Introduction I've been speedrunning this game for a little bit now and I've been exploring and done some researching for new, albeit small time saves. All of these are done on PC.

I've simply posted all videos from Skips & Tricks playlist individually and then copy-pasted my description from the videos underneath the corresponding video. This is merely for easy access.

At the bottom you can find 2 playlist, the first being useful Skips & Tricks and the second simply Bugs & Glitches that aren't really useful as of now, but I'll include it just in case it can be useful in the future.

Any Questions? Let me know if you have anything to add or questions about anything and I'll gladly help! ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Individual Videos I'll post the videos from the Skips & Tricks indivudually and talk a little about each one of them.

Must use: Heavy Machine Gun or Anti-Armor Pistol

While on top of the elevator you can actually exit a few seconds earlier than intended. However if you miss to go out you will get stuck up top.

Must use: Heavy Machine Gun or Anti-Armor Pistol

Not sure if this actually saves any time as I think you still have to wait on Burns anyway before the gates open.

Must use: Heavy Machine Gun or Anti-Armor Pistol

I've found out that you can actually keep staying on top of the ledge instead of dropping down and then go the the checkpoint.

You can keep sliding all the way to the checkpoint and saving a few seconds. You need to fall on the middle of the ledge when you first drop down otherwise you can't go around it, or atleast not as consistent for me.

You will face an invisible wall on the way so simply go to the left and around it.

For some reason the elevator opened up even before the dialogue was over and objective pops up, which normally would happen. I was already inside before they were done talking which shouldn't happen. No idea why this happened but it does save a few seconds.

Must use: Heavy Machine Gun or Anti-Armor Pistol

I suggest that you dodge right after you clip outside the cart. This is because otherwise you might get pushed down and fall below.

Instead of normally boosting, use Drift Boosting. However this can be risky as it's very easy to fall down but it is much faster. Also use Boost Dodging to get even faster. Not the most optimal but decent enough.

Keep in mind to not press "E" to cover against the last wall too early. If you do it, sometimes you will cover in the middle of it where there are no floor which will make you fall down. Therefore I advice to be rather close before initiating to cover.

Must use: Heavy Machine Gun or Anti-Armor Pistol

I suggest that you dodge right after you clip outside the cart. This is because otherwise you might get pushed down and fall below.

Instead of normally boosting, use Drift Boosting. However this can be risky as it's very easy to fall down but it is much faster. Also use Boost Dodging to get even faster. Not the most optimal but decent enough.

In addition to my other "Improved Clipping Skip" video I've also added Melee Dashing. It is even more risky to use since using Melee Dashing makes you not exactly travel in a straight line and you will risk falling down if you make a mistake.

Keep in mind to not press "E" to cover against the last wall too early. If you do it, sometimes you will cover in the middle of it where there are no floor which will make you fall down. Therefore I advice to be rather close before initiating to cover.

I didn't get a Drift Boost at the end before the terminal, but you can obviously do one there too, I just happen to missed it.

Must use: Heavy Machine Gun or Anti-Armor Pistol

If you can get it really fast it should save a few seconds since you can get off the elevator earlier than intended.

Must use: Heavy Machine Gun or Anti-Armor Pistol

If you get off earlier you may save a few seconds. Still not sure.

It seems that if you keep your distance the Sphere enemies they will simply just explode on their own. Not sure if this is supposed to happen or not but seems to be useful to skip having to actually shoot them and waste ammo and also a few seconds. ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Playlists

Skips & Tricks Here is a playlist with all the above listed videos. All of these seems to save time or atleast potentionally be useful. • https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLIu4Xm07NlVvha_QnTDvn8IpEdvBSdnOI

Bugs & Glitches This, atleast for now, is just a playlist of various bugs and glitches that I've found. None resulting in anything useful but might be worth documenting for future purposes. • https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLIu4Xm07NlVsiENW2UONBEuHIStbdRd3Y

Possible Improvements Here is my document where I compare my run to another 1:30:41 run I found on Youtube that is fairly well executed. The purpose is to see where I can still earn big time saves. • https://www.evernote.com/shard/s675/sh/c3b99854-713b-4bf7-ae94-220b167d4357/fbdee3947f7dcc222a79781f82aa97cf

Hey, nice to see some activity on this board. Good job on finding these various optimizations and good luck with the rest.

