Sinking Island

Sinking Island refers to two variants of a sub-world that involves quickly scaling an island as lava rises around it, found in Seaside Kingdom and Dark Side. The Seaside Kingdom version is accessed via a door below the Hot Spring Island and consists of using an Uproot to scale the island and collect two Power Moons, while the Dark Side version, accessed via a Moon Pipe, involves climbing it using Yoshi while collecting fruit.

Sinking Island
Internal name	SenobiTowerExStage SenobiTowerYoshiExStage
Moon Rock level?	No
Collectibles
Power Moons	2
Regional coins	None
Trivia
Music	Another World

Trivia

• It's possible to scale the island and reach the top without the use of any captures. In the Seaside Kingdom version, this allows both moons to be collected.
• Since getting burned by lava refreshes Mario's cap bounce, it's possible to explore many of the islands in the background of the level instead of entering the trigger area that causes the lava to begin rising. Most of these islands actually have collision, allowing the player to stand on top. However, the player cannot jump off the edge of the level due to an invisible wall. In clockwise order:
  • The two nearby islands to the right of the starting area can be reached in one-player mode by bringing a Life-Up Heart from outside the level.
  • The two islands located behind the camera when entering the level are beyond the invisible wall surrounding the level and cannot be reached.
  • The short island off to the left from the starting area can be reached using a Life-Up Heart, but it requires the use of two-player mode. This is because in one-player mode, Mario has no way of throwing Cappy after getting burned, meaning he must extend Cappy before the burn and stall near him in order to get a bounce, which is inefficient for distance.
  • The taller island off to the left from the starting area has no collision.
  • The island in the back-left of the level can be reached, but only with the aid of a Peach amiibo. The Peach amiibo can be used as many times as desired, even while Mario is currently bouncing on lava, allowing the player to reach and stand on a small lip at the bottom of the island. From there, the player can jump into the lava and use that to scurry up the side of the island, then cap bounce, wall jump off the island, and dive onto the lower part of the top area.
  • There is no known way to reach the top of the tallest island, found in the back-right of the level, without making the lava rise. It can only be reached briefly using the rising lava, before it is engulfed.
• If the player ventures far enough toward the edge of the level in certain directions, all the islands will visually disappear, since the area object that allows the islands to be rendered does not extend all the way to the edge of the level in every direction.
• It's theorized that it may be possible to reach the top of the level without entering the trigger area and making the lava rise, by lava bouncing over to the bottom of the tallest part of the level and performing a series of precise wall jumps up to the top.