/| |\
/ | | \
/ | | \
/ | | \
/ | | |\ \
/ _ | | | \ \
| / | | | | \ |
_________ | | | | | | | | ____ _______
/_____ / /| | | | | | | | | / \\____ \
/ / / | | | | | | | | | | _ | / /
/ / / | | \_/ | | | | | | | | | / /
/ / / | | | | | | | | | | | / /
/ / / /| | | / | | | | | `/ / / /
/ / / / | | | /_ | | | | | / / /
/ / / / | | | | | | | | \ / / /
/ / / /___| | | _ | | | | | \/ / /
/ / / _____ | | | | | | | | | / /
/ / /_/ \_| | | | | | | | | / /
/ /____________ | | | | | | | | / /____________
/________________\ | | | | | | | | /________________\
| | | | | | / /
| | | | | |/ /
\| | | | / _ _ _ _ _/ _
| | | / /)/ (-_) (-/)/_) . . .
| | | / /
\| |/
___ ___ ___ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ___ ___
( _`\ ( _`\ ( _`\ ( ) ( ) ( )( ) ( )( ) ( )( _`\ | _`\
| (_(_)| |_) )| (_(_)| | | | | || `\| || |/'/'| (_(_)| (_) )
`\__ \ | ,__/'| _)_ | | _ | | | || , ` || , < | _)_ | , /
( )_) || | | (_( )| |_( )| (_) || |`\ || |\`\ | (_( )| |\ \
`\____)(_) (____/'(____/'(_____)(_) (_)(_) (_)(____/'(_) (_)
_____ _ _ ___ ___ _____ _____
(_ _)( ) ( )( _`\ ( _`\ ( _ )( _ )
______ | | | |_| || (_(_) | (_(_)| (_) || ( ) | ______
(______)| | | _ || _)_ | _) | _ || | | |(______)
| | | | | || (_( ) | | | | | || (('\|
(_) (_) (_)(____/' (_) (_) (_)(___\_)
Copyright Notice:
Since I will never be able to make any money off of this
FAQ/walkthrough, you violating my copyright will cost me zero dollars in
damages, and therefore there's not much I could sue you for. I'm also
pretty sure that an FAQ on Spelunker won't increase my 1337ness. So do
whatever you want with it. It'd be cool if you e-mailed me at
[email protected] so that I can know what's become of my little
FAQ.
0. Sections:
- I. Introduction
- II. Story
- III. Controls
- IV. Heads-up Display
- V. Things you'll find in the cave
- VI. Walkthrough.
************************************************************************
I. Introduction
************************************************************************
When I was a kid growing up in Nevada, there was a series of
commercials about how dangerous abandoned mines are. "Stay out & Stay
alive!" was their slogan. They should have just handed out copies of
Spelunker.
This game is HARD. Most people, on first turning it on, get GAME
OVER in under 30 seconds. They usually lose their first life in under 2
seconds, trying to walk off the elevator. With this FAQ, you'll save
yourself a few lives of figuring out just what's going on, but you'll
still kill your little looter's neck every 30 seconds unless you operate
with extreme care. Just pretend you're exploring an abandoned mine. ;)
With that in mind, Spelunker can be LOTS of fun once you get a
feel for it. Perhaps because it requires so much dedication, or perhaps
because of the nifty little graphics. If you stick with it, you'll be
rewarded.
************************************************************************
II. Story
************************************************************************
You play the third Mario brother (Silvio) who died as a child from
always exploring abandoned mines. You're descending into a cave that's
something between a natural cave, an abandoned mine, and an ancient
tomb. I like to imagine that that it's a natural cave that was mined in
order to save on excavation costs and then afterwards was taken over by
a commune of Satanists who all died of asphyxiation and became ghosts,
leaving their supplies, keys, and treasures littered all over the floor
once their bodies were devoured by bats.
Actually, that's not too far off from the official storyline, which
you can read in the Spelunker manual at
http://www.nesfiles.com/NES/Spelunker/Spelunker.asp
************************************************************************
III. Controls
************************************************************************
Directional pad - Movement
Left and right make you walk left and right (usually off the edge of
a cliff, to your death).
Up and Down make you climb up and down ropes and ladders (usually
off the end of the rope, to your death).
