Lava

Verified against the spelunky.ai port v0.1.10 on 27 October 2026.

Lava fills pools in the Temple and the depths of Olmec's Lair. It's a liquid, the kind of water that burns: the player dies the moment his feet touch it, and so does a monster. Some of its surface spurts flames, and blobs of magma that become Magma Men. On a dark level it lights the dark around it.

Lava is a kind of water to the code: it fills a space and flows into any opening when the blocks holding it are destroyed, as water does ^[4]. The difference is what it does to whatever enters it. The clip shows the player walking off a floor into a pool: he dies as his feet touch it.

Spurts. When a level is made, each block of lava with nothing above it has a 1 in 4 chance of spurting ^[5]. A spurting block waits 100–300 steps (picked when it's made), then throws a flame up, or with a 1 in 8 chance a blob of magma, which turns into a Magma Man where it lands; it only counts down while the player is within 240 pixels ^{[6] [7]}.

Flowing. Lava that flows away from its place is destroyed there, leaving three drips and, 1 in 6, a falling flame ^[8]. The second clip shows a bomb opening a Temple pool's wall: the lava flows out and away beside the player, who isn't hurt.

A death in lava is counted in the end-of-game statistics' lava row ^[15]. A monster lava kills doesn't count as the player's kill ^[16]. The monsters' check is in the code most monsters share, so those whose own step event replaces it, such as the Bat and the Magma Man, aren't hurt by it. A smash trap that slides into lava sinks and is destroyed too (Smash Trap).

• The Temple, in its room templates' pools: each water tile of a Temple room is lava, and some pool edges are lava or a block, 1 in 2 each ^{[17] [18]}.
• Olmec's Lair, whose room is built over a sea of lava ^[19].
• The ending and the Sun challenge room, a bonus room ^{[20] [21]}.
• Custom levels, as the level editor's tile l ^[22].

Those rooms also have solid blocks drawn as lava, which are only walls ^[23].

• Lava kills on touch, whatever the player's hearts, so there's no crossing it: only over it, on a rope, a ladder or a jump.
• Mind the spurts. A blob of magma thrown up by a spurt hurts the player, and becomes a Magma Man where it lands (Magma Man).
• Letting it out. A bomb that breaks a pool's wall lets it flow away, as in the second clip, which can open the way across, or flood the floor below.

• Ropes dropped into lava burn up from the bottom, segment by segment ^[24].
• Light. Lava counts as a light source on a dark level ^[25].
• Generation keeps traps off lava: a Spear Trap isn't built where it would block a passage of lava, nor one on a block with lava on it ^[26].