A Comprehensive Guide to Golden Ending Speedruns in Katana ZERO

https://youtu.be/i6pI3W9if70

full script/text guide:

Introduction:

Hello, my name is xLiliAUS, or Lilian, and welcome to my Golden Ending speedrun guide. This guide will assume you already know how to speedrun the All Stages category of the game, if you don’t I have linked a tutorial in the description of this video. Additionally, this guide will contain major spoilers for Katana ZERO. With that out of the way, lets get into the guide.

Golden Ending is an alternative category to the much more popular All Stages. Where All Stages tasks the player with completing Factory through Bunker-2, and ending time when using the retinal scanner. Golden Ending instead tasks the player with completing Factory through Chinatown, and ending time when Zero dies during the confrontation with the Masked Men and the police squad.

Settings:

Although these settings ultimately do not matter much for the speedrun, as proper mashing and quick option selects make these settings unnecessary, it’s still advised to have response time set to x1 and text speed x2 in your game settings. Response time influences how long you have to make dialogue choices, it does not affect how long you have to make interruption choices however. x1 shortens the response time and x2 extends the time. Text speed is fairly self-explanatory, it speeds up the text, x1 is slower and x2 is faster.

Unlike All Stages, language choice does matter here, although no one language is considerably faster when mashing dialogue, four languages have freezes during dialogue which costs a lot of time. These languages are Korean, Japanese, Simplified and Traditional Chinese, and French. The Asian languages all freeze in Casino while Spinny Ricky spins the roulette, and French freezes during the V interrogation. Any other language is perfectly fine to run with.

For your settings in speedrun mode, you’ll want the same settings as All Stages, however you want to turn off “Action Only” as this is what enables you to have access to the dialogue necessary to meet your final death in Chinatown.

Factory:

After navigating Factory-Entry you’ll find yourself in a short hallway instead of Factory-1, this is the first dialogue sequence. Zero will receive a phone call after automatically running halfway through the hallway, so be ready to mash to pick up the phone call. For this dialogue sequence you’ll want to let the Psychiatrist finish what he is saying, if you try to hang up, he will call over and over until you finish this dialogue. You want to select the second option down, “I’m almost there.” And then mash to select the two interruption choices as fast as possible, both will read “Get on with it.” After two more text boxes to mash Zero will hang up and automatically run to the right.

Factory-2 will play a short cutscene of a Terry turning on the lasers and another Terry being vaporised, during this cutscene the lasers will move while Zero can’t. As a result, the lasers will have a different pattern when you can move as opposed to All Stages, if you just roll through you have a chance of dying due to the different pattern, it may be easier to quickly reset the room in this case, this will allow you to roll through the same way as All Stages.

In Factory-4 when interacting with the scientist you will have dialogue to mash through, choose the interruption choice “We need to go. Now.” You will have two more boxes to mash through before the scientist falls over and dies, the camera will pan to V and you’ll have another two dialogue boxes to mash through before you can play the rest of the room as usual.

Hotel:

Instead of going straight to Hotel-1 there is a Hotel-Entry screen to complete first. Hold right as soon as you exit Factory to prepare for Zero needing to walk right. Dialogue will automatically begin with the receptionist once you are close enough, you will need to select every interruption choice, so just mash here. The choices will read “*Stare blankly*”, “Could I please go?”, “Stop talking to me.”, “Shut up.”, “Shut up!”. There will then be an additional box to mash, as you mash you should begin holding right again, because you can begin walking to the right again after this dialogue.

After completing Hotel-Target and taking the elevator, there will be another screen, Hotel-Exit. You will have two dialogue boxes to mash before you will have to kill two shotgun enemies. After killing them simply roll to the left to finish Hotel.

Club:

Club is played almost exactly the same as All Stages, however, after Club-5 instead of going straight to Club-Exit there is an additional screen and cutscene in between, Club-Target. You will get a phone call, you will immediately hang up for this one by selecting the interruption option, and roll to the door and interact to enter. Here you will meet DJ Electrohead, once again select the interruption choice of “*Kill him*”. You will then get unmashable dialogue before Zero finally kills him and exits. From here Club-Exit is completed as normal.

Prison:

Upon entering Prison, Zero will get yet another phone call, once again choose to hang up right away and complete the first half of Prison without the enemies as usual.

After entering Fa Yuan’s cell at the end of Prison-4, you will enter an additional screen, mash the interact button on entry to initiate three dialogue boxes to mash through, then exit the room, the rest of Prison is played as usual.

