By dudemcbro and cheekychunk

UPDATED: July 16, 2020

These notes are for the DREAMCAST PAL version. Some of the glitches here do not work on any other versions.

Credits:

Many of the glitches, along with photos and videos, were originally found here: http://web8.orcaserver.de/ecco/glitches/ However, the site is no longer up. I managed to save some of the files if needed. Also, the Facebook group "Ecco the Dolphin: Cavers of Hope" (@cavernsofhope) has folks that might have some of these files as well as folks who took over the old website (I believe).

If you have any questions, contact me through the speeddemosarchive.com or speedrun.com forums, username dudemcbro. I can also be found on Discord.

These notes are based on aileronnoir's walkthrough I randomly found somewhere on the net. However, this one utilizes glitches and other tricks not in that guide.

These notes also assume you have played the game and are relatively familiar with levels & the glitches. See cheekychunk's speedrun videos @ speedrun.com for examples of most of the glitches used. You can also see some other glitches not used by cheekychunk (yet) at my lame youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCyPgBivFRleK6qG_8mX45wg

Also, these are just notes and are not some peer reviewed article, so sorry for typos and possible confusion.

Level 1: Aquamarine Bay

Go talk to both whales. Collect vitalits to kill some time if you want, help with staying alive a bit longer later on. Position self by where the rocks will fall for the cutscene. Talk to the baby whale. Talk to dolphin dudes. Save baby whale. Talk to mommy whale. Follow mommy whale.

Level 2: Perils of the Coral Reef

Activate glitch to clip thru the level. (swim to jellyfish then 180 and hug right wall until at area) Go collect the Power of Sonar. Go to level exit from behind.

Level 3: Trial Without Error

Swim due northish, past first shark area. Line up near the bottom of left rock where the 2 rocks stick out and make a triangle-ish shape. Follow towards the bottom wall on the left till level doesn't load. Swim out of level. Turn to about 10 o'clock, swim forward. Exit level @ bright light.

Skip to Level 7: Up and Down

Push rock and grab sonar powerup. Blow up the rock with Guile's stolen sonic boom. Go thru the tunnel. Grab temp health powerup. Drop from top of volcano @ waterfall. Make turtle fall on stingray. Grab stealth power up. Swim to exit.

Level 8: Roaring Forces

Grab stealth and swim past eel. (boost and move around seems to work best) Hit two buttons marked by dolphins. Get morph ball Touch fish. Swim out of level.

Level 9: Atlantis Lost

Possible faster strat: Clip through level where the crystal is at blocked temple cave thing. Swim up and into the air (about 20 boosts), then swim back to the middle of the level and try and fall onto crystal on top of the main temple.
***I haven't got this to work yet. Seems to be an invisible wall blocking you landing directly on top crystal, but maybe there is a better angle to approach it at.

Normal strat: Collect Crystal @ 8 clock to the guardian (behind the building, in seaweed) collect crystal @ 10 to the guardian (in grass, shallows) collect crystal @ 11 to guardian (collect vigour, then break wall to temply place.) collect crystal @ almost 12ish (push the rock into the current, go get crystal) jump thru 4 hoops floating above buildings. visit 4 outer buildings and sonar the things inside. visit the main temple, sonar all the circles. go to 12ish to guardian, line up on the left side of rings, heading towards rightish, turbo then swim fast, grab 5th crystal, give to guardian.

Level 12: Shrine of Controversy

Swim down towards where you exploit clip glitch. Hit jellies on the way down till you are almost dead. Exploit glitch to OoB. Swim under level, then thru center column to temple and grab the harness. Die. (Pro tip: Barfing out sound as you swim towards the harness makes you lose air faster. You basically want to be as close to out of breath and dead by the time you get to harness so you can die rather quickly.) On continue, go to drill looking thing with light.

