Glitch to Skip Sectors
2 years ago
United States

Found this glitch awhile ago but didn't have footage until today, I believe it to be done by opening jump on the first frame after closing the enter sector pop up, which obviously the lag assists. I'm going to continue trying to recreate this in live runs, hope to get it consistent

Russia

Skip 2 sectors?

United States

Its done upon entry, so theoretically you could skip all the way from sector 1 to sector 8. In the video I entered sector 6, got some lag when opening the jump menu which opened the next sector screen and was able to immediately jump to sector 7

Edited by the author 2 years ago
Sweden

Here is another instance of a sector skip.

MrJollyWeeper likes this
United States

So figuring out a consistent way of generating lag seems to be the key. Anyone know a good way?

Washington, D.C., USA

what mods do you have installed during the filming of this? Do you think it can be done in vanilla? I'd be interested to see whether this gets permitted under beat the game AE default. Personally, I would hope to see it not allowed. I say this because although we definitely sometimes use a glitch to win, cheeky swipes as i know them to be called, it's not so severe in the outcome as this could be. And the skill check for cheeky swiping is an interesting one, as opposed to the timing aspect of this, though it certainly takes skill. However, that's the only speedrunning category I care to comment on as I'm not too familiar with the others. Really cool find though.

United States

the only mod when filming was the preigniter mod, so should definitely be possible on vanilla. If it gets consistent, I fully understand the desire to have main leaderboards without it as it is quite a major shakeup, but as opposed to an outright ban on it I think restricting it to its own category is a more tempered measure

Golddmane likes this
Sweden

I see no reason for sector skipping to be banned. What might happen is that we create a misc category called "Beat the game, no sector skip". For speedrunning in general, all types of glitches are allowed. Check games like Oblivion and Vice City for examples.

As for how to create lag, running something like video rendering or a graphics test in the background might do it. When comparing Zerglings and Weepers skip the timings differ a bit, so I doesn't look like a frame perfect thing to me.

Golddmane and MrJollyWeeper like this
Washington, D.C., USA

Yeah i guess theres no reason to ban it, as you would still need to find what you need to beat flagship. Only now, if someone finds a way to beat flagship in like 5 minutes, with a build that only takes a few minutes to accumulate, they could chain skip sectors all the way. That will completely shatter the wr. I was wrong to say that it should be banned. Maybe this will even incentivize new players to speedrun. Unfortunately, I'll be busy with exams for the next few weeks so I won't have much time to practice this, but I'm excited to see who can master this and break the record.

MrJollyWeeper likes this
Canada

My only issue is with what Thomas suggested - If this trick only works if your PC is lagging, and the only way to realistically achieve this you have to run some ridiculous processor intensive process in the background, then this seems really silly. Suddenly competitively running requires a complex setup that has nothing to do with the game. It also probably becomes hardware specific where particular PCs are better at setting this up than others and is in no way consistent.

If it's just a frame perfect trick that always works consistently then I have no issue with it (though I personally still prefer NMG runs). But going into hardware manipulation seems too far to me.

Oshimia and MrJollyWeeper like this
United States

I wholeheartedly agree that if sector skips end up just being performance based they should be restricted to a misc category, kind of like zips in elden ring. and requiring extra out of game processes to do them is certainly a grey area. hopefully we can find a way to execute them without lag or generate lag in game without extra processes

Sweden

Good points Uppercasserole, needing another program could invalidate the sector skip for normal runs. Something to have in mind until the skip is figured out.

MrJollyWeeper likes this
United States

I did a little testing with RivaTuner to lower the framerate to 5 FPS and got the sector skips very consistent, although was unable to chain them all the way to sector 8. Don't know if I messed up after performing a skip or if they can't actually be chained all the way, also did not figure out the exact timing, but I am closing in.

United States

...aaaaaand I'v pulled one off with no lag. Getting very close to figuring it out

Thomas likes this
United States

Captured inputs this time. Looks to be tied to only the exit beacon, either after choosing the next sector or somewhere in the jump animation.

United States

After further testing I can confirm it is upon closing the message when entering a sector, I can only guess the frame after, as I got a few without mashing it. I have been unable to do two back-to-back, so I believe it only works if you’ve jumped from an exit beacon, meaning only half the sectors can be skipped in a run

Valhalla

Still huge even if it's just half the sectors, but I bet there's some way to do all of them.

MrJollyWeeper likes this
United States

Yeah, at the very least no more zoltan sectors

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