Nintendo Adventure Books 2: Leaping Lizards map
Intro: Book by Clyde Bosco and Archway Paperback. This adventure stars Luigi who must save the King after he’s transformed into a rabbit. Eventually this zany adventure will culminate into epic games. This guide is adapted from a handwritten draft I completed on 4/29/19 using my own physical copy of this book but I will provide a digital link below. This ‘map’ or guide will cover every page in the book but it’s set up as if you are reading the book so it jumps when the book jumps. To follow along F3 search the page listed (type out ‘page x’) or simply scroll down (or occasionally up). It’s not perfect but this worked the best for me. Look at the key page on the portal for the terminology that will make up this walk through and all others.
Relevant links: https://archive.org/details/Nintendo_Adventure_Books_2_Leaping_Lizards
Disclaimer: This guide is property of Amia J Moore/ C. Mechayoshi. It may not be copied without permission.
Edited: 1/4/24
Statistics:
Chapters: Fifty-eight
Items: Anchor, wand, wings, frog suit, pogo stick
Endings: Six
Max score: -Bugged. 780ish
Errors: None except that a page’s image is showing the wrong character once.
START Chapter 1 Page 1: Luigi visits the Mushroom Kingdom, racing around for fun. He hid away supplies last trip so use the opening puzzle to determine what he finds.
Puzzle: 1, maze
Rewards: anchor or frog suit or wings
Splits: page 5
Puzzle solution: Follow the maze to randomly see how many wrenches you get. Seven is the anchor, five or six frog suit, and four the wings. Get the frog suit according to the optimal route listed at the bottom of the guide or at the very least DON’T get the anchor!
Page 5 Chapter 2: Luigi meets friends at a picnic. Soon Toad rushes up with urgent news.
Reward: Five coins
Splits: page 64
Path: from page 1
Page 7 Chapter 3: Luigi swims after Morton and captures him rather impressively. Exhausted, Morton finally has some answers, or so it seems.
Split: page 79
Path: from page 58, page 12, page 67
Page 8 Chapter 4: Luigi runs for the whistle and fails when Iggy presents a legal notice. To get it from him they must win the upcoming Mushroom Games.
Puzzle: 1, maze
Splits: page 44 (follow Iggy), page 97 (leave on flying carpet)
Path: from page 87, page 33
Puzzle solution: You cant reach Iggy so don’t try anything and unless you want to see something funny happen. Go to page ninety-seven.
Page 12 Chapter 5: Luigi falls in Water Land.
Splits: page 50 (has anchor), page 7 (no anchor)
Path: from page 100, page 114
Puzzle solution: You don’t have the anchor hopefully so you should be able to take page seven.
Page 13 Chapter 6: The Royals win the whistle and fifty coins… Or rather forty-five coins as Iggy demands a small fee. Luigi changes the king back.
Reward: forty-five coins
Split: page 54
Path: from page 57
Page 15 Chapter 7: Next up is the Beetle bowl, a basketball like game. Use the puzzle to know what to do.
Puzzle: 1, word search
Splits: page 39 (Mario and Luigi dunk), page 102 (King, Peach, Toad dunk), page 85 (Luigi and Peach dunk)
Path: from page 95, 24, 82
Puzzle solution: It’s a word search that will reveal ‘split up the plumbers’ implying the page eighty-five option. Antics ensue on all paths but they will not net prizes.
Page 18 Chapter 8: Luigi makes his coins transform into rabbit hair. He tries the correct word next.
Buffet: lose five coins
Splits: page 104
Page 19 Chapter 9: They spend the next three weeks training and babysitting the King’s rabbit form. An old champ has a message in the puzzle that will reveal something about upcoming events.
Puzzles: 1, decipher, just hint
Splits: page 30
Path: from page 97
Puzzle solution: ‘Everybody cheats’ is what it says. Beware, though I’m sure you saw that coming..
Page 22 Chapter 10: Luigi’s equipment allows him to do well, but not well enough to thwart Iggy’s cheating. He takes second.
Reward: Wooden medal
Splits: page 57
Path: from page 89
Page 24 Chapter 11: Mario represents the team. He finds a mushroom that helps but over eagerness with breaking blocks in his signature fashion trips him up. He gets third.
Reward: Chocolate medal
Splits: page 15
Path: from page 111
Page 27 Chapter 12: Luigi dashes to the palace first. Things have gone awry, people are missing, etc, and Morton Koopa is there. Chase him using this puzzle.
Puzzle: 1, maze
Splits: page 98 (land on Morton), page 78 (land on window)
Path: from page 64
Puzzle solution: You follow a path to land on Morton or the window with no clear indication what’s correct. Both can work at this point but landing on Morton will give you the item right away.
