Amateur's Guide to Wheeler's Wild Ride

This guide is an amateur's insight into, namely, how to get your score past the hundreds. I've noticed quite a few people expressing frustration with this game because they either can't finish levels in the given time frame or they find the NP payout is too low. Since you can't change the NP payout, the logical thing to do would be changing your score, no?

Before I get into that, let me begin explaining how the coconuts work. As I've mentioned, you start out with fifty coconuts in the beginning. The coconuts do not work the same way as your standard "three lives" or "three chances" in games, but when your number of coconuts reaches zero and you crash one more time, it's game over.

You do not lose a set number of coconuts each time; the number of coconuts you lose seems to be entirely dependent on how serious your crash is. It seems you can lose anywhere from one to thirty coconuts at one go. Thirty for major crashes, around six to ten for moderate ones, and the smallest number of coconuts you can lose is one.

I also mentioned something about "completing levels in the given time frame", if you remember. This refers to the timer located in the middle of the bar at the bottom of your game screen. The timer limit changes depending on the difficulty of your level, but regardless, when it reaches zero you are treated to a shower of (15) coconuts. That's right; if you don't make it in time, there goes 15 of 'em. Now, as counterintuitive as this may seem, when you're about to run out of time, what you should do is crash on purpose. All you have to do is brake (press the down arrow key), then press either the left or right arrow key to tip over slowly. Voilà, you only lose one coconut.

But all this is not very helpful if you're unable to even finish the first few levels within the time limit. This is where game quality comes into play. When I play Wheeler's Wilde Ride on best quality, if I do nothing but press the up arrow key throughout Level 1-1, I have nine seconds left when I reach the flag. If I play it on low quality and do the same, I have 16 seconds left. What you should do is find a speed/game quality where you can go through a level comfortably while maintaining control of the bike.

After you've experimented for a while and gotten the hang of it, you should aim to finish the first three levels (1-1, 1-2, and 1-3) with ease. On Level 1-1, all you have to do is press the up arrow key. On Level 1-2, some steering of sorts is required. You need to try and tilt your bike with the left arrow key and the right arrow key so it's more or less parallel with whatever you're going to land on after you go off a ramp. This minimises bouncing off to odd directions, and thus, crashes. You should always follow the direction signs, as well. The signs direct you to wherever the finish point flag is. This may seem obvious, but I struggled to find and reach the flag on Level 1-3 in time because I wasn't really paying attention to the signs.

If you're not a very adventurous or curious person, here's my tactic for getting past the hundreds in this game. You don't need to ever move past Level 2-1 to do it. When you get to Level 2-1, you'll see it's lush green. (There are also waterfalls, but you don't get to see them if you follow my tactic. Too bad for you.) So what you do is go down the steep slope right in front of you and roll past a log. After you pass the log, start hitting the brakes and stop at the dip right there. It's a small, shallow U-shaped spot. Here's where you're going to earn the bulk of your score.

When I play through Levels 1-1, 1-2, 1-3, I'm not particularly trying to get all the coconuts. I just run through the course and get whatever comes my way. Usually I end up with 90 - 100 coconuts. That's more than what you'll need, so don't mind if you lose a few.

Okay. So if you noticed throughout the game, you get no points whatsoever for collecting coconuts. In fact, it's probably possible to go through levels without scoring a single point. What you're going to do at this U-shaped dip is do bike tricks, and lots of them. I'm currently still experimenting, but I managed to find a fairly easy series of bike tricks to do. First, do a wheelie by balancing on your front wheel (hold down either the left arrow key or the right arrow key). The reason I do all my tricks at this spot is because the dip makes it easier to balance and because I get more time on Level 2-1.

Anyway, back to the wheelie. So practice balancing a bit on one wheel first. You'll notice the longer you balance, the more points you get. You can get five points by staying up a bit, and maybe 25 if you stay up longer. (My record is 165 points from a wheelie alone.) I had trouble balancing my bike on low quality, so if you're having trouble too, try using a better game quality to make it easier.

After you're comfortable with balancing on the front wheel, you're ready for more complex tricks. If you were to press the space bar while balancing on your front wheel, nothing happens. This is because your wheel is on the ground and Wheeler the Lenny can't very well just twist the bike the other way like that. What you have to do is press a combination of spacebar plus left and right arrow keys. I don't know the precise combination myself, but if you press all three keys quickly enough, you should be balancing and flipping constantly from the front to back wheel.

If you do it long enough with enough flips (not 360 degree ones; you probably can't do those easily at the U-shaped dip), you can score a lot of points. I managed to get around 1380 points at one go with this method alone. Of course, this too requires practice. You'll have trouble maintaining balance at first, most likely. And always watch the timer. When you have about six seconds left, finish your trick and tip Wheeler over to lose one coconut instead of the default 15 when time runs out.

I don't know how to get beyond Level 3 right now, so I really can't give a walkthrough or say much about other things. And I definitely don't know how to get on the high score table. (I suppose it's possible to get on if you really persevere and keep using this method, though. I might try it out myself.) But I think this should suffice for the average Neopian who is looking to have fun playing a great new game while making NP at the same time. If you're feeling adventurous, I highly recommend trying out the harder levels and figuring them out by yourself. Games are more fun that way, after all. (That's what I say, but look who used walkthrough guides for plots... what? Would you have done 3-mods without a guide?)