Mendel Palace FAQ(NES) version 2.0.0 copyright 2004 by Andrew Schultz schultza@earthlink.net Please do not reproduce this FAQ for profit without my prior consent. However, if you write a polite e-mail to me referring to me(and this FAQ) by name, then I will probably say OK. But if I ignore you that means no--and I am bad about answering e-mail. Sorry. **** AD SPACE: **** My home page: http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Exhibit/2762 ================================ ENGINEERED TO BE WEIRD OUTLINE 1. INTRODUCTION 2. CONTROLS 3. MAP, POINTS AND GENERAL STRATEGIES 3-1. MAP 3-2. POINTS 3-3. GENERAL STRATEGIES 3-4. SILLY BONUS LEVELS 4. LEVEL BY LEVEL (to access a specific one, search for 4-#-#) 5. BONUS LEVELS (to access a specific one, search for 5-##, i.e. lvl 1 = 5-01, 23 = 5-23.) 6. VERSIONS 7. CREDITS ================================ 1. INTRODUCTION Mendel Palace is a lively and very odd game. It takes place on a group of 7x5 sliding tiles, which doesn't seem like much until you realize people can dodge around nicely on the tiles. Your protagonist's main weapon is being able to slide these tiles, which pushes opponents back. If they touch the edge of the playing field, then they burst into a bunch of small balls and go poof. Get rid of all enemies, and the level is cleared. You even have power- ups on the way. These include stars(100 gets an extra life--where've we seen that before?) or a sun, which slide all tiles on the board, or 5-second bonuses or sonic blasts that ripple tiles in every direction or just the indicated one. Sliding tiles may reveal a treasure, and sometimes you have to slide a tile seven times to see what's what, but it's not always good--it may reveal a sequence of nested squares, where more enemies can drop in. Later levels force you to avoid certain squares while sliding others. The enemies themselves are nothing short of bizarre. Each one does something different. I don't mean better. Legitimately different. Some jump in the air when they rush to attack you. Some jump the first time you slide their tiles. Others are fatties that bounce when their tile is shuffled and push you back--hopefully not into a wall. But the last three are delightful: dancers that spin with increasing curvature, swimmers who slide the tiles behind them(a very clever physically plausible enemy) and copycat girl scouts whom you must coerce into killing each other at times. There are nine scenes with each enemy in a different castle before you get to a boss fight. Then you cross the bridge to the big castle and go into the sky. Then there are 100 more bonus levels. Mendel Palace has parts that are very replayable and others that aren't. Many boards hide secret treasures that make them much easier. You even have spinners that bounce you around(you can direct several in a row to kick you at right angles, or even bounce between two) and glowing ones that kick you to a side level where you just need to collect treasure to advance. These are often well hidden, but if a level doesn't seem to have enough rewards, it's time to go poking around. If there's one big fault with Mendel Palace, it's a sign o' the times the game was made. NO SAVE ABILITY! Well, you can always continue--you get 3 lives to complete a level--and in fact you can try your luck at the last level you failed at in another castle when you continue. I've found I can get through the game in 2 hours after one stretch run--but it took me 4+ the first time, when I saw enemies and didn't know how they moved. Some of the levels, too, have a surprise that's hard to forget--enemies that seem to swarm are knocked out by a judicious hidden sun, and there's no other way to do it, and trying again you don't feel you're solving anything, just acting on received ideas--the difference between knowing which Bronte wrote what and knowing about the content of the books. Mendel Palace also seems to lock up my emulator and ZoopSoul mentioned the harrowing tragedy of having the game lock up on him on the original NES...when he was so close to finishing after an all night session playing it. Ouch! All in all though, Hudson has had much worse efforts. They always seem to take chances going in for esoteric puzzle games, and this one really worked. Good job to them! As a final note about this FAQ itself, I use shorthand such as UL/UR/DL/DR(upper/left/down/right) or 2U3R or even coordinates(DL=0,0). Also, there is a possibility I've missed some neat hidden points, and a reason I wrote this was to get from others what I'd maybe missed. Also, a pace is defined as 1/3 of a square, i.e. the smallest unit you can move. Also some shorthand you'll see will be (0/1/5, 0/1/3)--meaning all possible combos of these coordinates. 2. CONTROLS First of all, the start button is a useful pause. Use it to strategize where to go or which tile/enemy to blast next. The controls in Mendel Palace aren't perfectly intuitive because you can always stand on the edge of a tile, which crosses things up. If you are walking along an edge, you can't expect to have a tile in front of you to slide, really, and if you're at an edge, you will slide the tile in front of you. You can in fact slide the tile you're on if you are just inside it and facing towards the far side. This is never quite clear although if you're still on the thin outline, you'll probably still slide the square you're on. Where you are on a tile in Mendel Palace can be quantized. You can be at the left edge, right edge, or center and be at the top, center or bottom of it. You only get credit for picking up a square(star, rotating, dark-sun or tile-flip sun) if you step in the middle of it. Enemies are restricted to the same walking conventions as you are, except for the spinning dancers and diagonal swimmers, who aren't really walking anyway. Turning is also a problem in Mendel palace. It seems to take time to turn and slide. So be forewarned. You can actually turn in place by lightly tapping the controller, but it takes time for you to whirl around. Diagonal walking doesn't save you time, but it might confuse your opponents, and it helps you to understand the units your character moves in. As for the precise parameters about what you slide when you're where, assume you're sliding something left in the picture below. a b c < d e f < c, f and i will slide the tile you're on g h i < a, b, d, e, g, h will slide the tile you're near to If you're on the far edge of a tile in any direction you face, in fact, you'll slide that tile. An exception to having to step on something occurs when you take a flipper through it. Not only can you hold down the direction you want to twist a flipper in advance, you don't have to fly through the center of a star square to set it off. 3. MAP, POINTS AND GENERAL STRATEGIES 3-1. MAP Aliens(1) Mohawks(2) doodlers(3) +--------------+ Fatsos(4) | Big palace | buckwheats(5) +--------------+ Spin dolls(6) swimmers(7) girl scouts(8) In terms of difficulty, it seems to get harder as you go left-right, then down, etc. But I always go clockwise. You can't enter the Big Palace until you've cleared the other eight palaces. Once you've cleared one palace, you can't re-enter Each one has nine rooms, plus a boss fight. If your game ends, you can continue at any palace you want, at the last level you got stuck on. There is a castle in the sky after the big palace. The bonus levels are a bit more linear. 3-2. POINTS 100 points for each star you collect 10000 points + 10 stars for collecting a glowing star, i.e. the last of the orange stars, not added to the regular 100+1 for a star. 10 points for sliding an enemy back but not killing him 100 points each time you bump into a twiddler 1000 points for stepping on a 4-way sonic blast 1500 points for stepping on a directional blast 2000 points for stepping on a 5-second square 5000 points for stepping on a sun 100 points for stars in a dark side room, + 100 points for each time unit left when you collect them all 10000 points for winning a boss fight There are also squares that flash randomly. Here is their pattern: 10 / 10000 / 10 stars(+1000 points) / free 1up / 10 / 10000 / 10 stars(+1000 points) So often you think you're timing to get the 1up, but you're really getting 10 points, since it's vanished from what seems to be a loop of 4 after you were sure you saw that 1up last time. No points for sliding into something via a flipper or having other guys slide each other into a wall, which is a shame, as that can require a bit more skill. Points are a bit different for the bonus areas. 3-3. GENERAL STRATEGIES You should play Mendel Palace just to get through it and familiarize yourself with monsters the first time, then run by the second and see about hidden power-ups to get through quickly and with lots of points. If you build up men early on, you can waste them later. Just-get-through strategies include picking off one or two specific bad guys at the start of a level or its restart and dealing with the rest, a lesser force, later. You can also aim to take out just one or two bad guys per life if you get ahead of the game. Since there are no more than six to start a level, this will get you through. It's a practical strategy in case you don't want perfection. The commonest strategy to trap an opponent is to sucker him into a corner and wait kitty-corner. Whichever way he turns, slide that square. You don't want to wait at the edge nearest him, as he seems to track you by square on the 7x5 grid and not precise location, but often you can run past him if you're way in the corner, turn around and get him. Similarly you can shake one square over, turn around and blast him, if he does come at you. Bad guys take time to turn around as well. Stand and walk on the edge of tiles to run to a more favorable position, although this does make it harder to slide tiles. Perpetually sliding a tile in the "B" area(see 4-1, squares next to edge) can kill opponents that are running at you from the edge, eventually. This is a good simple mnemonic to mop up that last bad guy. Beware of just flipping squares over once you've won a level. If one holds a bonus, then go for it. But with all enemies clear, if you get one of those hypnotic square fields, the end-of-level tune will change and you'll have someone to fight against. Be especially wary of suns or sonic blast squares if you know the mega-squares exist. On the other hand, you can use a few seconds after you've nailed the last enemy to gather loot, in case you overlooked something or wanted to defeat the enemy to make picking up a treasure much safer. This is a nice finesse. But despite all this, there's one constant trick. Slide enough tiles to find a sonic blast or a sun, which will allow you to blast open the board and kill most of your enemies. 3-4. SILLY BONUS LEVELS There are three silly bonus levels I know of: a 7x5 chunk of stars, a 5x5 with flipper squares on the side, a 5x5 with flipper squares on the side, and a 7x5 set of sonic blast/star/open squares. This is a nice level to pick up points on. You don't have much to do, but you can maximize the points you get. If you run through a flashing flip- square you're transported to a dark level with 35 stars. The task is simple: pick up the 35 stars and get a nice bonus for the time you have left. You shouldn't have any problems getting things within the required time limit but the maximization is another thing. The best I've been able to do is to get 110 stars and 23000 points--you get 3000 just for entering, 10000+10 stars for completing it, 35 stars and 65 points for each time unit left(this is counted on the board's boundary.) The old 'chessboard parity problem' makes an appearance here. Consider the 7x5 board as follows: ..XX..XX..XX.. ..XX..XX..XX.. XX..XX..XX..XX XX..XX..XX..XX ..XX..XX..XX.. ..XX..XX..XX.. XX..XX..XX..XX XX..XX..XX..XX ..XX..XX..XX.. ..XX..XX..XX.. Note that there are 18 . squares and 17 X's. Also note that, for the quickest possible path, your guy must run between centers of the tiles. So if he starts off on an X, the next square is a ., then an X, and so on, and you're left with 2 .'s(oops, didn't think ahead to the hellish punctuation this would cause.) So it seems you have to live with that, and there's also a problem of turning at the right time so you don't lose any time, since to pick up a star you have to be at the center of it. But it's actually not too tough to do better. What you can do is to go left immediately, and you turn down once you get to the center of the edge star. Then you can start picking up stars from there. Weave left/up/right/up/etc, clearing each row as you get to it. This should get you the full bonus with the minimum of risky turns. Some bonus levels have bonus squares under them: ....... .