This is a FAQ for Meteos, ver. 0.2
By Mark Green
Email address for submissions/updates:
mark [at] antelope [dot] nildram [dot] co [dot] uk
The latest version of this FAQ will always be available from
http://www.gamefaqs.com.
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**************************** LEGAL BITS ******************************
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Neither the author of this FAQ, nor any person who distributes it in
any way, shall be responsible or liable for anything that results from
using this FAQ for any purpose, including but not limited to
damage to your Nintends DS, hands, eyes, controllers, or rockets.
This FAQ may be freely distributed provided that it is kept unmodified
and in its entirity. This FAQ may not be sold, or included as part
of a publication that is sold (including a website to which a
subscription is charged), without the author's express permission.
Meteos, Nintendo DS, and all the characters therein, are (c) and (tm)
Nintendo, Bandai, and/or Q Entertainment 2003-2005.. The use of any
trademarks within this FAQ is not intended to be a challenge to their
validity.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
1 - INTRODUCTION
----------------------------------------------------------------------
(This is an approximate translation of the scrolling text in the game's
intro.)
"Amongst all the stars in space, there is one planet which alone is
causing a major crisis. A planet where disasters are running wild.
Its name: Planet Meteos.
The Planet Meteos releases showers of material of ever-changing
appearence, called "Meteo"s. The released Meteos are landing on other
planets and building up there, gradually consuming the earth. Slowly,
the other lights of space are going out.
Several newer planets fear that they may be crushed by the assault.
But then, they made a discovery. If several meteos of the same type
are connected, they undergo nuclear fusion and launch back into space.
Thus, the defence operation began. Every planet began working on
developing new ways to link the meteos together and launch their
counterattack. Amongst the different civilisations, they found all
kinds of different methods of combining the meteos and launching
them back.
They are now beginning the ultimate counterattack: to pair the meteos
on the Planet Meteos itself. They have built the great battleship
"Metamorph Ark" from the same material as the meteos themselves,
with the ultimate goal that it will be able, alone, to destroy the
Planet Meteos.
In one small corner of the Milky Way, one small civilisation is
standing against the ultimate threat to the universe."
----------------------------------------------------------------------
2 - GAME BASICS
----------------------------------------------------------------------
The idea of Meteos is quite simple: your planet is being bombarded with
meteos (ie, meteors), and you must save your planet from destruction by
blasting the meteos back into space. You do this by building rockets
out of the meteos.
At the start of the game, you'll see an empty playfield and meteos will
begin to fall. The speed at which they fall, as well as the appearance of
the meteo blocks, will be determined by the planet that you're on; you
can choose this on the menus (as discussed below). If ever a solid line
of meteos stretch from the bottom to the top of the playfield, the line will
begin to strobe red; if another meteo is dropped on that line, your planet
will be destroyed and there'll be a lot of big explosion sound effects. In
most modes you only have one life, so the game will end at this point; if
you are in a mode where you have multiple lives, you'll lose one and the
field will empty for you to have another try.
You create rockets by moving the meteo blocks up and down. You can only
move blocks up and down, never left to right. The blocks are subject to
gravity, so you cannot move them up above the top of the stack they are
in. You move blocks by touching them and dragging them with the stylus,
or using the cursor driven by the DS joystick (but the stylus is superior
in every way)
When you move blocks, they change places with the other
meteos in the stack.
To create a rocket, you must line up three identical meteos either
horizontally or vertically. Here's an example:
(In the following diagrams, r, g, b, and p represent meteos of different
colours; a dot (.) represents a meteo whose colour is not important to
the example.)
o
/
/ Here, drag the top red block down..
.r
..
.r.
.r..
o
/
.^/ .. to create a line of three red blocks ..
.r
.r.
.r..
v
.
# And you create a rocket. The three red blocks you created
.# are transformed into "rocket fuel", and they - together with
.# anything above them - start to fly upwards.
.^.
. ..
o
/
.../ You can do the same with a horizontal line..
..r
.....
rr...
.....
... o .. create a horizontal line of three same colour blocks..
..| /
..|/.
[rrr].
.....
...
... .. and the three blocks turn into rocket fuel and start to
... lift off.
###..
^^^..
.....