Unlike your brother Mario, you cannot walk or run across the
smallest gap without falling through. If there is a space of even one
pixel between one platform and the next, you will have to jump to cross
it.
If you walk past a rope or ladder that's within reach, you will
automatically step onto it, and off it. Similarly, if you press left and
right while on a rope or ladder, you will walk off of it, to your death.
A - Jump
The A button makes you jump. By itself, it makes you do a small
vertical jump. With a directional button, you'll jump to the side.
Jumping is one of the most useful and aggravating skills in
Spelunker. You will always jump the same distance, so memorize that
distance, because you'll need to jump into some tight spaces.
If your jump path takes you past a rope or ladder, you will
automatically land on that rope or ladder. If you're not prepared for
this, you might continue pressing on the directional pad and walk off
the rope or ladder, killing you.
Many times in this game, you will have to jump off of a rope to
another rope or a platform. This is the most difficult maneuver in the
game, because if you press left or right while on a rope, you'll walk
off of the rope and die. However, you'll only do a side-jump if the
directional pad is already down when you hit A. So, you have to press
the direction pad, and hit A a split microsecond later. If you hit A
first, your character won't jump and will instead just fall off the
rope. If you wait too long to hit A, your character will interpret your
"jump" command as a directive to let go of the rope and fall to his
death.
A rope has a space of about 3 pixels that you can hold on to. If you
land too far to the side you stand a much greater risk of falling off
when you jump. You can **very quickly** tap the directional pad to scoot
your character over a bit on the rope, to you give you more takeoff
room.
B - Attack
B by itself activates your radioactive flashlight, which kills
ghosts and uses up some of the deadly radioactive fuel you carry on your
back. You can only use this attack while standing on solid rock, not on
the elevator or on a rope.
B + Up shoots a flare if you have one. This attack kills bats until
the flare dies about (about 2 seconds). If you're standing under a low
ceiling, the flare will hit it and do nothing. Incidentally, don't run
into the flare when it's floating back down or, like most things in this
game, it will kill you.
B + Down drops a bomb if you have one. This is only useful for
blowing up big rock formations that occasionally block your way. Once
you drop the bomb, get as far away as you can. Being half a screen away,
on the opposite edge of the scroll, or on a different ledge will keep
you safe.
************************************************************************
IV. Heads-Up Display
************************************************************************
There are a few things that show up on the top of the screen to
show your status. The bomb icon in the upper left shows how many bombs
you have. The pill-like icon next to the bomb shows how many flares you
have. The icon of the spelunker's head shows how many extra lives you
have. If you die when you have 0 extra lives, your game is over.
Next to the cluster of icons, you will see the word "MIN". Over in
the upper-right corner of the screen is the word "MAX". Somewhere
between them is a blue arrow, ticking slowly to the left. This is your
energy bar. If the blue arrow goes all the way to the left, you run out
of energy and die. Your energy is also lowered by about 1/16th every
time you turn on your radioactive ghost-killing flashlight. You can
regain energy by picking up the ringed-rod items I call "plutonium",
described in the next section of this FAQ.
Lastly, your score is the number below the energy bar.
************************************************************************
V. Things you'll find in the cave
************************************************************************
*********
A. Items:
*********
Bag of money - 500 pts
Gold coin - 1000 pts
Bomb - 500 pts
This gives you a bomb, with which you can blow up the big piles of
rock that occasionally get in the way.
Flare - 300 pts
These look like little blue gel-caps. You can use them to scare away
bats.
Plutonium - 100 pts
This looks like a little rod on a base, with rings around it that
jump up and down quickly. It resets the blue arrow that represents
your energy supply back to MAX.
Blinky - 0 or 1000 pts
This looks like something exceedingly shiny lying on the ground
shimmering. It randomly gives you a bomb, a flare, an energy refill,
1000 pts, or an extra life.
Key - 1000 pts
These come in orange and blue, and open doors of the same color.
****************
B. Cave-dwellers
****************
Ghost - 2000 pts
As if the mine wasn't scary enough already, it's infested with
ghosts! Ghosts come at you periodically throughout the mine. You'll
know they've appeared when you hear the hokey horror movie music.
They'll come at random from either side of the screen you're on, and
home in on you inexorably.
