The opening cut scene before the sign in brings you deep into the heart of the Numerian rainforest where we meet Doctor Horace Pythagoras, and his team (they’re not important) and his flying assistant Laptrap informs him that the monster Mathra has attacked again, the doctor does not believe that he’s real and he’s just superstition and then tells laptrap that they will go and find the keys to the city of Numeria themselves what could possibly go wrong….uh oh Mathra must have good hearing because the next victim is…..Doctor Pythagoras, as he’s being swept away he tells Laptrap to contact the Cluefinders. Why? Well it just so happens the group’s leader and founder is his niece Joni Savage

After we sign in and set our levels (yes we can pre-set the levels here there was no driving activity or automatic leveling yet) we are at a small airplane driven by one Fletcher Limburger carrying four pre-teens Joni asks him if they are getting closer to where her uncle was abducted, Santiago questions if Doctor Pythagoras was really taken by the monster, Limberger tries to change the subject by offering the kids some peanuts (with a hilarious interjection by Owen) Leslie opens her Big Book of Everything (I want that book!) explaining that she did read about the lost city of Numeria, we get some illustrations of it’s history while Limburger talks about the history of Numeria and how Mathra ruined everything. When Limburger finishes the story we arrive at Pythagoras’s base camp, and Laptrap greets the Cluefinders and explains what happened and shows them a map of the Numeria. Joni states that she, Santiago and Laptrap would go and find the keys while Leslie and Owen stay behind to be the videolink and backup (Santiago will have a Red Videophone on him at all times and you can call them for help whenever the player is having problems)


There's no concrete structure of where to go first in the first act you can start at either the Monkey Kingdom or the Goo Lagoon

When you enter the Monkey Kingdom you are greeted by the Monkey King Vasco de Bongo and he explains the situation to Joni and Santiago, and tells him where the first key is and explains that they’ll need to collect sneeze berries in order to cross the rings of fire safely. There are another couple of paths to take one will take you to the address puzzle the other will take you to the calendar puzzle

Activities in the Monkey Kingdom

Address stones puzzle: The force of Mathra’s flight has caused the address stones at a Monkey’s residence to fall off his doorway, the objective is to create the biggest possible number. You will receive purple sneeze berries when you succeed

CLUE BREAK: you meet up with a monkey guard that is guarding a relic that was allegedly dropped by Mathra, but this ain’t no monster poop it’s a can of engine oil that’s meant for airplanes hmmm why would Mathra need that. There are two other paths to take one will take you to the next sneeze berry earning puzzle the other will take you to a log bridge we’ll get to that in a minute

Monument puzzle: The cleaner monkey tells Joni and Santiago that he was cleaning the monument a little too hard and knocked off the number plate, the objective is to add the two numbers that are mentioned in the problem. You will receive blue sneeze berries when you succeed

Vine Barrier puzzle: When you arrive you see a monkey that falls into a pit of god knows what he won’t tell us it’s that disgusting and he needs help roping it off, it’s a measure puzzle (like #+#+#+#= length) you will earn Red Sneeze berries when you succeed

Oh it’s Cut Scene time: We meet up with Bongo again in this amphitheater area and he’s joined with three other monkey’s uh oh DUCK Mathra appearance. Yeah we find out here that Laptrap is the Scooby Doo of this group minus the bottomless pit stomach, anyway back to the game, even though Joni and Santiago proclaim they don’t believe in monsters, but Bongo says they have to….in Song….no seriously a song is sung here, and he is joined by three primate bandmates named wait for it….Davey Mickey and Peter (why does the king have to be Michael that makes no sense to me, and why name yourselves after the monkees if you instead sing a rather dark song) well we continue our journey we have two other paths to take the path to the left will take us to the Calendar puzzle the path to the right will take us to the treasure chest puzzle

Calendar Puzzle: Queen Itchibella (who I don’t think is married to King Bongo, she doesn’t call him her husband) has a calendar that states what day to feed her pet Flabberwock (?) the marker has fallen off and the king gave her a scroll explaining when to feed him, you have to put the marker on the calendar that marks that day, you will receive Gold Sneeze berries when you succeed

We arrive back with the Monkey’s you can either hear them sing another song or go to the treasure chest puzzle

Treasure Chest Puzzle: the monkey guard explains that while he was putting the King’s money away the lid to the treasure chest shut and his tail was caught, to reopen the chest a certain number of coins will need to be deposited. When you succeed you were earn Green Sneeze berries

*OPTIONAL ACTIVITY*

Now there is this bridge activity where you may need to cross a bridge to get to the Rings of Fire of course Joni thinks she can make it across but they are crossing a pit of snakes…..and just as she jumps, a bigger snake makes her regret that decision, don’t worry Santiago pulls her away in time, they decipher that they need to put two rocks on the end of that log that’s the same weight of the big rock on the opposite side in order to get across

Now if you take the path to the right of the chest activity you will find yourselves at the rings of fire we see colored bridges going to the right to the rings of fire (so yeah doing that will mean no need to do the bridge puzzle) going left will just take you back to the Amphitheatre again