I'd use sniper rifle for movement more, it's significantly faster, 18%. Lock-on/AR melee cancel is about as fast as drift boost so it saves boost gauge more than anything. Old movement speed chart tested on X360 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ykJpR9_O6FCiJIblkBJHS8O9xgScenMWKvrZEN2HGps/edit#gid=0 Old hard no-dlc & various notes https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LxKmj6EpHFlpJVbTqlprPMsjlL1iSEznbmyxH6sEnYg/edit

You might want to watch dosu penguin's god hard run on nicovideo: http://www.nicovideo.jp/mylist/56005925 They had the most current routes and glitch implementation in general for the original version since casual routes were pretty old by that point. Latest run had some capture problem midway through but his older runs are also archived.

Some god-hard ILs (not all are optimized) https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLixUgqix_ieR0c5Y5f3NfFSUj3zU9cXGl Various glitches and small things https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLixUgqix_ieSHu-tO25qPY9T0ooEonGs_

Unless PC is different you can do most timestop clips with any weapon barring disk/rocket launcher, the somersault melee more displaces sam's hitbox instead of moving his 'position' upwards. If you somersault on the 2-6 elevator you can trigger the cutscene earlier than intended even with a minimap timestop.

If someone found a way to clip through the 3-4 monorail that would be a massive timesave (the one inside kreon is already a 2min save). Wall of the monorail is huge but maybe there's some way through.

LFE gun causes damage per frame so you can deal big damage on targets that have no i-frames if you use time-stop or even slow-mo (main use right now is 2-3 argus first form on dosu penguin route). Very few enemies are susceptible to this. However the implementation of this weapon on PC port looks messed up, the visual sphere should be way larger. LFE is an excellent weapon on hard and still useful on GH even if it no longer one-shots gorgies. In general on higher difficulties every non-dlc weapon is worth using at parts of the run as all of them have particular strengths. Though lock-on/LFE/disc launcher are designed for console ver in that they dont need much aiming while being mobile. With mouse aim they should be less useful though still handy to use mid-boost. With DLC and having access to upgrades the AA pistol is extremely powerful and multi purpose so it takes up the roles of some others.

You can fire a rocket launcher and boost kick Bogeys into the explosion for high DPS (1-8,5-3). There's a lot of specific tricks like this. For combat in general keep in mind slow-mo drastically slows down your own fire rate, just to a lesser extent than the enemy. If possible keep slow-mo to a minimum to save real & game-time.

Before I stopped doing runs my sum of best on X360 hard no-dlc was 1:38. Not sure how much time the PC loading times save. Hard can probably be pushed below 1:35 and GH to sub 1:50.

I don't have that much knowledge about the in-depths of this game like you do, so it's really great to see someone actually put an effort into the finer details of the game. I'm probably going to take a break from this game though. I'm simply dropping all information I know before I move on to the next game. Hopefully my information can prove to be of use to someone out there.

Just a a quick pointer

• In your document you mention that on "5-1 Crystal Viper" there is a crate to the left that has a 100% droprate of EMP Grenades. This is false. I've gotten, although only once, a different drop. That drop being the "Boost Machine Gun". If you want I can upload a video of it if you would want to see it actually happening.

I want to add that the Time-stop glitch becomes harder to on higher fps. Higher fps also glitches the damage enemies do, it's really strange because it feels it's random and sometimes enemies 1-shot you to red.

In 3-7 there's another Elevator clip that can project you upwards and saves a lot of time because you don't need to travel your way around in a sort of tunnel. I could get this clip once and I tried a lot to repeat it to record it but I wasn't able to reproduce it.

In the boggie fight on casual difficulty with the anti-armor pistol is relatively easy to quick kill it. The rocket launches seems to be a good alternative if you get to that point without pistol ammo.

Could you specify exactly where this clipping is supposed to be done at? I'm not following you when you say "sort of tunnel".

Give me some suggestions I'm up to try finding some additional skips. If you have any ideas or suggestions feel free to let me know and I'll see what I can find. I'll post as I find more stuff.

Just proof to show that this actually has a chance to also drop "Boost Machine Gun".