However, you ain't afraid of no ghost! To kill them, just stand
on a flat rock surface (not the elevator or bubbly rock) and press B
to activate your proton pack. They have to be within about a certain
range to be killed, about half the screen. And once they start
dissolving, they keep coming at you for about another quarter-screen
still. So be sure to give them enough space when you vanquish them.
You'll get 2000 pts for your trouble.
Bat - 1000 pts
In case you somehow didn't see the bat, you'll know one's near
because of an annoying string of beeps that will go on non-stop as
long as the bat is on-screen (It's either the bat's natural sonar,
or the distressed shrieking of a bat with uncontrollable diarrhea).
Due to all the Satanist corpses they've been eating, the bats do
nothing but fly back and forth raining bat-shit (or "guano"), which
will kill you. You can banish one long enough to run past it by
firing a flare. This will net you 1000 pts, and silence the
shrieking for a few blessed moments.
********************************
C. Terrain, man-made and natural
********************************
The Main Elevator
This is where you start the game. You can move it up and down by
pressing up and down. Be careful - unless it's on the ground floor
you'll have to jump off of it or else you'll fall through the crack
between it and the ledges and fall to your doom.
Keep in mind, you cannot fire your ghost-ray while standing on
the Main Elevator.
This feature appears only in the first cave.
Elevators
These are strings of elevators, reminiscent of Super Mario Brothers,
half going up and half going down. If you ride a down-bar all the
way to the floor, you'll land safely. If you ride an up-bar all the
way to the ceiling, you'll be crushed to death.
You can safely step from one side of the elevator to the other
without jumping. If you're approaching an elevator from the left
side of the screen, you can usually just step onto it safely. If
you're approaching it from a ledge on the right side of the screen,
you will have to jump.
Rope
You jump onto them, and climb up and down. You can also jump off of
them. See the Controls section for more details.
Ladder
Like a rope, but wider.
Stalagmites
These are little triangular lumps on the ground. If you walk into
them or jump onto them, you'll bounce off. You have to jump clear
over them to proceed.
Incidentally, here's how to remember the difference between
stalagmites and stalactites: Stalactites are on the ceiling, so they
cling "tite" so they won't fall off. Stalagmites are on the floor,
and if they get big they "mite" touch the ceiling.
Strangely, there are no stalactites in this cave.
Burping Stalagmite
Okay, maybe they're not stalagmites, because apparently some of them
expel deadly fluid from their center, something stalagmites don't do
because they're just accumulations of minerals from dripping water.
These look like normal stalagmites, except that a little burp
appears over them every few seconds. Wait until it's just
disappeared, and jump over them. Don't stand too close to one while
it's burping, or you'll die.
Bubbly Ground (surface)
These are maybe the strangest feature of the cave. They're a stretch
of ground, the same color as normal rock floor, but rippling up and
down like the hair on a bristling dog. The first one is visible when
you start the game, on the second floor down.
Despite appearances, they're perfectly harmless. You can walk
across them safely, though slowly, or clear them in about three
jumps to save time. Keep in mind that you can't fire your ghost ray
while on one.
Pile of rock
These are big piles of rock, as tall as you are, that you can't get
past. You'll have to drop a bomb on them and destroy them to get
through. Stand *very* well clear when the bomb goes off.
Pits
These are cone-shaped depressions in the ground. If you fall into
one, you die. True, they're only about as tall as you are, but if
you fell 6 feet into a small pit in a cave by yourself, odds are
you'd twist your ankle and be unable to escape, so it's pretty
realistic.
Jump over pits to avoid them.
Occasionally, you'll just miss the far edge of the pit, and land
halfway down in one, alive. If you press the arrow key and the jump
button at **exactly** the same time, you might be able to jump out
alive. Usually, though, you'll step to the deadly bottom of the pit
and die.
Holes
The floor of the cave is littered with convenient holes, which would
be great for getting around if falling into them didn't kill you.
Just jump over them.
Like pits, you'll occasionally miss the far edge of the hole and
land, clinging to the side, halfway down. A vertical jump will get
you safely free.
Trap Doors
Once or twice per level, you'll be walking along toward a sack of
money, when suddenly the floor disappears beneath you and you've
fallen into a hole, to your death.
These traps can be recognized before you die in them. Look at
the floor in front of you. If it's all the ordinary thickness
(height of your character) except for one thin patch, that patch is
a trapdoor. Usually you just discover them through painful
experience, but if you scan each screen before you walk, you might
avoid them.