Now we get to the bridges of the rings of Fire, the bridge has a grid of numbers and there is a rock that displays the equation, either the answer is right and a number square reveals a letter (this is going to be important) when you answer correctly don’t worry the computer will keep track of the notes for you), answer wrong and the square will burn, and be careful even if the answer is correct a letter tile may not turn over, it will bounce and you'll have to try again, and don’t worry if your run out of sneeze berries you can go back to the Monkey Kingdom for more. There will be some cut scenes that are in between completed bridge crossings, they’re not that important but it’s nice to hear some banter between Joni, Santiago and Laptrap

After crossing five bridges you will arrive where there’s a puzzle all those codes you collected are instructions that will summon one of the keys to the lost city…and then a trap door opens which leads to another cut scene but that’s skippable (but kind of worth it to hear Santiago react to Joni saying “Weeee”) the slide will send you right back to where you started when the gameplay did and you will enter the next area of Numeria in order to get the next key

When you have a messy arrival into the Goo Lagoon you are greeted by a quartet of flowers who sound very similar to a certain rock band from Liverpool (can you name another band that sounds like they do?) and apparently their lives are being ruined by Mathra too except unlike in the Monkey Kingdom their goo is polluted. They also inform them that the key is located at Goo falls but they’re going to need a Beat er Beetle Bag

Again there are two paths to take, one will lead to the spider meal activity the other will lead to the yellow matter (I don’t know if it has a spelling) activity

NOTE: something I should have mentioned early on each area of the game is relegated to a certain school subject, while the Monkey Kingdom had Math Activities this has English/Language Arts and Logic activities

Goo Lagoon activities

Spider Lunch: we meet up with sister spiders who are about to have a meal and we see that one sister has spiders that have a shape on them that go together in a certain way the other sister need to have a bug given to her that has something similar to what her sister has, when you finish the activity you will be given a Purple Beetle bag

CLUE ALERT: you meet up with an injured flower (who may be based on Eliza Dolittle) and we see a scrap of paper that says Fletcher’s Furriers (hmm why would Mathra drop that) again there are two paths one will lead to another optional bridge puzzle (again we’ll get to that in a second) the other will lead to the crabalock activity

Crabalock puzzle: Oh no these birds have drank the polluted goo and are attacking this poor plant and the plant has to lock them in this tree trunk, this is a word activity that has to do with opposites….at least that’s how it is with level one (I haven’t played it on other levels). When you put the right key in, the trunk will lock. When you succeed you will receive a blue beetle bag

Attacknid puzzle: Now this starts off with a skippable cut scene (it doesn’t contain any information that would be vital to save Uncle Horace) we meet up with a tree that has a branch nose with some leaves, but one of them is actually a camouflaged attack-nid that’s been biting the tree branch. You take the leaf that doesn’t look the same as the other leaves and put it in the trees mouth. When you succeed you will receive a Red Beetle Bag

Cut Scene time!: we arrive near a goo pond and we meet up with the Liverpuddlians again and yes they get a song too however they only get two instead of three like the monkeys got. Of course if you’re going to have characters that are emulating the Beatles you might as well sing a song in the style of the Beatles their songs start off sounding like For the Benefit of Mr Kite (really? That song of all the songs in the Beatles Catalogue? Considering the circumstances it should have been a parody of HELP! I don’t know what the other half of the song sounds like but it sounds like something from the Beatlemania days)

Back to the game there are other paths to take one will lead to the gold beetle bag activity the other will lead to the worm transport activity

Help the…what is that thing: so this is an activity where you have to decipher the clues the big Yellow thing wrong on the tree trunk, you have to figure out which of the bugs on the back of that thing is making it’s life miserable, give it to the caterpillar (what is that?) he’ll eat the bug and you will be rewarded with a gold Beetle bag

Bug Excursion: this is more of a process of elimination puzzle with a story problem like sometimes they will state that a certain worm is at this seat this worm as to sit between two certain worms etcetera you will earn a green beetlebag when you complete the puzzle successfully


OPTIONAL ACTIVITY: we have another bridge! And Joni didn’t learn from last time except this time there’s goo and Santiago doesn’t catch her in time, thank god for Laptrap he pulls her out. There are three planks missing from the bridge and you have to finish the pattern in order to be able to cross

We have made it to goo falls! In this activity we have to guide the beetles that came from the Beetle bags up a wall to a flower they have to eat in order to free the arms of this relic that talks (yeah there’s one that talks at the rings of fire too) which will reveal the stairs that we have to climb to get to the next level of the falls oh and a clue is revealed as well, it takes a bit less effort to get a clue to get the key this time. Again don’t worry if you run out of beetles from the bags you can always go get another one (even better these tiles turn around most of them will be blank and you can move the beetle around as you please but the tile can turn back) This is an activity we have to four more times, and we get more between level banter between Joni and Santiago

