Chapter 3

Interlude

Luigi In The Shadow Castle

Not much to do here. Simply keep moving to your left, and eventually you’ll be caught by the brainwashed forces of Bleck.

Back to Flipside

Now that you have Boomer, you can explore Flipside a bit more. If you bust through the cracked wall on Flipside’s 1st Floor, you can find a couple of new buildings, including a handy card shop, which for ten coins will sell you a random creature card. Don’t forget that these double your attack power against certain creatures. You can find cards for creatures in upcoming chapters at the card shop, since the cards are random, so you may want to spend some coins here, especially if you haven’t been buying items.

The elevator from 1st Floor to Flipside B1 is working now. You can talk to Garson, the bartender in the bar here, for some gameplay tips. You can also visit the arcade by walking through the right wall of the bar. You can also flip into 3D mode near the elevator to find an InterNed card. You may also want to drop into the water here and swim along until you meet Flimm, a salesman with a rotating stock of rare items. You can also bust open a pipe in the Flipside 2F section that will lead you to the Flipside 3F section that’s blocked off by a fence. Standing on the leftmost block here and searching the screen with Tippi will let you find a path of blocks that will lead you up to a cooking recipe disk.

Welderburg will build pipes for you…at a price.

When you want to move on, head outside of Merlon’s house and flip, and start retracing your steps that you took to reach the second Heart Pillar. After crossing the small 3D ledge leading off to the right, then descending into the green pipe, you’ll be moving from Flipside 2nd Floor Outskirts to Flipside 1st Floor Outskirts. (You can drop down into one of the holes here to find a Merlon Card and a Merluvlee Card.) Find the pipe here with blocks on top of it, blast them with Boomer, then drop down. There are Tech enemies here that are resistant to jumping attacks, so try to nail them with Boomber bombs as they jump around. When you reach the wall at the right side of this area, use Slim to slim yourself down and maneuver through the wall to reach the Heart Pillar. Throw the Pure Heart in there, and you’ll open the doorway leading on to Chapter 3.

(Note that the pipe in this area will let you reach the first Pit of 100 Trials, if you wish to try it on for size at this point. See our chapter on that challenge for more information.)

Chapter 3–1: When Geeks Attack

First Screen

As soon as you enter this world, Tippi will be kidnapped by a geek named Francis. Your goal now is to rescue her! Proceed along the path here until you come to a small gap with a tall pipe nearby. Jump across the gap and shift into 3D to hit the shiftblock there. Jump onto it and jump onto the pipe and hit the block to go up to a red door.

Oh, the pain. The pure, unadulterated pain.

Now, that door will lead you on to the second screen, so before you take it, continue on to the right a bit. If you do so, you can find a Piranha Plant card up in the air (jump onto the blue figure in 3D mode and jump from there) as well as an Ice Storm and a Thunder Rage in the pipes.

Lastly, after heading up to the red door, but before going through it, use Peach and jump off to the right. You should be able to glide down to a floating platform with a green pipe on it. Head down the pipe to reach a level that’s something of an homage to the original Super Mario Bros. The second pipe here will lead you to the final confrontation at Bowser’s Castle, but the third pipe here will lead you to a room with a Magikoopa Card.

At this point, you have a number of options. If you just want to move on, take the second of the three small pipes to lead you to Bowser’s castle. If you want to go through the red door, feel free to do so; that path will lead you to a couple of bonus screens where you’ll able to supersize yourself and nab a couple of special items, including a Capture Card SP. At the end of that path, you’ll get a sign that tells you to fall down in between the red pipes, referring to the two red pipes on the first screen here. If you do so, you’ll wind up back in the Super Mario Bros. homage level. You can drop down into the green pipes here to find another Capture Card SP, but eventually you’ll wind up back at the three green pipes option. Take the middle one, again, to hit up Bowser’s Castle.

Bowser’s Castle

It's funny how Bowser usually winds up being the most likable character in these games.

Proceed to the right until you come to Bowser’s castle. Smash the red mark on it with Boomer, and Bowser himself will come down to fight you. This isn’t much of a boss fight, since all Bowser will really do is jump around and try to breathe flames at you. Lay down Boomer and detonate it when Bowser gets near, while simultaneously moving underneath him when he

Chapter 3–2: Bloops Ahoy

First Screen

You can use Bowser’s flame breath to kill the enemies here, or use Thoreau to throw them into each other. You can flip into 3D to avoid the whirlpool effect in the middle of this area, then use it again to reach the pipe at the end.

Second Screen

If you go to the far right end of this screen, you’ll see a diagram that displays six posts in an up, down, down, up, down, up configuration. Return to the middle of the screen and head up there to reach the green pipe there. That will lead you on through a couple of passages to reach the next red door.

Third Screen

Kill all of the enemies here by throwing them around with Thoreau or by firebreathing on them to reveal a chest. The next Pixl, Thudley, resides here. Jump over the post here and press 1 while he’s on your side to pound into the post and unlock the door. Return to the first screen, near the save point, and find the six posts in the ground there. Pound the second, third, and fifth posts into the ground. That’ll open the door leading on.

Fourth Screen

You have a big boss fight here, as a giant octopus enemy will attack you. It’ll trap you into a small section of the level and prevent you from leaving, while it also attempts to spear you with its spikes from below. Switch to Bowser here and breath fire on the red spike when it appears. Hitting it three times will cause the octopus to disappear, letting you end the chapter.