Just jump over them like an ordinary hole, to get by.
Floor-beams
These look like little bits of the same material as the elevators,
either floating in space or covering gaps in the floor. They act
just like ordinary floor.
Mine Car
This feature only appears in the first cave.
It's a mining car, on a very short track. You lower yourself
into it on the rope, and ride back and forth by pressing left and
right. Dodge the fire coming from the ceiling. You'll hop out
automatically when you hit the end.
Doors
These are blue or orange vertical panels that stand in your way. If
you have a key of the same color, you can walk (or jump) through
them and they'll disappear on contact. If you don't have the key,
they're impervious.
Idol
The Satanic Idol represents the end of the level. When you touch it,
you'll hear happy music and a one-way set of elevators will appear
to lower you down to the next cave. How do you get back out? You
don't. That's why the slogan is "Stay Out & Stay Alive!"
Jug Boat
This feature only appears in the third cave.
This is a great big pot floating in some water. It's just like
the mine car except you have to jump into it rather than walking
into it.
Geyser Elevator
This feature only appears in the third cave.
This is a big yellow platform that looks like a giant
gold-panning dish, riding swiftly up and down on a pillar of water.
Jump on when it's close enough, and jump off when there's a ledge
within range. Don't waste any time, though. It takes 15 seconds for
it to go through its whole cycle, bottom to top and back, so if you
miss it you'll have a long, boring wait and you'll lose around 1/8
of your energy.
Ziggaraut
This feature only appears in the fourth cave.
This is a great big purple step pyramid. It doesn't do anything,
but you can jump onto the top and middle platforms of it in order to
reach the treasures that are past them.
The second ziggaraut is the end of the game.
************************************************************************
VI. Walkthrough
************************************************************************
Rather than providing details on how to get every piece of treasure
in the caves, this walkthrough just tells you how to get the keys and
get to the end of every level. It might still be worth your while to
collect every treasure in the cave, so that you have enough flares and
bombs to get through it, but it's not necessary.
*******
Cave 1:
*******
You start out on the amazingly well-maintained mine elevator at the
entrance to the cave complex. Lower down to the first level, then jump
across onto the ledge (don't try to walk; somehow you'll slip through
and die). Go up the ramp to the first elevator belt in the game. Wait
until a down-bar is below you, then step off onto it, and then to the
ground.
Head right and you'll hit the first rope in the game. Jump onto the
rope, climb up until your feet are level with the top of the ramp, then
jump off (If your feet are too low, you'll bounce off the side of the
ramp and probably die. If your feet are too high, you'll have too far to
fall after you jump off the rope, and you'll die.) To your right are two
stalagmites. Jump over them (they can't kill you) and get the flare and
bomb at the end of the passage.
Then turn around and go back the way you came. Lower yourself to the
bottom of the rope and you'll step down safely onto land. Get on an
up-bar on the elevator and jump across to the top of the ramp, or wait
until you're above the ramp, step across onto a down-bar, and then step
from the down-bar to the top of the ramp. Then hop back onto the
elevator. No keys in this first passage, but you'll need the supplies.
Now for the first key. Go down one story to the passage with the
wierd ripply rock floor. Jump across to it, then walk or jump across the
ripply floor (it's harmless). Carefully leap the hole (it'll take about
the whole of your horizontal jumping ability) and head right. You'll
come to a pile of rocks blocking your way. Walk up to them, press Down+B
to drop a bomb, then walk left until the screen scrolls. Wait for the
flash that says the bomb's gone off, then head right again.
Pick up the plutonium, then carefully wait for the burping
stalagmite to go off. Once its burp disappears, jump swiftly over it and
head to the rope. Jump onto the rope and lower yourself down. If the
ghost appears while you're on the rope, either head to the top of the
rope or to the bottom and put some space between yourself and the ghost,
then kill it.
Towards the bottom of the rope is a gold coin on a ledge with a
stalagmite. If you want to go for this coin, be careful. Jumping onto
the ledge when you're too high up will make you land on the stalagmite,
bounce off the ledge, and possibly be killed. You want to climb until
your feet are just below the top of the ledge, then jump. Then take a
step back from the stalagmite, leap over it, leap back onto the rope,
and continue.
