Mushroom Mines

Mushroom Mines

Mushroom Mines is a world in Shovel Knight Dig and serves as the first world in The Well. Spore Knight is fought here.

History

Prior to the events of Shovel Knight Dig, Mushroom Mines was an active underground mine that at some point stopped being used and fell into disrepair. The collapsed caverns of the mine were later opened by Spore Knight's shroom stents for the purpose of navigating to the Enchantress headdress statue in order to place the pink Gemstone as part of the Hexcavators' plan to find a valuable item buried deep beneath The Well.

The mines were later entered by Shovel Knight in pursuit of Drill Knight, who had stolen Shovel Knight's bag as part of his team's plan. Shovel Knight later defeated Spore Knight, obtained the pink Gemstone, and destroyed the Enchantress statue.

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The status of the mines after the events of Shovel Knight Dig are uncertain, although they may possibly have returned back to their state of disrepair given that there was no reason for Spore Knight's shroom stents to keep the mine caverns open anymore. While the Enchantress headdress statue had existed underground since ancient times according to a stone slab in the Omega Driver room, it is not known whether Mushroom Mines was also present at this same time.

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  The Omega Driver room. The right-most stone slab indicates the existence of Enchantress headdress statues underground.

Level design

Mushroom Mines frequently uses bouncy mushrooms in the form of stationary mushrooms and walking mushrooms. Flies will infinitely respawn and normally only one is encountered on-screen at a time, although sometimes more can be present. Spore Knight is fought at the end of stage III. After completing Mushroom Mines, the player has a chance of being able to access Secret Fountain or Smeltworks next.

• Tutorial: This stage is accessed upon first entering The Well and is a pre-made level that shows the player how to play the game and introduces them to various game components. Chester appears part way through and sells a Flameo Wand, Looking Glass Accessory, and Inverse Repeller Accessory.
• Stage I: This stage tends to use simple level chunks. Stage enhancements introduced by signs can sometimes be active here, although the player is not informed what enhancements are active.
• Stage II: Mushdooms can rarely be encountered here.
• Stage III: Mushdooms and drill machines can be encountered in this stage, and almost always will only appear if a stage route has their respective sign. If these entities appear, the level structure is altered in the following ways:
  • Mushdooms being present will cause several Mushdoom level chunks to be used along with the possibility of using siderooms that use Mushdooms.
  • Drill machines being present will completely alter the level structure to only use drill machine level chunks, which result in vertically-oriented levels that have large sections of dirt.

True Ending

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The Mushroom Mines step of the True Ending involves having to find Altius. Altius will appear in a sideroom on top of a yellow chest sleeping and has to be hit in order to complete this step. When hit he will drop either a pink gem or a Relic, though the pink gem is more common. A sideroom with a yellow chest accessed via a locked gate can also contain Altius, but this chance only occurs if the door is opened; if the door is not opened Altius will appear in a normally accessible sideroom.

If Altius is found, in the stage selection room after defeating Spore Knight, Shield Knight will appear holding Altius. If Altius is not found, Shield Knight will sometimes appear in the room right before Spore Knight's boss battle asking if he has seen Altius.

Game components

Enemies:

• Flies - Infinitely respawn.
• Green and pink Blorbs
• Boneclangs: Normal and bomb.
• Walking mushrooms
• Spore creatures
• Propeller Rats
• Floating mushrooms
• Impostors

Unique hazards:

• Mines
• Drill machines

Unique interactive objects

• Mushrooms