Page 30 Chapter 13: The Mushroom Games start, bringing together all types. There are four teams, the Royals, Koopas, Hammers, and Sneaks. Tin medals go to first place, wooden second, and chocolate third.
Splits: page 111
Path: from page 19
Puzzle solution: At this part of the book it’s fun to choose different paths during the events, especially since you do not have to do perfect. See below for more tips.
Page 33 Chapter 14: Luigi turns a corner and finds Mario and co who have caught up completely somehow. They have even found out that the needed whistle item to fix the king, which Peach spotted at the ‘Koopermarket’ around Iggy’s neck. Quite the sleuths! Iggy then confronts them.
Splits: page 8
Path: from page 41, page 106
Page 35 Chapter 15: In a twist, Luigi lets Wooster be captain who in turn has the King do the jump. The King does so well he wins the medal and breaks a record. Wait, a giant rabbit is cheating! Actually no because that’s payback for all the junk the OTHER teams keep pulling.
Reward: TWO tin medals
Splits: page 57
Path: from page 55
Page 37 Chapter 16: Wooster tells the bad news involving the King’s transformation into a small fluffy white rabbit. Luigi volunteers himself to act.
Splits: page 69 (has wand), page 110 (no wand)
Path: from page 98, page 78, page 45
Puzzle solution: Use the wand if you have it but if not the other path is safe as long as you lack the anchor item from the very start.
Page 39 Chapter 17: Peach and the Mario bros charge into the fray while Toad becomes an easy target and is pounced on by everything. They win nothing.
Split: page 47
Path: from page 15
Page 41 Chapter 18: The doom ship enters a pipe to a secret tunnel. Luigi jumps off eventually and now must figure out where to go next. Use the puzzle.
Puzzles: 1, decipher
Splits: page 52 (climb down the hatch), page 33 (head into tunnel)
Path: page 114
Puzzle Solution: You connect numbers on a grid thing, eventually getting ‘squids below’. Again, no clear indication which is the correct choice. You can go the other way or go down the hatch on page fifty-two for a chance at an item.
Page 44 Chapter 19: The heroes attempt to sneak up on Iggy since he obviously cheated but get washed away comically.
Buffet: Lose the wings
Split: page 97
Path: from page 8
Puzzle solution: The wings from page one are forever lost but it’s not over if you play your cards right in the finale of the book. Keep moving.
Page 45 Chapter 20: In this path where the entire group travels together to the palace. Gerkins and Brock (only named on this path), the guards are asleep and the place is a mess. No one is around mostly including Morton anymore, so the Princess blows up before meeting Wooster.
Splits: page 37
Path: from page 64
Page 47 Chapter 21: The next events other than the Fungus Lift go bad for the Royals. Solve the puzzle for a hint on what’s to come.
Puzzle: 1, decipher, just a hint
Reward: tin medal
Splits: page 55
Path: from page 85, page 39, page 102
Puzzle solution: The upcoming event is a ‘feast in their honor’ as the puzzle shows. Great but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We can still lose here.. A curious thing about the puzzle however is that it depicts Mario as a higher jumper than Luigi oddly..
Page 50 Chapter 22: Luigi swims but is weighed down by the anchor and sucked into a pipe leading to Pipe Land. No harm occurs, but he going to have the miss the adventure so same thing?..
Game over
Path: page 110, page 12
Page 52 Chapter 23: Luigi enters the hatch, falling down into a pool with bloopers. Use the puzzle to get him out.
Puzzle: 1, maze
Splits: page 67 (land on Luigi), page 108 (land on Bloober)
Path: page 41
Puzzle solution: Even without retracing steps it’s easy to see the one path landing on Luigi and the two paths on blooper (called ‘bloober’- not actually a mistake just an archaic name for them). How you make your first move will depend on if you have the frog suit. If you do you are basically forced to land on blooper which will give an item, but otherwise you will land on Luigi which will lead to Luigi confronting Morton, but losing some progress and maybe looping.
WIN Page 54 Chapter 24: The King is returned to normal and a feast is held as page forty-seven said. All ends well.
Game over
Path: from page 13
Page 55 Chapter 25: Luigi wants to be the captain for the last event causing an understandable stress argument. Who should be captain?
Splits: page 35 (Wooster as captain), page 89 (Luigi remains captain)
Path: from page 47
Puzzle solution: Let Wooster take over for the best result since that option is essentially a trump card that ensures victory. Luigi however can work if you’ve done as well as you can do up until this point and I do believe the paths are entertaining enough to deserve exploration on repeat runs of this book. (It certainly was for me as a kid.) Just be careful with the items you own. See below.