Once a rocket is created, it will fly upwards. Any meteo that is carried
off the top of the screen on a rocket will be destroyed. Incoming meteos
will also land on the rocket. You cannot die as a result of meteos landing
on a rocket, even if they go above the top of the screen, so having a
rocket also provides some defence.
Notice that only the three meteos which you lined up to create the rocket
are transformed into rocket fuel. Meteos on top of those will ride on the
rocket but aren't transformed. However, meteos that are on a rocket can't
match with those that aren't, or match with those that are on different
rockets, even if they're lined up.
However, just launching a rocket isn't necessarily enough. Different
planets have different levels of gravity, and rockets launched take off
with different amounts of thrust. If there are too many meteos on one
of your rockets, it might not be able to make it all the way up to the top
of the screen. If this is the case, the rocket will begin to fall,
usually slowly (but this also varies between planets) back down towards
the other blocks.
...
... This rocket has not managed to successfully climb off the
... top of the screen, so it is now falling back down.
###
^^^..
..
. ..
.....
...
... Unless it is saved, it will fall back down into the layout
..... and eventually come to rest. Note that the three rocket fuel
###.. blocks stay connected to each other, meaning that the rocket
. .. is not seperated by gravity, even though the left and right sides of
..... this rocket are not supported underneath.
.
... Once the rocket has landed, after a few moments, the rocket
..... fuel blocks will turn back to ordinary meteos of random
.g... colours (NOT the original matched three colours!). Gravity
r.b.. may then cause the blocks that were previously on the rocket
..... to seperate from each other.
Fortunately, if this happens, you can prevent it by using one of several
techniques to give your rocket a BOOST.
SECONDARY IGNITION:
Create ANOTHER match using the blocks on the rocket.
This will cause one of two things to happen (and I'm not yet sure how to
determine which one will happen): either these blocks will blast off as
a seperate rocket, or the main rocket will be given a boost.
.g.
g.. Here is our example rocket again, which has begun to fall back
..g down.
###
^^^..
..
. ..
.....
o
.|./
||/ Rearrange the green blocks to create another match on the rocket..
[ggg]
###
^^^..
..
. ..
.....
...
...
###
###
^^^ .. and the rocket will BOOST back up again!
^^^
..
..
. ..
.....
SHOOT: A Shoot allows you to shoot a block upwards from the board to
join onto a rocket that is floating above it. You can only shoot a block if
there is a rocket above it for it to join, and there must be no other blocks
resting on it. To perform a Shoot, touch the block with the stylus and then
flick it upwards, or (if using the joystick), attempt to swap the block with
the blank space above it.
.
..
... The red block is below the rocket.
###
^^^..
..
..
.r...
.....
.
..
... o Touching the red block and flicking the stylus upwards..
###/
^^/..
| ..
| ..
.r...
.....
.
.
..
.#. .. causes the red block to shoot upwards and attach to the rocket,
#r# driving the existing blocks on the rocket (including the fuel)
^^^.. upwards.
..
..
. ...
.....
Shooting will give a rocket a very small boost, but usually this will not be
enough to make a difference. It does however allow you to send up blocks that
can be used to create another match on the rocket, providing another boost via
SECONDARY IGNITION. Alternatively, if one of your rockets is already escaping,
you can shoot extra meteos onto it to get rid of them.
STEP JUMP: A Step Jump occurs if a rocket lands and, as a result, a match
occurs between blocks inside and outside the rocket. Example:
.
..
..r Here, you have some blocks loaded on a rocket which has failed to
. ..... escape and is landing. Looking at the rocket and where it will
..###... to land, you see that the red block on the rocket is going to land
..^^^... on the fourth row of the overall layout.
.. .r.
.....r..
.
.. o
..r /
. ...../ Before the rocket lands, you move the two red blocks outside the
..###rr. rocket up to the fourth row.
..^^^||.
.. ||.
.....|..
.
. .. .. The result of this is that the rocket landing creates a match on
...[rrr] the three red blocks.
........
..###... (Remember that this cannot happen until the rocket lands.)
........
.
.. ..
..### This triggers a STEP JUMP, which relaunches the combined rocket
. ...^^ and gives it a substantial boost.
..###^^.
..^^^...
..^^^...
MID AIR DOCKING:
..
...
### Here, again, a rocket has failed to escape and is landing.
r^^^
r. ..
...r....
........
..
...
##o By re-arranging the red blocks on the ground..
|^/^
||/ ..
