This is my first time playing mr driller and im haveing a tough time with the1000m levels.

any tips?

I'd suggest to try the robot character as be basically has 6 instead of 3 lives due to his armour.
Also, don't forget that you can drill *upwards* which can help a lot in some situations. Try to stay below save clumps of X blocks. In general have eye for save block constructs that won't collapse so easily.

Thanks for the help.I do really bad with him due to how slow he is. unless slow and steady is the way to go on the deeper digs?                            

The algorithm, so to speak, to be decent at mr driller is not that hard. I'll try to summarize it basically:

1) Drill down faster you can. In the hypotetical situation where you always drill down for a whole level, you clear it, so we know that drilling down is good. DRILL DOWN :)

2) Try to get all the capsules you can get EASILY e.g. in a matter of seconds. Any capsule which is going to take longer and/or too much risk, just avoid it.

3) Drill left right CAREFULLY and only if STRICTLY NEEDED (e..g brown block) Most deaths in this game are what I call "stupid deaths" and they basically come from greediness (for getting more capsules) or just carlessness, especially at the quite easy 1000 mt level.

4) In every level, but especially in the 2-colors levels, drill down, then when you meet a brown block STAY PUT till all the chain reactions have completed.

5) Use the bonuses smartly:
    a) activate the bonus that gives you 5 % max air and the fast driller as soon as you get them
    b) activate the bubble just before having to drill LEFT OR RIGHT
    c) the trickiest one of them all is the FULL air bonus. This is tricky because if  you save it for too long, you may get another bonus (BAD). So I'd suggest using it when the air reaches about 50%, so that you don't risk too much to get another bonus, but still get a decent boost.

I hope these suggestions can help your game.

thanks for the advice...ill stop going left and right so much

Are you interested purely in survival, or do you want to score well?

Of course the goal is to drill downwards.  There are several factors to scoring however...

+ Collecting Air Capsules (each capsule collected increases in value)
+ Drilling Blocks (more blocks drilled = higher score)
+ Perfect Air Bonus (Get all Air Capsules in a stage
+ Live Bonus (# of lives at end of stage)
+ Time Bonus (time taken to clear stage)
+ Driller Award (fat bonus for doing well essentially!)

'Just drilling down' is pretty basic and is what any beginner will do.

You need to study the formations of X-blocks around air capsules in each stage and formulate strategies for getting at them.  Some are easy to figure out even if they look complicated.  + shaped formations with a capsule in the middle for example can be drilled from underneath to collapse into a = with the capsule between two sets of x-blocks.  This is hard to explain without diagrams.

Map out each stage by 100m sets, with a note of:
# of colours of blocks
# of air capsules
Formations of x=blocks
are there white blocks or crystals?

This lets you decide which stages you can rush through and which ones you need to be more dilligent at getting air capsules on.  If you know you are on a technical section and an easy one is coming up next, you can simply rush through and replenish your air on the next section.

If you are going for score, rather than avoiding some x-blocks/air capsules; you may be able to quickly drill a single x-block to get at an air capsule.  You lose 20% air but you gain it straight back, with the bonus of an extra 3000+ points.  This also applies if you want simply to drill down uninterrupted.

On later stages you actually get a tiny increase in air by using this method.  My guess is the actual air 'bonuses' are -19.5% and +20.5%.  Study this at 3000m to see what I mean.

Horinger-Z can can theoretically be used to help you clear the harder stages but he is slow and you will find yourself with air guage issues in the deeper stages, as well as have trouble dodging extended avalanches.  Taizou or Ataru are the fastest characters and I recommend them hightly.  Personal fave is Ataru who falls/moves quicker, while Taizou drills quicker... your call.

This is just a quick roundup of a few things to consider (I'm at work at the moment!).

To do well in this game you need to experiment and hard-code the falling mechanics of the blocks.  It will become second nature before you know it!

There is a 'perfect air bonus' in this version of the game? Did I miss that?
Scoring in this version seems to be pretty different from the others or am I seeing things?

Also, I disagree with the comment of avoiding horizontal movement made by an earlier poster.
It saved me soooo many times. ...and it's essential on some of the quest stages to fulfill the 10 chain combos.

thanks, i wish the game explained some of that stuff somewhere.

 Shimrod65 wrote:

There is a 'perfect air bonus' in this version of the game? Did I miss that?
Scoring in this version seems to be pretty different from the others or am I seeing things?

Well, I should have been clear in the above post...

I have only played this version of the game a couple of times at my friends house.  I assumed the basic mechanics were the same since they really haven't changed since Mr Driller G.

Perfect Air bonus should be easy to test next time I have access to the game.  I'm sure I got it before.

Also, when you need to sidestep and drill down, you can begin the downwards drilling while you are still only partly onto the block.  This is much quicker than walking the whole way onto the block before drilling down.

 pinstRIPeZOMBIE wrote:

thanks, i wish the game explained some of that stuff somewhere.

Hey, there's an in-game manual as always. Scoring isn't explained though.

Concerning the 'all air bonus': I just tried it on the 100 meter stage and it's not in there in this version.
The grabbed air containers just go into the item category like the underworlders and the point flags.
As far as I can see the bonus points obtainable are for the number of lives you bring through the level, how fast
you clear the level and another bonus (forgot the name) for something I can't identify - it's a huge portion of the bonus points though! Maybe style (combos vs. single blocks)? I have no real idea. Some more testing on the short stage.

Quote: "On later stages you actually get a tiny increase in air by using this method.  My guess is the actual air 'bonuses' are -19.5% and +20.5%.  Study this at 3000m to see what I mean."

Wow, I wasn't aware of that at all.

Quote: "Horinger-Z can can theoretically be used to help you clear the harder stages but he is slow and you will find yourself with air guage issues in the deeper stages, as well as have trouble dodging extended avalanches.  Taizou or Ataru are the fastest characters and I recommend them hightly.  Personal fave is Ataru who falls/moves quicker, while Taizou drills quicker... your call."

So far I used Susumu, but I start enjoying Taizo now. You have to know how to get your air capsules with him but the speed in both movement/falling and drilling is so much better. When you are drilling through some solid walls it's almost like playing a rhythm game if you use him - you can be so much faster with the right rhythm!

yarg!....im horrible at this game got to 980 meters and a block fell on me

oh well its still fun even if i suck..haha

WOW! Thanks for the really good info! But the power up that is a shoe with wings on it. What does that item do?

Wait, scratch that, I'm dumb. I just re-read the "How to play" and found out.