I just replayed the entire level yesterday, and took the time to complete it until I was satisfied, so I'll post this while it's hot. Let's talk about the conclusion first: This game is essentially a planning problem. Don't be fooled by the word “puzzle”. The further you go, the more brains you will need. Hand speed is secondary.
If you want to pass the level efficiently, the first thing you need to do is to get rid of the habit of "hitting whenever you see something strange". The distribution of monsters in each level is tied to the terrain. Some monsters block the way, some provide buffs, and some are purely bait to slow down your rhythm. The core idea of speedrunning is: If you can go around, go around, and if you can't go around, fight again. When fighting, give priority to the soft persimmons that can be solved with one blow, and leave the hard bones to the terrain. For example, if you walk to the edge of a narrow bridge and a monster comes towards you, if you insist, you will most likely be pushed down. You will lose health and lose time. If you take a step to the side and let the monster pounce, it will go down on its own. What is this called? This is called using collision volume.
Let's talk about the route. Each picture is not a single line. At the beginning, scan the field of view first, remember the direction of the exit, and then draw the shortest polyline in your mind. Note that the shortest is not necessarily the fastest, because if there is terrain on the road where you need to push boxes and smash mechanisms, you will have to spend an extra three seconds to adjust your position. Calculating, it is not as good as taking five steps to take another safe passage. Therefore, my personal habit is to stand still for two seconds at the beginning and mentally review the path before taking action. Don't think that these two seconds are wasted. In actual testing, you can save more than 20 seconds on average compared to running around blindly, especially in the middle and late stages.
There is another key point: pay attention to the prop refresh point at any time. The buffs in this game are refreshed regularly at fixed locations. You won't suffer any loss if you take them when you pass by, but don't put the cart before the horse by speeding up half the map just to get one. Only the combination effect of "monster slowdown + self-damage increase" is worth deviating slightly from the route to get it, because it can directly save time in killing monsters, especially in the section before the boss level, which is extremely cost-effective.
Finally, let's talk about the mentality. This game has a hidden timer. If a single level is delayed for a long time, it will enter “violent mode” and the monsters will move faster. Although it is not obvious, it has a great impact on the operation accuracy after playing several levels in a row. So my suggestion is: if you fail to pass a certain level three times in a row, don't give in. Exit and re-enter, refresh the map, and you may come up with a more convenient layout. Don't get angry with the level, time is your own.
This game is free and has no in-app purchases. You can play it purely with your brain, which is really rare. After playing Maze War, it is actually a very good strategy game. When you are bored, you can pick it up and play through it twice at high speed. It is much more enjoyable than mindless puzzle games. That's all. If you have any faster route ideas, please share them in the comment area. I can optimize the configuration further. 😏