[rrr]...
........
..
...
.### You create another rocket underneath the first one. This
..^^^ causes the two rockets to dock together, giving the first a
### .. boost.
.^^^....
........
In general, vertical rockets have more thrust power than horizontal ones,
and they also carry less weight (because they can only carry one column's
worth of blocks). Thus, in a pinch, it's a better idea to make vertical
rockets.
Because you need meteos to make rockets, sometimes there will be brief
period of times where there's nothing for you to do in the game. In
these cases, you can accelerate the fall of meteors by holding down
either shoulder button, or tapping and holding on the bottom right corner
of the screen.
In a multiplayer or VS CPU game, Meteos sent off the top of the screen are
sent to opponents. They will appear initially as black blocks which cannot
be matched with other blocks, but which can be put onto rockets created from
other blocks. After a few moments, they will turn back into regular meteos
of random colour.
ITEMS:
There are various special items available in the game. At the start of
the game, only a few are available, and the others must be unlocked via
Synthesis (see below). Items will drop onto the playfield in the usual
way. The majority of items will automatically trigger after a certain
amount of time has passed; by tapping the item with the stylus, you
can accelerate the timer, thus choosing when the item triggers.
The items are as follows:
Bomb - Explodes and blows up meteors around it.
Smart Bomb - Blows up every meteor on the screen!
Drill - Slowly digs down through the line of meteors under it, until it
hits the bottom of the screen, where it explodes, destroying the bottom
row.
Line Bomb - Destroys the horizontal line of meteors it's on.
Cross Bomb - Destroys all meteors lined up with it horizontally or
vertically.
X Bomb - Destroys all meteors in diagonals from it.
Rocket Engine - When activated, instantly creates a 5-block rocket base
centred on the Engine. This rocket has no Rocket Fuel - it is powered
by five rocket engines, which replace the blocks that were previously
present on the left and right of the Rocket Engine item. This rocket is
NOT guaranteed to escape and must still be boosted in the normal way.
Super Rocket - Same as Rocket Engine but the rocket base spans the entire
board!
Hammer - A few moments after activation, creates a huge hammer which
moves around the screen destroying Meteos randomly.
Axe - Similar to Hammer but slightly weaker.
Smoke Screen - Emits smoke, making it hard to see an area of the screen.
This is a negative item which can be sent to you in multiplayer or vs
CPU mode. If you get one, try to destroy it by loading it on a rocket.
Line Smoke - Similar to the Smoke Screen, but covers a smaller area.
However, it lasts longer.
Pitch Weight - Waits at the top of the screen for a bit, then destroys a
line.
Heavy Weight - Similar to Pitch Weight but destroys 3 lines.
Eraser - Destroys all meteors of the same colour as the one below it.
Accel Lock - Forces Time Acceleration to be always active. Like Smoke
Screen, this is a negative item and you should try to destroy it by
loading it on a rocket.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
3 - SYNTHESIS AND ITEMS
----------------------------------------------------------------------
In actual fact, the meteos which you send off the top of the screen in
play modes are not destroyed. They are saved and stored for you to use
to build useful items and unlock access to other planets. There are
a total of ten types of Meteo in the game, and each planet has five
of them. When you are choosing a planet, a bar graph will be shown
showing which types of meteo are available on the planet and how
frequently they appear. Although meteos look different on every planet,
they are always one of the ten types, which are differentiated by
colour.
At the end of each stage, you'll be shown a display showing all twelve
different types of Meteo, and showing how many of each type you gained.
The types, as ordered on the chart, are:
Air (White) Fire (Red)
Water (Blue) Earth (Orange)
Metal (Purple) Electric (Yellow)
Plant (Green) Animal (Pink)
Light (Lt. Green) Dark (Dark Blue)
At the bottom of the chart are an additional two types of meteo. These
will be displayed as "????" until you first collect one of each type:
Soul Time
These types are called "rare metals". Meteos of these types can appear
on any planet, but they only appear very rarely. Make sure to collect
them when they appear! Soul meteos are pink, and have an embryo icon
on them; Time meteos are white and have an hourglass icon.
Note that only meteos that are taken off the screen by rockets count
towards your stock. Meteos that are transformed into rocket fuel do
NOT count; neither do meteos that are just left on the field when a
round ends, and neither do meteos that are destroyed by items.
