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Dig Dug

Game Mechanics

The player embodies Dig Dug, dressed in white and blue, and able to dig tunnels (to dig means digging in English, dug being the preterior form of the verb). Dig Dug's goal is to eliminate monsters residing in the basement. The player uses a pump to swell them until they explode. He can also drop them from the rocks on them to crush them. There are two kinds of enemies: the Pookas are red and round monsters, inspired by tomatoes, wearing yellow glasses; Fygars are green dragons that spit fire. The hero dies if he gets caught by a monster, burn by a Fygar, or crush by a rock.

It takes four shots to blow a monster. If the monster isn't inflated completely, it's going to deflate and regain its normal size after a few seconds. The player can also swell enemies half to make sure the monster stays under a rock. Dig Dug can also cross an enemy that swells. It should also be noted that the last enemy present on the screen always tries to escape to the top left, so that the player cannot have the maximum points at the end of the table.

Normally, the monsters walk through the tunnels dug by Dig Dug, but they may turn into ghosts the time to slowly cross the earth between two tunnels.

The player is rewarded with more points if he kills a monster in the bottom of the screen. Similarly, killing an Fygar horizontally gives more points than vertically, since it only spits fire horizontally. In addition, killing a monster with a rock brings more points than killing it by inflating it. This can give 1000 points or more. Finally, killing several enemies at the same time leads to a combo, generating a large sum of points. If the player has dropped more than two rocks, vegetables (or other bonuses, like game flags Galaxian) will appear in the center of the screen. If the player reaches them before they disappear, he will win 1500, then 2000 points. These bonuses appear even if the rocks do not touch any enemy. The digging is also in itself a source of points, reporting 10 points for each case.

If the player drops a rock on an enemy and at the same time blows it up, the game will bugger, and destroy all enemies. However, the level will not be completed. The player then has the ability to dig through the level. We have to drop another rock to finish the level.

The number of levels is displayed by flowers in the right corner of the top of the screen. A big flower is 10 levels. The higher the level, the more enemies there will be to face. The latter are also moving faster and faster. The level ends when all the monsters are killed, or the last one ran away.

In the arcade version, the game ends at level 256, because this screen is unplayable. Indeed, at the beginning of the level, a Pooka is placed directly on Dig Dug, so it dies instantly at the launch of level 256. It's impossible to kill this Pooka. This is an example of kill screen.