*..... ....... .....?. ....... If you slide the sun immediately, the board reverts to where there is a flashing star a square right of where you started. You can pick it up for the quick bonus and then also slide the rotating bonus square as the countdown goes on. Some have bonus squares under other places: ....... ....... ..D.*.. ....... ....... Here, you can get all the stars, slide the sun and step on it, then step on the dark sun to get a new wave of bonuses to pick up. It's very lucrative. In the 5x5 one, with flippers on the side, the object is the same, but there's a hidden star at the center of the board. XX..XX..XX XX..XX..XX ..XX..XX.. ..XX..XX.. XX..XX..XX XX..XX..XX ..XX..XX.. ..XX..XX.. XX..XX..XX XX..XX..XX You should start moving when the star counter registers you've stepped on the center square. Then go as follows: +-------+ | | +-----+ | | +---+ +-+ | | | +-+ +-+ | | | | +-+ +---+ At the end of the walk, go down and slide left for the final star. With perfect play just walking through I've gotten 20000 on this level. There are a lot of zig zags to do it though. But in fact I believe you can do a bit better. When near a corner square, simply run into that flipper and push away from the corner. You'll keep bouncing off. This will net you a few extra hundred points in the end and won't take you too far off course. You should have the time to cover all four. Maybe you can cover other side squares the same way, but given the piking totals you'd get for the improvements I never bothered to check. I think it's >1000 per flipper, running past them into the wall, but you may not be able to use all 10 before time runs out on you. Of course you can head to an edge and run into a final flipper after getting the final star, as the bonus is counting down. For the all-sonic-blast level, you could clear out the center column of all stars, then use sonic blasts, take out the stars you see, and then work on the center row(one blast, grab the stars, slide the square you didn't touch.) But there's a sun handy to make your life much easier. Slide down and go down. Slide right and go right. Slide right and get the star. Go back left and slide right. Get the sun. Then... tuvwxyz sponmlk rqf0hij (0 = g, retreat from cde1234 3 to 2.) ba98765 I've been able to extract 25000 points from this. 4. LEVEL BY LEVEL (to access a specific one, search for 4-#-#) I'll try to include maps where possible here. The tiles you slide get more complicated as the game goes on. I've also probably missed a good deal of hidden stuff in here. But I hope to have nailed the important parts. Ledger for maps e = where enemy drops + = star * = sun . = normal square : = unshiftable square @ = square thing enemies drop on # = sonic > = arrow, i.e. directional sonic D = sun that darkens things X = block x = bustable block ! = passage to side level = = un-slideable square w/metal screws on % = flip-square you can bounce off I may include several in a square as the game goes on; a square, shifted several times, will display different attributes. I may even miss some later ones as the game gets quite involved. But the maps are still 7x5. Below is a map that deals with terminology I'll use. A=outside, B=inside, C =near center, D=center. So "A-square" or "A" means peripheral. I also may refer to a square as (2,3) or such which in this case means 2 right and 3 up of the lowe left corner. AAAAAAA ABBBBBA ABCDCBA ABBBBBA AAAAAAA 4-1. ALIENS The aliens aren't too tough. They don't go directly for you, and they're not terribly fast. They don't zigzag much, either, and if they're kitty- corner from you they don't get close to the edge so you may not know which way to push. The blue ones turn into smaller aliens after one hit later on, but even those aren't going to intimidate you. If the aliens are in one of the 'B' squares in the map above but near the edge, you can take them out. You're a bit faster than they are, too, unless you dawdle too long. To defeat the aliens, you can pretty much slide their tiles back and move forward. They're not fast enough to catch up to you and take time to recover after you've slid their tiles. Your biggest risk is if you try to pick up all the stars before winning. Just nailing everyone should be no problem. 90 points for a white/green alien 990 points for a big white/blue alien 80 points for a small white/blue alien 4-1-1. ....... ....... ..+++.. ....... ....... ...?... ..+++.. ....... ....... ....... This introductory level presents you with the very basics. You can pick up all six stars and then deal with your opponents. Actually, if you go for a corner star, you can push an opponent into the wall once he gets to the next square. There's nothing hidden here except for a bonus at the center square where you were. Four opponents appear at the corners. 4-1-2. S...... ......+ ..+++.. ....... ....... ....... ..+++.. ....... ......S +.....? Enemies at the corners again but this time there are hidden squares. Stars under the UR/DL are what you need for the point and ten-star bonus. You can still just pick up the stars and use the sonic blast to kill all but one enemy. Then go to the lower right sonic blast, use it, and slide the lower right corner for a neat bonus. Get the final two stars. Clear your enemies. 4-1-3. +.....+ ....... +....S+ .?..... +.....+ ....... +S....+ .....*. +.....+ ....... Three enemies on each side column. Here you can jump-start by stepping on a sonic square when you have bad guys lined up. This will also reveal the sun and the bonus. Slide the squares where the stars disappeared and the rest should be a mop up job. You don't even have to slide your opponents. Just step on the sun after you've gotten what you want. 4-1-4. ......S *...... .++.... ....... .++.++. ....... ....++. ....... S...... ......? Three enemies each side column, and the plan of dodge, pick up stars, get one sonic blast, get a bonus and then the sun still holds. Although you can just get the blast first and take out a few bad guys to make picking up the stars easier. 4-1-5. ...+... S.....S ..+++.. ....... .++.++. ....... ..+++.. ....... ...+... S.....S 6 guys at top/bottom of columns 1/4/7. It's a bit difficult here to go after the stars without turning one over first, but if you head to a corner and slide the sonic blast out and then step on it when a lot of victims are around, you'll have just one star to flip back over and should pick up the others pretty easily. You can probably take out everyone else with sonic blasts here. 4-1-6. +++++++ ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... +++++++ ....... Now you move on to the blue aliens(at the corners.) They're really just as easy--the big motivation is to blast them the first time, or they turn into a couple of small guys who give you less points even if they can be backed into a wall halfway across the board with just one slide. 4-1-7. +++++++ S....eS +++++++ e*..... +++.+++ ....... +++++++ .....?e +++++++ Se....S It's well worth your time to try to pick up everything here. It's good for point total and general enemy avoidance skills. The enemies are still pretty clueless, and with sonic blasts at the corner and even a sun, there are plenty of ways to bail yourself out even if the monsters start going fast and there are too many to run away from, which takes a while to happen anyway. 4-1-8. +++++++ ....... +.....+ ?...... +.....+ ....... +.....+ ......* +++++++ ....... Eight enemies, in the corners and midpoint of each edge, in the form of tiny blue aliens. You can probably blast the one on the bottom, pull the star up again, and walk around any enemies that might accost you from then on. After walking around and getting everything, slide (6,1) to reveal a sun. Heck, you can get almost everything if you double back immediately after touching the sun. But if you want to win quickly, go down, two right, slide and step on the sun. 4-1-9. ....... S+++++o +...... .S+++?+ ++..... ..SS+++ ++++... ....SS+ ++++++. *.....S Blast down first of all to get one enemy. If you're really on the ball, go right and down and blast again. That will kill off two of the enemies(green guys) that are on the top ridge of stars. If it works, great, but in any case try to slide the DR square to help kill a few more enemies off. Note that there's an orange sun in the upper left when you trip the DR square. There are a lot of stars to get here the natural way so you may just want to bag what you can before tripping the darkness(when it also helps to have just one guy remaining.) If you are able to get most stars before grabbing the orange sun, you can get a whopping bonus, but grabbing the stars in the dark works pretty well. Use the sun once all that's over and you should be able to get to the bonus at (5,3) just before the level ends. 4-1-10. There's no boss scene--just a weird prince carrying off the girl you want to rescue. 4-2. BABIES These are a bit tougher. They jump up and down, so you have to time when to slide a tile out from under them. But they don't tend to make quick turns, you're a bit faster than they are, and of course you can anticipate where they'll wind up, short-term. The timing shouldn't take long to master, either. You can walk under them while they're jumping as well. Pink pants babies move constantly. Green ones don't move unless you do. Red ones seem to stay on the ground less. 150 points for a pink pants baby 310 points for a green pants baby 590 points for a red pants baby 4-2-1. .....+. +...... ..*.... ......+ .+..... Four babies land, one on each star. You can almost just off them with the sun, but one will probably bounce up, and you'll have to avoid him. Don't jump on it immediately, either, or you may not get any babies. The sun reveals stars vertically and horizontally around it, though, and you can just pick off the four stars on the edge later for a nice bonus. 4-2-2. XX..... ..+++.. XX..... ..+++.. ....... ..SSS.. .....XX ..+++.. .....XX ..+++.. Babies land in the UR, DL, and 1DR of the UL and 1UL of the DR. The blocks follow the pattern: crumbly, solid, solid, and the babies break them when they first land. You can pick off the sonic blasts sequentially, getting the stars vertically above each one before proceeding to the next. 4-2-3. ++...++ ++...++ ++...++ ++...++ ++...++ Babies land 3 on a side, left and right. Note if you push a star you have to push it twice to bring it back up. Random bonus in the lower right. 4-2-4. <.....< <.+++.< <.+.+.< <.+++.< <.....< Your first meetup with bad guys close by and directional sonic blasts. Fortunately the enemies run to the edges. Bad guys are in rows of 3, just next to you. The green-pants guys can be easy to kill if you use a blast at the right time. You'll want to get rid of bad guys expediently, but beware of using a directional sonic blast up the side. That's because eventually a hypnotic square will come by and make for reinforcements. Try to use horizontal sonic blasts, or trap the bad guys in the middle. ?-bonus at (1,4). 4-2-5. ....... ....... +++.+++ 555.SSS +.+.+.+ 5!5.S!S +++.+++ 555.SSS ....... ....... Bad guys in corners, middle of top/bottom Hidden sonic blasts under the right stars, additional seconds under the left, and big treasures in the center square make this an easy level. On the left: sun and dark-sun. On the right: bonus and sun. You may want to save one enemy to get through all the fun with a huge bonus. 4-2-6. +++++.. ?...5B. ++++... ...5B.. +++.... ..5B... ++..... .5B.... +...... 5B....S Five red babies drop on the diagonal border of stars. You can get the stars prettty easily and uncover some 5-second bonuses under where the stars were. 4-2-7. X.....X S+++++S X.....X X.555.X X.....X S.....S X.....X X.555.X X.....X ?+++++S 6 babies land at the corners and midpoints of the blocks. If you run quickly left or right you can nail one. Along the way you can pick up a lot of 5-second boosts but I think the key is to get bad guys to jump into culdesacs and run away. Let them come at you, dodge slightly up or down, go towards the center, turn and push--or if you've really got the knack, run under them. 4-2-8. XXXXXXX XX+++XX XX+.+XX XX+++XX XXXXXXX Green guys here. The final star is under the place where you started. This is actually an easy level despite the cramped quarters as the 6 babies who drop down(columns 1&3) are going to move in a continual square path if you just sit there. Knock out all but one as you face down and slide, and the final one, you can follow while picking up stars. Then slide the square in the middle for a nice bonus. You can even get 5-second deals by sliding pieces pretty easily. There's a sun in the upper left if you cut out all the blocks(takes 3-4 slides each.) 4-2-9. +++++++ O....?O +.....+ .*555*. +.....+ .*555*. +.....+ .