Burn the Midnight Oil
by Ess Gee
January 2003

Walkthrough

Stage1:
The level begins as Lara enters the foyer to the tomb/nightclub via a long sliding hall. Get your pistols drawn and hit the ground running as 2 rolling balls are pursuing her. The foyer is well guarded by 4 ninjas. Deal with these guys and find a large medi-pack behind the alcove to the left of the double doors. Go through the double doors, to the pyramid display room. You will be chased by another ninja from the foyer. Deal with him, shoot the 4 shatter vases - another ninja emerges from the shadows of the wooden benches.
Despatch him then find the grenade ammo in the shadows of the benches on the other side. Explore what was the formal entry off to the side of this room and find Uzi ammo in the alcove to the left. Enter the next room through the second set of double doors. There's a small medi-pack lying on the ground in front of you. Race the ninja to see if you can pick it up before he does. Deal with this thief and he will give up a small medi-pack anyway. Take a breath - the initial onslaught is over.

Go through the third set of double doors, the hall leads around to the right. You catch a view of the nightclub room but first come to a bit of a hole in the path. Investigate the short alcove off to the right of this - kill the scorpion and pickup the small medi-pack. Now drop down into the nightclub room. One end of the room has 3 columns - the other has 4. At the end with 3 columns, jump and pull up to the ledge on the third column, enter the alcove and pull the lever, and get a camera shot of the door it opens.
Drop back down in to the nightclub room and things are hotting up. 4 mummies are on the prowl and I don't think they just want the first dance, Lara. Well you can't kill them right now, so they'll pester you while you move around this room. Hopefully you searched around first and discovered the other two pull-up alcoves at the 4-column end of the room. Take the left hand one; you've just opened the trapdoor before to pass through here.

Drop down into Puzzle Piece 1 room. Jump up on to platform and grab the first Eye puzzle piece. A ninja ambushes you from the back of the room and there's another one down in the alley on the other side of the platform. Deal with the ninjas, and then enter the sandy crawl space off from the alley. Pickup the Uzi ammo on the floor and flares up in the second crawl space in the shadows. Flick the lever, which shows you the door it opens. Exit the crawl space. Head along the brown rocky passage, despatch a ninja and find a pull-up crawl space off to the right and get the large medi-pack. Some warning music and a red glow alert you to a fire tile, leap over this and exit the passageway. Run straight ahead to the other end of the nightclub room and pull up to the right hand alcove. This corridor is now open. Enter the chasm jump room. Make your way to the far end of this room, encountering one ninja along the way. Note before you enter the next room - the two sloping columns. Take the left hand one, slide, jump, grab and pull up into Puzzle Piece 2 room. A ninja runs off in to a little guardroom to the left to alert his mate. Deal with these 2 then go to the right hand side of the room to pickup the second eye puzzle piece on the platform. Another ninja has pursued you from behind. Despatch him and get a small medi-pack for your trouble. If you investigate the small guardroom it will trigger a mummy to materialise. They really don't want you to have those puzzle pieces. Again you can't kill him, and he will annoy you while your trying to get out of this room. The best thing to do is get him to follow you round the back of the puzzle piece platform then run to the exit to give yourself time for the exit move. Check you have full health. Line up on an angle for a back flip towards the other sloped column (not the one you entered by). Back flip, slide, grab and drop down in to the chasm.

It's dark and gloomy down here; use flares to discover an inaccessible trapdoor and 2 crawl spaces. Enter the northern most crawlspace and crawl through to a bluish pebble coat hall. If you follow the path round to the right you'll encounter a deadly spike pit that cannot be passed. There's nothing further here. Go back and follow the path to the left, jump the deep spike pit. Watch out for the fire tile trap, it's hard to miss. This path goes nowhere as well. What a waste of time. Actually not, between the deep spike pit and the firetrap is Secret 1 (large medipack) - hidden up in the timber ceiling. Drop back down and exit this area via the long crawl space.
The second crawl space takes you to the red fire/furnace room. Watch out, most of the floor is red-hot coal. The way to the lever room on the other side involves a couple of standing jumps and some monkey swinging. See the following diagram:

Legend: X = death; O = safe square; M = monkey swing


XMOMXXEnt
XMXOXX
XMXXOX
XMXXXX
Lever roomXMXXXX


Get to the lever room; pull the lever to open the trapdoor back in the chasm area. Make your way back across the fire/furnace room and exit via the long crawlspace.

