ix925@sdcc6.UUCP (??????) (02/21/85)
Marble Madness is a fun game, but they're aren't enough races.
After the Ultimate Race, the game ends and plays some fancy music.
After about being on the floor for about two weeks at the arcade which
I go to, most of the players were able to finish the entire game.
Maybe Atari should put in more longer races, I was sort of
disappointed when I found out that there were only 6 races, Crystal
Castles had 40 levels and Missle Command and Asteroids had more then
could be counted.
Here are a few tips you can use to play the game:
1. Use both trac balls when playing single player
Both of them control the marble and combined they
give you more speed.
2. The light blue stuff is ice. You can't control the
marble when it is on this stuff. It appears at the
end of the beginner race at in the Ultimate race.
Roll the marble in along the right side and let it go.
3. In the intermediate race, You can avoid the opening maze,
you know, the one where the marble keeps bouncing around
inside, by jumping onto the middle section. When the
marble gets about halfway down, roll both tracballs to
the right and it'll jump onto the middle to get off,
just jump off where the maze ends. It really works, but
it takes practice. It saves ALOT of time.
4. The green slime can be avoided most of the time by going
as fast you can by them. For some reason the slime seems
to move out of the way if you move fast enough... Maybe
they're afraid??!!
5. In the areial race, there are two paths you can take after
the red scoop throws you. One is in the front with those
pipes and one is in the back with nothing but ups and
downs. Take the one with the pipes, its quicker. The
hammers have a pattern. The most common is two hammers
and then four. Go after the four. With the one with one
hammer at a time, you move forward then back then forward
again.
6. In Silly race watch the time, don't spend too long
squashing things. It's fun but time is of the essence. If
it takes more then two seconds to squash one, its time to
move on. The pink birds are helpful at one point. Get hit
by one bird when you are going to the right along the
path. It'll teleport you right to the exit. After the
birds, the path goes up and into another bouncy maze.
That is also a waste of time. When the marble is going
up roll it back down and to the left. It'll hop off and
you'll be on a flat surface. I've seen some people save
about 4-5 secs doing that.
7. In Ultimate Race, GOOD LUCK!!! It takes a lot of luck
everything comes into play here. The first two parts with
the slime and marble eater, just takes a lot of luck and
manuvering. On the ice, just roll in at a moderate to
fast speed. Your hoping that by going fast, you can knock
the black marble off at the same time you die. The
disappearing paths is just an illusion. Go through them
at a average speed. They always seem to appear at the
right time. Even if they do disappear just as you are
about to leave it, the marble will usually fall onto
the next one with a SMACK and dizziness.
And, that is the end. Just sit back and listen to the music. What did
Atari do, put car speakers into that machine? They sounds pretty good.
Good Luck....