Level 13: Master of Forgotten Skills

Do it legit :( No known skips yet. Activate fan 1, 2, 3 Move pink, light orange, yellow, blue, dark orange

Level 14: Process That Never Ends

Fast Strat:

1. Swim to the end of the conveyor belt.
2. When the engineer dolphin swims by on the right side, talk to him.
3. Immediately swim towards the exit of the conveyor belt and talk to the other dolphin, but do not close the text.
4. When the cutscene triggers, close the text.
5. While the cutscene does its thing swim Ecco into the rock grinders and die.
6. At the glitched 'Continue' screen, wait about 10 seconds or so, then continue. When you continue, the level does not load properly for a few seconds, in which you can quickly dash OoB.
7. Swim forward and down till find the lower area.
8. Swim to exit.

Slow Strat:

1. Go talk to the engineer dolphin outside glass towards the end of the conveyor belt.
2. Swim all the way back to talk to the two swimming dolphins and then go to the rock cart.
3. When the dolphins and you start moving the cart, do the OoB trick.
4. Swim down and forward to bottom of level.
5. Swim to exit.

Level 15: Blades in Motion

Exploit Glitch under the column on right. Swim to the bottom of big fan area. Follow da yellow area Swim to exit.

Level 16: Perpetual Fluidity

Refer to map for map point #s. Haven't found a glitch to speed this level up yet. You start at (1), get the sonar power up at (2), and use it to clear the passage ahead of you of the sharp red things. Swim along the passage to (3). Here you encounter a room full of mines, they will explode if you pass through one of the red beams of light, swim past them to (4). Hit the switch to open the door and swim to (5), then to (6). Hit the switch and swim to (7). Don't hit the switch in this room yet, swim into the passage below the one you entered from to reach (8), hit the switch at (8) and swim back to (7). Hit the switch at (7) now and swim through the passage to (9). Hit the switch to open the door, swim to (10) hit the switch, swim back to (9) and hit the switch again. Swim to (7), due to all the switches you have been hitting raising the water level there is now a white tunnel near the surface that is now accessible, swim through it to (6), use the low down tunnel to swim to (5), swim to (8), swim through to (11). At (11) hit the switch and use the power of sonar to clear the half blocked pipe, swim through the passage towards (12) to exit the level.

Level 17: Obscure Ways to Terminus

Take the farthest left tunnel. After U pipe, stop, don't let current take you to the next pipe. Jump over the divider. Continue to do this till you get to last bay. Take the farthest right pipe. Take pipe to end.

Level 18: Sleeping Forces of Doom

Just focus on knocking crystals out of tentacles as fast as possible till boss dies.

Level 19: Twisted Realities

Cutscene

Level 20: Anguish of Dearth

Exploit glitch by big boulder go back to the big boulder and follow to skip

Level 21: Entrapment

Skipped

Level 22: Caverns of Hope

Swim to the first area where there is a current pushing you. As you get close to the dolphin tossing rocks, wedge yourself into the crevice on the right. Once lodged, rapidly swim, dash, and turn controller in all sorts of directions. Eventually, you will be kicked OoB. You can do this a bit more consistently, it seems, by doing a reverse thrust followed by a dash, and repeating till you get OoB. Then swim to the level exit, about 8ish o'clock. It is a long swim.

Level 23: Lair of Evil:

Make right at the first fork. At room with 2 dolphins, go thru the door left of the green icon door. (i think) Go to the room with the dolphin that spots you. Have him open the door for you. Get to the printing room Get clam to tattoo you. Return to the rude dolphin room. Go left and follow the tunnel. In room with 2 dolphins, go to the green icon door. In room with big tower thing, Clip thru a gap in one of crystal blocked tubes. Follow to end.