Page 57 Chapter 26: Well, it’s over. Had fun? Tally the scores.
Splits: Page 72 (ten points or less), page 66 (eleven to twenty-nine points), page 13 (thirty to forty-five points), page 72 (forty-six or more)
Path: from page 35, page 22, page 116
Puzzle Solution: Tin is ten points, wood= five, chocolate = 1. You need from thirty to forty-five points on page thirteen. Remember that one medal for a total of ten points is free regardless of paths so essentially you need to earn twenty points somehow minimum. The Wooster path nets that but if you got several wooden medals and a tin medal you can still scrape by. Avoid all chocolate medals. It will be the same as if you won nothing because there simply aren’t enough events for them to add up to anything useful.
Page 58 Chapter 27: Luigi investigates the houseboat before Morton spots him. The koopaling is worn out so he calls a doom ship for an escape. Iggy however betrays Morton slightly by pulling the ladder up too soon (also Iggy is younger than Morton incorrectly). Anyway, what should Luigi go after?
Puzzle: 1, decipher
Splits: page 62 (board the dooms ship), page 7 (go after Morton)
Path: 117
Puzzle solution: Swap the odd numbered letters. To visualize this properly you might need to rewrite the letters on a separate piece of paper then swap letters reading from bottom to top. The two messages are ‘Go after Iggy now’ and ‘Morton cant help’. So go to page sixty-two accordingly for the optimal route but the other one is safe and in fact is encouraged on the score card.
Page 62 Chapter 28: Luigi boards the doomship. Should he pounce or hold steady? Use the puzzle.
Puzzle: 1, decipher
Split: page 100 (confront Iggy), page 114 (stay hidden)
Path: from page 58
Puzzle solution: An easy puzzle that spells ‘do not move’. So don’t!
Page 64 Chapter 29: Toad informs them that Morton is making a mess of the palace. Mario wants to head there but Luigi thinks he’s faster. Use the puzzle to know what to do.
Puzzle: 1, decipher
Splits: page 45 (travel together), page 27 (send Luigi)
Path: from page 5
Puzzle solution: Color in the triangle shapes and it will spell out ‘send Luigi’ so head to twenty-seven. The alternative is save however.
Page 66 Chapter 30: The Koopas win, forcing the heroes to wait another six years with a giant rabbit king.
Game over
Path: from page 57
Page 67 Chapter 31: Luigi gets blasted with ink that puts him to sleep. He wakes back up in Water Land.
Splits: page 7
Path: from page 52
Puzzle solution: a mild loop back.
Page 69 Chapter 32: Luigi tries to use the ruby wand but he must choose the right word. Use the puzzle to know.
Puzzle: 1, maze
Splits: page 18 (Alakazam!), page 104 (Alakazook!)
Path: from page 37, page 91
Puzzle solution: Just follow the maze and it will be ‘alakazook’ on page one-hundred four. The page eighteen option is a hazard.
Page 72 Chapter 33: A ‘you can’t get that score/cheat’ page.
Path: from page 106, page 57
Page 73 Chapter 34: Luigi and Toad head off to find Morton, being lead to Water Land. The puzzle provides a preview of what’s to come.
Puzzle: 1, logic, just a hint
Split: page 117
Path: from page 104
Puzzle solution: Interesting but annoying in some circumstances, this requires mirroring the image then marking off letters in the water. It will mention a ‘doom ship’. Not as important as it sounds since these are unskippable events ahead. Now move on.
Page 76 Chapter 35: Luigi swims after Morton’s canoe and is ready to pounce. Use the puzzle carefully.
Puzzle: 1, maze
Splits: page 94 (hits the canoe), page 91 (misses the canoe)
Path: from page 110
Puzzle solution: You trace a path that will either miss or hit the boat. You want to MISS on page ninety-one.
Page 78 Chapter 36: Luigi dives but misses just as Mario and co arrive. The Princess is now upset and for good reason. Go to thirty-seven.
Splits: page 37
Path: from page 98
Page 79 Chapter 37: Morton tells Luigi of the sliver whistle Iggy has. Luigi then lets him go when Mario and co on a flying carpet find him. They take off and spot the doom ship getting away. The puzzle reveals the location.
Puzzle: 1, decipher, just a hint
Split: page 87
Path: from page 7
Puzzle solution: Count the fringes of the rug. The puzzle is easy and the result is ‘Iggys under sea lab’. It’s just a hint though.
