Wrecking Crew: Another brick in the wall

Another five hours of my life invested into Wrecking Crew, another dozen levels completed - some of them are real bastards. I'm getting there. Slowly.

 

Level 71

This level wastes no time putting you in danger - run! Run left, wrap-around to the right, and drop down - the wrenches will follow.

Next you'll have to smash the row of walls and ladders being chased by wrenches. The first key to surviving this is to make sure you take out the ladders first - wrenches only change directions when passing by a ladder, so if you smash them, they'll just continue in a single file in an infinite loop letting you lead them and wrap around as many times as you need to demolish the row. The second key is praying that the fireballs spawn at times when you have a chance of avoiding them.

After clearing the row, you have a chance to lose the wrenches, but you have to move fast and precisely. Climb down two levels, drop the barrel, then climb up and over the barrel, and if you do all this and stay ahead of the wrenches, they'll bunch up and get trapped between the barrels, leaving fireballs as the only remaining danger.

No. No. No!

But if you can make it to the bottom, you're good.

Level 76

Level 76 is horrible - took me well over an hour to pass this one through sheer luck. Even without fireballs, there are just so many ways you can find yourself flanked by approaching enemies on both sides, and the more ladders you destroy, the less chance you have to escape. With fireballs, it's just insanity, especially on the upper half of the stage.

 

Which isn't to say that there's no strategy involved. With some quick and strategic demolition on the middle levels, you can get the wrenches stuck on a ladder, leaving you free to demolish the upper ones with only the eggplant(s) and fireballs to worry about. Which is plenty to worry about. Of course, once you've done that, you've got to skedaddle down the ladders to the lower half of the stage, smashing everything on your way down, and not get caught by anything - and that takes luck.

You'll also want to make sure both eggplant men are in the stage's upper half.

 

If you can make it here and take out the ladder behind you without anything following you, then you're doing well. If anything followed you down the ladder, or fell down to the bottom level from having the ladder knocked out from underneath them, you are good and screwed. Seriously - best of luck clearing out that bottom floor with more than one enemy going after you.

 

Level 80

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the most diabolical level of the game yet. For the first and so far only time, I had to use a mid-level save state to beat it, and it took me days of trying still.

You have to problems to deal with immediately. First, there's Spike. If he knocks you down to the bottom of the level, you're not getting back up. Second, you absolutely cannot allow a single enemy to escape from the upper three floors, or they will wind up getting stuck on one of the ladderless floors of gray walls bounded with dynamite, making it impossible for you to clear it.

Solve both of these problems at once by immediately destroying three ladders - the one just to your left, and the two leftmost ladders on the floor below you.

This drops Spike to the bottom where he'll be a problem for later, and creates a stable running loop for the eggplants to keep them on the upper levels, even if they reverse direction.

But now you have to clear three fairly dense floors of debris while four enemies and fireballs roam around this rather narrow space!

I managed to get the wrenches stuck on the leftmost ladder, unable to pathfind their way to the top floor where I set up a base camp. And here, I made a save state.

 

I found that as long as I stayed on the upper floor, the wrenches would not leave their loop. Eggplants could be avoided individually by standing on the correct floor segment. Fireballs could be dodged by climbing a few rungs down the ladders (but not all the way, to avoid luring the wrenches out of their neat little ladder trap). Having both eggplant men approach at once, or one eggplant approach at the same time as a fireball could be impossible to avoid, in which case I'd reload.

The dark walls on the second floor from the top were the next to be demolished, and I could get at them by climbing down the ladder between them, smashing them down in three strokes, and climbing right back up to the top floor. With good timing, speed, and a little luck, the wrenches wouldn't have a chance to leave their loop. But the window for doing it safely is brief indeed.

The next and most difficult part was taking out the ladders. This part has to go like clockwork, or you die.

If you wrap around before both wrenches pass by the rightmost ladder, one will reverse direction. And then you're screwed.

Succeed and you can take out the dark walls in peace, unbothered by anything except maybe a fireball which you can dodge by wrapping-around.

Hopefully you trapped all of the enemies on the upper floors - without connecting ladders, they can't follow you. Spike still awaits you on the lower floors, but he can actually help!

Now there's no enemies patrolling the bottom floors and you're free to destroy the dark walls here. The first floor is simple, but do not touch the dynamite - it will blow up the ladder and you need that to reach the others. I've made that mistake multiple times thanks to the stress of getting this far.

The second floor is a bit trickier - make sure Spike is trapped on the fourth floor, let him knock you down so that you can escape it yourself, and then climb the ladder to the third floor, wrap around left, and drop down. Hit each brick exactly once and use the dynamite to both finish the job and knock you off the ledge back down. And pray that fireballs don't come - you only get one chance to do this right.

To clear the fourth floor, where Spike should still be trapped, just let him demolish the row for you! You might fall down a few times, but be patient, be mindful of fireballs, and do not under any circumstances use the dynamite here or knock Spike down himself until the whole row is destroyed.

Finally, you can drop down to the bottom floor and destroy the ladder to finish the level.