Studio:

Just like in Hotel, there is a Studio-Entry screen before Studio-1, also like in Hotel, you’ll want to hold to the right so Zero doesn’t just stand still, you’ll have three dialogue boxes to mash through before this though. After walking far enough to the right more dialogue will automatically trigger, mash through two more boxes before mashing your attack button to get through the following gun pause as quick as possible. After the gun pause there is one more dialogue box to mash before V knocks you down, after that, mash interact to enter Studio-1. In the Studio-Lobby room with the elevator you’ll have one more box to mash before V runs away and you can play Studio normally until you complete the V fight.

After defeating V an additional cutscene will play before Snow dashes into the room, this leads to a conversation between V and Snow. Mash Snow’s initial text box and she will dash toward you, continue mashing to pick the top interruption choice “*Battle stance*”. You will then need to mash through seven dialogue boxes, on the seventh dialogue box the screen will go black, after mashing this dialogue you will need to exit the room to the left. Keep in mind you can move while the screen is still black, so holding left and roll to buffer it is best.

Mansion:

Mansion can be played normally until after Mansion-6 and Replay Skip, you will be greeted with the longest dialogue section of the run, V’s interrogation. There are three cycles to this sequence.

For the first cycle you will want to just mash the entire time. Choose the top two options of “*Open Eyes*” and then “…My head.” Mash through the two following dialogue boxes and interrupt V by saying “Fuck you.” This will prompt V to kill Zero after three dialogue boxes and begin the second cycle.

The second cycles begins the same as the first, however, you’ll notice that the “Fuck you.” dialogue choice is crossed out, do not select it and wait for V to finish what he is saying, then choose the top option, “I want answers, V.” mash through two dialogue boxes and let V finish what he is saying before selecting the top option of “Let me go.” If you interrupt V you will have to complete this cycle again. This will prompt V to kill Zero after a dialogue box yet again.

The third cycle begins the same as the first two, once again do not interrupt V by saying “Fuck you.”, wait for him to finish and select the top option “Don’t be late for your date, V.” From here you just mash and pick every interruption choice. There are twenty three dialogue boxes and four interruption choices in total to mash through. The interruption choices are “Your tape was kid shit.”, “You honestly thought you were in my league.”, “It’s sad, watching you grovel for my approval.”, and “I’m tied up and you still want my approval.” After all the dialogue, Kissyface will say “Hey guys check this out.” and the boss fight will start.

After the Kissyface boss fight there are another sixteen dialogue boxes to mash through before the Motorway bike chase can begin. After the highway section and the helicopter boss fight, there is more dialogue to mash. Select the interruption option of “It’s over, V.”, mash through V’s dialogue and once again select the interruption choice “End it, V.” Following this will be five more dialogue boxes before the level ends.

Chinatown:

Just like Hotel and Studio before it, Chinatown has an entry screen and you must hold right as the stage begins. Unlike Hotel and Studio though, the dialogue with Spinny Ricky does not automatically begin, you have to interact to begin the dialogue, so just mash your interact button. You can’t interrupt him, so select all the top dialogue options, “Thanks…”, “What’s the game?” and “All in.” This begins the gambling part of the dialogue, you need to choose black, red and red again in that order, black is the bottom option and both reds are the top option. After successfully gambling you have one dialogue box to mash, hold right as you do so to move to the Terry as quick as possible, interrupt him with “*Show Chips*” and mash his dialogue to continue to the next room.

In the next room we see Headhunter and Fifteen talking, there are nine total dialogue boxes here to mash. When Headhunter says “Whoever you are… You just made a huge mistake.” the miniboss fight will start abruptly, so be ready. Roll toward her twice and slash her to “defeat” her. If you miss the slash, she will jump off the wall and land behind you, so you can slash her then. Leave the room to the left and prepare to mash your replay eject button, because there’s a replay here that saves a lot of time if you get the skip. If you miss the skip Headhunter will have two boxes of dialogue, you’ll have to pick up the tapes on the table and mash through one more dialogue box and kill the police officers that run and leave through the left for real this time. The rest of Chinatown can be played normally until after the last room, China-8.

After China-8 you’ll be in an additional room, China-Exit, there are four dialogue boxes to mash here, but be careful as soon after the fourth box an interruption choice appears which you don’t want to select. After the masked man finishes his dialogue, select the bottom option “Back off or I’ll kill you.” Wait for the masked man to finish once more and again select the bottom option “Time to die.” This prompts Zero to slash at the masked man and for the police to open fire, causing Zero to meet his final death, and ending the run.

Closing:

Congratulations, you now know how to run Golden Ending, so go on and pb, maybe even record your run and submit to speedrun.com. We’d love to have you join our community, I’ve left some links in the description for the speedrun.com page and an invite link to the official speedrunning discord server invite for you to join in if you haven’t already.

Advanced Bunker 2-1 on Controller

https://youtu.be/79kRKLXB_M8

Doing advanced bunker 2-1 may be easier on a keyboard, but you can do it differently on controller. Its mostly slashing upwards, then downwards while never letting go of roll.