Level 24: Powers of Levitation

1. Turn on all 3 fans.
2. In the outer circular hallway with the organ, go thru the tunnel between organ and air dispenser. Down the tunnel is another tunnel leading to the shark.
3. Talk to mean dolphin and follow. Don't get to close or too far away.
4. Talk to the nice dolphin.
5. Go to the main facility and talk to mean(nice) dolphin again.
6. Go activate all switches
7. Talk to whales.
8. Find the engineer dolphin swimming outside.
9. Go to organ, put face in it, and barf out sound.
10. Profit

level 25: Hanging Waters

1. Begin by jumping over barriers. After the 2nd barrier, the current will take you along, just jump the barriers as needed.
2. In the first area, jump in a bubble and stay in it as it flows toward the tunnel.
3. Follow the tunnel to the next area. Here, get to the tunnel by jumping into new bubbles and bouncing off others. You can skip most of the bubble jumps by aiming correctly at the gate to hit one of the bubbles in the air. Aim for about 10 o'clock in circle gate, a little more than halfway out. PRO TIP: you can adjust height of bounce by tilting back slightly on the joystick.
4. Once in the next tunnel, take the right fork. Just before the gate, jump out of the tunnel directly to right. If done correctly, you will fall to your death, but pass a checkpoint on way to death. Will respawn at that checkpoint.
5. Activate the switch, then take rightmost of the 3 tunnels.
6. Once you reach the pool area, go to fallen rock in the tunnel. At the top, to the left of one of the smaller rocks is a crack you can glitch through. This allows you to skip ICE & FIRE (level 26)
7. Go to where you can jump into a water tunnel.
8. Follow it to where 3 tunnels are.
9. Get to the middle tunnel. Take it past the barrier and jump to the right tunnel. Go past barriers and take the middle tunnel. Go past the barrier and take left, then right, then right, then left twice quickly. End up at squid.
10. Glitch cutscene to swim thru air here then swim towards Mutaclone exit.
11. Fall out near the bubble near Mutaclone exit.
12. Jump from bubble to Mutalcone exit area.
13. At the next pool area, use the clipped water right of the waterfall coming from above.
14. Swim to the top and enter the next level via Mutaclone.

Level 26: Ice and Fire

Skipped

Level 27: Abyss of Inferno

Skipped

Level 28: Mutaclone

1. Break all yellow stones.
2. Lure enemy dolphin into yellow gas.
3. Attack. Profit.

Level 29: Invasion

Cutscene

Level 30: Chance of Reckoning

1. Block three vortexes with rocks.
2. Grab the sonar power up. Attack the 2 eyes and the third eye on the back of the head.
3. Go to where the rock fell.
4. Exit level. Level 31: Hatchery

---

Forced Entry Skip

1. Swim to egg dropper.
2. Position yourself underneath it.
3. Turn 160ish degrees to the right. You should be facing about 10 o'clock, with 12 being where you started the level.
4. Reverse until you are squeezed tight under the egg dropper. (Don't reverse too much, or you run the risk of getting stuck in the floor).
5. When egg dropper opens, dash-swim straight up. If done correctly, you will pop inside the egg dropper. If the trick doesn't automatically push you into the exit, swim to it.

Level 32: Seeds of Poison

1. Grab sonar power up.
2. Swim up and blast open door.
3. Swim down (try not to let bad guy attack you)
4. Top up on health and air if needed. Repeat till you get to top and exit level.

Level 33: Transfiguration

1. Go to the cave with sonar power up. Kill all the bats.
2. Get sonar power up again and swim out of the cave and down and break open rock. There is another sonar here.
3. Get sonar power up again and go to the other place with bat and kill it and blast open rocks.
4. Grab morph item. There are 2 strats here. Strat 1: Fastest IF you don't get hit while transformed.
5. Go touch fish.
6. Swim towards the top where the red part of the main Foe column is. Exit level.

Strat 2: Slower, but safer.

1. Go touch fish
2. Quickly swim to the other side of the column where you can't be shot by baddies.
3. Find a gap on the bottom of the level.
4. OoB and swim up to level exit.

Level 34: Heart of the Foe

1. Get under the device that shoots out jellies. Sonar jellies into the heart. Dash into the heart.
2. Repeat till boss be dead.
3. Profit.