Most of these I got from other runs, some I found myself. Almost every one of them is in my latest run. Not all of these are guaranteed to be the fastest, but as far as I'm aware they are. Or at least most of them. Also, most of these aren't exclusive to HARD. It's just my main difficulty, but if you play on EASY, I'm sure some of these will also be helpful to you. There are also no skips exclusive to either PS1 or PC, the games are the same except for the loading screens and compressed assets on the PS1 and some other minor differences that won't affect anything you see here.
Level 1: Canyon of Death
On this screen, you can just run forward to avoid the specter hug. They're not lethal, but you should avoid as much of them as you can to save time.
On the next screen, enemies won't spawn immediately, unless you run to the middle of it (and back)
While shooting specters, stay at about 10 pixels or fewer from the left edge, and specters from behind won't be able to attack you. Not having to turn around to shoot them saves time (and is infinitely safer).
This entire section should be beaten about like that:
On the first screen, enemies run out at about 0:55 into the run, on the second at about 1:33 into the run (on the PS1 release). Usually earlier.
Not killing the enemies to our left can lead to unpredictable consequences. In this example, not a single goat spawned:
I don't exactly know how this despawning of enemies functions, so for now, it is essentially random. This works on both the PS1 and PC releases, just like any other trick in the guide. And don't worry, that's not the last time it will be used!
On the screen with the goats, if you get to the ladder and one of them touches you, you become invincible until the end of the level:
This is faster, but you'll miss out on any specters respawning since about 70% of the time you won't get it first try and everything restarts once you die. Also, it's a little hard.
You can double jump on the canyon:
(excuse the Silent Hill music in the background)
Now, the climbing section might look a little confusing at first, which is why I included my inputs alongside the footage:
As long as you hold your jump key, Andy will grab the wall automatically. In the PS1 version, the bone on the last screen will fall a little faster.
Level 2: Swamplands
This is where it gets a little tricky. Watch how I beat the first few screens.
You can jump (but better use double jump for safety) onto the rope at the edge of screen 3, and that's mostly it. Except I got lucky with that leaf that the piranha plant ate, if I hadn't, it would have played its rising animation, and in that case you can double jump through it:
In the next section, you have to jump as soon as you get your feet underwater:
If you fail to jump (or jump too early), you'll have to wait about 3–5 seconds:
Which isn't that bad of a time loss, but still mostly avoidable.
If you get the timing right, you can also just dodge them:
For more on dodging, here's me beating this entire section without crouching:
To clarify, this ISN'T something you should do in a regular run, just something to keep in mind. Again, you should experiment as much as possible, and maybe you'll find some new skips: I started writing this guide three days ago, and since then found a few, including this dodging exploit.
On this screen, stand at exactly this pixel:
This is where the piranha plant can't hurt you (only give a little smooch) and where you can also double jump to hit the leaves (or whatever that thing is)
Demonstration:
If you step 2 or more pixels closer, you're dead.
Another demonstration of how this would look in a real run:
(You have to move in small steps, or you're also dead because of a bigger walking hitbox)
On a later screen, if you hold jump and right at the apex of your swing, this can happen:
Level 3: Magic Lake
When you touch the rock, if you just hold down, it'll send you to the left, but if you hold down left right before touching it, it'll send you to the right:
In the second water section, if you stay near the left wall, you can avoid the first hazard:
On the next screen, you can just hold down-left:
In this one spot, new players get a bit confused, but the trick is that there's a zone where no hazards can affect you:
Here's how that looks in-game:
The next one has no tricks, but I just wanted to show it because a lot of new players struggle here:
You just have to stop holding right when there's a hazard in front of you.
On the screen with piranha plants, you only have to hit one:
Or the faster way:
To do that one, you have to start holding your run button while still swimming.
If you time it correctly, on the next screen you can skip killing the specters and hitting the tree:
Here's how that should play out:
You might also die to the specters after falling, which is alright because they're at a checkpoint. However, I would recommend killing them before going up.
