Underground Bunker

The Underground Bunker is a cave in Pikmin 5: Apex Predator. It is the only cave in Olimar, and the first cave in the game.

Sublevel 1

The map layout is a massive donut with a gaping hole from the ceiling. No treasure is present. Upon landing with your squad, your walkie talkie will go off and Rhea, a fellow member of your rescue team, will give you a description of the bunker taken from Olimar. The people are in the center of the donut on the second sublevel, with stairs right next to where you landed. The character looks where the stairs should be and sees a wall. Unfortunately, the earthquake shook a portion of the roof down creating a wall between you and the stairs, forcing you to take the long way around. Upon explaining the situation to Rhea, she tells you to be careful for other falling objects and that the ceiling hole creates potential for creatures to have snuck in the bunker. Rhea wishes you good luck, the walkie talkie shuts off, and the cutscene ends.

The first obstacle the player will encounter is three dwarf bulborbs. Kill them and advance. A quarter of the way around the donut, a dwarf bulborb falls from the sky. This is the final warning to consider being careful about the falling debris. After killing the dwarf bulborb, continue walking and there will be a trail of dwarves to kill. Once the player is halfway around the donut, a shadow will appear over head if you walk over a certain area. This is a falling rock! Quickly move your Pikmin out of the shadow and none of them should get hurt. Continue down the donut and the ground is split into two rows of tiles. One will have a dwarf bulborb. If the player steps on the empty tile, a rock shadow appears overhead. This will continue with the same pattern until three quarters of the way into the donut. The last quarter will have dwarves and falling rocks on both tiles, culminating in a breakable wall.

In a second cutscene Rhea curses the rescue crew's luck as now the stairs are blocked on both sides. Olimar pipes in on the walkie talkie and tells the player to try tearing down the weaker wall with Pikmin.

After the cutscene, direct all Pikmin to the breakable wall and wait a few seconds for the Pikmin to tear it down. Upon tearing the wall down, the player sees that the stairs have collapsed into a hole and the player is given the option to hop down the hole into the final sublevel. Choose yes and hop down to the final sublevel.

Sublevel 2

The map is again a massive donut with a wall blocking the player into only going forward. No treasure is present. Upon landing, another cutscene begins.

The citizens are in the hole of the donut, but the door is directly behind the fallen wall, forcing the player to walk all the way around again. They are screaming as a bulborb is chomping on the door, attempting to get inside. They call for your help and Rhea tells you to hurry to save them. The cutscene ends.

On this sublevel, there are Fiery Dweevils and Dwarf Bulborbs. Kill the dwarves to prevent them from eating your Pikmin and fight or ignore the Dweevils at your own choice. What escalates the difficulty are the Bumbling Snitchbugs present once the player has gotten a quarter of the way around the donut. If a Bumbling Snitchbug catches the player, the Pikmin will disband, making them vulnerable for dwarf bulborbs! Isolate these Snitchbugs and kill them, then continue the same method the rest of the way around the donut. The "boss" of the underground bunker is the adult Bulborb and two Bumbling Snitchbugs. Slowly approach one Bumbling Snitchbug until it lunges at you, making sure not to trigger the other Snutchbug or the Bulborb. Throw Pikmin at it when it finishes its lunge, far away from the other two enemies, and swarm it once it falls from the weight of the Pikmin. Repeat with the other Bumbling Snitchug. Finally, bum-rush the Bulborb. Unfortunately, it will not fall asleep here so casualties will be likely.

After killing the Bulborb, the final cutscene begins, with everyone inside the bunker calling you their hero and the rescue crew creating a set of stairs to leave the Underground Bunker, and you're done!