Advanced Guide to Psychboss Individual Level Speedruns! [$35 Bounty!]

Hello, welcome to the **Advanced Guide** to beating Psychboss Individual Level! If you haven’t already, you’ll want to read through and master the Basic Guide here: https://www.speedrun.com/katana_zero/guide/h16x7 

Now that you’re ready for more advanced strategies, let’s begin! 

All the preparation and the intro cutscene should be done **as detailed in the basic guide**, so we won’t cover those sections here.

#Hands Phase

To make your Hands phase faster and more optimal, you’ll want to practice predicting when the hands will leave their portals. This means walking further to the left or right where the hands will come out and hitting them when you know they’ll come out, and requires a lot of practice. You can see it done here in the current World Record: https://youtu.be/VY5TW6dx_oU?t=166 

#Orbs Phase

To do Orbs phase quickly, you’ll want to use what’s called the Kain strategy - after hitting Restart, roll right, jump up against the right wall, and then deflect orbs while descending to the ground. You can again see this done in the current World Record here: https://youtu.be/VY5TW6dx_oU?t=182 

After that, you’ll immediately get the part of Orbs where the clones randomly arrange themselves. For a good time, you’re going to want to get good enough RNG to hit every orb back at the clone and kill all of them, which is known as a onecycle. This is a very common reset point for runs, and about 75% of my runs end here. 

#Eyes & Final Phase + Exit

There is actually nothing different in these two phases, just practice and do it quickly. No new tricks or execution. The exit is also of course the same.

#Goals

If you want to set goals for yourself, here are some benchmarks you should try to reach when implementing different strategies:

After implementing faster hands phase: under 2:50

After implementing the orbs onecycle and faster hands: under 2:40

Once you’ve gotten under the 2:40 mark, you’ll be in contention for the world record. Just keep trying and hope for some good Orb RNG, and if you want any advice or help you can always contact me at Quinn#5645 on Discord (through DMs or the KZ Speedrunning server: https://discord.gg/4vcjw4tCR2) 

Good luck, go for that bounty, and enjoy!

All known skips

2. Hotel Target skip [Hotel] https://youtu.be/5L-F_fiU3cw?t=675
	Instead of talking to the target on the balcony, open the door and throw something at him to kill him. 
	This skips the long dialogue you have with him if you just run at him.
	
3. Replay skip [Mansion] https://youtu.be/5L-F_fiU3cw?t=2272
	When the replay would start rolling for the last mansion room where the bomb detonates on the door and puts you into interrigation,
	you have a 1-frame window of skipping the unskippable replay. 
	Currently this is done my mashing the replay skip key(eg. Y for xbox) when entering the door and hoping.
	Saves around 5s
	
4. Copskip [Chinatown] https://youtu.be/5L-F_fiU3cw?t=2804
	Same as replay skip but much bigger. Skips dialogue, having to get dragon tape from the table and the fight against the 2 cops coming in.
	This happens when you hit the laserBoss after roulette and exit the room. Mash the replay skip key when exiting and pray.
	Saves around 16s
	
5. Moto transition skips [Mansion] https://youtu.be/5L-F_fiU3cw?t=2552
	When in the motorcycle level, each time the screen transitions to a new background and the save icon is visible in the bottom right,
	restarting the level with the R-key or pause->restart saves a few seconds each time. 
	Both conditions must be met! Restarting at a point where the save icon is shown but the background doesn't change, loses time.
	Can also be done after hitting V off of his bike, to make the fight start immediately.
	
6. Slaughterhouse skips [Slaughterhouse] https://youtu.be/5L-F_fiU3cw?t=3638
	In the 2nd room, cutting the cord of the TV before killing the Terry, disables the sniper and skips the opening "cutscene".
	After this every other room with a TV can be skipped by rolling past the cameras you can see attached to the roof.
	Saves a bunch of time and fairly easy to do 1st try in runs with practice.
	
7. Bunker elevator door skips [Bunker1] https://youtu.be/5L-F_fiU3cw?t=4217
	Kind of the same as Moto transition skips. You want to reset when the doors are about to open for a new floor.
	The first room gets the biggest timesave from this and even that is not necessary. 
	Pause->restart loses time so this has to be done with a keyboard R-key hit to save time.
	Personally I only do this in the first floor as the timesave is minimal afterwards.

Beginner's Guide to Psychboss Individual Level Speedruns! [$35 Bounty!]

#The Bounty

**35 dollar bounty?** What 35 dollar bounty, you might ask? Well, if you can beat the current Normal Mode Katana record for Psychboss Individual Level (standing at **2:31.00** currently) I will pay you 35 dollars when your run is verified! Now, on to the guide.