*555*. +++++++ O.....O Here you must slide six times before a square you zapped reappears. This makes getting all stars a bit awkward. Fortunately you can cut left a square and down and wait for the enemy to jump before running through him to the right. Go counterclockwise. Stop to push the bonus square over. Then go to the center to get the five seconds. You will want to beware of revealing and stepping on any of the suns, as those cause monsters to drop in the corner. Here is the first level where you really have to concentrate on dredging monsters to the side. 4-2-10. This is your first boss fight and not a very difficult one. The enemy bounces back and forth over your square. There's actually a very easy solution to this. Once he starts to bounce back left, run to the right on the square where he was, then up. He'll now be bouncing up/down ad nauseam...or at least until you face up and slide the square in the top row when he lands. Easy 10000 points. Congrats, you won the second castle! 4-3. DOODLERS Doodlers draw on squares, which means you can't slide the tile, but even worse it may summon an additional enemy to fight you. Pink doodlers wait a while before drawing something. They also draw very slowly, and they only draw houses or fruit or a sun, which mean you can't slide the tile under the square if they get through with it. Green doodlers are a bit nastier, as when they're finished drawing, a ghost appears and starts running around. The tile they've drawn on is also invalidated, but if you slide a tile while it's still being drawn on, it goes clear. One additional factor you'll note here is that some times become solid and unslideable after a few tries, so you need a bit more precision here. Fortunately the doodlers don't do much other than doodle, and they aren't too fast. Also this is a bit of a spoiler for the game, but there are squares where you can unearth a sun pretty quickly and wipe everything out. Except for enemies standing on squares that can no longer be slid. So this level can be extremely short--whether that means you solve it, or you don't have any good squares to slide, depends on luck or knowing where the sun is. Often here you'll have to wait for doodlers to get on a square you can slide, so you need to time things so that they *just* step on a square and then you slide from under them. 120 points for a pink doodler. 0 points for reversing a doodled square 980 points for a green doodler 30 points for a ghost created by a green doodler 4-3-1. +.....+ S.....S +.....+ .*..... +.....+ ....... +.....+ .....?. +.....+ S.....S Enemies at the corners. This is not a bad introductory level and you can even afford to get too greedy with the stars right away. Just remember where the sun is, and don't let it get covered. You also want to flip the bonus in the DR over. These guys are as harmless as the original aliens, so if you are playing for points this is a good level to pile them up on. 4-3-2. ....+++ ....... ....... .....*. ....... ....... ....... .?..... +++.... ....... Enemies on each star. Again there is a lot of time to get what you want. Not that there's much. I've run down and just bagged the bad guys--sliding down as they went right, then circled for all six stars. Then I slid and touched off the sun before getting the random bonus. 4-3-3. +++.... ....... ++..... .....*. +.....+ ...?... .....++ .*..... ....+++ ....... Enemies in UL, DR, (1,1) (5,3) Another pretty easy level where you can just bag the first sun after shoving the tile under the enemy and go to the other--stopping on the random treasure first. 4-3-4. .....++ ?...... ......+ ....... +.....+ .SSSSS. +...... ....... ++..... ......D Enemies at (1,0) (4,0) (1,4) (4,4) (0,2) (5,2) Here's the first level where squares may actually turn solid on you. When they do, you can no longer slide them. Squares in area A are immune from this, and it's in your best interest to pick off bad guys on the side--go left, slide, and go down and slide. Then you can hit one of the sonic squares in the center when the bad guys are near and goad the others over to a corner if you must. It's not a bad level if you clear some stuff off initially, and once you're done you can pick up a bonus in the UL. 4-3-5. ....+e. 55..... ....+.e ..@@@.. <- D under center +++.+++ ..*=*.. <- after 2 hits each e.+.... ..@@@.. <- ? under center .e+.... .....55 <-5's here become @ then solid This level introduces the green doodlers, who are much tougher adversaries than the pink ones. The dumb way to get through is to go left, shift three times, and walk on the sun. But if you actually want a sense of accomplishment then you can head to the corners and sides and start sliding tiles. You need to be careful not to slide anything too near the center or new bad guys will pop up. Many of the star squares though turn solid if you slide them too often, though, so don't look for bonuses there. 4-3-6. +.....+ @.....@ ....... ======= +.....+ @55555@ ....... ======= +.....+ @5...5@ ..SSS.. ======= +.....+ @55555@ ....... ======= +.....+ @.....@ ....... ======= Back to pink doodlers, at the corners. There's nothing remarkably tough about this level unless you start to dawdle, as you'll note that everything turns solid if you slide it injudiciously. Try to slam enemies against the top or left walls as you have the regenerators on the sides. 4-3-7. S+++... .....?. ======= ....... ....555 ======= ....... ....... ======= ....... 555.... ======= ...+++S .*..... ======= Green guys are back. Again you can just look for the sun and blow everything up, but you can also wander around a bit and kill the enemies-- corners and midpoints of top sides. For that kill the bad guys above and below you first. 4-3-8. ....... =S...S= =S+++S= =@*..@= ....... =.....= =55555= =.....= ....... =.....= =55555= =.....= ....... =.....= =55555= =.....= ....... =S...S= =S+++S= =@..?@= Back to the greens, two rows of three. Again, the quick out is to go left and up and slide up three times. Given how the sides get cordoned off, and how many monsters there are, this seems the only viable solution without risk. 4-3-9. =.=.=.= =@=.=@= =+=.=+= =*=+=*= ======= .=.=.=. .=.=.=. +=+=+=+ .=.=+=. ======= =.=.=.= =.=?=.= =.=+=.= =.=.=.= ======= .=.=.=. .=.=.=. +=+=+=+ .=.=+=. ======= =.=.=.= =@=.=@= =+=.=+= =*=.=*= ======= One more time--two rows of three. You've probably guessed by looking at the board that there's an easy way out. And you've probably guessed by looking at the board number that maybe the way out isn't so easy. Two rows of three enemies again here and my best advice is to go down, slide, go up and slide to knock out the two central enemies. Then you can wait in the center a bit. When the bad guys are on slideable squares, let them start drawing, and then go to one of the squares that will be suns(1L/R from a corner) and as the tiles are still turning, go up/down to the nearest landing-square and push it. This means only two new guys. Repeat the process as before. Let the bad guys follow you around, and when they both start drawing, go over to the sun. This level seems impossible without using the under-tiles and with them there's a trick or two but nothing you can't master. 4-3-10. The boss fight here gets ugly. You have two side rows of three bad guys each and the reflexive action of going left to blast one doesn't work, because the squares the monsters appear from are solid. I find a good pattern is to go left to the right edge of the square to your left and slide a tile when the bad guy just crosses over--that'll wipe one out--and face up and slide the UL corner doodler into the wall. This may take two tries of sliding up, but if it takes one the rest of the course is easy. The timing is that critical here, and you don't want to waste time going farther left than you have to. Then I co right and face up. Then I go up a square, right, and slide a tile up. Then I slide down and see if I can knock out the bottom two guys before the DR one creates a new friend. If I am unable to, I generally wait above the DR enemy until he crosses to (5,1) and then I slide down to take him out. Then I just scramble to wipe out half-drawn bad guys and hope I don't get overwhelmed. The key here is to wipe out at least three enemies in the time it takes them to reproduce initially--since this will redouble the population of bad guys to face. Then if you can disrupt a few others, the remaining task will be easier. If you ever get down to two enemies, the task should be very easy. 4-4. FATTIES Given how big fatties were compared to the other enemies standing outside castles, I assumed they were the toughest. But not really. The main thing to remember with them is that you need to pursue them as they go crashing against the side. Basically, you need to slide the square they're under, run after them, and slide the square they're under before they stomp down and cause you to go hurtling back. The timing for white fatties is easy--but with purple fatties you have to wait for when it's exactly right. There's a split second between their landing and when you can slide the square under them, or they slide you back. But given how slow they are(as long as you don't take too much time) you have some big advantages and this is the second most trivial and drawn out button-bashing you'll do in the game. Fatties also don't seem to follow you too diligently, but when you attack them, be sure to finish things off as often when they send shock waves, they can open up portal squares that undo your hard work bumping them into walls in the first place. It's worth noting that a black/purple won't spontaneously slam into the wall. It'll be up against it and you'll need one last burst to kill it off. So you can never relax with just one shot at it, nor is it necessarily wise to sonic blast one from a distance. But you can get fatties to bounce on the ground and try to shock each other into a wall. The only big problem is when a purple guy lands on a boundary. Then you have to guess which square the game thinks he's on. You usually get the benefit of the doubt. 190 points for a black/white fatty 440 points for a black/purple fatty 4-4-1. S.....S %+++++? ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... S.....S .+++++% Given how easy it is to get all the stars here you should really try to in this level. The first order of business is heading to the upper left to knock out two of the four fatties that appear at the corner. You can bash the UL fatty into the wall and step on the sonic bit to get the other one. Then go along the top row to get stars and go down onto the next sonic bit(DR) to reveal everything else. Get all the stars and chase the final two fatties down. 4-4-2. ......S ......% ......S ....... ......S ....... ......S ?...... ......S ......% This is another level with even more hidden stars, but again it's actually pretty easy to clear everything off. Five fatties appear from the left, and you may want to wait a bit before tripping a sonic square. The top fatties seem to go down, then left towards you. So you can nail two or three with a bit of patience. Next, you can smash one fatty against the wall so nobody is left. The last bit is really easy. You can get rid of the final fatty, or you can just let him chase you around. You can pick off the hidden stars row by row, by sliding them and walking on them. The fatty isn't fast enough. You can also use the sonic blasts to reveal each row, and even if you forget if you nailed one star, you can sort of zigzag across the rows to make sure. 4-4-3. +.....+ %.....D +.....+ ....... +.....+ ....... +.....+ ....... +.....+ %.....% This is another easy level with fatties at the corners. Nail the UL one and you can pretty much skirt the perimeter to get all the star squares--although you'll have to un-slide the one you used to nail the fatty. Then you can zap two other fatties, get the dark sun, run around, pick up all the stars for a second 10-star, 10000 point bonus and nail the final guy. 4-4-4. ....... ....... ....... +++++++ ....... +++++++ ....... ?+++++S ....... ....... Here you have to slide fatties off to the side, but it's really not so bad. You can pick them off one by one as your pursuers won't be fast enough to get to you. Again you can probably even pick off the undercover stars--I've done so without killing anyone off first but I go for the UL fatty of the four in the corners to start. Don't touch the sun unless you want an additional challenge, and don't touch the sonic squares either. As fatties try to level with you horizontally first, this is all not too tough. There's not a lot of waiting. You may have to circle around one fatty to get all the stars, but even if they get in the way, you may be able to slam them in the wall. 4-4-5. ....... @.....@ ....... .+++.*. ....... .