Page 82 Chapter 38: Luigi wants the first event and it quickly goes sour when the others start the race early. He does catch up but attempting to play dirty costs him any medal.
Split: page 15
Path: from page 111
Page 85 Chapter 39: Luigi and the Princess dunk beetles while the rest defend. They do decently, placing second.
Reward: wooden medal
Split: page 47
Path: from page 15
Page 87 Chapter 40: The heroes take the carpet underground. They explore the tunnels before finding Iggy. Go to page eight.
Split: page 8
Path: from page 79
Page 89 Chapter 41: Luigi remains captain. How well he will do will depend on your load out.
Splits: page 22 (has pogo stick OR wings), page 101 (has both pogo stick and wings), page 116 (has neither pogo stick or wings)
Path: from page 55
Puzzle solution: Have the pogo stick OR the wings but not both for a chance to still win!! Page one-hundred sixteen will do okay but not best and may make you lose with not enough points.
Page 91 Chapter 42: Luigi rocks Morton’s boat then tosses the koopaling on shore. He gets the wand and then head to the palace. The puzzle reveals a quirk about the ruby wand.
Puzzle: 1, decipher, just a hint
Reward: seven coins, wand
Split: page 69
Path: from page 76
Puzzle solution: Follow the rules to cross out certain wands. The message ‘it’s a one way wand’ will be revealed, a hint that the other path to page sixty-nine curiously omits. In other words the wand can’t help the King turn back but you will be forced to try it and fail anyway, thus my ‘just a hint’ rating. I suppose it implies that you can’t try to use it twice as a later option gives you.
Page 94 Chapter 43: Morton whacks Luigi with the paddle, knocking him out. Morton ponders if Luigi’s cap covered in ‘koopa klay’ will be a good ashtray (yes it says that, well Morton confirmed smoker!) The page’s image mistakenly shows Roy.
Game over
Path: from page 76
Page 95 Chapter 44: Peach represents the team. A clever tactic allows her to handle the waves and win first.
Reward: Tin medal
Splits: page 15
Path: 111
Page 97 Chapter 45: The crew return to the palace.
Splits: page 19
Path: from page 8, page 44
Page 98 Chapter 56: Luigi tackles Morton. The wand is dropped and Luigi gets to it first. Morton escapes as Mario and co arrive finally. Go to thirty-seven.
Reward: three coins, wand
Splits: page 37
Path: from page 27
Page 100 Chapter 47: Luigi steps from behind the crate to confront Iggy. Iggy does a daring move to throw him off, literally.
Split: page 12
Path: from page 62
Puzzle solution: Part of a small loop back. Just keep moving.
Page 101 Chapter 48: The pogo stick and wings are too strong and Luigi shoots off into space, getting disqualified.
Game over
Path: from page 89
Page 102 Chapter 49: Mario and Luigi defend while the others go on offense. Things go south and team wins nothing.
Split: page 47
Path: from page 15
Page 104 Chapter 50: Luigi turns the King into a bigger rabbit. Now he must decide to try the wand again or go after Morton.
Splits: page 73 (head out to find Morton), page 119 (use ruby wand again)
Path: from page 69
Puzzle Solution: Head to seventy-three for Morton.
Page 108 Chapter 52: Luigi puts on the frog suit (even if you didn’t chose it in the start!) to resist the ink blast then scares the bloopers off. He gets a pogo stick left behind by one.
Reward: Pogo stick
Splits: page 106
Path: from page 52
Page 106 Chapter 51: In the tunnels Luigi finds coins. Use the puzzle to find the exact amount.
Puzzle: 1, decipher
Reward: fifteen coins or less.
Splits: page 72 (more than fifteen coins), page 33 (less than fifteen coins)
Path: from page 108
Puzzle solution: Go to thirty-three as you wont have more than fifteen coins max.
Page 111 Chapter 54: The first event is an obstacle course with stairs to climb, water to traverse, and vines to swing. Last there is a flying carpet section. Luigi must decide who will take the challenge.
Puzzle: 1, maze
Splits: page 24 (Mario runs obstacle course), page 95 (Peach runs the obstacle course), page 82 (Luigi runs obstacle course)
Path: from page 30
Puzzle solution: This puzzle is rather tricky as it does not state directly if you can switch paths or not. Let’s assume not. Observe carefully and Peach’s path is sound and is the best option. The other two are very entertaining to read, if you dare!
Page 110 Chapter 53: Luigi is chasing Morton when the Koopaling jumps in a boat. How he gives chase depends on if he has an item.
Splits: page 50 (has anchor), page 76 (no anchor)
Path: from page 37
Puzzle solution: Don’t attempt this path if you have the anchor!
