(Life is an) Uphill Battle

[GooRoo]

My own copy is dated the 13^th (World/properties date ... not Windows file date). Perhaps I uploaded it on the 14^th and you are looking at the Windows (file) date, and not the internal Gruntz World/Properties date?

[GooRoo]

I have updated several partz of the walk-through for this Custom Level with imagez. The actual walk-through section is only about 75% complete (that is, with imagez added), and I am working on it as time permitz. The stage play I am involved in ("A Christmas Carol") has its last performance Sunday, December 20^th, so I hope to finish up before Christmas day.

The Gruntz component needz to be updated to show the new gruntz the solver bakez and enterz into the game. The Toyz component is a copy of a CL that had no Toy, so that needz to be changed. The Toolz component may have an 'order' problem ... listed with at least one Tool out of sequence. I have the most fiath in the Coinz and Secretz componentz. Those may provide enough information for a solver to make it through the solution.

[GooRoo]

I just uploaded what I believe to be a complete and usable walk-through for this old Custom Level.

Printed out on USA standard 8-1/2 X 11 inch paper, it is 13 pagez, including supporting imagez when objectz such as enemy gruntz are mentioned.

I hope this will encourage those Gruntzerz who were put off on playing this CL to take up the challenge, and work their way to a "PERFECT!" score.

[swietymiki]

Level number twenty, time 53:12.

This is a level that lives up to its name. Overall it's quite complicated, has some tight timing sections and doesn't always deal fairly with the solver. But let's start from the beginning. The first puzzle involves a spring in a field of spikes. Soon after entering, you step on a SecretTeleporterTrigger which forces you to speed up to reach the wormhole in time. You're given barely enough time to make it to the wormhole by making optimal jumps through the area and there's also a small clever detail to the solution that I won't share here. It already felt more difficult than the other spring-based levels like Springtime in Cloud City due to that "time limit" (and I couldn't just do it from the get-go). I have not known at this point that this secret (and several others) are required to complete the level - there is a totally invisible blue toggle switch under the tree which has to be pressed to make a bridge for a rolling ball the very end of the level. What I find even more perplexing is that in another part of the map, there's a mound behind a tree (with a coin, not required to complete the level) and it's not only partially visible, but there's also a large arrow from alternate ground tiles pointing at it. But here, there's nothing to indicate that this switch exists. The neighboring foundation tile is where your Grunt lands after being teleported and doesn't really hint at the tree in any way. For any potential custom level designers reading this, it's a bad practice to put such things without an indication to draw the solver's attention to this spot.

Soon after returning from the wormhole you get to enter another area of the map and are greeted by a modified version of The Rock's ending puzzle. And honestly I don't like that a random factor was added to it - four toggling red pyramids on the battlefield and the AI of the rock throwers was changed to hit and runners. This causes them to get killed randomly and, what the solver doesn't know at this stage, you later have to return to this area with a straw and drink at least 8 out of potential 10 puddles to bake additional Gruntz. And you can do nothing to help with that other than restart from the previous save, because to eliminate the clubs and swords, you don't have any other option than sending the rock throwers after them. You also need full health to be able to exit the area without getting killed by the boomerang on the arrow path, so it's pretty tough.

You get teleported to the middle area and from that point the map shows its true non-linear colors. There are lots of tool exchanges, especially between gauntletz and shovel that need to be done in the right order and some Gruntz also need to be taken through the right secret teleporters to press more blue switches. You can screw yourself up in advance on multiple occassions. I believe it is the hardest map of GooRoo (that I've played) so far and it definitely deserves the "Hard" rating. Two SecretTeleporterTriggers in the middle area are pretty easy to find but there are another two hidden in the arrow maze, one of them being completely unreachable without sending your Grunt on a suicidal path and then redirecting him with a sponge gun. I admit I wouldn't have found that one without searching for it in the editor - there's again no hint of something of interest being on any of the arrows. It's a nice and difficult puzzle otherwise. The level feels noticeably different to play than the previous levels (which I consider to be a good thing), even though it uses only one toy and zero powerups.

The timing sections are harder than usual. The secret switches in the two faces areas basically require you to know the path in advance unless you have very quick reflexes (some bridges only show up for 1 second, so you essentially have 0.4 seconds to react). But sometimes even that won't be enough, if you collected the coins in the wrong order and ended up on the opposite side of the island. You get the exact amount of time to collect the coins you need, get in and get out. The silver pyramids part also requires some rapid clicking, although it's not complex.

This map has one significant issue at the end that just needs to be mentioned. Imagine you got to the end of the level doing everything right, found all the blue switches, coins, etc. One of the last parts involves releasing a rolling ball which goes around the entire map to hit a green switch, opening the fort entrance. You wait some time but the pyramid never goes down. You reload and follow the ball, finding out it gets dumped into the water at one of the corners and you can do nothing about it. That's because soon after the ball is released, it rolls over a secret switch which then creates arrows for a short amount of time (little over 1 second) that redirect the ball on the map corners. Turns out that the game of Gruntz doesn't work identically on all machines, as on my PC the ball and the arrow already desynchronized on the second corner - the tile changed too late to influence the ball's direction (as if the ball was going faster than intended). Restarting doesn't help at all, it always happens in the same spot. Rohit seems to have run into exactly the same issue back in 2006 (see the previous page of this thread). So this makes the level totally unbeatable on some computers and definitely should be fixed by making the time window a lot larger. I exported my savegame to a different (older) PC and it worked there fortunately, so I was eventually able to finish the map.