Get the sparkly at the bottom of the rope, then jump from the rope
to the ladder. At the bottom is a blue key!
Then, back up the ladder, jump from the ladder to the rope, and head
back to the elevator, exercising the same caution on the obstacles as on
the way in.
On the way to the second key, stop at the next story down and pick
up the plutonium at the end, to refuel after that long climb. Be careful
jumping the pit with a stalagmite after it. If you make it over the pit
but jump over the stalagmite from too close, you'll bounce off the
stalagmite and into the pit, to your death.
While you're on this passage, walk all the way to the rightmost end
of it, jump once, and you'll make a random power-up appear on the floor
above.
Now, head down one story to where the burping stalagmite is. Head
down the hill (carefully jumping the obstacles) and you'll come to an
elevator. Step onto the down-bars of the elevator, then step across to
the up-bars, but DO NOT STEP across onto the ledge to the right. There's
a small gap on the right side of most elevators, and you'll fall
through. Instead, carefully jump to the ledge. If you don't land already
on the rope, a vertical jump will get you on to it.
Head up the rope to the small room. Now, look at the floor ahead of
you. You'll see a hole underneath the floor, just past the stalagmite.
There's a trap door there. So, carefully jump over the stalagmite so you
land before the hole. Then jump over the hole -- the floor will
disappear from under you, but you will land safely on the other side if
you set it up right. Get the blue key and return back the way you came.
Hop (DON'T STEP) back onto the elevator, and be careful to get across to
the downside quickly or else you'll be crushed on the ceiling. You can
either make a careful hop to the downside, or wait until you're almost
at the top, when your up-bar will match up with a down-bar, and step
across in the nick of time.
If you ride the elevator all the way to the bottom then head left,
there's a room with a bat, a plutonium, and a bag of money. It's worth
going after for the plutonium. Try to stay low on the rope when you jump
onto the ledge with the bat, so you won't be as far into its range. If
there's a gap in its constant rain of excrement, dash through it.
Otherwise, press UP+B to fire a flare and then rush through. Do the same
for the way out. Head back to the main elevator the way you came.
Now, for the third key. Go down once again, to the next level down.
If you go after the gold coin that's to the right of the rope, keep in
mind that you will automatically land on the rope when you try to jump
the gap. So, the way to do it is, jump to the rope, climb down until
your feet are a tiny bit below the ledge, then jump onto the ledge, then
over the stalagmite, then back.
Lower yourself into the mine car and head right, waiting until each
flare of fire is up before you go under it. Be careful on the ones that
are close together -- there must not be a single pixel of overlap
between your head and the fire. In the last two pairs of fires, the
space between only gives you one or two pixels of space on either side,
so be careful. Hit the end, walk down the stairs, grab the orange key,
then head back the way you came.
That's all the keys for this cave, so head all the way to the ground
floor, grab the plutonium, then go up one story to the passage with the
blue door and hop onto it. Bomb the rock (you'll need to be on the far
left edge of the ledge, next to the elevator, to clear the blast) and
head right. If you go for the two treasures up the rope next to the
idol, be careful to pasition yourself correctly when you hop off the
rope, and keep in mind again that you will land on the rope when you try
to hop from one edge of the gap to the other. Now, walk through the
doors to the idol, and you've made it past the first cave!
*******
Cave 2:
*******
Ride the one-way elevator down to the next passage. If you jump
across the elevator-belt to grab the bag of money, take a good look at
the floor and avoid the trapdoor.
Go down one floor on the elevator-belt and exit to the left, where
the two stalagmites are. Go over to the rockpile on the left, bomb it
(you only need to be next to the burping stalagmite, not past it, to be
safe), and keep going left. You'll see a blue key on the left side of a
little chamber at the bottom of a rope. Grab it and head back to the
elevator.
You might want to go all the way to the right, past the elevator,
and grab the flare. Then, head to the bottom of the elevator, hop the
gap, and grap the plutonium. Continuing left, you'll come to two ropes
hung next to each other from the ceiling. Be careful here -- for some
reason, it's harder to jump from rope to rope than it is to jump to and
from one rope. Grab the flair if you're worried you'll run out, then go
down to the first passage on the right. Continue all the way to the
right over the two strange passages of floor. Grab the plutonium (being
careful because you will land on the rope when you try to jump over the
gap) and head down the rope. You'll see a small chamber with some rocks
in it below you. Climb into the chamber, and you'll spot the a blue key.
