I don't actually know the cheat code, but I manage to get 13 hearts left pretty regularly. One key is to take the risk and die (often) rather than take a heart and accept a lower score. The really tough bottleneck is this one point where you are just one diamond short of leveling and you almost always at this point need to get lucky multiple times to get the Gnome.
General strategy is that you have to be aggressive in exploring the map while conserving health, which often means taking a risk rather than playing it safe. If you can figure out places where all neighbors are definitely non-zero, that's good. It means the Gnome can't escape to there. So try to explore in other directions, and don't take the health hit.
IsaacKuo
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A member registered Mar 17, 2015
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It's not a badge, but a fun bonus challenge is to sweep the board with 13 health points left. If that's too difficult, start off with trying to sweep the board with 10 health points left.
Either way, the key is to try to get all the gold treasures and hopefully the gnome before using a heart. This makes the game more exciting because there's is a big pressure to try and maximize exploration and take risks, rather than take a heart before getting all the treasure (10 hearts) and the gnome (13 hearts).
I'm not 100% sure, but I think you can have only one 9 near a corner, because Romeo and Juliet always mirror each other's positions horizontally. I only noticed that like last week, after a VERY long time just thinking they were on the same row.
So I think the max would be a total of 67.
That's 8+8+8, 7+7, 9+11+9, either middle of 3rd row or 3rd from bottom row.
Or near a corner, 10+11+7, 9+7, 8+8+7. Either way, total of 67.
The best I've gotten is 13 hearts left. I think this may be the highest possible. In order to do it you have to get ALL the gold treasure chests and the gnome (and the Dragon Egg) before using a single heart. It's not so easy, but I once got super lucky and I was in the groove, and managed to finish with 13 hearts left in only 36 seconds. Usually I take a LOT longer with a lot of really awkward mental logic and still taking some risks.
The main "trick" to getting 13 is just knowing it's possible in the first place. For the longest time I thought maybe 10 was the best possible, and I only rarely got it. I would sometimes get 8, sometimes even 9, but 10 was very rare. My mind was blown the first time I got 13. But since then, I've gotten 13 sometimes simply because I knew it was possible.