Hello and welcome to the TrueAchievements walkthrough for Coffin Dodgers! This is a kart racer, in the vein of games like Mario Kart, although far less polished. It's quite a simple completion, merely requiring two full playthroughs of the story mode and some extra grinding to purchase all upgrades for your Kart, followed by a quick mop-up in split-screen versus for any missed powerup achievements.
The environments are quite busy, leading to a lot of visual clutter on-screen as you're zipping through hairpin turns. Fortunately, it's easy enough to get and keep the lead once your kart is upgraded that you shouldn't have any issues at all getting gold medals on your 2nd playthrough. There won't be a hints/tips pages, as there are only a few very minor things to keep in mind.
- Don't worry about trying to get all golds on your first playthrough. You should be able to get gold on the first six races (three races in each of the first two areas) fairly easily, but the 3rd and 4th areas might be tough to get 1st place. Just focus on placing high enough each race to continue to the next one. Basically, don't come in below the Death character on the race standings.
- Focus on top-speed and handling upgrades first. The acceleration upgrade is largely irrelevant except at the very beginning of the race. After speed and handling, the upgrade to carry an additional powerup is quite handy.
- If you're in 1st place, just get rid of any powerups you may get that aren't the bubble shield or the EMP blast. The EMP is handy if an opponent is about to pass, and the shield obviously helps keep you from getting zapped by the person in 2nd. Oil slicks are fine, and should be placed in narrower areas of the track to increase the likelihood that the computer opponents will hit them. The rocket and machine gun are completely worthless when in 1st, so get rid of them asap.
- Lastly, although this should be obvious, use
to activate your powerups when ready to use them.
Story Walkthrough
My apologies in advance for those used to my more thorough walkthroughs, but this game does not lend itself to that style. Apart from the miscellaneous/mop-up section, it's going to look more like a roadmap than a walkthrough, but such is the nature of this game's achievements. Most of them will be earned merely by going through story mode twice and getting gold medals on all stages. The rest will be the mop-up.
After winning your first race, you'll unlock Grimaced.
After winning two or three races, you should have enough coins to buy your first upgrade. Upgrade your engine to increase your top speed and you will unlock My Kart Is Augmented.
Make sure to hit Try Again if you don't win the first six races. After winning the first three (The Village), you'll unlock Death Defier, and after three more (The Town) you'll get Death Derider.
Once you reach the three races on The Farm, you should periodically see a UFO fly over the track with a beam under it. Run into the beam to get spun out and unlock Batteries Not Included.
Although it isn't necessary since you'll be doing a 2nd playthrough as Death anyway, it's actually quite easy to get 1st place in the final race of the game in the Showdown area. Doing so will unlock Death Decider, but don't worry if you fail as you should easily accomplish this in your 2nd playthrough as Death after a few more upgrades.
Completing the final race will also unlock One Foot In The Grave, as well as unlocking the Death racer for your 2nd playthrough.
Now that you've finished the story mode, the Death character is unlocked. Start a new story mode using Death as your racer. Make sure to get gold on all the races in the first two areas again even though you already have, as the gold medal gets you more points for upgrades. Once you reach the 3rd and 4th areas, you should have upgraded your kart enough to get gold on all of those this time as well. Also, once you purchase the final upgrade in any of the categories (with the paint category being the easiest, as there is only one upgrade to buy in it), you'll unlock We Can Rebuild Him.
Make sure on this playthrough to get all 1st place finishes in The Farm and The Graveyard areas. If you don't win a race, hit Try Again. There is no way to replay races after you finish without going all the way back through story mode again. You'll get the following two achievements for winning all three races in those two areas.
Finally, at the end of this playthrough you'll unlock:
For the final story mode achievement, you'll need to grind out a race to earn enough tokens for the remaining upgrades. The good thing is, finishing a race in 1st gets you the tokens for winning, but still allows you to replay that race via the Try Again option and keep the tokens. So the quickest way to finish your upgrades is to start a new game again and keep replaying one of the first few races (whichever one you feel you can win the easiest). Before starting the race ,go to the garage and count how many tokens you need to purchase all of the remaining upgrades, then just keep using Try Again on that race until you have enough. Once you do, finish it out and go to the garage to purchase the remaining upgrades for the Million Dollar Granddad achievement.
Mop-Up
You may have unlocked many of the following achievements while doing the story mode. For those that you haven't, they can be grinded against a 2nd controller in split-screen. Just load up 2-player split screen against a 2nd controller. Most of the weapons ones will be done in Free Roam mode. Use the rocket launcher and uzi against the 2nd controller 20 times each, making sure to run over the opponent before they respawn back in their kart to get During the War if you haven't already. Make sure you hit them with the Uzi until they crash/explode, otherwise it doesn't count. Also, make sure anytime you get the shield bubble, that you get a weapon with player two and activate your shield before shooting at yourself with player 2's weapon to work toward the Luckily... achievement. You should get the 20 shield uses one by the time you've finished the Uzi, Rocket Launcher, and EMP ones.
If you somehow haven't gotten the one for using turbo without crashing 20 times, don't worry, as you should finish it in the next step. Switch to 2-player split screen Race mode (oil slicks aren't in free roam). Get the powerup, and if it's an oil slick, make sure you're moving forward before placing it. Once you do, drive over it with player 2. Repeat this 20 times. If you get a turbo and still haven't gotten that achievement, make sure to use the turbo and keep from crashing until it runs out each time.
Switch to Granddaddy mode and drive around until you find an item with a blue light beneath it. Pick it up to unlock Sweep. If you STILL haven't finished the 20 turbos achievement, finish that here, as ALL the powerups in Granddaddy mode are turbos.
SweepGet 1 Crazy Granddad item.
For Skater Boy, load up a race on The Town - Race 3 in Single Player - Time Trial mode. Follow the track until you see the skateboarder (hard to miss). Ram him, then simply wait until he gets up and ram him again. After five brutal hit-and-runs, you'll unlock the achievement.
Similarly, for Paper Boy load up a race on The Village - Race 3 in time trial. At the very start, you should see the paperboy ride away. Catch up to him and ram him. Wait a second after you ram him to make sure it registers, then pause the game and restart the race. Repeat this five times to unlock the achievement.
Congratulations (or condolences?) on finishing this one, and thanks for using my walkthrough!~Life