend playing the game, it is recommended that you make sure Campbell survives the plank at the end of case 1. This will allow you to successfully use the “Flashback” method for the second ending achievement. To do this though, you also cannot use Flashback to replay any levels until you complete this playthrough. If you flashback during this run, the game will revert back to the default ending and you will need to play twice.
Other than that, all you need to worry about in this playthrough of the game is getting the collectibles. Jeffy x360a wrote a five star collectible guide, and you should follow it by the letter. If you miss a certain collectible it is exceedingly difficult to pinpoint which one was missed, so follow the guide! It can be found here. While doing this playthrough you will have to save the man (see "Compassion") and will most likely snag a few achievements for beating best times in puzzles. If you don't get them all, no worries, I'll cover those in a second.
Step 3 - Flashback for puzzle times and missing collectibles
At this point, you should have all your puzzle pieces, Billy dolls, audio tapes and case files. You've beaten the game once, got the Path of Blood achievement and now you have access to the Flashback feature. Any normal difficulty puzzle times you didn't beat on your actual run through of the game can be flashbacked to and beaten. Also, take a quick flashback to the puzzles and select Insane difficulty. This will snag you all the achievements in the game except for Path of Flesh. In the guide I have listed where the puzzles can be easily accessed and the method for restoring checkpoints and beating the puzzles.
Step 4 - Flashback for alternate ending
Now you will need to load up Chapter 1 and KILL Campbell by falling off the plank. Wait until Chapter 2 loads just to be safe. Then load up Chapter 8 and complete it fully.
Conclusion:
There you have it. The puzzles can be tricky, but if you follow the guide, you can easily flashback and restore checkpoints and grind them out. As far as collectibles go, I can't say enough that you should follow Jeffy's guide from the beginning. It can be difficult to pinpoint an item missed here and there. Enjoy.
x360a would like to thank mattshotcha for this Road Map