#Introduction

Hello and welcome to a beginner-level guide to running the Psychotherapist Boss individual level categories! 

Please note that this guide is primarily for PC, keyboard & mouse runners - most of it also applies to controller runs, but some parts may not work.

If you have any issues with any part of this guide, you can @ me in the Speedrunning Discord: https://discord.gg/4vcjw4tCR2 or DM me (I'm Quinn#5645).

We'll only cover normal mode with the Katana/Prism Sword in this guide and the Advanced Guide. Hard mode and Labswords will be covered in a separate guide in the future.

In this guide, you'll get to know the **basic strategies and must-knows** for a Psych IL speedrun, so you'll be ready to tackle the more difficult strategies in the Advanced Guide.

#Preparation

To be ready for the speedrun, you need to have your settings configured for it! This is fortunately already covered in Baroti's excellent guide here: https://www.speedrun.com/katana_zero/guide/kgwz8

However, you'll need to change one more setting after that: go to Options > Keyboard Controls and set your Interact and Confirm keys to be Right Click.

You'll now want to download AutoClicker here: https://sourceforge.net/projects/orphamielautoclicker/

The reason we're using AutoClicker is because the Psych IL category, unlike every other category, allows you to use it to automatically skip through the dialogue before the boss fight.

You'll probably also want some kind of recording software if you don't already have one. I recommend OBS: https://obsproject.com/download

When you're ready to start a run, launch AutoClicker and follow these steps:

Set Mouse Button (under Click options) to Right, set the Click interval to all zeroes except for milliseconds, which should be set to 1. Set Click repeat to "Repeat until stopped" and set Cursor position to "Current location". Then minimize the AutoClicker window.

Then you can launch Katana Zero, make sure your settings are correct, check you're recording, and then you can begin!

#Starting & The Intro Cutscene

As soon as you press Begin Run, you should hold right so that your character will instantly begin walking toward the Therapist. 

As you hold right, press the F6 button once, which will start the AutoClicker. Once the dialogue starts (at which point you can stop holding right) you should see it advance automatically, since the AutoClicker is constantly pressing the interact/confirm buttons.

Keep in mind that you can pause the game at any time - pausing the game will not invalidate your speedrun. If you want to pause the game and check this guide in the middle of a run, you can.

Personally, I tend to use the 40 second cutscene at the start of each attempt to stretch, check my messages, maybe take a bite of a snack or grab some water. It works well as a rest time between runs.

After the cutscene ends (the final dialogue line is "I will suffer you no more!"), press F6 once to disable the AutoClicker. You'll now be at the first battle phase: the Hands.

#Hands Phase

Now, for Hands, you’ll want to start with this basic strategy - more optimal stuff gets covered in the advanced guide.

The pattern of hands is two from the left, then one from each side, then two from the left again, then two from the right, then one from each side - and at that point, you should have ended the phase - missing any hands is generally just going to mean your run is dead. You should memorize this pattern since it’s pretty easy to remember. 

As far as hitting the hands, you’ll at this point just want to stay in the middle and hit the hands from there - as a beginner, you should focus on making sure you hit every hand rather than hitting them super fast.

#Orbs Phase

As soon as you hit the last hands and you see the floating Psych start to glitch out and vanish, press your Restart button, which will skip the intro animation for Orbs and save a second. 

Roll into the right corner and reflect each orb from there by deflecting, then rolling back into the corner again and again til the next part of Orbs starts. 

In the next part, where they fire vertically downward, you’ll want to deflect two of the orbs if possible, but if you can’t, just do one for now. Then you’ll get to the next part.

In this part where they arrange themselves randomly, you’ll want to sit in the right corner and pray - hopefully, you’ll get a pattern where you can just deflect all of the orbs in a row, but it’s okay if you don’t. Just make sure not to die here!

#Eyes Phase

This phase is pretty much straightforward - just hit the eyes. Practice is vital here, make sure your reactions and movement are good so you can hit them quickly.

#Final Phase

When the transformation sequence ends, you’ll want to press your Restart button as soon as you regain control of your character. You can do this by either using a cue in the music (you can use custom music in Katana Zero, so you can also get a better cue with that) or by spamming roll or attack and reacting to the animation of that by pressing Restart.

Then, all you need to do is survive, kill the minions, and hit the boss tentacles as fast as you can - the pattern is:

Cross of syringes, downward syringes going right to left, minions, following stabbing tentacle, vulnerable boss tentacle, minions, downward syringes going left to right, circle of syringes, downward syringes going right to left, vulnerable boss tentacle, following stabbing tentacle, minions, following stabbing tentacle, circle of syringes, following stabbing tentacle, random downward syringes, vulnerable boss tentacle.

