Dawdler

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A Dawdler, referred to as Duopede internally, is a simple enemy in Sackboy: A Big Adventure that follows a path and deals damage to the player on contact. They take the form of walking red cubes with big eyes, a green highlight on their tops, and a protective metal casing that covers their left, right and bottom sides. They also have jagged metal teeth on their faces and spinning blades on their sides. A variant of this enemy appears in Jumping To Conclusions and High And Mighty, which has no legs and features wings in place of the rotating blades, but otherwise behaves identically to the normal version.

Dawdlers are one of the few enemies in Sackboy: A Big Adventure that are explicitly named in-game; in This Way Up's bonus room, Gerald Strudleguff says that the whole place is "crawling with Dawdlers" before remarking that he won't let them trap him again, refering to the one that's caged next to him.

Behaviour

Dawdlers are rarely seen alone; they usually come in packs of at least two or three individuals, travelling in a centipede-like formation. They do not explicitly target or hunt the player, but rather follow a predetermined path. They deal touch damage to any player or enemy that gets in its way, or touches its left/right sides. They will also push any physics objects in their way. Because they are normally bound to the paths they are set to follow, they do not adhere to gravity like other enemies, and can often be found walking on walls, running in place on conveyor belts or rolling cylinders, and even flying through the air with wings.

A Dawdler is vulnerable from its top and back sides, so the player can defeat one by jumping on it, or hitting its back with a slap or spin (rolling into its back also works, but only if the player is not attached to a wall or ceiling). Alternatively, it can be picked up and thrown, being destroyed as soon as it collides with something. It will also be destroyed if the player throws something directly at it. Whichever method is used, it will usually award 20 points on death, except in situations where they infinitely respawn, such as in High And Mighty. In such cases, only the first instance of a Dawdler will award points on death; any future instances after that will not award points.

In rhythm levels like Beat The Heat, Dawdlers will occasionally stop in place and dance in time with the music.

List of Levels with Dawdlers

• Sticking With It
• Slippery Slope
• Beat The Heat
• Water Predicament
• This Side Up
• Flash Forward
• Jumping To Conclusions
• Vexpiration Date
• High And Mighty
• Trial 2: Jump The Queue
• Trial 16: The Ripsnorter

In Ultimate Sackboy

Dawdlers return in Ultimate Sackboy as one of the basic obstacles that can spawn on the track, and behave differently to their SABA counterparts. When spawned, a Dawdler stays idle until the player gets close enough, at which point it begins slowly walking forward. It awards three Rare bubbles on defeat, and can be destroyed by landing on it, sliding into it, or running into it with a Shield. If the player is unprotected and either runs straight into a Dawdler or switches into its lane when parallel with its spikes, the player dies.