You can use your stock of meteos to buy (or technically, make) items
in the Synthesis menu (see below). The items available to buy are
divided into four categories: Planets, Items, Rare Metals, and
Sound.
Note that items only appear on the synthesis menus in the game once you
have enough money to buy them. However, once an item has appeared on the
menu once, it will not be removed even if later (due to buying something
else) you no longer have enough money to buy it. In this case, the
item will appear faded out in the menu, and any parts of the cost which
you cannot afford will be shown in red.
Planets:
[ Buying a planet will allow you to choose it as your planet for Simple
game, and as your home planet in Star Trip. ]
Frizam 100 Air, 200 water
MegaDome 200 Air, 200 Fire, 100 Water, 100 Earth
Florius 1 Soul
Layer Zero 256 Air, 256 Fire, 256 Water, 256 Earth, 256 Metal,
256 Electric, 256 Plant, 256 Animal, 64 Light, 64 Dark
Gerugeru 666 Fire, 666 Earth, 666 Animal, 3 Dark
Jyagonbo 50 Water, 100 Earth, 600 Plant, 100 Animal, 1 Light
Items:
[ Buying an item will unlock it, making it eligable to appear in the
game.]
Drill 150 Air, 50 Fire
1-Line Bomb 111 Fire, 111 Water, 111 Earth
Smoke Screen 200 Air, 200 Water
Cross Bomb 100 Fire, 300 Electric, 5 Dark
X Bomb 500 Fire, 500 Earth, 5 Light, 1 Time
Giant Axe 500 Plant, 400 Animal
Heavy Weight 256 Earth, 256 Fire, 512 Plant
Thor Hammer 500 Electric
Rare Metal:
[ Rare Metals allows you to purchase blocks of the rare metal
types using other meteos. This is a bad idea usually, because they
are very expensive, but you might be desperate! ]
1 Soul Meteo 250 Fire, 250 Water, 250 Electric, 250 Animal, 100 Light
1 Time Meteo 250 Air, 250 Earth, 250 Metal, 250 Plant, 100 Dark
Sounds:
[ Buying sounds will enable them to be selected in the Sound Test. ]
Byubum Set 300 Air
Firam Set 100 Fire
Gerugeru Set 300 Fire
Oriana Set 100 Water
Frizam Set 300 Water
Anastasi Set 100 Earth
Forte Set 300 Earth
Grannest Set 100 Metal
Mechs Set 300 Metal
Jagonbo Set 100 Plant
Udo Set 300 Plant
Megadome Set 100 Electric
Graviton Set 300 Electric
Daunas Set 300 Animal
Anima Set 700 Animal
Hyuji Set 100 Light
ThirdNova Set 200 Light
HeatHaze Set 700 Fire
Heaven's Door Set 100 Dark
Yoronion Set 200 Dark
Wireon Set 50 Light
LunaLuna Set 50 Dark
Rastar Set 1 Time
Opening 100 Air
Menu 100 Air
Synthesis 300 Fire 300 Water
Star Trip 300 Earth 300 Metal
Multiplayer 300 Electric 300 Plant
Ending 1 200 Light
Ending 2 100 Light
Ending 3 200 Dark
Staff Roll 100 Air, 100 Fire, 100 Water, 100 Earth, 100 Metal,
100 Electric, 100 Plant, 100 Animal, 100 Light, 100 Dark
----------------------------------------------------------------------
4 - MENU GUIDES / TRANSLATIONS
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Note that you can freely re-arrange items in the game menus by dragging
them around with the stylus! Because of this, it's necessary to identify
the menu items by the icon in the corner or the colour of the item.
The game is started by tapping the "touch" logo in the corner of the
screen; or just leave the game running to view an intro sequence that
will let you gloat at any PSP owners in the room.
Opening menu:
Blue - Meteos (Play)
Green - Synthesis / Merge / Factory
Purple - Multiplayer
Cyan - Options
Yellow - Extra
Options Menu:
Planet Icon - Default planet
(Lets you specify which planet will be your default home in Star Trip
or Multiplayer, or the default play planet for Simple. The effect
of choosing a particular planet is described above.)
Switch - Item Switch
(Lets you choose which items will appear in the game. Each item can
be turned on and off, and the option at the top allows you to choose
how many items appear.)
Hand Icon - Handedness
(Left or right-handed.)