Bomb the rock (climb to the top of the rope to be safe), and grab the
key.
Now, head left towards the bat (use a flair if need be, since
there's more flairs in the mine than you'll ever need) and head left.
Hop up the stairs, and you'll get the third blue key.
Now walk back down the stairs, back past the bat, up the ropes, to
the left, and all the way back to the two ropes hanging side by side
from the ceiling. Head down the ropes (you'll have to hop from the right
one to the left one, then back again) and you'll come to a blue door on
the right. Open it, and you'll see past you a room full of ropes. This
is, without a doubt, the hardest part of the entire game. If you're
playing on an emulator, save your game now. If you're playing on a
cartridge, take a deep breath, relax, and make sure there's no heavy
objects nearby with which you might break your TV or NES in a fit of
rage.
Now, start hopping ropes. You'll notice a bag of money under the
second rope. DON'T GO FOR THE BAG! The fall is just a little too far,
and you'll die. If you want the treasures on the bottom (a bag of money,
a flare, and a bomb) hop to the fourth rope, and climb that one to the
bottom. Then hop back onto the fourth rope to get back up.
This room is simple in premise. Just hop from rope to rope until you
hit the chamber at the right (past a blue door) where the key is. In
practice, it's pretty difficult. Read my section on rope-hopping under
the CONTROLS portion of this FAQ for more tips on hopping ropes. Note
that each time you hop from one rope to another, you'll wind up higher
than you were before. This will quickly make you hit the ceiling, bounce
off, and die. So, make sure to climb down a little between hops.
Then head through the door, down the steps, and grab the orange key.
Go back out the way you came. BE CAREFUL on the way out. Look carefully
at the ceiling, and you'll notice that it hangs down sharply at points.
You must be quite low on the rope in order to not hit this overhang and
kill yourself. But be careful when you're lowering yourself to the end
of the rope. You climb very quickly, and it's quite easy to fall off.
Even though normal people hang onto ropes with their hands, your feet
must still be on the rope (with about a pixel to spare) in order to not
fall off. If the little purple bit at the end of the rope is all that's
showing, you're down as far as you can go.
You may notice a long beeping sound that starts going during this.
If so, that's your energy running out. Don't rush, or you'll die.
There's a plutonium on the next floor down after this room, and there's
plenty of time to get it.
After picking up the plutonium, head right, bomb the rock (you must
be at the top of the first slope to be safe), and then there's one more
rope-hop to do before you hit the Satanic Idol. Aren't you glad they
didn't make you jump from one rope to another in PE? Climbing to the top
of one was hard enough. Go through the doors, and you're at the end of
the second cave.
*******
Cave 3:
*******
Head down the elevator, and bomb the rock (you'll need to be at
least halfway over the bubbly rock floor to be safe, so you'll probably
need to hop in order to make it that far in time). Head left and you'll
see a blue key in a small chamber up a rope. Bomb the rock that's in
your way to the key (climb down the rope and stand next to the hole on
the right to be safe. You can also hop the gap with the rope in it, but
it's tricky because, as always, you'll have to hop onto the rope, lower
yourself a little, and hop off again), and grab the prize.
Now, head out of the chamber, and down the rope to the next level.
If you want, you can hop past the ladder and down the passage to the
right, where there's a flare, a bag of money, three coins, and a bomb.
If so, you'll have to clear the burping stalagmite to be safe during the
bomb-blast, which will require timing your bomb carefully.
If you'd rather not risk it, just go down the ladder. Head right
through the door, over the bubbly ground (unlike the other bubbly
grounds, you'll have to jump to clear the end of this one). To the
right, you'll find another series of rope jumps. Be careful as in Cave
2, hopping from rope to rope. Grab the plutonium, then go down to the
platform next to the pot in the water. Jump into the pot and head left,
enjoying a delicious shower of water in the process. You'll hop out at
the left end.
There's a small chamber with a bat, steps, and an orange key. Flare
the bat, hop the steps, grab the key. The bat will be back by this
point. You won't be able to flare it from the top of the stairs, so wait
until it's to the farthest right and slip past it to the bottom. Then
flare it, and head back out the way you came, over the jug, over the
ropes, and all the way back to the ladder and a rope descending down
into darkness.