Enter the first long passage way where the trapdoor was; to your left is the first tomb room - you hear an internal trapdoor open in this tomb but the main trapdoor denies you access at this stage. You see a trapdoor at the end of the passageway - take the path off to the right and locate the lever with two paths running off either side (these form a loop). Pull the lever to open the trapdoor at the end of the main passageway. Off to your right of the lever is a tempting small medi-pack. Take the long way round to grab it or else you'll meet a fiery end.

Exit the main passageway where you opened the last trapdoor and encounter an even longer passageway stretching left and right. Shoot the shatter vases at either end - 2 ninjas will come to check out what all the noise is about. This passage leads to 6 cells. You can solve this puzzle in a couple of different orders, but this is the most direct route. As you stand at the entrance of this passageway, number the cells 1-6 as follows - I shall refer to them this way:

654321

First eliminate cells 4 and 2 - they are only decorative and have no access. Cell 1 is not accessible from the passageway.
Go to cell 3, enter and step up on to the platform to pickup the Uzi ammo. You are surrounded by a ring of fire. Jump up in to the alcove at the back of the room; the cell gate closes. Make a timed run along the tunnel to gain backdoor access to cell 1 before the trapdoor closes, as flames pursue you. No time to take a breath there's 3 scorpions biting at your ankles that need pacifying before you can pull the lever located on the red cross platform. This lever opens the trapdoor to the first tomb that you passed on the way in - remember the one with the internal gate that you couldn't access? To get out of cell 1, locate the drop-down space in one of the corners, drop down in to it, its pressure sensitive and will open the front gate. Also pickup the small medi-pack in this space. Pull back up and exit cell 1. Head for the first tomb.
Enter the first tomb and a trapdoor will imprison you from behind. Approach the coffin. Each side has a pressure pad "face" to open the two lever rooms on either side of the tomb. Kill the 4 scorpions that are now bothering you. Proceed to each of the lever alcoves and pull the levers. The one on the right (as you're looking at them) re-opens the exit to the tomb. Don't leave the tomb without pulling the other lever. The lever on the left shows you the trapdoor that it opens at the back of cell 5. I suggest you save before you attempt to exit this first tomb. If you run to leave the tomb the trapdoor will slam down and you will be trapped and you will spend the rest of your days in this tomb. Locate Lara on the tile before the exit hall begins and leap over the pressure sensitive tile in the hallway and the trapdoor will not be activated.

Now head back down the long passageways to cell 6. If you have explored cell 5 you would have found a locked trapdoor at the back of the room, which gave you a view of the exit trapdoor that you just opened in the first tomb. Enter cell 6 and proceed to the blown out area at the back of it. Take a short slide and grab the ledge ahead to avoid falling in to the deep spike pit. Pull up on to the ledge and pull the lever, which opens the trapdoor at the back of cell 5 and the connecting trapdoor in the stone area that you are currently in. If you have visited cell 5 and 6 before doing the first tomb, then you would have to make your way back along the ledges above the small slide and exit via cell 6 to complete the other rooms, and then return via cell 5 or 6 to exit the 6-cell area.

You now enter the sandy excavation site - it's simply a combination of climbs, jumps and burrows that need to be negotiated. When you make the final climb up out of this area, stop on the last ledge, turn around and find the hidden cave on the other side of this shaft. Run jump to grab and pull-up in to the cave and discover Secret 2 - the grenade gun. Crawl back out of the cave and drop down the shaft, then climb back up the ledges to enter the spike room that protects the main tomb. Just tread carefully and move between spike thrusts and you will proceed unscathed. Save and top up the health before entering the main tomb.

Here we go! There are 4 ninjas waiting in ambush in the main tomb. First take out the guy in the turret to your left then deal with the other 3 on the ground - all the time avoiding the matrix of dart emitters in the room. There are three major ramps in the room. The 2 either side are not accessible from the ground the one at the back of the room is. Watch out for the rolling ball traps on all of them. The ramp at the back of the tomb will unleash 2 separate rolling balls at different occasions.