We have reached the top of the falls! Now we have to push the shapes in a certain order in order to retrieve the other key, and yes there’s another trap door we fall through when we retrieve it

Going back to the key retrieval puzzle is allowed you’ll get other prizes when you follow the instructions again

You’ve got both keys, and Limburger is ready to fly you into the Lost City (hmm okay why couldn’t he have just flown them into the lost city we can actually see the gates from the home base). Now we reach another Cut Scene Limburger says they are circling over the city gates, Joni and Santiago parachute down only they don’t land in the lost city they reach something called *checks the manual* the jungle canopy, and we meet up with a smart alecky bat and a snobby bird but despite their attitude they help (these two seem to be like an odd couple here) and we have to do Geography Puzzles here in order to get out of the tree tops, don’t worry you won’t be here very long you just have to cross a branch and help some birds get to some vacation destinations

By the way you don’t earn anything when you’re in this area heck you don’t even have to go back

Jungle Canopy Activities

You Are Here: Before you can get anywhere you have to figure out where exactly you are and which branch to take to get to the Lost City when you do we get another scene of Santiago cautiously crossing and Joni just zipping across

Bird US Geography: we are almost at the lost city but there’s this travel agent that has to help six birds figure out where in the United States they want to go for their vacation, get the birds to their destination and she’ll help us get to the Lost City (wait a minute if Laptrap could get Joni out of that Goo Swamp why couldn’t he have flown them to the Lost City)

We’ve made it at last to the Lost City and the two keys have merged themselves together, let’s open the gate, and there’s Mathra he’s sleeping, Joni plans to get him while he’s out, but Santiago has reviewed all the clues……the city gates have locked behind them

If you haven’t figured it out by now, the pilot that got the Cluefinders to Numeria is behind it all, he just used the legend of Mathra to keep everyone away from the Lost City while he took animals for his fur company, and Joni’s uncle was about to ruin everything. And that’s why he didn’t bother to just drop them off at the city gates (or even inside the lost city thereby making the entire game kind of pointless....good god did we leave Owen and Leslie alone with him? well considering that they still do video phone stuff they weren't in any danger)

Limburger flies off in the fake Mathra leaving a bunch of smoke behind causing laptrap to sneeze and wake up the entrances to a temple. They explain that they animals and Uncle Horace are inside that temple and they will have rebuild the Mathra trap at the bottomless pits of doom, but first they will need to receive snagnets from these chambers. No they don’t get a song, because they’re not exactly in peril here. Oh and everything here is Science related except for the Bottomless Pits of Doom. Of course there are two paths but they aren’t as simple as going left or right, the furthest entrance will take you to the Numerian Chamber of Order, the gateway closest to you will take you to the Numerian Chamber of Vision



Lost City Activities

Numerian Chamber of Order: When we arrive (yes there’s another skippable cutscene here) we see the chamber hands juggling the stones but they drop them they accuse each other of dropping the stones but admit they’ll have to work together to put them back in the right place when we do Joni and Santiago will High Five each other and so will the Chamber Hands…..who quickly regret it because when you think about it they’re bumping heads so of course it would hurt. When we succeed we receive Purple Snagnets

Numerian Chamber of Vision: Here we have the reinstate the ahem eyes of the chamber host and she will show you a little film when you put it in the correct order of the evolution of something (like for an example a solar eclipse, or watching Pumpkins or Peanuts grow) when complete it correctly we will be given Gold Snagnets

Numerian Chamber of Structure: We are met with a Skull that welcomes you to his chamber and we have to put pieces of animal bones together when we get it right we see the animal in it’s flesh form and will receive red Snagnets

Numerian Chamber of Illusion: This is a closeup activity where we have to guess what this item is a closeup of, we match three pictures with items (by the way in this chamber master doesn’t have a face it’s just a big lava lamp) When we finish we will earn Blue Snagnets

Numerian Chamber of Knowledge: we arrive here and we notice a water wheel that’s for goo and the chamber explains that the Goo from Goo Spring turns her wheel and generates her power, and oh look Limburger left his oil drum there of course he decided to pollute the goo (just why? How does that benefit him?)

And we have made it to the bottomless pits of Doom, however the activity is not science related it’s Language arts related and all of the pits will have different rules, like for example the Purple pit will have Opposites (or antonyms) rules Green will have Synonyms, Red will have Category related rules, Blue will have Homophone related rules (words that sound the same), and Gold will have Nouns.

Eventually we will find our way to where Uncle Horace is being held, he gets rescued Limburger falls into the mathra trap, Joni questions if the Bottomless pit really is bottomless (but is there really such a thing anyway?) the doctor rewards the cluefinders by giving them Laptrap much to his equilibrium of knowing that even though there will be more excitement, more danger and more monsters, even nicer we see the characters in the game wave them off.

Limburger climbs up from the home base of the game and vows revenge (yes we do eventually see him again but we’ll get to that walkthrough when we get to it) and he stomps off, thereby Mathra remaining a legend…..or is it