Speaker Icon - Sound balance
Exclamation - Clear Data
Clear data menu:
Star Trip Data
Time Attack Data
Challenge Data
Synthesis items and unlocks
Statistics
! EVERYTHING !
Meteos (Play) Menu:
Red - Simple Game
Orange - Star Trip
Blue - Time Attack
Green - Challenge
Yellow - How to Play
Simple Game:
Play Meteos on a single planet for as long as you can survive, or play
against CPU opponents. Tap on the Planet picture to choose the planet to
play on; you can choose any planet you've unlocked. The menu on the
right hand side has the following options:
Rules: Stocks (ie, Lives) - option begins with a star
or Time (clock)
# Stocks, or Amount of Time
Difficulty
CPU Level
Team
Time Attack:
Play Meteos on a single planet for a limited amount of time, and try to
destroy as many meteos as you can. Alternatively, play until a certain
number of meteos are destroyed, and try and do it as fast as you can.
You do not have a free choice of planet; it is determined by the mode you
select.
The four options are:
2 Minute Time (on Geolight)
5 Minute Time (on Layer Zero)
100 Meteors (on Firam)
1000 Meteors (on Heaven's Door)
Note that you can only play each mode on the specified planet, and you
cannot unlock a planet by visiting it in Time Attack.
Star Trip:
The "story mode" of Meteos, in this mode you travel between multiple different
planets challenging their inhabitants to games of Meteos. On each stage you
will be playing against one or more CPU opponents; defeating them will allow
you to continue to the next stage.
On the Star Trip menu, you can tap the planet icon to change your home
planet, and also tap the left and right arrows to adjust the difficulty level.
To start Star Trip, click on one of the three courses shown at the bottom of
the screen. They are as follows:
Left hand side: STRAIGHT course: you will play a series of seven planets,
with no choices offered. The first six planets are random, but the
seventh planet is always Meteos itself.
Middle: BRANCH course: you will be shown a map containing a large number
of different planets. After playing each planet, you will be offered
the choice of two different planets to visit next.
The map below applies if you choose your home planet as GeoLight (which
is the default).
Staria Meteos
HeatHaze
Bubitto Hyugia Meteos
Jagonbo Giganta
Grannest Forte Sabon Meteos
Firam Byubum Keibios
Oriana Frizam Daunas Heaven's Meteos
Anastasi Gerugeru Florius Door
Megadome Layer Third Meteos
Mechs Zero Wireon Nova?
Gravitor Anima Meteos
LunaLuna
Yoronion Meteos
If you choose a home planet other that GeoLight, the map will be
altered as follows: the game scans each column in turn, left to
right, top to bottom, creating a list of planets. GeoLight is added at
the top of the list, and your chosen home planet is removed from the
list. Then, the list is fitted back to the map structure above, again
left to right and top to bottom. Thus, if you choose Firam as your
home planet, your first planet will be GeoLight, and you'll have a
choice of Oriana and Anastasi.
Right: MULTI course: rather than playing against a single opponent,
you will play against teams of opponents with a particular theme. You
will also be given a mission to complete on each stage. If you
manage to complete the mission on a stage, you will be offered a choice
of which planet to visit next after that stage; if you fail to complete
the mission, you can still continue in the game, but you will not be
offered any choice of route.
Multiplayer:
Multiple Cartridge Play
DS Download Play
Yellow Icon - Profiles
Extras:
Music note: Sound Test
0/1: Statistics
Download icon: Upload demo
[ Lets you load a demo of Meteos onto your friend's DS. ]
Statistics:
First game startup time
Number of game starts
Total active time
Total play time
Number of games, Simple mode
Total time, Simple mode
Star Trip, number of games
Star Trip, total time
Star Trip completions
Challenge, number of games
Challenge, total time
Time Attack, number of games
Time Attack, total time
Multiplayer, number of games
Multiplayer, total time
Multiplayer, number of opponents
Number of destroyed Meteos
Number of destroyed Items
Number of rockets created
Meteos used as rocket fuel
----------------------------------------------------------------------
5 - PLANETS
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Note: the percentages listed for each planet represent the frequency
with which each type of Meteo falls on that planet.
Geolight -------------------------------------------------------------
Air 100%
Fire 100%
Water 100%
Earth 100%
Animal 50%
This is the first planet you'll play on, and as such, it's the standard
to which other planets are compared.
