I felt as thou I should share this information. But that Relic Eye thing brad had in the quick look on top of spotting gems will also beep if you are close to a secret door which leads to the black market (and possibly other places I guess).

You can buy a lot of different stuff there, I even bought a new character (who ended up shooting me with a freeze gun he stole :(

But if you ever see that thing start beeping that is why. Oh and It beeps faster the closer you get

I've only played the PC version so I don't know if it's any different on the 360 butI should also point out that once you go there no shops will ever appear in future stages until your next game (that is, when you die) so if you pass up on an item chances are that you'll never get it again (unless you're lucky enough to find it in a crate.)

It's possible to steal from it though it's extremely risky since it aggros all the shopkeepers but it's rewarding.

It's also the first step to getting into the secret stages..

(spoilers, I guess)

Buy (or steal) the Ankh from the Black Market (which resurrects you) and then die in front of a Big Blue Moai statue in the Ice Caves (3-2 or 3-3). When revived, you will be inside the Moai. This seems to give you a hat. Then kill an Anubis in 4-1 or 4-2 while wearing the Hat. This gives you a scepter.... The scepter serves as a key for the door to the City of Gold (and you can consider me Coronado because I will not be getting that far)

Anyway if interested, go here for more detailed descriptions, (someone helpfully linked a similar page in the pro tips thread) Xbla fans

Awesome, thanks for that info. It started beeping and I figured I was close to something but then I was killed. Haven't had it beep since.

What I loved about this game was you're totally encouraged to figure these things out from scratch. The net's your friend if you wind up getting a bit frustrated (I went to it when I wasn't sure if I'd found everything for the free-PC version), but it's super rewarding just to explore as much as you can and experiment, since a good portion of the time that curiosity will be rewarded. Derek Yu is a clever guy.

@eroticfishcake said:

I've only played the PC version so I don't know if it's any different on the 360 butI should also point out that once you go there no shops will ever appear in future stages until your next game (that is, when you die) so if you pass up on an item chances are that you'll never get it again (unless you're lucky enough to find it in a crate.)

It's possible to steal from it though it's extremely risky since it aggros all the shopkeepers but it's rewarding.

I'm not sure if this has changed, or if it's because I popped the Ankh, but I found a shop in the Caves after going through the Black Market in a playthrough this evening.