Page 114 Chapter 55: Luigi hides while the ship takes a plunges in the water. Use the puzzle to make a move.
Puzzle: 1, decipher
Splits: page 12 (jump of ship quickly), page 41 (hang on)
Path: from page 62
Puzzle solution: The correct ships will spell out ‘hang on’ so go to forty-one.
Page 116 Chapter 56: Luigi does his best but places third.
Reward: Chocolate medal
Split: page 57
Path: from page 89
Page 117 Chapter 57: In Water Land, Luigi and Toad face cheep cheeps before Toad has enough. Luigi now travels alone before finding signs of Koopa activity. What a quiter!
Reward: six coins
Split: page 58
Path: from page 73
Page 119 Chapter 58: Luigi make the King larger than the room they’re in and it gets worse from there..
Game over
Path: from page 104
Summary: A nice read, with with an atypical plot that involves no one being kidnapped and an exciting climax that allows multiple paths to victory in true CYOA style. The puzzles were nothing to write home about, but the adventure made up for it. Now here is the optimal path and your likely score.
Optimal path: START 1 (frog suit) – 5 – (five coins) – 64- 27- 98 (three coins, wand)- 37- 69- 104- 73- 117 (six coins)- 58- 62- 114- 41- 52- 108 (pogo stick)- 106 (about fifteen coins) – 33- 8- 97- 16- 30- 111- 95 (tin medal) – 15- 85 (wood)- 47 (tin)- 55- 35 (two tin medals)- 57- 13 (forty-five coins)- 54 WIN.
-Score 740 “Drain Chief -Two Plumbs Up”.
So this path takes a lot of what the book considers the ‘right’ choices. The pogo stick detour can be skipped if you will use the Wooster captain path later. The above actually uses zero items aside from the frog suit and to get extra coins you must NOT get the wand form Morton right away but instead chase him a little later in the book on page ninety-one. Notice that we don’t earn “Mushroom Games Champ and Plumber Master” with a threshold of 801 or more. After some research I made a slightly modified path that will earn a few more points.
Higher score path: START 1 (frog suit) – 5 (five coins)- 64- 45- 37- 110- 76- 91 (wand, seven coins)- 69- 104- 73- 117 (six coins)- 58- 62- 114- 41- 52- 108- 106 (fifteen coins)- 33- 8- 97- 19- 30, etc… The rest is identical to the Optimal Path.
Conclusions: The structure of the book is strong I feel, always allowing multiple paths but not becoming directionless at any point. There are a few loop backs, but you can always get back on point. This was a favorite as a kid because Luigi is an entertaining protagonist, actually all of the cast is pretty good here, and it was very fun to go through the end sequence and see the various shenanigans while scraping up a victory- or not. They put an ‘item of doom’ in here unfortunately with the anchor and I don’t really like the randomness of how you get your first item at the start, but if you get the wrong thing there’s only one place where it’ll kill you. I found it sort of interesting that there’s a second ‘item of doom’ potentially, by means of the wings if you happen to combine it with the pogo stick. Normally I’d say that’s a cheap way to lose, but the way the book frames the wacky outcome I doubt you’d be too upset! It’s best to just ignore the score system even exists here. Your enemies are decent and I like how Iggy, canonically a smart guy, is able to string our heroes along on a technicality. Really, it’s just a good book. 4.5/5
Item locations:
Anchor: page 1
Wand: page 98
P-wing: page 1
Frog suit: page 1
Pogo stick: page 108
Puzzle analysis: Nineteen puzzles and an unusual amount of them only serving to give the player a hint rather than to give you a solution on what to do. There are seven ‘maze’ puzzles in this book, six ‘decipher’, and one ‘word search’. There are four decipher puzzles that double as ‘just a hint’. One ‘logic’ puzzle is also ‘just a hint’. I enjoyed the puzzles here though. They were simple but always doable and mostly fun especially towards the end. I only complain that a lot of them are of the same type and many tempt or require you to use scratch paper or draw in your book. Petty? Perhaps, but not all of this series are online and it is out of production for the real things so..
*New* Book goals:
Did you defeat Morton: You do this naturally by chasing him endlessly in Water Land. There’s too many pages to list where you’re following the tanned koopaling. Strangely one puzzle seems to tell you not follow on fifty-eight so I don’t get that hint.
Swim with the bloopers: one fifty-two this leads eventually to the pogo stick, though that is not a required item. Those are all the hints. It seems they didn’t try too much here.
Last edit: 2/20/20, 11/13/20, 11/14/21