OK the dust has settled and it's time to explore the tomb. Grab the flares from one of the turrets. Your present destination is the 2 side ramps. Climb the ladder on the sidewall to the small 2-piece ledge. Jump over the gap between these two ledges to trigger the rolling ball in the alcove below. Now hang drop down on to the upper part of the ramp. Enter the alcove and pull the lever. This opens the trapdoor in the alcove on the opposite side of the tomb. Exit the alcove jump down to the floor and climb the ladder again. Once up on the 2-piece ledge, run jump to the long ledge at either end of the tomb, run along and run jump to get to the other 2-piece ledge (opposite side of room). This time hang drop on to the upper ramp. The rolling ball hasn't triggered yet. A quick step on the next tile up the ramp and run jump back out and down to the floor is required to trigger and avoid the rolling ball. Repeat the climb once more to get back to this ramp again - you can now safely enter the alcove and pull the lever. Alternatively, a quick sprint from the ramp straight into the alcove will also work. I won't try and describe what happens next just take a look for yourself. You have opened the path to move on. Go back up the long ramp at the back of the tomb to discover a path where there wasn't one before. Proceed up the long sloping hallway and avoid the homing dart emitters. At the top of the hallway save and have a good look around with the binoculars to familiarise yourself with the layout. First you need to perform a leap and a series of springing jumps in order to get to the Uzi’s on top of the column that's in the darkness. Then drop down to the floor. There's no marker for where the pushable statue object has to be moved. If you noticed when you were up top in the hallway there are 5 columns (well, 4 and the remains of a fifth one) situated in a 2 x 3 grid. Well just drag the statue to the tile that would be where the sixth column would be in this grid. There is also a clear hint of this pattern on the stonewalls. This sets the columns alight and opens the trapdoor in the lattice wall. Go through to the Eye of Horus gate, combine and use the 2 eyepieces and enter Stage 2.

Stage 2:
Drop down in to the tunnels via the sliding pole. Where you emerge the tunnel splits right and left. Go right. Ride the long downhill slide. At the end of the third section leap and grab the ledge in front of you before you fall and meet an untimely death in the deep pit.
Look up to see which wall is climbable and climb up to the next part of the tunnel. On the left of this section is a pull-up crawl space. Jump up and grab the Hand of Orion puzzle piece. Drop back down to the tunnel. The tunnel turns left, follows a long way along then you climb up to the top, back flip out at the top. Go to the end of the tunnel
And drop down to return to what would have been the left fork of the main tunnel that you haven't investigated yet. Shoot the ninja and turn around and climb up into another crawl space. Make your way up through the tunnel until you emerge at the vast cavern. Keep a savegame up at the top of the ridge; there are a couple of areas that may leave you stranded down below. You've reached the oil source, but beware the oil down below is volatile so don't land on it. Proceed carefully along the ridge and enjoy the view - note the trapdoor at the end above the 'oilfall'. About half way along the ridge, the last ninja will attack you from afar. Polish him off and proceed to where the ridge veers towards the right of the cavern and where a wall ledge is reachable. Leap and grab the ledge and shimmy left until you can see a sliding ledge beneath you and a smaller ledge below this on the ground. Drop slide and grab the edge of the first ledge then shimmy left one block into the darkness and pull up on to a small ledge. Light a flare and carefully access the small cave for the Uzi ammo pickup. Now grab the edge of the rock outcrop that conceals this cave, pull up and do a 4-way slide jump combination to get to the lever room. Pull the lever to open the trapdoor at the exit of the cavern. Grab the rock ledge just to the left of the lever room and shimmy up and around to get back to the small cave area. Drop back to the ledge and shimmy right until the safe rock platform is below you. Drop down to the rock platform. You now need to make your way across the middle of the cavern to the other side by a series of rock platform jumps and then head right towards the 'oilfall'. With the 'oilfall' in sight, a mummy will emerge and approach you (remember I said 'the oil gives life to the dead'). A grenade will do nicely here thank you. Now you can make the last couple of jumps to reach a small flat area behind the rock outcrop and adjacent to the 'oilfall'. Grab the flares pickup. Now look at the column next to the 'oilfall'. The hieroglyphics are oriented differently. Leap and grab the column and climb up to the small wooden bridge.
Pass through the next hall to the checkerboard puzzle. This is much like the fire room puzzle - trial and error. Basically all white squares mean death and the safe path on the red squares is shown below - but please mess up at least once to see what happens if you choose the wrong path.

XXXX1
XXX2X
XXXXX
XXX3X
5X4XX

Once you have negotiated this - run and grab to reach the crawl space.
Crawl through the sandy space then climb up to the top of the tunnel. Notice the small alcove opposite the puzzle hole. Place the Hand of Orion in its puzzle hole to reveal the lever in the hidden area in the alcove behind and reseal the climb-up tunnel that you have just emerged from. A short fly-by sequence indicates this.
Pull the lever to open the final trapdoor and exit the building to enjoy a nice Egyptian sunset. Lara now knows where the oil is coming from and has stopped the ninjas from getting to it. All in a day's work! Stay tuned to see how this story develops.

The finish trigger reloads to the start of the level so you can go back and take a more leisurely stroll through the tomb and finish off the mummies now that you have the grenade gun.