Firam ----------------------------------------------------------------
Air 30%
Fire 100%
Earth 30%
Metal 30%
Electric 30%
Oreana ---------------------------------------------------------------
Air 60%
Fire 60%
Water 100%
Electric 60%
Plant 60%
Skin:
Blue backdrop with water images. Slow mellow music. Rockets launch
with kettle-drum melodies. Meteos are edged texture blocks.
Anastasi -------------------------------------------------------------
Air 50%
Fire 50%
Earth 100%
Metal 50%
Animal 30%
Settings:
Quite high gravity but quite high launch power. Boost effectiveness
quite low.
Skin:
Desert backdrop. Music is tense thrummed guitar chords. Rockets
launch with alternating notes. Mteos are edged texture blocks.
Grannest -------------------------------------------------------------
Air 60%
Fire 60%
Water 60%
Metal 100%
Electric 60%
Megadome
-------------------------------------------------------------
Air 100%
Fire 60%
Metal 100%
Electric 100%
Plant 60%
Settings:
Moderate launch power but very slow gravity and very effective
boosting.
Skin:
"Island in space" backdrop. Music is continuous techno drumbeat.
Rockets launch with arpeggio sounds. Meteos are icons in boxes.
Florius --------------------------------------------------------------
Air 50%
Fire 20%
Water 50%
Plant 100%
Animal 90%
Frizam ---------------------------------------------------------------
Air 50%
Water 100%
Earth 50%
Metal 50%
Electric 50%
Byubum ---------------------------------------------------------------
Air 100%
Fire 50%
Water 50%
Earth 50%
Metal 50%
Daunas ---------------------------------------------------------------
Air 100%
Fire 100%
Earth 100%
Plant 100%
Animal 100%
Keibios --------------------------------------------------------------
Fire 50%
Earth 100%
Metal 50%
Electric 50%
Plant 50%
Heaven's Door --------------------------------------------------------
Air 100%
Fire 100%
Water 100%
Earth 100%
Metal 70%
Electric 70%
Settings:
This is one of the most unusual planets in the game: rockets have
INFINITE thrust. In other words, the moment you make a match of three
meteos, everything above it is INSTANTLY thrown off the top of the
screen, and there is no possibility of the rocket failing to launch.
Grannest ------------------------------------------------------------
Air 70%
Fire 70%
Electric 70%
Water 70%
Metal 100%
Jagonbo -------------------------------------------------------------
Air 20%
Water 20%
Earth 20%
Plant 100%
Animal 20%
Bubitto -------------------------------------------------------------
Air 100%
Fire 20%
Water 20%
Electric 20%
Earth 20%
Staria --------------------------------------------------------------
Air 40%
Water 50%
Earth 40%
Plant 30%
Animal 100%
Light 40%
Yoronion ------------------------------------------------------------
Metal 100%
Electric 100%
Plant 50%
Animal 50%
Dark 60%
Setting:
Moderate launches, but gravity is hard and fast.
Skin:
Geodome backdrop. Music is string chords. Rockets launch with
sampled telephone chatter. Meteos are edged texture blocks.
Mechs ---------------------------------------------------------------
Air 30%
Fire 30%
Water 30%
Metal 100%
Electric 70%
Setting:
Weak launches and high gravity. No inertia or momentum! Quite
effective boosting, but good luck getting one in before the rocket
lands. On the plus side, the time before a landed rocket collapses
is increased.
Skin:
Anime-style city backdrop. Music is techno drumbeat. Rockets launch
with synthesised arpeggios. Meteos are unboxed abstract symbols.
Gravitor ------------------------------------------------------------
Air 40%
Earth 100%
Metal 60%
Electric 60%
Animal 40%
Setting:
Launch strength here is ZERO! Yes, that's right, your first match
will do NOTHING - in order to launch a rocket at all you MUST make
at least one boost! Boosts are effective, but this is still a
HARD planet..
Skin:
Backdrop is a swirling black hole. Music is fast, tense drumbeat.
Rockets launch with guitar riffs. Meteos are blocks of stone with
outdented symbols.
LunaLuna ------------------------------------------------------------
Fire 100%
Earth 100%
Metal 100%
Electric 100%
Plant 100%
Setting:
Launches are weak, but launches and gravity are very slow.
skin:
Stone backdrop. Music is quiet backing melody. Rockets launch
with record scratching sounds. Meteos are circular sign symbols.