You should really just practice this phase so you get used to the attack patterns - ideally you want to be able to survive this phase without dying and while hitting all three tentacles every time.

#Exit

After you return to the therapy room, simply hold left - do not press the interact button because you don’t want to accidentally search the Therapist’s body. Wait until you’re halfway to the door, then start spamming interact while holding left - since you’re holding left, it’ll automatically select the “Go Home” option, and the run will end.

#Goals

Once you’ve done all of the steps in this guide, you should hopefully be able to get a time under 3 minutes and 30 seconds as long as you don’t die. You’ll want to aim for a time under 3:10 before you move on to the Advanced Guide (unless you just wanna skip ahead, of course).

#Advanced Strategies

Once you feel you’re ready, you can move on to the Advanced Guide here: https://www.speedrun.com/katana_zero/guide/3rbd5

Consistent Fast Conveyor Belt Room Strat

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/578010311

A lot of people have trouble with the fast conveyor belt room strat in slaughterhouse that involves moving the conveyor belt to the right and deflecting bullets when coming into the room. I've found that by adding a few nuances to your movement, you can make this strat almost entirely consistent, and I detail them in this video.

Game settings and keybinds

Speedrun options:
Stable seed - Enable - Makes the behaviour of enemies consistent, please note that in some rooms the behaviour of enemies changes one time once you quick restart a room.
Skip cutscenes - Enable
Action only - Enable
Skip replay - Enable
Dragon dash max - Enable - if you're on controller, it lets you to do a dragon dash quickly.
Show timer - Enable - Required by the speedrun.com rules.
No slowmo - If you don't intent to use slow-mo throughout your runs enable this as it will disable the fan in the factory, which saves like ~0,5s.

Game options:
Hitpause - Set it to 0%, once you kill an enemy or deflect a bullet the screen freezes briefely, this in total costs you a few minutes in time.
Screenshake - Once you disable hitpause, it becomes extremely hard to tell what is going on due to the excessive screenshake, set it to 0% or at the very least set it to ~20%.
Response time - It just changes how much time you have to respond to texts, it does not affect the time.
Text speed - You lose a frame everytime you have to click through a single dialogue window so set text speed to 2x.
Skip rewind - ON - This is an animation that plays of zero backtracking when you die/do a quick restart.
Slowdown control - Changes the behaviour of activating slow-mo, if it's on hold you will have to hold the slow-mo button to keep it up, and with the tap the slow-mo button will work as a toggle.

graphics options
Vsync - OFF - vsync introduces input delay, so as long as the game does not tear you should turn it off.
Restart FX - OFF - An animation that plays when the room is quick restarted, loses a bit of time each restart.
Rewind FX - It just gives rewind a wobbly effect, does not impact time.

Keyboard and mouse keybindings:
Up/down/left/right - Just use the standard wasd or arrow keys, however up and down are used for menuing, as such you may want to have two keybinds for up or down. This is due to the need of quickly menuing in studio elevator (the optimal order at which you complete the rooms is space -> quiet hills -> doom, this is due to the elevator animation
taking the shortest amount of time to complete in this configuration) where after completing quiet hills you will need to rapidly press the up or down button three times. 
Using two keybinds at the same time is marginally faster (maybe ~0,1s xd).

Jump - Most people decide to use the W for jumping, some are using the spacebar (mostly because they are familar with space bar being the jump button in other games).

Slash - Just use the default LMB.

Pickup/throw - Most people stick with the default keybinding of RMB, however you will need to change it to something else if you wanna bind roll button to RMB, in which case shift/ctrl/alt/space all work quite well for this keybind.

Walk - Somewhat useful, it lets you see further beyond, which comes useful if you mess up a strat and need to peer far away to see what has happened. One other use is when you're doing [walking variant of BB2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4SFeITUck0) as such bind it to shift/ctrl/alt/space.

Roll - It can be binded to a bunch of buttons, space and shift are popular picks, RMB is cozy, ctrl and alt may be used.

Slow-mo - shift/ctrl/alt.

Interact - shift/ctrl/alt/space you also have to bind this button to two keys, that's due to the need of mashing through the dialogue, the second keybind can be wherever, because you have ample time to reposition your hand placement after you finish the dialogue mash.

Replay Eject - It is used for [replay skip](https://youtu.be/jGbNyDgXq7U?t=488), to do it you need to do a frame perfect input of the replay eject button during the screen transition just before kissyface, as such both keys need to be bound in a place where you can easily and quickly mash them.

Quick Restart - This button needs to be in an accessible spot where you will need to be able to hold the A or D button and the roll button (or S button) and be able to hit the restart button at the same time. Q is a somewhat popular pick for it, though you may accidently press on it, so you may pick something further away. 
I have also bound the quick restart button to both Q and R so that I may more easily click the restart button during bunker 1.

