I played this long before it had badges. The mechanical updates are surprising and welcome. Like not looting until AFTER battle. Excellent game. I don't recall the black orbs, what do they do? I'll probably find out soon enough...
It's not a difficult badge. If it were merely difficult, I would've gotten it much sooner. I got impossible from Canada, then hard from Mexico. It's a good spot because it'll infect Peru early.
the game has unfair collision detection and slippery controls. It's only problematic on the last level though, which was not fun at all. I wonder why devs even bother with games like this...