+++... ....... .+++.?. ....... @.....@ Fatties at the corners again but here the hidden squares are asymmetrical. Wait for the UL fatty to move to a different square, squash him and then pick off the goodies underneath. You can waltz through this level if you'd like but it's just as easy to uncover the sun after clearing the stars. You can probably do that first but there's no guarantee some fatties will be saved so you can collect the stars later. 4-4-6. +.....+ ....... .+...+. .....D. ..+.+.. ....... .+...+. ....... +.....+ ....... Everything here is pretty straightforward--though there are purple guys at the corner, and this may make for some awkwardness if you get the dark sun and try to slam a purple into the wall. The key problem is--you don't know where the edge of each time is. Fortunately purple guys can't slam you back into a wall, and you have plenty of time to flummox them or even get a pair of them to stamp each other out. 4-4-7. XXXXXXX S.....S +++++++ ....... +.....+ .*+++?. +++++++ ....... XXXXXXX S.....S The area may seem crowded but fortunately the purple fatties are easy to avoid. As before it's not a bad idea to circle around and get all the star squares, including the hidden ones, and in fact doing so will cause the fatties to group together. Once they are, step on the sun, and step out of the way. They'll wind up bashing each other into walls until one is left. Then take the next one in hand to hand combat. 4-4-8. ...+... +++.+++ @.....S ...+... .?%%%.. +++.+++ ....... ...+... ..%%%D. ...+... +++.+++ @.....S Again a bit of sliding and chasing should run circles around the bad guys at the corner and line them up for you too. But using the dark sun may not allow enough time to kill the bad guys off, and so here I recommend simply using the flip-boards that can catapult you through a final enemy. The strategy is pretty simple. Turn up the flip tile, stay in one place, ahd when the bad guy comes at you, circle around and springboard through the flip-tile at him. 4-4-9. ..X.X.. .+++++. =%%%%%= .X.X.X. .+++++. .%%%%%. ..X.X.. .+++++. !%%%%%? =.....= .X.X.X. .+++++. .%%%%%. ..X.X.. .+++++. =%%%%%= An amusing little level where bad guys are in the chambers UL, UR, DL and DR of you. You can semi-cheat and wimp out of this level by going left two squares(wait for the purple fatties to turn away) and then sliding the left- edge square twice. Step on the flip-tile and enter the bonus area. The alternative is to bash a block to the right and goad a fatty into one corner square. Then turn around and slide three times, two for the purple fatty and one for the white one that drops from the corner afterwards. The square will turn solid, but that's OK because there are four fatties for four corner squares. If this doesn't work you'll have a bit of a free for all and the best thing to do is to stand around the edges and try to slide fatties as they get close. It takes too long to get all the stars in the level proper--sped up purple fatties are too much--so proceed honest if you want, or maybe even go to the right to get the alternating reward, but I do recommend cutting out easily. 4-4-10. I'm not sure what's up with the boss level here. You seem to just have to wait for the girl to change you with the stars she throws and then stay near the center. Let her slide the tile under you, and she'll wait to slide it again. Meanwhile, you've changed into a fatty, and BOOM...your stomping down sends her into the wall. The only risk is that she may run into you or that you'll get too close to the wall. But it seems you don't have to run at her. Just be sure not to move up/down except to scramble back past her. I've won this level even by letting it be, so I can't see the point. It's another instance where the game tries to flummox you into action, but eventually you'll get exahusted and give up and do as little as you need to, which is the solution. 4-5. JUMPERS These jumpers are similar to the purple fatties in that you can't kill them on the first jump. So often you have to make sure no-one's coming at you from behind and then slide, wait for the enemy to land, and slide again. After you push them back the first time, though, you can run at them and slide them some more into a wall. It's getting started that's hard. Brown haired jumpers go up high, red haired ones go extra high, leaving you extra susceptible to an attack from the rear. The same sort of caveats and tricks(ie running at them) apply as with the fatties, but in boards where there are generator squares to uncover you'll want to be even more careful. You can run under the jumpers if you are quick enough, but they can nail you with their feet. Also, you may catch a break if you manage to push a jumper's square while he is turning. He can't jump then. And of course if the jumpers are just landing, they are vulnerable then. Sonic blasts are also effective against them--they can't anticipate them--and you can also wipe baddies out at the start of a level too if you run for them. Brown jumpers are also particularly susceptible to you turning around and smashing them, as when they've got their backs to you, they don't know to jump. So, like in basketball, fake them out and get them in the air, and the rest is easy. Red jumpers are much tougher as you always seem to need to smack them twice except for the very beginning of stages. They're always on alert. But they jump higher and thus allow you more time to adjust--despite leaving you open to rear attacks while waiting for them to land. But one weakness: if you shoot yourself at them with a flipper square, they won't duck. If jumpers come at you in a posse, note first that they tend to jump slowly forward, so you can have a war of attrition, but you can also sneak in at some time to move forward a tile and push them back. This may require a bit of a wait, but I've found it's effective if inelegant when your usual tricks of suns, etc. doesn't work. Also, watch jumpers' shadows to see when they are going forward. This will save you the indignity of getting landed on. 480 points for a brown haired jumper 980 points for a red haired jumper 4-5-1. e...... ....... ..+++S. .?...%. ....... ....... .S+++.. .%...*. ......e ....... Enemies at (1,1) and (5,3) as well. As with most first castle scenes in this game there is an easy way out if you search around a bit. You can probably get all six stars, and the concurrent bonus, before the bad guys start moving. Then you can wipe them out by sliding and stepping on the sun. Be careful to make sure they've just landed, though, or you'll have to take them out manually. While the level ends you can uncover the chance-square. 4-5-2. +++*+++ ....... SSSSSSS ...!... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... +++?+++ @@@.@@@ SSS.SSS ....... Two columns of three. This level has potential for a whopping bonus, and I advise that you take it. Of course, you can go up and get the sun, then go down and get the other sun that was revealed, and the level ends pretty quickly. But the jumpers aren't bad to dodge if you want to go in for the REAL points. First of all you can go a pace to the left, go up, and clear out the stars in a counterclockwise motion. Get the random bonus on the way. Step on the sun when the bad guys aren't jumping, then go south to step on the other sun. Then quickly go back up and slide the top center square north. Flip through the flashing turnstile and you'll enter a bonus room. It's got stars 5x5. 4-5-3. S.....% %...... +.....+ ..%%%.. +.....+ .*%%%?. +.....+ ..%%%.. %.....S ......% This is also a very good level for piling up points. With only men at the corners it's pretty easy to get all six stars by just running around, and then you can slide open the sun and step on it with everyone on the surface. Then you can even get the random gift before the level ends for you. But if you don't get the timing right, hide in the very corner and unleash the sonic blast on the edges when enemies get near. 4-5-4. ......+ *....? ......+ *....% ......+ *....% ......+ *....% ......+ *....D Again, you can get a lot of points here just by faking bad guys out. Go up first. This will pull them left. Then sweep right and down to get all five stars. Then head left on the bottom row, slide the DL square, and step on the sun. You can then go north when you wish to eliminate more enemies. You'll note that the generator squares come from left to right and so, after knocking out the second sun, start sliding above immediately. It should take six slides. Then step on the sun, slide up five times, step on the sun, and slide up four times. Fortunately the generators aren't recurring. You can even go right to get the random thing that appears after getting the UL sun, then down through the flippers, to get the dark sun and clean up a tidy sum of points. An alternative way through the level is just to leave one bad guy--stand on the last sun when one is jumping--and pick off the dark sun and get all the stars you can. Not using secret tiles, you can just do se do everyone going up and down the right edge. They'll stay on the left edge of the far right tiles, making it easy for you to roll them up once you get them all on one side of you. 4-5-5. Xe...eX XX+++XX XXX.XXX XX+++XX Xe...eX Enemies at the corners, nothing secret I could find. The claustrophobia from this level is the only real problem, and fortunately it allows for a quick start. Go up one square and left and wait for the bad guy to come right so you can slam him into the wall. Then you can pull the UR bad guy in to the UL and turn around and get him. To get the star bonus it is easiest not to futz with the star squares, and if you eliminate two bad guys up top you can always sneak through the middle bottleneck--three lanes, two enemies. You can also stand diagonal from the center bottleneck square and slide the square above/below it and eventually the bad guys trying to come through will crash as they tend to jump slightly forward. In fact there's even time to get the three stars above, kill all four guys when they come up, and go back down for the final three stars, if you make your moves quickly and correctly. 4-5-6. %+++++% ....... +.....+ .S%%%S. +.....+ .*%%%?. +.....+ .S%%%S. %+++++% ....... Your first encounter with red haired jumpers. One at each corner. You can nail one as the level starts. But the key little trick you have to knock off another jumper without much effort is to slide the sun's tile. Step on it when a jumper is above/below. Then step on the sonic blast above/below that a jumper isn't on, once they land. This will ensure that at least one of them is killed. From there you can do worse than use the flippers to go in a square and run through any enemies in your way. Or you can dispose of them conventionally, dragging them to the sides or just lumping them together as they chase you and then pushing them serially. 4-5-7. @%%%%%@ 5.....5 @%%%%%@ 5.....5 @++.++@ 5..+..5 @%%%%%@ 5.....5 @%%%%%@ 5.....5 This is a fun level that looks confusing because it has no real spaces you can slide tiles, but in fact there is a nice option to get through this quickly. The generators are one-time only, but even if they weren't you could just disable them and proceed with this strategy. It's actually very little problem to get the two left stars, slide the center tile for a third, and get the two right ones. You might have to duck up and go back down. But from there, all you need to do is to bounce onto one of the flipper squares and immediately push back opposite the direction you came. You're a human missile now, bouncing back and forth and killing every jumper that comes in your way. You have twenty such pairs but will probably need just four or five. If you want to pile up extra points, slide and pick up the five-second tiles on the side. 4-5-8. XXXXXXX @@@@@%@ XXXXXXX @@@@%%% X...XXX .++@@%@ ee.XXXX +++@@@@ ee.XXXX +++@@@@ This level requires some quick thinking early on. If you go left and then turn down and slide a few times, you should be able to nail two bad guys. You can play cat and mouse now, and there's no reason you can't pick off all the star squares with one bad guy left. The trouble may be just leaving one, but don't sweat it if you can't. You can always leave your opponents at a distance by opening up (0,2), forcing them to jump, and then moving around to nab that extra star. Just move around the 2x2 square rapidly. 4-5-9. @@@@@@@ *...... @@%@%@@ ...%D.. @@@@@@@ ..%.%.. @@%@%@@ ..?%... @@@@@@@ ......