Guide-Playlist for Katana ZERO Speedrunning! Will be kept up to date with newest strats!

How to modify your save file in case of messing up your sob.

The save file is found in C:\Users\your username\AppData\Local\Katana_ZERO
https://imgur.com/a/NlGjQbj
You will have to either enable hidden items or type %appdata% into the windows search bar. 
What you're looking for is a file named KatanaSpeedrunOpt[your steam id number].
Open it with notepad.

The times in the file are saved in seconds, so a time of 3m 7s 850ms will be shown as 187.85.
https://imgur.com/a/HDzIiVA
This is my factory time, the 0 under the time is the amount of deaths at that stage, and the 4 is the medal that you were given. 
4 - platinum
3 - gold
2 - silver
1 - bronze
0 - no medal
Now all you have to do is to replace the time/deaths/medal of the stages you messed up and save the changes.

Moving techniques in the game

**Normal rolls:**
Basic way of moving in the game, you roll by either using a dedicated roll button or by holding A or D and then pressing S. This can be performed every 22 frames or 163.63 BPM. The best technique to do this is by timing the button presses, and not by mashing the roll button repeatedly.
video of normal rolls
https://youtu.be/Ge0GrcL3obY?t=207

**Crouch rolls:**
A more advanced way of moving in the game, you roll by holding the button S and roll with the buttons A or D, on controller hold down on the stick or d-pad and press roll. This causes the character to move faster but the roll cooldown is the same as with the normal rolls. This technique saves ~10 seconds over the span of the whole run, as such you do not have to bother picking it up for a long time, at least until the sub-20 range, and even then it is hardly a requirement to get good times in the game, however the earlier you pick it up, the less painful the transition will be. C-rolling is also more punishing to do than normal rolls, because if you mistime it, your character gets stuck in one spot until you roll again. You may also opt to just c-roll on flat surfaces with no enemies, as it's practically no different than just normal rolling, the difficult part is c-rolling while attacking enemies.
Note: you cannot c-roll on platforms because you will fall down while holding down the S button, as such you still need to use normal rolls throughout your runs.
video of crouch rolling
https://youtu.be/jGbNyDgXq7U?t=206

**Crouch slashing:**
The fastest way of moving in the game, but also the hardest, so hard in-fact that it's only viable for top level IL runs or screen records, as such don't bother picking it up, you will only lose time as compared to just doing c-rolls. The way you do this technique is by weaving slashes in-between c-rolls, the fastest timings for this are: You start a c-roll, then slash after 10 frames, then do a c-roll after 12 frames rinse and repeat.
video of crouch slashing 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pexwFLq8LMI

NEW Updated Katana Zero Tutorial Playlist

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLh1Xfa8yqAEjE3cFdMPAY4pyuXKdUom3x

This is a comprehensive tutorial using updated/current strats for every level in the game and includes beginner, intermediate, and advanced strats.

Room restarts and how much time they can save.

The theory behind room resetting: 
Some rooms upon restarting move the starting position of your character which will either let you complete the room faster or slower. However the game doesn't let you restart from the moment you gain control over your character, it's delayed by a few frames, so even though in a room such as slaughter-3 you are moved just a tiny bit forward you will be losing time. That's also assuming you make a frame perfect reset. Realistically you will not perform them so you will be further losing time. Here's a technique on how to properly quick restart, hold down a dedicated roll button before you restart the room (or hold down 's' and 'd' if you're crouch rolling), this will cause your character to roll on the very first frame upon restarting the room. As for the restarting itself, you can either mash the restart button or try to time it with a single press.

Here's the list of rooms you save time by restarting (not including the time loss that may come from a slower strat)
These times aren't perfect, expect them to be wrong by ~0,1s.
[If you are confused by which room is which use this sheet for reference.](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1DcgpzrmbLRd5xOUl1UuyBVlApboBe9FvNP9xPhBH-x0/edit#gid=1717210142)