Skip two piranha plants and the specters afterward:
And here's how you beat the next (and last) section:
In case you didn't know, if you throw your special power projectile diagonally on the floor, instead of disappearing it will just roll on the ground. Also, you can't fall on the last screen, so feel free to jump!
And in case you get lucky, you don't have to kill a single specter here.
So that was it for disc 1, if you were playing the PS1 release. Now onto the rest:
Level 4: Space Island
Now, this one is one of my favorite skips in the run: just like on easy, you can just jump through the specters here. Takes a bit of practice, but generally isn't too hard:
The rest of the level is fairly short and there's not much to explain, so I'll let you watch my gameplay for yourself:
With some notes, of course.
The death in the beginning only happened because I was setting up the recording too long. In a real run, you are 100% safe if you jump immediately.
On the screen with builder worms, you have to kill 3 before you can kill the two above.
And that's it!
Level 5: Rivers of Fire
Probably my least favorite so far. There's not much you can do in terms of skips, so just avoid dying. Which on this level is not that easy (mostly because of the introduction of spiders)
So in the beginning, what you have to remember is that you don't have to kill each and every enemy:
Only shoot the ones in your way.
In the next section, once again, just try to avoid dying:
(I got lucky with the bottom specter here, but you should be able to do everything else in your run)
The one thing you can do to save a bit of time is to not shoot the second builder worm. That one is a dud and can't hurt you, it's just there to waste time.
The strategy with spiders is to stay in the lower left of the screen and kill 1-2 and then go a little up. When you climb up, the spiders get more aggressive and will start running towards you. If two spiders are running at you, you're dead. But you can in most cases deal with one.
The rest of the level is also quite straightforward:
If you didn't die during the last section, some lava eruptions here might despawn.
Which brings us yet closer to the end, with:
Level 6: Caverns of Doom
The shortest level in the game. There are no skips here.
The next two levels are (not only my favorite, but also) the last levels in the game. It will be harder from here. This is why I recommend you practice them exclusively before trying to go into a run and ruin your WR in the very end. THAT WAS PAINFUL AND I HOPE YOU WON'T GET TO EXPERIENCE THAT.
Level 7: Into the Lair
The point of no return!
Getting into the lair is straightforward:
After you get into the lair, just run and avoid as many enemies as you can! Jump through the specter at the crusher and you'll be fine. You can also stand between the crusher by the way.
If you die after returning to the crusher, don't worry! There's a checkpoint there.
Level 8: Heart of Darkness
On the first screen, push the enemies to the next screen and stay at the edge of it, just like on level 1. If a specter is falling from the ceiling, just jump:
After that, you can skip some enemies here:
Just kill all the enemies on the next screen, there's no skips there:
You don't have to kill the ones on the ceiling if they don't bother you.
When collecting the third shard, you can also skip enemies:
This, however, is way more dangerous, so I would recommend you practice that part (and the next one) before going into a real run.
Also, you can see ground fireballs just passing through me. That's because I was standing at the edge of the screen. If I was crouching or if I was standing a little further to the right, it would have got me. You can see more of it here:
You can double jump to skip some enemies before the bridge:
As for the bridge, it's in fact my favorite part of the game!
Here's my fastest walkthrough of it:
As you can see, I didn't know about the glitch with the ground fireballs yet. The strategy is this:
- Skip the three specters in the beginning (which prevents the spawning of the same type of enemy on a later screen)
- Stay on the left edge until you can proceed
- Get as many specters flying as you can (by shooting while crouching)
- Jump through specters if you're feeling lucky
The double ground fireballs from the Master of Darkness shouldn't be too bad if you get the timing right.
And that's it! There aren't any skips in the last screen ("Absolute Darkness"), so I didn't include it here. Thanks for reading, and I hope it helps!
If you want to contact me for any questions, you can on Discord: inqurity