* 6 Enemies in 2 edge columns. With perfect timing this level's a cinch: go to the DR or UL, wait a bit until everyone's in the center, and blast the corner square to reveal a sun. If things go right, no-one will reappear. Step on the sun when everyone else has landed. Be sure not to slide anything else in the meantime. You may have some leftovers, which you can deal with by slamming against a wall. The generators shouldn't be a factor as you can keep sliding, and the red guys should go down pretty quickly. Just deal with the squares--and enemies--one at a time to prevent them from coming back too quickly. Oh, and don't step on the second sun. That brings all the generators back. You can kill the guy to the left or right to start out to ensure you can pile up more points, as you can pick up the dark sun and walk around for a nice star bonus. 4-5-10. This is a contentious boss fight, with brown jumpers on the sides. They're quicker than the regular ones you'll see, but you can still get off to a good start by sliding left at the right time, heading up and sliding up. Now what I like to do is go down along the edge and start going left and right. Enemies will clump together eventually, and if you get far enough away and go uo, you can turn back and slide a few of them from above. Once you're down to two opponents the rest is rather easy as you can probably slide them back several squares in a group, sliding and moving forward--although 4 is too many for that. Be sure to run along the very back and cut back at the second- to-edge square. The bad guys don't go in more than one before turning around, and the time it takes for them to change direction should be fatal. 4-6. DANCERS These are weird enemies that travel in curves. They seem to know where you are. There are fast accurate ones and slow inaccurate ones. Fortunately they get winded, so if you avoid them a bit you can often catch them dead. If you hit a dancer once you should be all set, but if they curve in from several directions, you're toast. There are a lot of tiles that turn into blockades on these levels and they're useful--but the fast dancers can bust through them. 250 points for an orange dancer. 450 points for a pink/red dancer. 4-6-1. *...... ....+.+ ....... ...+... ....... ..+.... .?5.... +@@+... ....... .+..... Enemies at the corners. This level looks very straightforward as all you have to do is go for the sun and it should work...well, then two more dancers appear, but they're no problem. But first--head for the 5(left, down) and the ?(left) and you can get the one-up bonus if you start right away. It shouldn't be hard to avoid the twirling dancers and in fact after you get the sun, you should go right a square and south to wipe out one of the two that pop up. Then you should clean up the stars for the nice bonus. Then kill off the final dancer when she wanders near a wall. 4-6-2. ...+... S.....S ....... .+++++. ....... ....... +++.+++ ...@... ....... .+++++. ....... ....... ...+... S.....S ....... Enemies at corners of B. This is another not too bad level. You should be able to pick up all the stars without getting hit. The key is to note how the enemies bounce off the walls--they don't curve much until you get the fast ones--and also you can use the sonic blast in the corners if you get in real trouble. 4-6-3. .....ee .+++..? ....XXe 5+++..5 .XX.XX. 5..+..5 eXX.... 5..+++5 ee..... ...+++. You can knock out a bunch of dancers as they come out of the chute above, and as a result you can leave just one on the board pretty quickly. This will allow you to do looting to get the star. In general the center square is a good place to stay because there's no way to access it without the dancer being vulnerable to you sliding them. 4-6-4. +XXXXX+ %XXXXX% ?XXX+++ +XXXXX+ %XXXXX% +XXX+X+ +XX.XX+ %XX.XX% +X+++X+ < ??to center + +XXXXX+ %XXXXX% +X+XXX+ +XXXXX+ %XXXXX! +++XXX! 6 enemies. More of the same here, but it's even easier, really, because when you carve your way L, 2D, L or R, 2U, R, you can just look to the right and fire away. If you're going for full points it may be trickier. Because you'll have to leave one dancer while getting to both corners. It can however be done--in that case go left first. Blast everything in the DL, clear the left, go right, blast the UR except for one, and sneak by the final dancer--go along the edge of the passageway. Clear the stars and slide the DR and go through the glowing flipper to a 7x5 bonus area. 4-6-5. +XX.XX+ @XX+XX@ +XX.XX+ 5XX+XX5 +XX.XX+ 5XX+XX5 +XX.XX+ 5XX+XX5 <- random on right +XX.XX+ @XX+XX@ 4 enemies in corners. Here you have pink leotard dancers, and they can bash through walls before the speed up music starts. While you're waiting for them, uncover the stars that are around you. Again you should be able to duck them to clear everything--you can also set up a temporary block by sliding columns 2, 3, 5 or 6. You can also grab a sun in the center column(rows 2 and 4) for a very easy way out of this level, but grabbing two releases new enemies in the corner, and besides you may want to pile up the points first. Getting 5 second add ons allows for this. 4-6-6. eXXXXXe .+++++. @.....@ XXXXXXX +++++++ .55555. XXXXXXX +++++++ .5.*.5. XXXXXXX +++++++ .55555. eXXXXXe .+++++. @.....@ With the 5-second bunkers there's big potential for points here. And even if the bad guys start going too fast, just excavate the sun in the center. There's no major point in hurrying to take out a path to the side, and you should have plenty of time to uncover all the stars you want to. It's even possible to complete the stars row-by-row and collect the 5-second pieces after you step on the sun. 4-6-7. +...... 5++.... ....... .+..... +5+.... ....... ..+.+.. ++.?.++ @.....@ .....+. ....+5+ ....... ......+ ....++5 ....... Here the bad guys get legitimately obnoxious, and so you'll want to pick off one in the corner first. Try to focus on ones that launch themselves at you from a far wall, step to the side, and knock them out. With only one left you should be able to sweep through them. 4-6-8. eX..... .X..... ?X..... eX...X. .X+++X. .X@@@X. eX...Xe .X+++X. .X@@@X. .X...Xe .X+++X. .X@@@X. .....Xe .....X. .....X* An easy solution is to go over to the right, wait at (5,4) and take out the three dancers. Then get the sun and it's over. But if you'd like a bit of trickery you can go left first, get the varying reward, then go back right. You can take out the three columns and then stand by the UR to take out the remaining enemies in the right corridor. You can't really get the sun, though, or new enemies will appear. 4-6-9. *++X... ...X... .55X... ++X.... ..X.... 55X.... +X...X+ .X...X. 5X...X5 ....X++ ....X.. ....X55 ...X++? ...X... ...X55. The best bet for a good start is to go L 2D L and slide left. Then go up and slide left again as the two other enemies come out. You can then go into the upper left and kill the level by taking the sun if you want. The riskier alternative is to go to the upper right, clear it out, and come back left. 4-6-10. The boss fight, like the castle, seems very twisty when you first encounter it, but fortunately there is an easy way to deal with it. Go left and nail the one dancer. Try to stay on the right edge of your square. Wait a bit. When the dancers start to move, go left and then turn right and slide the tiles to the right. Hopefully you'll be able to catch one dancer in your path, and you can smash her into the right wall. You can repeat this back- and-forth for a while. The dancers will bounce against the top wall, giving you plenty of lateral rom to run. 4-7. SWIMMERS The swimmers are possibly the most brilliant part of the game. They're only the second hardest, though, although what they do is pretty clear. They kick up the square behind them, giving the same effect as if you slid it. They can be taken from the side, but they're pesky from the back and head-on, and they can wait out of bounds leaving you no real way to attack them. In addition, they frequently kick up generator squares that respawn other enemies. You can knock them into pillars on the playing field, though, and their patterns are predictable enough that you should know how not to get killed by them. Don't stand behind or in front of them. There are green and blue swimmers. Blue ones can use diagonals, but both are vulnerable to narrow hallways where you can stand on the edge of the tile you want to slide. Both also realign themselves after running one lap across the 'pool' and sometimes their lumping together works to your advantage. 240 points for a green swimmer 720 points for a blue swimmer 4-7-1. ....... ......* .+++++. ....... ....... .SSSSS. .+++++. ....... ....... ?...... You can go right to the upper right to get the sun, but you might as well clear out the stars first. You can get the top row easily enough. Go to the right and when the top swimmer is on his way hook around him. Later on you can use the sonic blasts in the center to take out the swimmers. 4-7-2. X+++++X XSSSSSX X.....X X....*X X.....X X..?..X X.....X X*....X X+++++X XSSSSSX This is another level that isn't too bad and in fact you can let the swimmers take care of themselves on their first lap right. You don't get any points for this, but the rest of the way is clear. You can step on the suns with the swimmers out and even activate the sonic blasts then if you really want to load up on points. Then stay at one of the sides, wait for them to come towards you, move towards the center, and slide. 4-7-3. ......* XXXXXXX ....... XXXXXXX ....... XXX?XXX ....... XXXXXXX D...... XXXXXXX Here you don't have time to grab the dark sun, but fortunately it's pretty easy to use the sun to nail the swimmers. You can't get the sun right away with any effect, but a 5-second solution is to stand at (5,4) and face right. When the top guy dives in, slide him and then slide again. Get the sun immediately and then dig your way to the center. Of course you can wait a bit to leave a single enemy and then get the dark sun too, but you can't get all the stars without running out of time. 4-7-4. XXXXXXX XXXXXXX +++++++ ......? +++ +++ ....... +++++++ *...... XXXXXXX XXXXXXX Here again you can use the sun to take out mostly everyone, although you can also get right to taking the stars. Veer left, go up and go back right and you'll have half of them. Then go along the bottom--slide squares without stars to reveal them--and get the sun. The rest should be clean up as you can just slide around to see what you haven't gotten, but before you leave the level remember to get the UR bit. Oh, if guys walk along the blocks at the top, you can run them into the wall by sliding the blocks, even though they never change. 4-7-5. XXX@@@@ XXX++++ XXX...% XXX@@@@ XXX++++ XXX...% XXX@@@@ XXX++++ XXX...% XXX@@@@ XX*++++ XXX...% XXX@@@@ XXX++++ XXX...% There's a way to solve this level very quickly: D, slide L, turn left when the swimmers are on top of their first block. Now this doesn't allow you to get the star bonus, but the other way would consist of you having to work through a lot of sonic blasts and single regenerators. 4-7-6. +++.+++ %%%X%%% @@@X@@@ +++.+++ %%%X%%% @@@X@@@ ....... XXX.XXX XXX?XXX +++.+++ %%%X%%% @@@X@@@ +++.+++ %%%X%%! @@@X@@@ Again there's an easy way out here but you might want to slide your starting square first. You really don't want to hang around, though, as barriers will pop up and make your job a royal mess. It's possible to clear out at least half of the stars(UR 6, UL--1 on top, 3 on bottom, then down through the 2nd-bottom row) but then things start to get disjointed. The star bonus is possible, but Better just to pick on the DR flipper. 4-7-7. @.....@ +.....+ S.....S @.....@ +.....+ SX?X.XS @.....@ +.....+ S.X.X.S @.....@ +.....+ SX.X*XS @.....@ +.....+ S.....S This one's easy if you see what to do. Right, slide south, get the sun. It's possible to get all the stars, but you'll need to open up a square on the edge just after getting the sun and then do a bit of dodging. Use the sonic blasts at the side to get rid of the one-time generators. Also, you can establish walls at the corners of the B-area so that you can blast any swimmers that come back. Note that the regenerators throw out green swimmers, so after you get the sun, you're pretty much set. 4-7-8. ++++++. 555555. ?...... XXXXXX. ....... XXXXXX. ....... ....... ....... .XXXXXX ....... .XXXXXX .++++++ .555555 ......D The easy way to get the stars is to go right, up, left, and slide south to cut down the left edge--but first, maybe go down a square and slide up to get the bonus. You can even trap the blue swimmers here, but do try to leave one. Then go right from the DL. You should get all the stars. Now on the way back you can pick up the 5-second bonuses. If or when you have just one opponent you can try for the dark sun in the bottom right. Because the level is linear enough, you can probably grab the new stars that appear with little problem, especially if you goad the remaining swimmer to walk down to the bottom to have a run at you. The remaining swimmer is a bit of a problem in the dark, but what you can do is to go to the center row and hit the top of the tile. The swimmer will follow you. When he's a square and a half away, go to the bottom of the tile, turn and fire. 4-7-9. @.....