Factory-3	0,3s 
Hotel-6		0,6s
Club-Entry	0,1s
Club-4		0,7s
Mansion-2	0,05s You can restart the level in the section before you break glass and go down to V, I made sure to this properly, so even though the time save is small, if you are able to restart within ~3 frames, it saves time, though I wouldn't recommend going for that. 
Mansion-3	0,4s
Reply skip: 	You have to wait 0,56s before the game gives you control over your character if you perform
			replay skip, restarting the level lets you shave off 5 frames of the total time.
Kissyface: 	Upon picking up the katana you are able to restart the level, this saves 3,4s.
Moto Chase: 	[Video showing all of the moto chase restarts](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8cKWixi2kw&t=589s) 
			In all of these restarts the disk on the bottom right corner has to appear before you can
			restart.
			The first restart happens once you kill all of the enemies in the 4th wave of enemies.
			The second restart happens when all of the cones are off the screen or toppled.
			The third restart happens once you kill all of the enemies in the second wave after
			the cones.
			The fourth restart happens once you kill all of the enemies in the second waver after 
			the third restart.
			The fifth restart happens at the last wave of enemies (so four waves after the 
			fourth restart) you have to both kill all of the enemies and all cars have to go off-screen.
			The sixth (optional) restart happens when after you kill V, you have to wait longer
			 than usual for the disk to appear. [video of this happening](https://youtu.be/-cHxhvjXTXs?t=580).
			Even though the no-restart version of the heli fight can end up being faster, it's upto 
			RNG if you save/lose time, depending on how quickly V starts shooting. In 50% of cases
			you can save upto a second, and in the other 50% you can lose upto a second. This is a 
			rough estimate. Don't bother with the no-restart version of heli fight unless you get to 
			sub-17 or so, due to the sheer difficulty of this strat. 
Chinatown-8	0,2s
Dragon-3	0,5s
Dragon-4	0,1s
Slaughter-5	0,05s Same as Mansion-2, you can gain some time by doing a frame perfect restart, but you have ~3 frames of leeway.
Slaughter-7	0,35s

In bunker 1 you are able to restart the room before the elevator opens which causes the doors to open faster. 
Bunker1-2	0,4s
Bunker1-3	0,3s
Bunker1-4	0,5s
And so on (I can't be arsed to time each one, but they all save roughly the same amount of time).

Routes/Conversation for all Categories

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/12FOPd1bX01nq1vqWnXrCqdZXjn2z-BfDx33mKs2NeQQ/edit?usp=sharing

Please click on the Tabs or the link within the introduction.
Images with Red Backgrounds are specific texts that you may want to pay attention to for better optimization (non spamming areas).

Please Note: Still completing 100%/All Achievements. Should be completed before May 10th.

Run Essential Lore

**Strong Terry**
	Bouncer at Club. Loved characted by all the characters in the game. Hasn't done anything wrong ever.
	Mourned by everyone after Zero brutally ended his life in a red mist of pure rage.
	According to sources, he is currently lifting with Baby Jesus.
	May his soul rest in piece.
	We miss you <3
	
**Spinny Ricky**
	Skinny Ricky who controls the roulette table in Chinatown.
	More importantly, the keeper of Baba Booey (He says Babba Booey, but it is Baba Booey).
	Not very rich.
	
**Richard the Slender**
	A person being initiated to become a Skinny Ricky.
	Initiation tests include such tests as:
		-Taming your beast's mane into the most powerful hairstyle... The pompadour
		-Trial by Grease Fire
		-Shotgunning a specific beer presented by a Skinny Ricky
	
**Skinny Ricky (Multiple = Skinny Rickies)**
	Title used by characters rocking a pompadour and a crowbar.
	Skinny counterpart of Terries.
	Special move:
		-Double stacking to make your life hell. Actually created by the devil.
		
**Terry (Multiple = Terries)**
	Title used by buffed up fisters.
	Most notable Terry being of course the beloved Strong Terry (F).
	
**Turret Terry**
	Terry who has been trained to wield a mounted machine gun.
	Highly tilting but serves an important role in the RickyTerry-verse.

Tips for Dragonmod Runners!

A collection of useful info that will help you to improve your run, in order by level!

All of these tips assume you have a general knowledge of basic strategies from vanilla KZ, like replay skip and restarting on certain rooms.

General tips:

As The Dragon, your roll is longer (making perfect rolling have a different timing) and your jump is slightly different.

Try using The Dragon’s dash not just to kill enemies but also to move around faster.

You will need to use the dash to compensate for a lack of throwables.

Factory:

The first room has you playing as Zero with Dragon’s sprites, so be aware that in this room roll distance is the normal distance, jumps are normal, and Lab Swords are equipped if you had any chosen. This also means you cannot dash in this room.

Second room: Beware of the laser that will kill you if you try to pet the cat.

Third room: Press the restart button as soon as the room loads, as due to a bug the player starts out of bounds and cannot move. Pressing restart should bring you to the room’s start.

Fourth room: If it is on, you can dash through the fan.

Fifth room: You can simultaneously roll and dash away from the Scientist as you press the interact key to get the biggest head start possible.

Hotel:

First room: Instantly slash or roll to cut off the “start music” animation, then press restart. This saves several seconds.

Fifth room: Be careful, your dashes can only kill enemies at the end of the dash if you are in the “background” layer. Beware of accidentally dashing through the end walls of the background layer and falling out of the map. John Rose’s “jumping” cutscene freezes you for a few seconds, make sure not to have enemies nearby.

