A shame this came out shortly after the DS did. I never hear much about this game, but what I hear about it is good...even if there are things about it that frustrate me later on.
Area 1-1: Skullker Hideout
The game begins with The Red Dozers - Jill, Grutch and Gearmo - heading off to the Skullkers' hideout to retrieve the Red Diamond, which was left to Jill after her mother passed away. Jill heads off in the Drill Dozer into the Skullkers' hideout, but she soon falls through a trap door and gets knocked for a loop upon landing. From here, getting back out is priority number one.
Left and Right move left and right, A jumps, B in conjunction with the D-Pad lets Jill look around while the B button is held down, Down and A slides. L and R will be your drill buttons, with L drilling in one direction and R drilling in the other. You'll be using R more often than not, but there will be times where you have to use L, and that will be mentioned in detail later. When you drill, you'll see a gauge on the screen that fills up and goes back down. You'll be able to get more out of your drill later in the level.
Jill soon gets back in the Drill Dozer. By drilling through the wall with L or R, you can destroy the wall, but the drill will not run for long. The walls you destroy will have health meters, and when they go all the way down, the walls will be destroyed. You can also hold Left and Right to move forward and back while drilling. If you see cracks in a wall, floor or ceiling, you can use the D-Pad in conjunction with the drill to drill through them and find things.
In the next room, you can destroy the blocks with the drill. The blocks reveal some posters with information, such as the pause menu where you can save your game and exit the level as well as the equipment menu and help file that you can access with Select. If you get the prompt above your head to press the B button, press it. Sometimes it will be Grutch or Gearmo contacting you, and other times, you'll be able to read the thing your standing in front of or interact with what is in front of you.
The small black rectangles you'll pick up are chips. Chips are used to purchase things in the shop, which won't be mentioned until a bit later on. The bigger the chip, the more it is worth.
As you go through the game, you'll get hints from Grutch and Gearmo, usually Gearmo, about what you need to do next.
Self-repairing barriers require extra gears to get through. The small ones require two gears, while the bigger ones require three. If you see a big red box with a drill on it, drill through it to open it. You'll find second gear. To shift gears, hold down either of the shoulder buttons, and when the drill gauge gives you the "SHIFT UP!" instruction, briefly let go of the shoulder button you were holding and press and hold it again to run the drill in a higher gear. You'll go into second gear, and while the drill will still go up and down, that brief instance will be more powerful than when your drills are in first gear. With that in mind, time it right, and you'll be able to destroy the barriers in one shot without them regaining health. Shifting up will take some practice and timing, but once you get used to it, you'll be able to do some cool stuff in this game.
Along the way, you'll have to use your drill to fight enemies. Enemies have health meters much like cracked walls, and you'll need to defeat them to progress and get chips. Some robotic enemies will shoot bullets at you, but if you drill the bullets, you can block the bullets. The drill won't block all projectiles, such as missiles or bombs, however.
The boxes with the wrench on them will give you health (such as the green stone that replenishes three units of health) or chips for the shop.
The blocks that are made out of metal won't be able to be destroyed yet. You'll need parts from the shop to break them, and you won't get them until later.
The electrical barriers in the broken parts of the floors will hurt you, so jump or slide over them.
To go through doors in the background wall, go up to them and press B to enter them.
You'll eventually go through the Skullkers' quarters and destroy everything before you get to third gear. The socket lifts will carry your Drill Dozer from one point to another if you drill into it and keep running the drill. If you let go of the button you're drilling into the lift with, you'll let go of the lift.
You'll eventually get your third gear later in the later. Getting to third gear from second gear is just like going from second to first, except you're shifting up from second gear. Once you're in third gear, however, the drill will keep running until you let go of the shoulder button you've been using to run the drill. Also, the music changes to something much more triumphant once you have third gear. With third gear, you can go through the thicker self-repairing barriers and tear through scores of enemies and blocks.
With third gear, you'll finally be able to make it to the elevator behind the big barrier you couldn't get through before. If you go to the left, you'll go back to where the trap door was. The battery will refill even more health than the green stone, and you won't find it often.
Going to the right leads to a fight with a tank. Jump over the missiles, then drill into the hole in the tank and shift up to third gear. If you know what you're doing, you'll be able to take care of the tank in two attack cycles.
Afterwards, you'll be able to put your drill in a machine to open the door. R will open the door, while L will close it. When you're done, press B to detach your drill from the machine. You'll need to break a wall on the other end to reveal the machine on the other end to close the door, which in turn lowers a wall blocking the exit. Once that wall is lowered, you'll be able to exit.
Jill - who is a silent protagonist - talks with Grutch and Gearmo. When you leave a level, you'll automatically go back down to first gear and lose the other two gears, but you'll be able to regain those gears in every level you go to. You'll also find out that Jill's father, Doug, was beaten up by the Skullkers, and Jill is taking over as the boss in his stead until he recovers. From here, the hunt for the Red Diamond continues on.
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