At the end of World 2-3 in New Super Mario Bros. Wii, you find this formation.

Look familiar?

It's strikingly similar to a formation we saw in a prior tip. Check it out

So you might be thinking you can apply the same technique: wait until the Koopa gets about halfway down the 'stair' and jump on it.

You keep bouncing, racking up points, until

1UP!

You can keep doing this for as long as there's time left on the clock, with the added bonuses of: 1. there's no bug that goes off if you get more than a certain amount of lives, 99's the limit and 2. if you need to, you can come back to this stage and do the trick again for yet more lives.

And, to help illustrate the timing, I've prepared the video below.

In The Punisher, you find all kinds of things to pick up, some, like moneybags, food, and precious gems, are good for some points, but others, like pipes, shurikens, axes, chairs

oil drums

And all kinds of other things can be used as weapons.

But there's another reason to pick them up.

At the end of each stage, you get bonus points tallied up, and there's a special category for item pickups.

You get some bonus points for everything you've picked up in the level, whether you smashed it over some malefactor's skull or not. So you should definitely spend a few extra seconds picking up everything you come across in order to build up an impressive score.

Unless having your initials across the top of the game screen doesn't mean that much to you.

You have two ways to clear levels in Pengo, you can either make all three of the blocks with diamonds on them touch each other or you can use the regular blocks to squish the blob-things that fill up the levels.

But, what might not be immediately obvious is that you can use the boundaries of the stage to your advantage.

Just walk up to the edge and press the Push button. You'll cause shockwaves to go down the length of it, stunning any enemies that are near it.

Giving you a few precious seconds to formulate a counter-strategy.

Tetris Attack is all about getting chains and combos to keep your puzzle alive and rain garbage down upon your enemies. One of the more nebulously defined category is the 'skill chain', where you maneuver blocks to form matches while others are still clearing.

Let's say you have this setup here, and you make a clear.

Then you move up, slide out the Heart

With timing so that the bottom part of the puzzle falls before the Diamond on top does

Then, when the Diamond does fall, it counts as a chain!

And, so you can get a better sense of the timing required, I've put together an animated .gif here (4MB) to show it in action.

And yes, I know that this would have been a 2-clear even without timing it just so. But the timing is the key. You can use this technique to create chains where you normally wouldn't get one, which can really put a hurting on your opponent.

On the very last stage of Mega Man 2, after you've fought Wily for the first time, you come across his last line of defense: some brown dripping fluid in a narrow corridor. Doesn't sound too scary, I know, but they're kind of tough to avoid.

Or are they?

When you first start the stage, you fall down a pretty long shaft.

If you hold down the Right arrow immediately, you'll work your way over to the right side

And once you land, you can start going to the right. You'll be so far over to the side of the screen that the drips won't have time to fall on your head.

Unless of course you double-back and go to the left for some reason. So I wouldn't recommend that.

The first Castlevania game is pretty tough, mostly because the enemies are way more maneuverable than you and hit harder than you, which seems a little unfair. One of the more common sticking points is the boss of the fifth area, Death. But, with the proper preparation, he goes down pretty easily.

One of the first candles you come across contains Holy Water.

You're going to want to hang onto it for the duration of the level, and make sure you use it frequently enough that you get the Triple Shot.

Don't be tempted by the Cross toward the end, that's Fool's Gold.

Then, once you get to Death's room, start jumping and lobbing Holy Water on the upper-right platform.

Death will come down, land on the explosions, and get stunned.

Keep on jumping, tossing Holy Water, jumping, tossing Holy Water, etc. until

You win!

And Death didn't even have a chance to move.

Today, I'm going to share one a quick-'n'-easy two hit combo with Street Fighter's Guile.

First, you're going to want to hold Back on the controller to charge for the Sonic Boom. Then press Forward and Weak punch to throw it.

Keep holding Forward to walk toward your opponent, trailing your projectile, after it hits,

follow it up with a Fierce Punch.

Done right, you'll be able to hit your opponent with both of them for a quick 2-hit combo!

And, if you can back your opponent in the corner he won't slide back so far when the initial hit smacks him, giving him less time to recover and avoid the second hit.

Since this is kind of tough to show the timing in picture form, I've created an animated .gif here(4.5MB) that shows it in action.

Oh, and it also works for Street Fighter 4.

Crazy Taxi is kind of a tough game. Mostly because if you play the arcade game, you have no indication of how to perform the advanced techniques that you need to know to be successful at the game.

But that's what I'm here for.

You need to know 4 techniques to be a successful cabbie.

1. The Crazy Dash - The idea is to shift into Drive and then immediately stomp on the gas. The timing is a little tough to get without a demonstration, but pulled off successfully, you'll immediately rocket to top speed. You can do this at any time, even while you're driving. Also, if you're at a stop, and you do the Crazy Dash, but immediately put the car into Reverse, you'll go full-speed backwards.

2. The Limiter Cut - Once you get going at top speed with the Crazy Dash, you'll notice that your car will start to vibrate. When that happens you want to throw the car into Reverse, then Drive, and then hit the Gas, with the same timing as the Crazy Dash. This will give you a burst of speed that lets you go faster than your top speed for a couple of seconds.

3. The Crazy Drift - While you're driving, put the car into Reverse and then into Drive while turning a direction. You'll easily slide around corners. Let go of everything and do a Crazy Dash to recover.

4. The Crazy Stop - Do the Crazy Dash, but hit Reverse and the Brake instead of Drive and the Gas. You'll manage to stop much faster.

Here's a video I prepared of me performing all 4 of these techniques on the Dreamcast version Crazy Box challenge rank S-S. I'm a little out of practice at the game, but I think you'll get the idea.

A while back I told you about a trick to racking up a lot of lives in Super Mario Bros. 3. But, you kind of have to wait until you're almost halfway through the game to do it. Isn't there a way to stock up on lives beforehand?

You betcha!

Make your way to 1-2, the second stage in the game. Make sure you have the Raccoon Tail and make your way to the pipe that generates an endless supply of Goombas.

Let a few build up around you and then start jumping on them.

It's kind of tricky, but what you want to do is to hold down the A button when you land on them to bounce toward the top of the screen, then rapidly press the A Button to slow your descent. Repeat this over and over (without touching the ground) to eventually be rewarded with

1UP!

Yeah, it's a little bit more work and a little bit slower, but you can do it so much earlier in the game that it's worth giving yourself a little bit of a buffer until you can make it to World 3.

Oh, and this also works any time you can get 3 Dry Bones together in a place with high ceilings.

When you're playing through Yoshi's Island, you occasionally run into some bonus games, one of which is the Match Cards game.

It's kind of like Memory, you get a quick look at the cards, and then they're flipped over and you have to make matches. Screw up a couple of times and you lose.

But what if you don't have a camera or some other way to take a screenshot for reference? And what if you don't have a photographic memory?

I like to use a pen and paper. You have just enough time to write down what's being shown to you if you're quick and use a kind of shorthand.

For instance, with the screen above, I'd write:

Then, it's an easy matter of matching up the items by consulting your notes. Which will fill up your inventory and

The last thing you match will turn into a 10UP!

Double bonus!