Feed That Skeith! A Hungry Skeith Guide

Story: You control Foreman, a Buzz on a mission. He is there to sort jellies off of the factory conveyor belt and into their respective vats. The conveyor belt he is responsible for sorting continuously runs, supplying a very plump Skeith hulking over the end of it with endless treats. Whether this warehouse specializes in jelly distribution and our Skeith pal is there to clean up the mess, or every Skeith gains its bulk by being continuously fed for months on end before being released into the wild and our Buzz friend is there to ensure his good health, the world will never know. And why does Foreman have to wear a hard hat while the Skeith doesn't? That can't be up to code, but I digress.

Every level Foreman has a target amount of jellies he must deposit into their respective vats. Once this goal is met, a new level starts with a higher goal and a faster conveyor belt. After five mistakes, which occur in two ways: A jelly is sorted into the wrong vat or the Skeith eats a jelly, it's game over!

Controls: Left, Up, Right, Down, Space Bar.

Controlling Foreman in this game, while not hard, takes some time to get used to. If you are going for the avatar or any type of high score, your first task is to commit the keystrokes to muscle memory. It is important that you get familiar with not only the action of maneuvering Foreman from the conveyor belt to the vats, but down the conveyor belt (in case you have to chase a jelly), as well as behind you to the preview conveyor belt. Practice, practice, practice this for a while because the only way to get the avatar or high score is to be able to move seamlessly between all these points and then back to the beginning of the conveyor belt to pick up a new jelly and do it all over again.

The Conveyor Belt: The conveyor belt is made up of two parts: what I call the preview section and the main section. The preview section is to the left of the vats and curved. This is where you can see the jellies and various foods before they get sucked into the tube and deposited onto the main conveyor belt, at which time they are fair game for Foreman or our jelly intolerant Skeith friend.

Foods and Vats: Two types of food come down the conveyor belt: Jellies, which make the Skeith sick and should be kept away from him at all cost, and desert foods. The only foods you need worry about are the jellies, which are distinguishable by their bright red, blue and green colors. What is even more helpful is that the vats they go in are color coded to match. Further, the vats are situated from easiest to access to hardest to access depending on how many points putting the correct jelly inside yields. More about this below.

Red- 3pts, far left vat. It makes sense the jelly with the lowest point value is the easiest vat to access with the fewest keystrokes, right?

Blue- 5pts, middle vat. Slightly harder, but no big deal.

Green- 8pts, far right vat. The hardest to maneuver, but no sweat once you've become comfortable with the keystrokes. These will be the ones you will rely on heavily in our strategy that I will outline later.

It should be noted that, just because the red jellies yield the lowest points does not mean they have the highest chance of showing up. In my experience, it is all a matter of luck. Some games I get tons of reds, some games I can't see them through all the blues. I do not believe there is a rhyme or reason, and if there is, it's only slightly weighted.

Levels: I will not hold your hand and detail a list of levels and how many jellies you must deposit, because it's really straight forward.

Level 1: 5 Jellies.

From here, every level adds five more to its goal and speeds up slightly.

Strategy

Overview: In order to get the avatar, I believe you need a combination of two things: Speedy fingers and luck. Notice only one of those things you can practice, so make sure to do it. The luck part comes in when you are sorting jellies. The more green jellies you get into the vats at lower levels, the higher your score is before the conveyor belt becomes too unmanageable and the game ends. There is no guaranteeing you will get a hefty amount of green jellies every (or any) game, but my strategy revolves around them to maximize your point totals.

Level 1 (5 Jellies): FIVE jellies. That's all you need to progress. And the conveyor belt is moving SOOO SLOOOW. My strategy for this level is to utilize your preview conveyor belt to its full potential and move any jellies that aren't green onto it.

From your practice plays you should have gotten a good rhythm for how spaced out each food item is on the preview belt and roughly the frequency at which they appear. Use this knowledge to dump the unnecessary jellies onto the preview belt BETWEEN other jellies or food items. At this point the belts are moving slowly enough that, unless you pile everything on top of each other, you can handle shuffling things around while you wait for the green jellies.

Note: Blue jellies will do in a pinch.

Keeping your eye on the jelly count is a MUST for this strategy to work. You only have five mess ups, so you have to be very careful with where you sit everything down. Imagine this though: You have 4/5 jellies in their vats and two red jellies come down the preview line, followed by a green! Forget proper spacing: The round will immediately end as soon as that green jelly hits home. Get rid of those red jellies and get your points!

At the end of this level I recommend you have 30+ points.

Level 2 (10 Jellies): Since the amount of jellies is doubled here, the round takes longer, which means more red jellies, which means you will probably end up dumping some into their vats anyway. This is fine. I recommend only "juggling" two red jellies on the preview belt at a time and dumping any more than that.

Other than that, the strategy from the first round applies here: Mostly greens/blues and juggle the reds.

I recommend you have 90+ points after this level.

Level 3: (15 Jellies): This is where things get tricky. I still recommend juggling two red jellies, but they will start piling up, so if you are more comfortable juggling one, or not juggling at all and just depositing all of the jellies that come down the line, that's fine. I've found success here directly correlates with how far you need to play in the game to get where you want to be. Higher points in level three= Needing less jellies later and not having to contend with the crazy fast conveyor belt.

HOWEVER, this is where my strategy shifts. Remember when I told you about keeping an eye on our jelly number and why we should do that? Well, here is where we implement it. No matter how you play level three, I HIGHLY recommend you wait until you only need two jellies and make sure those last two jellies are green, using the strategy I wrote about earlier.

I no longer have a recommended points value because from here on out it solely depends on what jellies drop for you.

Levels 4, 5&6: You should be making sure either the last one or two jellies are green. Remember, we cannot control what jellies we get, but we can try to control what we deposit because it can make all the difference.

From here on out the conveyor gets too fast to try any nifty tricks, in my opinion. If you are able to get those last few jellies to be green, then go for it, but what will really help you here is your reflexes and, hopefully, a good spread of green and blue jellies.

I got the avatar during level 9 with a LOT of luck.

Tips & Tricks

The jury is out on breaks in between levels. The game surely affords you plenty of time to recover. Some think it's good to take a break after that crazy fast level so that you can come back refreshed, but others think that it gets your head out of that mindset and slows your reflexes down. I say, if you need to take a break, make it a short one to keep those reflexes up to par but not have your nerves wracked.

Speaking of wracked nerves: The foods the Skeith eats will help you majorly with this problem. You will probably not notice them in the lower levels where things are slower and you're paying attention to everything at once BUT them, but in higher levels where you are only concerned with what's spitting out onto the main belt, seeing a desert should make you sign in relief. Seriously. I have trained myself to take a quick breath and un-tense my shoulders in the higher levels whenever a desert comes down the line. It helps me 'reset' and get ready for the new jelly onslaught.

For some (undoubtedly evil) reason, the font makes the 4 look a LOT like the 9. So don't get excited in level 6 when you start off in the 400 point range and think you're just that close to the avatar score, because you still have a long ways to go!

Final Thoughts

This is one of my favorite games in Neopia. I like pushing my reflexes and seeing myself get just. That. Many. More. Jellies. Each round. The score for the avatar is 1000+ points and a gold trophy will run you 1200+. With a little patience and keeping all of these tips and strategies in mind, you can do it! I believe in you!

Now, get out there and feed some Skeiths!