Marker Man Misadventures 5

It is now time to explore World 4. This game is finally out of the forest and in some sort of mineshaft. The level is cave themed and spoooooooky music is playing. The spooky music is less than 10 seconds long. I guess I should expect that by now.

If you have not learned how to use the camera panning controls by now, this level is almost impossible to exit, unless you make a leap of faith off the waterfall area and don't hit something. Far to the right of the exit glove there are additional platforms where you can get the coins. Also, am I missing something in that spike area? Why in the world would you not take the bottom path? There's nothing to gain by going the top route, except for the sake of challenge. Obviously I took the higher route. Also, can you imagine game overing in this world and starting here with only one marker in the whole level? Yikes.

This level is fairly dangerous. There is a new enemy that can drain health quickly, there are spikes all over the ground, and there are lots of platforms, both small and moving ones. On the plus side, there is a good storage of markers at the ceiling of one of the areas. I actually like this level. It's fun.

Toxic Sneeze

This enemy outputs 1 damage per frame, scaled up to 4 because it is world 4 (probably). It occasionally makes a loud sneeze, but that's purely cosmetic. In addition to the 4 damage per frame, coming into contact with the toxic sneeze will cause 25 lingering damage over the course of 5 seconds. Both types of damage can kill you. Although it is not bubbleable, it is a stationary enemy that can be pushed around, so it is easy to get around it or place an object between marker man and the toxic sneeze so that no damage is taken and the enemy can be moved out of the way. What I'm trying to say is, do not touch .

There are tight spaces and spiky walls everywhere, but they aren't really that dangerous because of the window of time you have to go past them when they move. Since the shoe boys are bubbleable, you can just push them off a ledge and not worry about them immediately. Definitely safer than level 41.

It feels quite similar to level 42. Jump over the shoe boys, and if you want to get that coin in the pit of doom you should be able to draw a line just long enough on the side of the pit wall to get out if you use the camera controls.

This place is pretty rude. You have bandits placed in really bad locations (bad for you, that is) which makes it difficult to explore without getting mugged. The one way trip at the bottom is particularly nasty. The moving platforms are not synchronized and move "out of phase", making it difficult to rely on jumping straight from one to the other. The best way to go down I found is to quickly place a line platform over the bandit in the cubby, and staying there until the second platform is there. Due to where the top platform stops, going back up is near impossible.

Marker Bandit

These guys are the worst . They move back and forth very quickly, stopping on occasion, and if they manage to touch you, they will steal your markers . You cannot get those markers back from them and you cannot bubble them. How many markers do they steal? It appears to be a random number from 2 to 10. Yes, up to ten markers can be stolen instantly.

There's a lot of things that can go wrong here. You could run into a spike and die. You can fall to your death. You can have all your markers stolen. The safest place to be is probably the center, between the walls of spikes in the well. The main danger here is the bouncy pads. You need to figure out how to reduce your bounce. The most effective method I found is to brush against the side of a platform as I'm in the air.

The bandit that's guarding the one coin to the right is sometimes dumb and will eventually run itself out of the hole, so you can collect the coin without trouble. If you do not want to wait what could be a very long time, then try making a ramp from your position to that hole so that the bandit starts running up it. You can use that opportunity to delete the bridge from underneath him and, if timed correctly, it will cause him to glide out of the hole. There's not really any good way to do this level from what I can tell: just doing a lot of coordination and cheesing. You don't have to get the coin in the hole unless you want to do the bonus level. Hey, bonus level!

I was curious if the rabbits would still do 4 damage here because I'm not really in world 4, am I? They don't. They do 13 damage. THIRTEEN DAMAGE. Does this mean there are at least 13 worlds I have to go through to beat the game? I guess the bonus levels are a separate world, so maybe 12. Are the dog levels their own world because they are all in their own range of levels? 11 worlds then. Possibly. Maybe. Anyways, the death pendulums are completely harmless. They are too far out of the way for navigation to be hindered. Just watch out for those rabbits.

UHHHH. I may have figured out where my extra lives came from. I wasn't completely paying attention, but when I exited the bonus level I noticed I had two lives remaining. I played the level again and I confirmed my theory. Completing a bonus level gives marker man an extra life. Too bad lives are almost pointless for me because I save scum.

There's a sneaky coin hidden in this level. So, by mapping it out I made the only part that made this level interesting gone. Just kidding, there's one more interesting part. The choke point with the two spiky walls move at different rates. That is to say, their move cycles have slightly different times. This means there are times where it's impossible to pass them because they're "out of phase". Simply wait until both spiky walls are moving away from each other and towards each other in a synchronized manner.

A short level where the left half of the map is fairly pointless to do. The toxic sneezes on the small platforms will be the biggest problem. Try pushing them away before landing on their platforms.

There is a timing challenge at the beginning, and after that some platforming with moving ground. That's the only tough part of the level. Everything else is just walking closer to the exit. And the exit is… another dog level? Already? Wow, okay. Short world, I guess.

This is a racing level of a different kind! All the yellow blocks will disappear after you step on them, so you cannot stop moving. You could do it the boring way and place line shapes over them so they don't disappear, but the fun way is to just run through it. The level is pretty easy anyways. The only problems are the occasional long blocks that get in your way. When facing one of these, just jump and stick to the side of them so you don't need to worry about the platform underneath you being gone. Annnnnnnd we're done!

With world 4 complete, it is now time to see the map. If you couldn't tell from the level maps, the world map is very small and much more linear than usual.

See you later…. cowboys.