The 100,000 points, AKA 100K trip, is the greatest shortcut in Kid Chameleon. Unlike the Plethora cheat, which saves a bigger distance, taking the psychedelic 100K trip is not cheating, because the shortcut can be triggered 'accidentally'. Presumably, the idea behind the trip is that only advanced players can take the shortcut by achieving very high scores in the first levels, a skill that qualifies them to skip half of the game and go on to play more challenging rounds.
Route[]
The 100K trip goes from Under Skull Mountain 1 to Woods of Despair 1. That's the beginning of Stage 3, right in the second half of the game. You will have skipped 26 levels minimum.
Instead of taking a teleporter in the source level, the trip must be triggered by reaching a score over 100,000 points before exiting Under Skull Mountain 1. Once this score is met, the screen goes all LSD and three things happen:
- you are warped to Woods of Despair 1,
- you lose your helmet,
- your score is set to 1,000,001 points.
You do get to keep your previous lives and continues. Since all other points are rewarded in units of ten, your taking this warp will be easy identifiable in the final score due to it ending in 1 instead of 0.
Math[]
In order to sum up 100,000 points at such an early stage of the game, it is absolutely imperative to get the 10,000 blocks in Under Skull Mountain 1 which can only be reached by Cyclone. This secret room with the 10,000 blocks is the necessary start point of the trip.
Since there are 4 of these blocks, and there is no other way to increase your score during a round, you must have earned 60,000 points before entering this level. But there's more: you must get here in your Cyclone pajamas, meaning you'll need to get the helmet in Elsewhere 1. This prevents you from getting the flag and collecting bonuses in Highwater Pass 2 due to the map layout.
So, this leaves you with the need to collect 60,000 points in the first three levels of the game. Thus, if a player intends to take the shortcut, they must begin to work from the very first round.
Instructions[]
From the moment you start a new game with your mind set on the 100K trip:
- Earn Speed bonus (under 20 seconds), No prize and No hit in Blue Lake Woods 1. That will give you at least 22400 points.
- Earn Speed bonus (under 22 seconds), No prize and No hit in Blue Lake Woods 2. That will give you at least 22380 points.
- Earn Speed bonus (under 60 seconds) and No hit in Highwater Pass 1. That will give you at least 17000 points. You can't obtain a No Prize bonus here because you need a Berserker helmet to complete the round.
- If you fail to get one of the No hit bonuses, you still can meet the 60,000 minimum by collecting two clocks in Highwater Pass 1, if it does not take you too long. Every extra three minutes equals 3000 points. However, if you collect more than two clocks you will lose your speed bonus, so be careful when doing so.
- Get the teleporter in Highwater Pass 2.
- Grab the Cyclone helmet in Elsewhere 1.
- Keep Cyclone through most of Under Skull Mountain 1 in order to reach the 10,000 blocks.
Extras[]
- The maximum number of lives the player can have when taking the 100,000 point trip is 9 without diamond powers, and the maximum number of continues is 8. Two of these lives are gained via points.
- If the player can run through Blue Lake Woods 1 perfectly, they have time to get the ankh and both the no hit and speed bonuses.
- The player can collect the ankh in the well from Blue Lake Woods 2, along with the second ankh and continue in the invisible blocks near the end of the level, and restart round, allowing them to gain the no hit, no prize, and speed bonuses while netting a life and a continue from the level, fairly leisurely.
- The player can collect a continue, as well as two clocks from Highwater Pass 1 to make up for Blue Lake Woods 1's ankh disallowing the prize bonus. If the player gets the no hit and speed bonuses from Highwater Pass 1, they should have just enough points for the 100k trip, as well as a total of five lives and five continues at this point, including the starting lives.
- The elsewhere from Highwater Pass 1 contains an additional continue.
- Two additional continues and two more lives can be collected in Under Skull Mountain 1. The first and second continues are located after the first drop in the level and after the first jump respectively. As for the lives, one is just before the 10,000 point blocks, and the second is above the end of the level. After the player collects all of these, they can go back to claim the four 10,000 point blocks.
- If the player wishes for even more security, they can abuse the infinite lives glitch or farm lives on Highwater Pass 2, which will give you 32867 or 99 lives, respectively.