@ +..5..+ *XX@XX* ....... ..555.. XX...XX ....... .55555. X.....X ....... ..555.. XX...XX @.....@ +..5..+ +X@XX+ You have 6 enemies here but can dispose of the center-left and UL one according to before-they-move procedures. From there you can just slide the UL again, grab the sun, and win. Or you can try for a bit more. It's possible to pick up the stars in the corners. You may have to stop off to pick up some 5-second boosts on the way as the monsters turn white and start walking around after you pretty quickly, but if you're able to kill a few blues to start, then you should be able to outwit the greens. Just remember not to take all the 5-second bursts at once and to pay special attention to the generator squares. Get rid of bad guys there immediately. There are only six, but with the action potentially turning fast you'll want to watch it. You can probably play with fire here and grab both suns, which will also point you to where spare 5-second stashes are for extra bonuses, and you should have time to get the variable treasures too. 4-7-10. Now's the time to show that you understand what it's like to be a swimmer. You must kill the girl as a swimmer or, if you can avoid her shots, push her against the wall after luring her there. It's usually just easier to be the swimmer, though, and for that you go up against the lower wall and wait for her to come in. Once she looks like she's near pushing you, move up and down a couple of squares. Be sure to be adjacent to her, though, and not running at her. Hit the button repeatedly when you go up by her. It seems to have effect only when you cross a tile boundary, but I'm not entirely sure of this. What I am sure of is that, as a swimmer, you push her back almost two full strokes, so when something works, it goes great. Therer's a bit of luck involved here but this is a pretty risk free way to go. 4-8. GIRL SCOUTS Girl scouts copy you. They're a female version of you. They slide tiles or move, and they generally try to encircle you. The yellow ones are slower than you and have a delayed reaction to when you start moving. When you hear a bell ring, that means they're just about to start running after you in which case you're going to be toast soon. So you need to be quick. Sneaking up on the slower versions of yourself from behind works as does nabbing them from the side. You can also get them to kill each other, although that doesn't get you any points, and you can roll them up with sliding tiles. Girl scouts can also slam their friends into you, but if you fly into them, that is ok. Yellow girl scouts can be drawn to you if you just moving around in circles. In fact, you can even just turn around. Then when they get close, slide their tile and roll them up. Their reaction times aren't too quick, and you can stun them with the first punch. You can take advantage of this completely by standing in the center of a square and turning ninety degrees as they come at you from a diagonal square, i.e. if they are coming from the UR you can turn up and right until one gets near. Then you can slide them and roll them up. The downside is that turning around with people on your tail can expose you and let them catch up from behind. For the record, a 180 degree turn takes the same time as moving one unit on the board. 650 points for a yellow/orange girl scout 560 points for a red girl scout 4-8-1. e.+.+.e @.5.5.. .+++++. .55555. .++.++. .55?55. ..+++.. ..555*. e..+..e ...5..@ Here the girl scouts go much slower than you do, so it's little problem to run circles around them and get the star bonus. Better yet, you can go right two and slide down to get the sun. This will leave only 5-second bonuses along with two generated enemies, and you can traverse the heart shape to get all the stars. Disposing of the girl scouts here is simple, as with your speed advantage you can sneak up behind them and they're defenseless. 4-8-2. e.....e +++++++ ....... .?..... e.....e ....... ....... .....*. e.....e +++++++ Six enemies on the side columns. Here you can head for the directional sonic blast and wait for the right time to step on it--i.e. nailing someone. Then you can slide the square it was on for a bonus. You should be relatively unimpeded if you try to get all the hidden stars. If a girl scout confronts you head on, you can just hook around her and hit her from the side. Once you've got all the stars, you can slide (5,1) and win out. You can even afford to leave a few because you can pick that all up later. 4-8-3. ++++++% %.....@ +.....+ .X5X5X. +.....+ ..X?X.. +.....+ .X5X5X. %++++++ @.....% Here again you can circle around the periphery and nab some pretty serious points. But first you may want to clear all the enemies out. With only one left, you can slide all the tiles along the periphery and pile up points. You can knock off the L and UL enemies right away, and the others shouldn't be much of a problem. Time may be, but there are some 5-second boosts. You can easily walk around your last enemy on the way to a star bonus. 4-8-4. +.....+ <.....* +.....+ <.....< +.....+ <@@@@@< +.....+ <.....< +.....+ !.....< There's an easy way through this using the tiles. You can probably pick up all the star tiles, though, without the two enemies bugging you, so do that first. Don't slide anything. Then slide the UR square to get the sun and immediately head around the first rotating blast to the center one. When it faces left, step on it, and you'll knock out the new enemies you just created. During the ripple, walk over to the rotating reward. You can also do this honestly making sure nobody slides a center square-- and even if they do, you should be able to defeat even 6 or 7 girl scouts by just picking on one at a time and running behind/to the side of a vulnerable one. 4-8-5. <<<<<<< ....... ....... <+++++< ....... ..555.. <+++++< ....... ..555.. <+++++< ....... ..?55.. <<<<<<< ....... ....... It's possible to get all stars without killing any enemies, but it's probably safer to go left, slide, and use the directional sonic blasts to pick off enemies on the side rows and columns. With only three left the game of tag should be easier to win, and you should find a row or two you can walk across easily. But if bad guys start to chase you, head for a sonic blast square. They'll follow you. Just remember that digging one up while you're chased will result in you going into a wall. 4-8-6. +...... +...... +...... <- ? on left, sun on right +...... +...... Here you have an easy start--go left and start sliding tiles away. Eventually only two people will be left. You'll get the person at (0,2) immediately, the (0,3) person will be slid down, and (0,4) will take care of (0,5). Then you can go up a square. Slowly rotate from up to left and back again to see what From here you can try to clear off stars and such if you'd like, but there are so many that it can get awkward to remember. With just one person chasing you, they should be irrelevantly digging something while you slide each square for a star. Each square seems to have a directional blast, 5 seconds, a star, and an open space in its cycle of 7. So you can conceivably clear the board of all goodies but it's a bit arduous. 4-8-7. <@@@@@< ....... *XXXXX? <@...@< 5.+++.5 XXXXXXX <@...@< 5.+++.5 XXXXXXX <@...@< 5.+++.5 XXXXXXX <@@@@@< ....... SXXXXX* 6 people, on the corners and sides. Nail the left one and get the UL one next. Then slide the UL to reveal a sun. Stepping on it should kill most, if not all, of your enemies. If it kills all, then quickly face right and slide that. With reduced enemy forces it should be easy to pile up the 3x3 of star tiles. Then you can go to the other sun and clear the rest of the board. Having bad guys regenerated isn't so bad as they're the easier types. 4-8-8. e+++++e ....... !%%%%%% +++++++ .@@@@@. %%%%%%% +++.+++ .@@@@@. %%%%%%% +++++++ .@@@@@. %%%%%%% e+++++e ....... %%%%%%S The really easy way out of this level is to slide left twice, going through the flipper to hit the wall, then slide up and take out the UL red. Then slide the UL square to get to the flashing flipper and 7x5 star area of bonus goodies. You can also take on your enemies one at a time in each corner, and you can proceed from corner to corner via the flippers you can uncover--they run you through the walls--but there's a chance enemies may leak out and start revealing the generator squares in areas B-D. Also when you try to finesse this way you may kill everyone before making a full loop unless you backtrack. Overall it's better to just take the easy bonus and run. Although not a bad challenge to kill all four enemies individually. Just slide when the enemies are facing the wall, and stand at the edge of the corner square. The bonus side-level here is a bit tricky. It seems straightforward enough, and it's nice how you can start in the center and get three stars before they even appearbut you may need to backtrack a bit to get things done. You see, there are four hidden stars. They are kitty corner to your starting square. ....... ..!.!.. ....... ..!.!.. ....... 4-8-9. ....... ....... [] <<<<< 5 eventually It's not hard to go right and smash the three enemies over there. You can often cut back and kill one dancer on the left afterwards. However, taking care of the remaining dancers is awkward. The inner squares turn to generators and then to 5-second deals. The best strategy seems to be to nail the dancer against a top/bottom wall and slide several times. This takes care of the generator. You can also duck out in a corner and slide when a dancer gets close DL/UR have sun, DR has dark sun, UL has ?. You'll need to slide a few times to grab these, but with one dancer left they're accessible. I don't recommend taking the sun, though, as it unleashes a torrent of generator squares. 4-9-5. e.....e .++.++. +++.+++ .++.++. e.....e If you can kill a red haired jumper early on, great. The L/UL gambit of getting rid of guys at the start works well. There's a sun at (1,3) or (5,1) if you dig hard enough but first it's possible to corral all the star squares. There are generators on the sides you need to be aware of, and after picking off one sun it's best to try to smash bad guys into the upper and lower walls. Eventually they'll coagulate onto one square and you'll be able to smack them up or down in the split seconds you get to slide tiles over. You may have to save the red haired guys until last. 4-9-6. This level may seem like a bit of a dud but the trick they want you to discover is how to get all of the stars. Two are hidden. XXXXXXX XXXXXXX +XXXXX% XXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXX +++.+++ ....... %.....% XXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXX %XXXXX+ You can collect all the stars on the surface before the enemies start. Here we'll go right, then left. When an enemy jumps into the water, slam him against the side wall. Then slide the tile again so the flipper comes up. Go up to the top and slide down to reveal one star square. Get it, go down and right, and slide right to reveal another flipper. You can even kill the last enemy in the process as you can take the flipper down and slide the DR square up from the edge with no terrible rush. 4-9-7. @@@@@@@ ======= @.....@ ======= @.....@ ==?*5== @.....@ ======= @@@@@@@ ======= This is another pretty dumb level. I guess what they are trying to get you to think is--there's too many bad guys to handle, so what's the easy way out? 6 enemies in 2 rows...just go right, slide the center square, step on the sun, and you win. There's no way to win this by trickery given how all the blocks go solid immediately. 4-9-8. ======= ======= ======= ======= ==?.+== ==XDX== ======= ======= ======= ======= 2 rows with 6 enemies and they all copycat you. You might as well get the treasure first--including the dark sun--as this gets you the lion's share of the points. Here what you need to do is to leave one of the blocks open and have bad guys face each other on the other two. You can sneak behind a bad guy who takes the center square and slam her into the single wall as well. But pretty clearly it's only the center area where you'll be able to smash anyone against a wall. Your best bet is to hang out on the square to the side, duck to the center, and turn around to smash your enemies. 