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Editorials 
Exploring the Mansion
- By Dan
Doll
Still curious as to the depth of Luigi's Mansion? Well read on as English gamer Alex Deas reveals the puzzling aspects of the mansion's first series of rooms. Be forewarned, you're about to enter Spoiler City. Enjoy your stay.
Let's pick up after Luigi first opens the door to his dark, new Mansion....
You start off in the Entrance Hall of the Mansion. Go up the stairs and try the doors. They're locked, but that won't be a problem for too long. If the eerie noises haven't scared you off, go back down the stairs. A ghostly figure appears and drops a key. Put it to good use on the central door.
Inside, you'll meet the scientist. After failing to deal with the ghosts himself, he'll give you the vacuum. The ghosts here just disappear when you shine light at them, but they come back in the rest of the mansion. The trick is to stun them up close, giving you enough time to start hoovering. You'll stay locked on until you've caught them, or you get hurt, so don't worry about loosing them. If you pull away from a ghost until it has no health left, you'll catch it. If you repeatedly pull away, it'll go faster, so try that out if you're in a hurry. There are 10 ghosts in all, but don't worry about it. When you're confident you're an expert ghost buster, you can go back to the Mansion.
Right, now you're tooled up and ready to start busting them ghosts. Once you're ready, go back to the room you unlocked before. Pick up the free money if you like, and put out the purple candles. That gets the attention of the ghosts, who are a little more aggressive this time. If you practiced hard, this part should be easy. I found it best to wait until the ghosts were right behind you, then quickly turn around and stun them. Next, make with the hoovering until there's no more ghost. Now deal with the next few. You'll know when you're finished because the lights come on and a chest appears. Open the chest to get the key to the next room.
The next couple of rooms go along in pretty much the same way as the first one. The purple ghosts are the same as the orange ghosts, except those have a bit more energy. But by this time they shouldn't be too much of a problem. You can hoover up several ghosts at once, so try that if you think you're up to it.
The third room has another couple of new ghosts. The main one you'll see is the Green ghost. They like to throw banana skins around. These can be hoovered up, but watch out you don't hoover them to your feet, as you'll end up falling over them anyway. Try to steer yourself away from the bananas if you can, or you'll fall over and have to catch the ghosts again. Hiding in one of the cupboards is a blue ghost. These aren't much threat, as they disappear for good after you stun them. But if you do manage to catch it you'll get a whole load of money. Unless you're particularly curious, you may get to the stage where there's no ghosts left, but the lights aren't on.
You see, ghosts are sneaky sometimes. They like to hide from you, and scare you when you're not paying attention. In this case, there's two of them hiding in the cupboards, so start banging them or hoovering them until they open. One of them is one of those blue ones, so don't worry too much, as you can clear the room whether he's gone or not. When the lights finally come on again a key will appear on a high shelf. But oh no! Luigi isn't tall enough! You have to learn to use your hoover in many ways to succeed in this game, and this is one of them. Point your hoover at it and get sucking. Soon it will be yours. This is also good practice at aiming the hoover, so make sure you do it with style.
Now you have the key to another section. In the next corridor, there are all these ghostly mice. They can be easily hoovered up for practice or avoided. Now look at the map. There will be one door that is open, so head for that. One thing to note here, there are more doors in the corridor than the map claims there are. If you try to open doors that aren't on the map you'll find yourself victim to a mean trap (Though it's quite funny to watch, so be sure to try it if you have some spare energy).
Now, back to the unlocked door. Go inside and you'll find yourself in a study. Some books will fly at you, so deal with them first. By now you'll have noticed another new ghost in the room. You'll probably try conventional methods of catching him. But you'll soon notice that they're not working. These 'Character' ghosts form the main part of the game. You need to figure out an ingenious way to catch them, which is where the main fun of this game comes.
The main thing to watch for when dealing with these ghosts is to look out for their heart, as that's the part you have to hoover to drain their energy. Usually you need to distract them in some way to get it to appear. To get you in a puzzle solving mood, things start out simple. Face away from this ghost and watch closely. After a while he'll stop reading and have a nice big yawn. Quickly turn round, stun him, and get hoovering! You can get him in one go if you're a pro, but don't worry if you don't. Just do the same thing again and soon he will be yours.
When hoovering 'Character' ghosts, they'll drop a load of pearl things. These can be collected to add to your money total, which ends up as a score at the end of the game. You also get a little something else at the end of the game, depending on your score, so pick up all the cash you can. Of course, they might also drop black mushrooms. Try to avoid these, as they shrink Luigi for a while, making him almost useless.
So now you've dealt with your first proper ghost. Use the map to find your way to the next room and go inside. You'll find yourself in a bedroom. Look away from the mirror in the corner and the second 'Character' ghost will make herself known. This time, waiting for her to get bored won't work, so you have to take matters in to your own hands. Look at the curtains and you may notice that one of them is flapping slightly. Here comes another fun way to use a vacuum. Start sucking at the curtain and walk to the right. This pulls it open, revealing a hole in the window and a gentle breeze. This will bother the ghost enough to make her stop combing her hair. Stun her before she gets up to close the curtain and get hoovering. If she gets away she'll close the curtain, but you can just open it again. Once she's finished, you'll earn yourself another key.
Next room up is the nursery. Looking away from the cradle will make Baby appear, but he's asleep, and no amount of hoovering can wake up a ghost baby. So, how do you wake him up? You'd think shouting and banging the walls would do the job, but this baby sleeps quite soundly. Well, the loudest thing in the room seems to be the rocking horse in the corner. Get it rocking with your hoover until Baby wakes up.
As you can imagine, he's not best pleased about waking up. But unlike most babies who'll just cry for a while, this one starts to attack you with his teddies. They can be hoovered up if they get too close, so don't worry. However, Baby seems immune to the old torch and hoover technique. While trying to avoid him, start trying to hoover up the ball that should be beside the cradle. Point your hoover towards the ground a little to pick it up, and hold down R to keep it attached. Now quickly aim it at Baby and let go of R. The ball will shoot towards Baby and bash him. This annoys him even more than being woken up, so he decides to get really mean…
Now you've made it all the way to the first boss. He starts off attacking you with rocking horses. Run sideways to avoid them. Don't bother trying to hoover them up, as you'll just get hit. After a few of those he'll attack with balls. The idea here is the same as before. There will be one ball that hangs around, and it usually bounces to the far side of the arena. Just like before, start hoovering. Once you've got it, point it at Baby and release. It shouldn't be too hard, given the size of them both. Now's your big chance. Get in close and get hoovering. You'll probably get about halfway before he breaks off. He'll bounce around for a while, but that's easily avoided. Repeat the procedure with the horses and the balls to get more of his energy off. It usually takes three goes to get him, so don't worry if he gets away. When he has little energy left, there's an extra part to the Rocking Horse attack. When two of them appear at once, just stand in the middle and you'll be fine. Do the ball thing again and this time you should finish him off.
And there you have it, a glimpse at the opening puzzles involved in Luigi's Mansion. Check back after Nov. 18 for more on Luigi's Mansion. Special thanks once more to Alex Deas.
Agree with what I'm saying? Disagree? Let us know your thoughts on this issue in our mail bag. The views of Dan Doll are not necessarily the views of NGenres.com or its affiliates.
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| "Start sucking at the curtain and walk to the right. This pulls it open, revealing a hole in the window and a gentle breeze." |
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