The key is to get as fast as possible to the rocks so you can get yourself in between the 2 rocks. From there perform just do a melee attack with Assault Rifle, I'm sure other works too. It's really simple and consistent.

If you get this you could probably kill all enemies before the rocks even move out of the way. Not sure if it saves too much times since you might still have to wait for Burns to get all the way up?

Boost machinegun dropping there looks like a port inconsistency, that sucks since having guaranteed EMP for 5-2 is a big deal.

On PS3 version there is a clip through the fence on 3-3 (specific timing when the ground splits apart?). Saves ~60s I was never able to reproduce this on 360 and vnichiro could also only do it 1/3 of the time. One of very few differences between 360/PS3 but I might have been doing it wrong.

I guess on 3-7 elevator you mean outside the kreon before you get that walking segment? I tried to skip the unknown room for a long time on the next elevator but there are very thoroughly placed invisible walls around the final elevator.

Sam's head and core on the back are a weakpoint and you can get damaged by multiple attacks on the same frame so it's sometimes possible to instantly die to gorgie fire on console as well.

Shotgun headshots might kill bogey faster than AA pistol but it's prob not worth picking up.

Rocket launcher should speed up fights regardless since you can use it for the last hit etc. You're usually going to have one fluid weapon slot switching based on situation anyway (eg. sniper for movement, rocket as heavy weapon). Keeping AA pistol + AR + Laser on you is pretty redundant, that's 3 long range pinpoint weapons.

If you can get it fast enough you could probably save a few seconds, however there is a risk you might fall out of the lift and have to restart checkpoint.

Yeah! This is where I meant @Nordanix but instead of clipping that way, you are propelled to the top of the area saving having to do the whole path in the tunnel. I got it only once.

I tried to clip up to the to like you mentioned, but only managed to clip underneath the top of the area floor. I might give it a couple more tries later. Any details on how you got it would be useful.

For the elevator from 3-2 to 3-3, you can make Burns arrive faster by rushing to the elevator, going back a little then go back to the elevator like in this:

I've been trying to do the 3-3 skip, but I'm not sure if it's possible in the PC version. That sucks cause it's a pretty big skip, and one of the few timed cutscene that's left.

Also, do you guys have an idea why the guy lowering the bridge in the 3-2 part is sometimes getting stuck in the ship? It makes a considerable loss of time for no reason. (talking about this part

I think it's just the AI being the idiots they are, unfortunately nothing to do about it. You sure it loses time though? I mean the bridge will get lowered regardless of them leaving the ship or not so.

I'm pretty sure yeah. The AI will get stuck for a good 20 to 30 seconds, but if they aren't, they will lower the bridge just a mere 5 seconds later. It's happening like 80% of the time in my runs, it's a bit annoying.

I wouldn't know as this unfortunately happens in all of my attempts.

The only thing, except AI RNG that is, would be when you kill the last enemy. The ship keeps circling above until all enemies are dead. Depending on how fast or slow your fight is, the ship will be at different positions in above before when it heads back where it will land. This is the only thing I can think off that might affect, but I doubt it.

Hopefully you figure something out, otherwise you'll just have to hope it doesn't happen.

I'm still a bit new to that, But can you share to explain about the start Skip for 3-6? trying to figuring out how to make it easy, only manage to get it 3 times in the same hour, but it was luck i'm guessing.

There's honestly not much to it. You simply shoot before doing a Melee Attack with certain weapons, I recommend Assault Rifle/Anti-Armor Pistol as these tend to be more consistent for me.

I don't know what else I can say other than that, it's honestly nothing complex. All you need to do is the same as in the videos. Try experiment with your angles as well. I might not be to much of help as I've never really had to think much of it, it shouldn't be that inconsistent as to only get it 3 times per hour.

It might differ depending if you play on PC or Consoles as well if 60fps or 120/144fps.

I just figure it out the exploit for that. its not as hard after all.

All it takes is that moment where everything suddenly makes sense. Keep up the good work and if you need more help don't hesitate to ask!

Cap your fps to 60 at least, or it will be way harder.

I haven't played on 60fps so I can't say if it's way harder or not. However I've always played uncapped with 144hz and had no troubles getting the clips. I'd say use whatever works for you.