4-9-9. This is a pretty pointless boss fight. You can basically stand still and see where the guy lands. Slide his tile when he lands above, and he's pushed into danger. If you don't touch him he will balance between two different squares for a while and you'll have to track him down again. So you will have to roll him up with a second slide, as he otherwise will nail you by shifting one of the tiles OVER you, even if you're not at the edge. You get 15000 for this instead of the usual 10000. 4-9-10. The girl you beat in all those boss fights takes you to the big castle in the sky, where you're on to the final ten scenes. 4-10. NINJAS These guys are smart. They'll slide a tile to try to nail you, and generally the best way to beat them is to know where the sun is. Fortunately they get into turf wars, sliding each other, at times, and there you can nip in from the side. One particular weaknesses: ninjas on each side of a block are kicking it. Easy to sneak behind there. Pink ninjas seem to go faster and are overall a bit smarter. 330 points for a blue ninja. 810 points for a pink ninja. 4-10-1. Maps don't work so well here and the only advice I can offer is that you have two paths: 1. step on a sun, look for the next one, and continue until you see the flashing flipper which you should use to get out of the stage. 2. Before stepping on each sun, collect all stars from the board. This will get you the bonus star just before you step on the flashing flipper. You can also smash the ninjas into walls, but they're pretty easy to avoid here. And sometimes the top stars slide before you can get to them--in that case you can probably dodge and slide enough to get to them eventually. On the bonus level you are in a 7x5 room but have to dig out each square to uncover the star underneath it. You can do this without retracing, but the timing and turning can be awkward. One pattern is below. (0-9, a-z) stuvwxy ronmlkj qp89ahi 5670bgf 4321cde 4-10-2. ++..... ....... +XXXXX+ .@@@@@. +X...X+ .@@@@@. +XXXXX+ .@@@@@. .....++ ....... Here your first order of business is to slide left and slide right, getting rid of immediate threats. Then you'll want to escape to a corner. Don't worry about taking out all stars here. If you're in a corner you won't have to go through all squares regenerating. A plan that works for me is to knock out the square above and drive the guy that appears in the generator into the wall. Then I go left and slide up. Then I slide left. If all goes well I should have a bunch of guys I can keep pushing left, and if anyone's left over I fake them out in the DL. Taking the stars is too much of a distraction as that gives the bad guys time to kick open generators and speed up, leaving you without much of a chance. This isn't the worst level to lose a guy on, so if things don't go as planned, don't panic. You can kill off certain enemies with one guy and come back for the rest later. 4-10-3. eX+++Xe @X...X@ XX...XX XX@@@XX XX...XX XX+++XX XX...XX XX@@@XX eX+++Xe @X...X@ This level really isn't too bad and in fact you have plenty of time to get the star bonus here. Slide left, go left, then slide/go right twice. Clear out the top three stars, and if the ninjas have broken down the top bit you may want to kick them into the side walls. You may even break down a wall to speed things up although you may need a pit stop to re-slide the corner square that has become a generator. Then go to the bottom three. The ninjas may still be trying to kick down the walls that separate them from you, and if so, you can position yourself to blast them into the side. If they're already in the center, move up one side, have a ninja follow you, veer to the center, turn, and slide them into the wall. Again they can regenerate here so make sure you have an easy thing before you slide. 4-10-4. +.....+ ....... S.....S XXXXXXX +.....+ .@@@@@. 5...*.5 XXXXXXX +.....+ .@@@@@. 5.....5 XXXXXXX +.....+ .@@@@@. 5.?...5 XXXXXXX +.....+ ....... S.....S XXXXXXX For a quick win you'll want to stay to the sides. You can get the stars without much trouble-left through the guy right away(he can't kill you at the start) and down, then back up, all the way right and down. You may have to duck someone coming head on, but no big deal. Once that's done you need to reveal the sonic blasts at the corners. This may require looping around but that's OK because that also lumps the pink ninjas together a bit more so you can eventually take them out. Sliding any square in the interior allows more generators to throw pink ninjas at you, so using the sliders on the corners--or only sliding side squares--should win this. You can keep enough ahead of the pink ninjas that you can kill them yourself if the sonic blast doesn't take them all out. But just wait on the sonic blast and don't touch the center 'til everyone's near. 4-10-5. 5555555 ++++++D 5.eee.5 +@@@@@+ 5.eee.5 +@@@@@+ 5.eee.5 +@@@@@+ 5555555 ?++++++ Go down immediately before the enemy forms, and you can circle around and get the 5-second bonuses. You may be sidetracked by a pink ninja sliding your square, but don't worry. This is just to buy points and time. The next thing to do is to go to a corner and wait for the bad guys to come. Run up/down and when at the center row, slide down and then get out of the way of sliding ninjas. They may slide back and forth a bit. But in the confusion you should find a couple of pink ninjas to roll up. Go back in the corner and repeat or, if there's no way back to the center row, head to another corner and try again. It doesn't seem practical to get the star bonus here, but if you have just one enemy left I imagine you can slide, get the star, etc. The dark sun/star bonus is even a possibility even with enemies sped up. 4-10-6. @@@@@@@ [] SSSSSSS +%%%%%+ [] .55555. +.....+ [] .+++++. +%%%%%+ [] .55555. @@@@@@@ [] SSSSSSS Unfortunately the bouncing off flippers repeatedly trick doesn't work here. The enemies will slide them. The way instead is to use the sonic blasts to take care of them. The big problem is getting started and for that I generally would goad the bad guys over to the left, then start sliding the DR corner. Wait for the bad guys to get close, step on the center, and go to the DL. This should get most of them but while the generators reappear you can position yourself to kill the ninjas before they spawn. I didn't find much troube with keeping the top generators from reappearing but you can do the same thing with sonic blasts and those. If you get in a mess where you don't have enough sonic blasts but several pink ninjas are left, lure them in again to a corner, move away, and swat them from the side if possible. But taking a couple of lives for this should be no disgrace. 4-10-7. %%%%%%% @@@@@@@ < ! in UL %%%%%%% @@@@@@@ %%%.%%% @@@.@@@ %%%%%%% @@@@@@@ %%%%%%% @@@@@@@ < ? in DR 2 rows of 3 enemies. Instead of taking the spinners right away it may be a good idea to slide a past to the left, then up to the corner. This will cause new bad guys to regenerate but will save the flippers for later...if you want to play honestly. If you don't, then try to run to the DR without touching flippers and then bounce your way back UL through flippers. Slide the UL square until a glowing flipper appears. The bonus level here is easy. The three hidden stars are under the center and to the left/right of it. You'll have to dig twice for each. This is a really easy level, and you can probably pile up more points by bouncing between flippers, but I couldn't be bothered. 4-10-8. Dark sun in UL, 5's on top and bottom, ? in DR. This seminal endurance level has a bunch of suns between all its generators. If you play carefully you won't need to slide anyone, although you will be sliding empty squares repeatedly. The cycle is: 5 generators, block, sun. Here it may be a good idea to find a scrap of graph paper(or draw your own, 7x5) and keep track of which suns you've uncovered. You see, there can be 6 guys on the board at the same time and 5 generators per square. That means that each sun can take out 6 guys, but your 34 suns(there isn't one under the center) will only need to take out 175 total, i.e. you'll only need 30. But you still will want to keep track of which squares you've used. And you'll want to make sure 6 bad guys have appeared before you step on the center of the sun. If there are too few enemies around and you see a sun, you might want to just start turning tiles over at random. Then when enough enemies are generated, kill them off. Note that if you use 5 slides to reveal one sun, the next will require only 4, assuming it hasn't been tampered with. 4-10-9. This creep is not too bad. The main thing to note is that he tends to jump very high and there's no way you can really push hi maround, but you can note where his shadow falls. I just retreat to the corner. He'll go kitty corner, and often he'll try to fire a tile at you. You can run to that square after the tile is over it as he tends to fire one at the other angle as well. Then he runs in to your corner square, but you can turn around and get him. He's worth 20000 points. 4-10-10. This level is very tricky because the girl has the ability to transform you into some useless stuff. You can wait for the first stars to hit you and become a swimmer and win as you won before(light blue stars always do this-- note the color,) but on the other hand it's also possible to skirt along the bottom and change direction after one of her missiles has just hit the wall. She'll creep closer. You'll need to get in the corner, but eventually you can go up a square and right/left above her, the turn around and slide her square. It isn't too hard but there is a bit of melodrama--you tend to turn into something just as she slides into the wall. 70000 points for this. You walk out onto a mirror. The one princess is crying, but you have rescued her mirror image. You win, sort of, except for the 100 bonus levels ahead. There's no choice of the order to do these in. Here is the order of the sparklies fired at you, with what they do effectively: blue/swimmer: can fake the girl out and kick her two squares back green/alien pink/leaper red/dancer or scout white/ninja--you can proceed as before and the best part is, you can kick the princess into a wall if she kicks you first. These guys kick back! brown/doodler or jumper light green/baby pink/fatty So only let yourself be hit by the blues or white My best score, in the game I used for this walkthrough in fact, is 2731180, with 38 lives and 72 stars, although I did use save states to get it. 5. BONUS LEVELS To access these, hit start, select and reset at the same time. These are arranged randomly by monster type. You start off with two extra lives and infinite continues. The high score is reset to 50000 and yours is reset to zero. You also seem to be able to have no more than 5 extra lives. You get extra lives and 20000 and then every multiple of 70000 here, and the rotating gift goes 10000/1000/10/10000/1000/1up/10/etc. 5-01. +.....S ....... ....... ...+... ....... ..+S+.. ....... ...+... S.....+ ....... Enemies on the corners. Here you just need to run around picking stuff up. Slide your original square first to reveal four hidden stars, and be aware that the aliens are faster here than in the original level. But you can still sucker them over to a sonic blast, although this may require you to re-slide one of the corner squares. 5-02. e...... ....... ..+++S. .?...%. ....... ....... .S+++.. .%...*. ......e ....... Enemies in UL, DR, and on the sonics. Here you can just get the sun right away to win, or you can go up and right and slide the alien into the wall, proceeding to pick up the other stars easily. Then get the sun and step on the rotating gift as time expires. 5-03. e.....e ..+++.. ....... <- ? under center ..+++.. e.....e A pretty plain level where there's no real trouble to collect the stars and subdue the fatties. You've done this before. 5-04. +++*+++ ....... ....... ....... +++?+++ Here you can go to the top and get the sun and go down and get the next sun to subdue the generated monsters--level over. However you can also go back up quickly, slide the top tile, and go through the glowing flipper. Or, if you really want to pile up points, circle around counterclockwise from the top--you may need a juke move--to get all the stars. Then you can use the sun as before. The bonus level is trivial--just start running left and then you won't have to overlap. (1-9, a-z) tuvwxyz srqponm 321ijkl 478hgfe 569abcd 5-05. +++++.. ?..55XX ++++... ..55XXX +++.... .55XXXX ++..... 55XXXXX +...... 5XXXXX* Enemies appear on the far diagonal(five bouncing babies) but you can run under and even through them as the level begins although in my opinion it's better to go for the sun and then carve your way out of the cave you made. You should again be able to clear out the stars and, later, the 5-second blocks with little problem. They can be cleared with a flowing zigzag motion. You don't even have to slam anyone into the wall but if you can goad a few that way it wouldn't hurt. Note that getting the sun puts up a few roadblocks and may not kill all opponents, but it should kill at least half. 5-06. XXXXXXX S.....S +++++++ ....... +.....