Duration: 11:27

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Even had I done marginally better on my dry run of Egypt, I wouldn't have had enough Stars to carry me through another set... especially considering the rampant inflation that's totally devaluing the Star-based economy. Honestly, I'm a little surprised I managed to make it even that far.

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1. Jungle Gym Antics

Playing just one stage to total completion is on the same general order of magnitude as just running through a whole theme of courses in one free-form fit of free running... if you're lucky. Honestly, some courses are more painful than others and some are just plain easily polished off. Even with this one as a prime candidate for "easy completion," it takes quite a decent chunk of time to sort everything out.

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In order to reach total completion of a stage, there's a bit of a checklist:

1) Come in first place for a total of 20 Stars. This isn't generally too hard, although the crown-wearing Avatar's preset course will often make liberal use of the Split Path elements that you won't have access to until you unlock it.

2) Find all 16 Stars just floating around in the stage. You've certainly noticed several placed tantalizingly close along the main route... some of them I was willing and/or able to grab along the way, and others I just resigned myself to revisiting later, since the majority of the Stars on a course are reachable only via the Split Path elements anyway. (Noticing a deliberate theme here?) ...these represent a darker side to the Split Path, however, since most often they take you further OUT of the way than Stars already generally tend to.

3) Complete the three Bonus Objectives for 2, 3, and 4 Stars apiece. Generally, these are race-related tasks, sometimes incorporating the other players or the stage Stars in some fashion... other times, they'll just ask some specific task of you while you do your own thing. You've had a chance to see quite the array of Objectives so far... although my problem usually is how they'll only show them very briefly as you're getting ready at the starting line as those highly distracting entrance Avatar animations are playing... so a lot of the time, I'll flat out miss entirely what the point might've been.

Now, as a general rule, there's only that very finite supply of Stars in a stage to obtain... that is, if you place first in the standings, you'll receive 20 Stars and never get any more for the quality of your time versus the fixed three opposing runs. If you gather Stars, they will remain collected and be replaced with faint outlines. (So you can still accomplish Star-related Bonus Objectives.)

Which brings us to our one exception... Bonus Objectives cycle through three predefined goals per stage endlessly, and you will be rewarded with 2, 3, or 4 Stars... and then the objective will go back to the first one for a chance at 2 more stars and so on and so forth. So... technically there IS a potential source for unlimited extra Stars other than the daily login bonuses. However, the earnings are so slight and the objectives so obtuse at times that I really can't recommend them all that strongly.

Some very important catches about Bonus Objectives, while we're at it... you can ONLY work on the currently-presented objective, you must complete the entire thing in one run. So if the goal is to perform 10 Slide Jumps, you have to start all over again starting from 0 if you don't perform them all in a single run.

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In general, you can expect the first place finish to be the most readily-achievable source of Stars. Exploring the stage for the more deviously-laid Stars is probably second in line, as long as you're thorough about it... and they didn't get TOO evil about it, which we'll have the chance to see. Bonus Objectives can tend to go either way, but since you will generally NEED at least three dedicated runs to finish them, it's probably best to focus on them as your biggest obstacle. (And you might just pick up a couple Stars extra when the objectives cycle back around... but best not to make much of that anyway.)

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Even if I already cleared it on the first pass through, I'll list the first objectives for posterity's sake.

Bonus Objective 1: Get at least bronze medal without dying.

Once you know the course layouts, this kind of objective shouldn't pose a problem at all... and the first course is simple enough that it ought not be that unreasonable even for a first-time run, as was the case here

Bonus Objective 2: Keep the silver opponent in your screen for the whole race.

These ones are... the WORST. You can't just race, and some course elements have a catch even sneakier than simply following along...

Bonus Objective 3: Finish the race without ever braking, walking or stopping (swinging on ropes is ok).

This one seems like it would be hard based on how it sounds... but if all you do is make sure you hold the movement analog stick as far as it will go while you're on the ground, you won't have to worry about any speeding violations.