HeatHaze ------------------------------------------------------------
Air 20%
Earth 20%
Electric 10%
Dark 10%
Animal 30%
Fire 100%
Meteos --------------------------------------------------------------
Fire 100%
Electric 100%
Plant 100%
Animal 100%
Light 100%
Dark 100%
Settings:
This is the "boss planet" which appears at the end of all Star Trip
games. As such, you won't be too surprised to find that this planet
tends to be chaotic. Falling rockets are relatively slow, but thrust
is weak, and the meteor fall rate is high. Expect to have lots of
rockets in the air!
Planet Of The Credits
-----------------------------------------------
ALL 100%
Not a proper planet, of course. You get to play on this "planet" during
the credits roll after completing Star Trip. Since you've already
completed the game, this might seem pointless: however, meteos destroyed
during this mode are still added to your stock for Synthesis! As such,
this mode provides a good opportunity to stock up on all types of meteo,
and rare metal meteos also fall more often in this mode. However, it's
not a giveaway: the meteo blocks are a lot smaller (and thus harder to
tap precisely), you'll typically need multiple matches to launch any
substantial rocket, and when the credits end you're kicked out IMMEDIATELY.
So much for those 3 Soul blocks on that rocket that would have escaped in
2 seconds..
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6 - OTHER TRANSLATIONS
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Star Trip Endings
There are multiple different Star Trip endings.
In Branch mode, the ending you get depends on which of the seven
instances of Meteos you visit. From top to bottom:
Ending 1 (bad ending!):
The Metamorph Ark was a battleship made from the same material as the
planet, so that it would have equal strength in battle. To defeat
the Planet Meteos, it transformed to resemble it, and was victorious.
But then a disaster occured: the Metamorph Ark did not return to its
original form. It remained, becoming a new Planet Meteos! Only God
knows what our fate may be now.
Ending 7:
The merciless Meteos army had smashed many stars throughout space,
leaving them broken. The meteos that had flown from the planet Meteos
flew through space, gathering dust, and slowly building up until,
after thousands of years, they themselves became new stars.
These stars were rich in resources, and the inhabitants of the other
planets looked up at the beautiful new galaxy.
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7 - GENERAL FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
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WHAT IS "THE FLAW" AND HOW DOES IT AFFECT GAMEPLAY?
"The Flaw" is, allegedly, a game-breaking design fault in Meteos
which certain reviewers have complained about. "The flaw" is
that since moving blocks around with the stylus is so fast, and
since there is no penalty for a "wrong" move (one that doesn't
create any rockets), you can simply scribble the stylus around all
over the screen and count on creating a rocket by chance. Advocates
of "the flaw" claim that this technique is so effective, especially
at saving you from death at the last moment, that once you are aware
of it it becomes a sham to attempt to play by any other method.
The most obvious problem with this claim is that it isn't backed
up by real results. Many flaw advocates claim that random scribbling
will save you whenever you're about to die, yet if this were truly the
case these players would be logging theoretically unlimited scores in
Simple mode. Although random scribbling will get you rockets, it won't
get you rockets in optimal locations, nor will it guarantee they'll be
able to launch.
In multiplayer, likewise, the "flaw" isn't as effective as it sounds.
This is because, in multiplayer mode, meteos sent onto your field by the
opponent can't be matched against each other, so just moving them around
randomly can have no useful effect at all. This significantly lowers the
effectiveness of the "flaw" at saving you from dying.
About the only mode where the "flaw" may be effective is Star Trip mode,
because the AI is relatively weak. However, random scrubbing still won't
get you the biggest range of blocks for Synthesis, nor will it help you
achieve the missions in Multi mode.
The bottom line is that, although the flaw is a problem it's not the
game-breaker it's painted as. Using it to complete Star Trip is just
the equivalent of smashing your way through Tekken's single player by
picking one of the Capoeiristas and hammering the kick buttons: it'll
let you unlock stuff but it's by no means the best way to play.
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7 - CREDITS
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At the moment, I've recieved no contributions, so the entire FAQ is by
me, Mark Green.
Many thanks to Q Entertainment for making the game, Nintendo for making
the DS, Craig Rothwell and Play-Asia for making me able to play it, and
EIC and JWPce for making me able to read it.