+ .*+++?. +++++++ ....... XXXXXXX S.....S Here you can kill off the dancers on one side quickly, before they start moving, and deal easily with another so that you can clear out the playfield to get the star bonus. Remember to get the sun last, and if you're a points miser you can even get the sonic blast before the sun, but it's not worth the effort to me. 5-07. e.+++.e ....... %.....% ..+++.. ....... ..555.. ....... ....... ..@@@.. ..+++.. ....... ..555.. e.+++.e ....... %.....% This level is much trickier than it appears. The key thing to note is-- don't slide any of the C/D squares. That will spawn nasty red dancers. Instead, just follow an orange dancer to a side and slide it. Then take out the stars with one dancer left and even pick up the 5-second power-ups if you'd like. 5-08. +++++++ @....?@ +.....+ .*555*. +.....+ ..555.. +.....+ .*555*. +++++++ @.....@ [cycles of 7] 3 columns of 2 enemies. You can do the usual taking them out going up and down. But if you are really confident, you can just go straight up and circle around the girl scouts coming at you. You may have to jump aside from one star. Don't slide anything until you've got the all the stars if you choose this route. This is really a pretty easy level if you just want to get through. You can just unlock one of the suns and step on it, then go to a corner and slide away to get rid of the generators there. Then you can detour to pick up the 5-second bits to pile up your point totals and don't forget the randomized bit as well. But the rest of the level just consists of going to a corner, sliding a bunch, turning to the sun square near the corner, uncovering it and repeating. You have the initiative if you're facing a scout and want to get in a sliding battle, so if they do start following you, you can shake them off. And you don't have to use the corners or the suns if you want to win very quickly, without points. 5-09. S+++++< ....... +.....+ ..%%%.. +.....+ .*%%%?. +.....+ ..%%%.. <+++++S ....... 4 aliens at the corners here. You can win super-quickly by going 1 left, sliding and getting the sun. But the bad guys are easy enough to fake out walking around. And there's even an easier way: go to the DL, slide the bad guy's tile, do it again, go up through the flipper, and then go to the UR. Slide down from the top edge and go through that flipper. Then uncover the sun two left of the center square. Step on it and go left through the flippers to get the randomized bonus as the level ends. 5-10. Again, just like the first level, a scene where the bad guy takes the princess away. You don't need to do anything. 5-11. xxxxxx* +++++++ xxxxxxx +++++++ xxxxxxx +++++++ xxxxxxx +++++++ ?xxxxxx D++++++ Two aliens, in the lucrative corners, are trying to stop you. This level really shouldn't cause too many problems for you to pick up everything, and of course you can bail out by heading directly for the sun. But I think it's a good idea to try to clear everything. The first step to this is going to the lower right and sliding a tile next to the corner to get one of the aliens. Don't get the orange sun yet. Just slide each rubble tile to reveal a star and finally slide the sun tile. You can outrun the bad guy when doing this if your movements are efficient, and you can usually sweep the rows back and forth. If you make few errors you should be able to win before the monster(s) start going quickly, but if not, you should still be able to outmaneuver just one bad guy and pick up both glowing stars. Then you should still have the sun left in the UR corner to decide the issue quickly. Just get the tempo down: slide, move, slide, move. Keep to the center, and this level is a technical exercise. 5-12. White fatties at the corners. +++++++ ....... ....... ......! ....... ....... ....... ?...... +++++++ ....... You don't even have to tackle the fatties, who aren't that difficult. You just need to sneak out to the bonus level on the side, which has 5x5 stars, flippers on the sides, and a star in the center to uncover. 5-13. eX+++Xe .X@@@X. .X@@@X. .X555X. ?X555X* .X+++X. .X@@@X. .X@@@X. .X555X. .X555X. ....... ..+++.. ....... ....... ..SSS.. .X+++X. .X@@@X. .X@@@X. .X555X. .X555X. eX+++Xe .X@@@X. .X@@@X. .X555X. *X555XD Here you should use the side columns to blast the bad guys. Basically you should stay in a corner and see which lane on the tile they use to jump up at you. Then you take a lane not used, wait on the corner square, and turn and slide the tile when they jump into the corner. You may have to go back up to the center to goad more bad guys in, and you can complete the level quickly this way. The sides also have the advantage of not regenerating enemies. But I prefer to leave one bad guy and then clear out the stars. Slide the 3 center tiles in the center row for the bonus and then go to the lower right and get the dark sun. Clear out all those star tiles. Then go to the corner for the final bait and switch. Even if the bad guys get fast here, it shouldn't be a problem. You can always move one lane over and run past them as they jump at you. 5-14. @.....@ +.....+ S.....S @.....@ +.....+ SX?X.XS @.....@ +.....+ S.X.X.S @.....@ +.....+ SX.X*XS @.....@ +.....+ S.....S 2 columns of 3 enemies. You can go for the stars or directly get to the sun. I think the sun may be the best bet, as you can always reawaken just one enemy by sliding a side square. Plus it is a less dangerous pink dancer that pops up instead of an orange one. 5-15. +XX.XX+ .XX+XX. @XX.XX@ +XX.XX+ .XX+XX. 5XXSXX5 +XX.XX+ .XX+XX. 5XX.XX5 +XX.XX+ .XX+XX? 5XXSXX5 +XX.XX+ .XX+XX. @XX.XX@ Pink dancers at the corners. There doesn't seem to be much to do early on, but actually you can slide the two tiles to the north for a couple of stars, then get the other star tiles in the center column. Get one of the suns and the dancers scatter. You can end the level now or step on another sun to go for big points. If you plan to step on the second sun, or if you step on neither sun, you need to wait for the dancers to bust open the blocks in the four columns so that you can do the same to get to the side. If you're going for the big points, then you can wait one square from the left edge and bash the dancers as they come in. The 5-seconds and stars thus fall very easily. Then you can do the same for the right although the one last dancer may be a bit tricky to evade. You may have to drag her out to the center area and then sneak in to the right edge and get her later. If you don't want to use suns, kill all but one and then go on a spree to the stars on the sides. Again, if you kill all the monsters, just loosen up a corner to get one less difficult enemy back. 5-16. e.....e @.....@ <+++++< @.....@ @<+++<@ @.....@ @.<+<.@ ....... ....... ....... ....... .*..... ....... ..+.... e.....e ......* *...... .....*. ....... ....*.. ..+.... ...*... ....... ....... <++++<. ....... .<++<.. ..+.... e.....e @..<++@ @.....@ @.....@ @.....@ @.....@ @!<...@ This level has big potential for you to pile up points. Just follow the suns. If you just wait, you'll be kicked down. Then there is usually a trail of stars to the next sun. If you have great reflexes or remember how the level goes, you can take the flippers all the way through the level, but walking is not too bad. The bonus level is the plain 7x5 type.. 5-17. e..+..e +++.+++ S.....@ ...+... ....... .?.%... +++.+++ ....... ..%.%.. ...+... ....... ...%.D. e..+..e +++.+++ @.....S White fatties are the enemy of the moment. Here you can go left and down to nail the first enemy. Then slide the bottom row--except for the square with the star already--to take care of the stars there. You can probably circle around to the top pretty easily. Again if you have a chance to bash a bad guy into the wall, do it. Even if one gets in your way, you'll be sliding tiles and moving forward, anyway, so it shouldn't matter. Point hoarders will of course want to leave one enemy. There's a rotating bonus and a dark sun, and with fatties being rather slow, you can really run circles around them even when they start going fast. Just get into a sliding/stomping match if you're really desperate. 5-18. %+++++% ....... +.....+ .S%%%S. +.....+ .*%%%?. +.....+ .S%%%S. %+++++% ....... The green aliens in the four corners look like tough opponents but first, you can just knock them out with the hidden sun to your left, and second, if you get onto one of the flippers, you can take a quick route around the perimeter and pick up all the stars. Then you can get the sun and go in for a few bonuses before the level ends. In fact I might even trip uncover a sonic blast to trip off the sun and then go through the flippers for the bonus before leaving the level--sliding and tripping a final sonic blast for fun. Of course you can play with the flippers before touching the sun if you like to niggle extra points, too. 5-19. +.....+ <.....S +.....+ <.....< +.....+ <@@@@@< +.....+ <.....< +.....+ ?.....< Because you can just go in the corner and swat the DL bad guy this one is really quite easy. After that's done you can clean up the stars easily and kill off the other bad guy. If you want some extra points and a bit of a challenge, slide (6,4) for the sun and then (6,2). Activate it when it points left, get the sun, and the rest should be mop up. 5-20. 3 columns of 2 dancers on the edge. You've seen this boss fight before, but not quite this fast to start. I like to run left, nail a dancer, and quickly run back right where you'll have more dodge room in the center. Stay near the wall and you often have nowhere to run and get caught by a rebound anyway. There will eventually be a few enemies who slow donwn and you'll need to grab the chance to slide tiles at them. Once you get started on the first enemy, it will be easier to dodge until a slowdown. 5-21. SSSSSSS @@@@@@@ ....... +++++++ ....... +++++++ ....... ?+++++* SSSSSSS @@@@@@@ This is again a level with a pretty easy bail-out. You can just go to a corner, bash a fatty, and whenever a fatty's on the top or bottom, slide his tile twice to kill him--and the one generated just after. But I have a slight modification to all this. Take out all but one of the fatties, and then you can go around sliding the star tiles for a big bonus, and zap him. If you are really on your game, you can do as follows: uncover the sun and then collect the stars. Don't slide any tiles until you've got everything. Then you can slide the fatties at the side and go for the squares where they are newly generated. You can step on lots of sonic blasts too, and though there's no totally scientific way through, killing bad guys as they appear and picking up sonic blasts is low risk and the main bummer should be that you sonic-blast the final enemy before you uncork everything. 5-22. <.....< .?555.. @.....@ <.+++.< ....... ....... <.+.+.< ....... @.....@ <.+++.< ....... ....... <.....< ..555.. @....S@ Red girl scouts. Go right quickly and down and slide (5,0) twice to reveal the sun. Step on it. You can end the level quickly this way or, if you'd like, you can slide a corner square to have just one opponent. You shoulod even have time to pick up 5-second timers along the way. And if you are really tricky, you can slide a generator square, pick up stuff, slide the square before the opponent gets active, and do a bit more. The trick here to getting all the points is remembering which stars you've slid, or things will get confusing and the girl scout will chase you down. But sometimes you can get her to do your work for you. 5-23. ....... @+.@..@ ....... S...... ......+ ....... +..*.++ ....... ..+S... +@@.@@S ....... @.S@..@ <+..S+@ Orange enemies. This level is a big mess with the green aliens that spawn from randomly placed generators and the best I can suggest, if you don't want to go through by brute force, is to slide the central square to produce a sun. Then slide the square left of it to get the next sun, go down, and go through the glowing flipper to the bonus board. It's a 7x5 maze of flippers where you just need to look for the sun (5,1). 5-24. %+++++% ....... @@@@@@@ +.....+ .S...S. @@@@@@@ +.....+ ..+++.. @@@@@@@ +.....+ .S...S. @@@@@@@ %+++++% ....... @@@@@@@ The key here is not to step on the sonic tiles. They can make it so enemies appear generated. Keep to the sides to kill enemies because the generated green aliens are much nastier than the oranges. You can start well by revealing the three stars in the center and taking the flippers to move around in a circle to get all the stars. 5-25. @.....@ +.....+ S.....S < @.....@ +.....+ S.!...S