Climb all the way down this rope. There's a big ledge on the right
with a flare, coin, and plutonium on it. There's another more accessible
plutonium just a bit closer, so you don't need to go for them. If you
do, though, be careful because there's a trapdoor after the pit.
Now, once you're at the bottom of the rope, go down the next rope
and grab the plutonium. Head right to the geyser. Down the ladder is
just a coin, blinky, and bag of cash, none of which you need to bother
with unless you're trying to get everything.
To get the next key, ride the geyser down to the first big ledge on
the right: the ledge with a capsule, pit, and coin. Get onto this ledge,
and climb down the rope. At the bottom you'll see a bat and a blue key.
Stand to the right of the rope to launch a flare, then grab the key and
rush back to the rope. Be careful not to hit the flare on its way back
down as you get back onto the rope. I reccomend waiting until the flare
disappears, then get out of the way of the bat quickly.
Now, climb back up the rope, to the geyser. Get on the plate and
jump off at the ground floor. Go up the ladder, and you're at the end of
the third cave!
*******
Cave 4:
*******
Ride the elevator down into the last cave. This elevator's unusual
in that you can step onto it from the right.
Climb down the ropes to the steps. If you want, get the treasures.
You can jump onto the top and middle floors of the step-pyramid.
Once you're at the steps, you'll notice an orange key on a ledge to
the right. This is one of the trickier jumps in the game. Climb the rope
until your feet are just above the purple part of the rope that is just
above the level of the ledge, then jump. If you're too high, you'll hit
the ceiling, and if you're too low you won't make the ledge, but if you
get it just right you'll land on the ledge. Snag the key, and jump back
onto the rope. This also is a tricky jump, because you must jump closer
to the lip than usual or else you'll miss the rope.
Head down to the floor, the go right over the hole to get a
plutonium. Go back left, and up the rope to the ledge above. If you go
for the bag of money to the right, be careful because there's a trap
door. Then go up the long rope to the top, then across to where two
ropes hang from the ceiling.
Go down the ropes, then down the ladder, then down the steps. Climb
the rope to the top, and grab the orange key. Don't be fooled by the
ladder to the right, under the bomb. It's under the ledge; you can't
reach it.
Go down the rope, and bomb the rocks (stand all the way to the left
to be clear). To the right side of the ladder is a ledge with an orange
key on it and a bat above. You could risk jumping onto the ledge and
firing a flare, but there's an easier way. On the ledge you were just
on, where you bombed the rocks, look at the ceiling. Most of it is too
low for a flare, but there's a little dip right above where the rocks
were (sort of next to a stalactite). Fire a flare there, then hurry onto
the ladder, hop onto the ledge (being careful to get even with the ledge
first so you don't die from the fall). Grab the key and get back on the
ladder.
To your left further down the ladder is a ledge with a rope leading
up to a blue key. Get that key. If you want to get the plutonium, watch
out for a trapdoor between it and the rope.
Now head down the ladder, through the blue door, down a rope, left
some more, to a pile of rocks. You'll have to clear the burping
stalagmite to be clear when you bomb the rocks, so you'll want to plant
the bomb just as the burp is dissipating in order to time it right. Now
go up the rope to the left, watch out for the trapdoor in the middle of
the ledge to your right, and go up the next rope (the ledge to the
right of that rope is empty, by the way, so don't bother checking it).
Go up the rope to the left, and then get off at the ledge with the
orange door, and go through to get a blue key.
Continue up the rope to another rock pile (stand next to the rope to
be clear). Climb the ladder, staying about two rungs down in order to
have enough space to clear the ledge at your head.
Go through the orange and blue doors, and stand before the
ziggaraut. That's the end of the 4th Cave! You'll see a congratulatory
screen (IMHO a better ending than either Zelda or Super Mario Brothers),
and then be whisked away to another cave. This one is exactly the same
as the first, but colored green, with more ghosts and invisible keys.
Don't remember where the keys are located? Well, that's what
walkthroughs are for. :)
Beat that one and you'll see the same congratulatory message, but in
green. Then you'll be sent to a grey cave with the keys still invisible,
but not in the same positions as before. I spent some time looking for
them, but couldn't find them. If you do, please drop me a line at
[email protected] and I'll add them to this FAQ.
THE END
