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Lode Runner Bug Collection

Unfortunately, a program of this complexity is bound to have a few problems. This page lists the significant bugs that I know of in the new Lode Runner games. Level makers may want to read through this list, as players can sometimes use them to their advantage.

Flying Lode Runner
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

If you walk off of a monk and onto a tile where there is an invisible ladder, you will "fly" through that and the next tile. You can fly right through some kinds of turf, but flying into other kinds of turf will cause the level to restart. Download fly.zip to try some puzzles that take advantage of this. [Found by Konstantin Seiler]

Suspended monks
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

The falling rock created by the pickaxe falls faster than monks do. If a falling monk is hit by this rock, the monk remains suspended in mid-air forever (unless you blow it up with a bomb). The tile with this suspended monk behaves just like the tile with the fallen rock, except that it's permanent. It is also possible (but difficult) to hit your fellow player, or even yourself, in this manner, with similar results. Some other things to do [from Patrick Mihelich]:
- Trap someone under a pile of rubble and set off a big bomb such that the turf immediately underneath the victim is destroyed, but not the victim himself.
- Hit someone with the pickaxe while he's using a jackhammer.
- Hit someone when he's in a snare in midair.

Tool duplication
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

This bug occurs if you are carrying four small bombs and a tool, and standing on a fifth small bomb. If you then press your "pickup/drop" key, the bomb you are standing on will magically turn into a duplicate of the tool you are holding. (This was fixed in Lode Runner On-Line.) [Found by John Taylor]

You can't use that here
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

In certain situations, there is a split second when you're running between different kinds of tiles, where the rules for determining whether you can use tools get applied to one tile, but the tool will actually get used on the other tile. This allows you to sometimes use tools (including small bombs) in mid-air, or while hanging onto a bar, which you're not supposed to be able to do. Although the bug is consistent, it does not work for all tools in all situations; e.g. the snare seems to be totally immune to it.

Walking through floors
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

This works if you're on a ladder, with bedrock below. Hold down the "UP" key while you tap on the "DOWN" key very quickly, many times. If you tap it fast enough, you will sink through the floor and into the room below. If you're having trouble getting this to work, try changing the game speed. The default speed seems to be about the easiest. This does not work with all versions of the game. [Found by Dan Bank]

Bouncing off walls
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

If you're standing on a monk with a wall to your right, and you try to move to the right, you will actually move left! This is clearly a bug, since if the wall is instead on your left and you try to move left, nothing happens.

Invisible hand-over-hand bar
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

If the tile after a hand-over-hand bar contains turf that has been temporarily removed, it will behave sort of like there is a bar there also. This prevents you from, say, lighting a bomb at that position. It doesn't support you like a bar normally does, however. The bug only occurs if you enter the tile from the side, from a tile with a bar.

Can't climb down
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

If you blow up the turf beneath a ladder, you will then run over it as if it were still there, and won't easily be able to drop down into the open space. The same thing happens with phaze bricks beneath ladders in Lode Runner On-Line. A workaround is to start to climb up the ladder, and then climb down.

Can't climb down II
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

You cannot drop down through a phaze brick that is directly beneath a hand-over-hand bar. [Found by Howie Pelton]

Trapdoor between ladders
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

Trapdoors with ladders both above and below them don't work right. You can climb back up out of the trap (wrong), but you can't move left or right (also wrong). The treasure in this picture is inaccessible. However, if you use a tool (other than a bomb) at that tile, it will start behaving correctly.

Survive Liquid Tile
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

Liquid tile won't hurt you if there's a ladder directly above it. You'll fall right through it! Download lavagames.pzl to try this out. [Found by Loyalle Chin]

Also, if your starting position is over liquid tile, you will fall safely through the first 2 tiles. [Found by Jim Winkler]

Tool duplication II
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

If you try to drop an item on top of a treasure that you can't collect because it is the wrong color, the treasure will turn into a duplicate of the item you dropped. This renders the level unsolvable, though, because you can then never collect the vanished treasure.

Walk on air
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

If you use a big bomb to blow up the rubble created by a pickaxe, it doesn't destroy it. Instead, it makes it permanent, and invisible!

The fossil
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

If you use the pickaxe to drop rubble onto a hand-over-hand bar, the graphic on that tile may change somewhat randomly when you zap some nearby turf, or when nearby turf reappears. The graphics that you get are different on the bottom row of the screen than on the other rows. The only really strange graphic that appears is shown above: a dinosaur fossil? [Found by Dan Bank]

Slippery
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

If you zap a hole 2 tiles above a bar, and 3 tiles above liquid tile, and then drop through it, you won't be able to grab onto the bar, and will fall to your doom. Strange... [Found by Jim Winkler]

Ad infinitum
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

On a puzzle with no exit doors, if you enter a teleporter and the top row of the screen at the same time, you will get caught in an infinite loop. You will start to exit the level, then start to teleport away, then start to exit the level, etc. One could argue that this is not a true bug, but it is very unusual. [Found by Jim Winkler]

No exit
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

You can destroy exit doors and invisible ladders by picking up the last treasure while they are covered with rubble from a pickaxe. [Found by Patrick Mihelich]

Stuck
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line
If you are carrying a boss bomb, enter a teleporter, and press the Use button just as you finish rematerializing, you may get permanently frozen at that position, even if it's in mid-air. [Found by Patrick Mihelich]

Stretch
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

If you have a light touch, you can grab treasure or a tool on an adjacent tile when you are on slimed turf. You have to use this trick to solve these puzzles. Maybe not really a bug, since this behavior is not illogical, but barely-possible things like this aren't really consistent with the spirit of the game. [Found by Loyalle Chin]

Cut, mangle, and paste
The Legend Returns
Lode Runner On-Line

Beware of the Cut-and-Paste and Copy-and-Paste features in the level editor. If you have numbered your monks to tie them to particular entrances, their numbers will get reset back to zero when you select them. This does not apply to Legend, since it does not have the monk-numbering feature.

Other possible bugs