Club:

First room: The first room has you playing as Zero with Dragon’s sprites, so be aware that in this room roll distance is the normal distance and jumps are normal. This also means you cannot dash in this room.

Second room: Note that you can dash through the view fields of cameras instead of hiding behind objects or obscuring them. Also, the Ricky that walks in after you kill Strong Terry can only be killed with the end of your dash.

Third room: Again, keep in mind that you can dash through camera view fields. Turrets can only be killed by the end of your dash.

Fifth room: Be aware that if you use a dash to kill all four Skinny Rickies, it may cause all the other enemies to notice you, even through walls and floors. You can use this to your advantage. 

Prison:

Fifth room (right after entering the door): Press the restart button as soon as the room loads, as due to a bug the player starts out of bounds and cannot move. Pressing restart should bring you to the room’s start.

Studio: 

First room: Instantly slash or roll to cut off the “start music” animation. This saves several seconds.

Second room (Hub): The second room has you playing as Zero with Dragon’s sprites, so be aware that in this room roll distance is the normal distance and jumps are normal. This also means you cannot dash in this room.

First Space room: Press the restart button as soon as the room loads, as due to a bug the player starts out of bounds and cannot move. Pressing restart should bring you to the room’s start.

First Quiet Hills room: Remember you can dash through camera view fields. Do not attempt to use the door on your way back, it soft locks the game. Press the restart button as soon as the room loads, as due to a bug the player starts out of bounds and cannot move. Pressing restart should bring you to the room’s start.

First Chapel of Doom room: Press the restart button as soon as the room loads, as due to a bug the player starts out of bounds and cannot move. Pressing restart should bring you to the room’s start.

Second Chapel of Doom room: Unlike in normal KZ, you can get way ahead of the minecart. Get to the end as fast as you can (Dash through the lasers and then jump and dash to get up to the higher ledge you usually need the cart for).

V Bossfight: Be careful not to leave the bounds of the room, as you can walk out to the left. The platform that is there (which exists to stop V from escaping the room) also makes Fast V strategies considerably harder. Be aware that your dash does not affect V.

Mansion:

First room: Instantly slash or roll to cut off the “start music” animation. This saves several seconds, and will also make all enemies in this room peaceful. They will not attack you. 

Third room: There is no Molotov to break the generator, so simply dash past the camera. The game automatically turns off the lights in the next room.

Sixth room: Dash instantly toward the explosive door, as this will speed up the replay (if you fail to replay skip).

Kissyface bossfight: Dash doesn’t affect Kissyface. When you need to get back your sword, move your cursor to directly on top of the guy holding your sword and dash, or else you may begin floating (which happens when you dash without a sword).

Motorcycle: Everything here is the same as in the normal game, as the bike is simply a reskin. 

Chinatown:

Second room: Drones can only be killed by the end of your dash.

Third room: Same as previous. 

Fifth room: Press the restart button as soon as the room loads, as due to a bug the player starts out of bounds and cannot move. Pressing restart should bring you to the room’s start.

Sixth room: Drones can only be killed by the end of your dash.

Seventh room: Same as previous.

Dragon Tape:

All rooms: Use the same strategies as in vanilla KZ, it’s the same. 

Slaughterhouse:

Second room: Remember to cut the wire and not trigger the camera sensor, as with all other camera sensor rooms.

Bunker:

Keep in mind that Turrets can only be killed with the end of your slash.

Bunker 2:

Headhunter bossfight Phase 1: Use the dash to your advantage to get rid of enemy spawns quicker. 

Headhunter bossfight Phase 2: Use the dash to quickly and efficiently defeat Headhunter.

Psychotherapy:

Use the same strategies as normal. This room has you playing as Zero with Dragon’s sprites, so be aware that in this room roll distance is the normal distance and jumps are normal. This also means you cannot dash in this room. Beware also that the range in which Eyes can spawn during the eye phase is slightly larger.

Thanks for reading!

Name	Author
A Comprehensive Guide to Golden Ending Speedruns in Katana ZERO	xLiliAUS 4 years ago
Advanced Bunker 2-1 on Controller	Xerclipse 4 years ago
Advanced Guide to Psychboss Individual Level Speedruns! [$35 Bounty!]	RoseIsFluid 2 years ago
All known skips	Kainalo 5 years ago
Beginner's Guide to Psychboss Individual Level Speedruns! [$35 Bounty!]	RoseIsFluid 2 years ago
Consistent Fast Conveyor Belt Room Strat	BigNoNo 4 years ago
Game settings and keybinds	Bar0ti 3 years ago
Guide-Playlist for Katana ZERO Speedrunning! Will be kept up to date with newest strats!	Kainalo 5 years ago
How to modify your save file in case of messing up your sob.	Bar0ti 4 years ago
Moving techniques in the game	Bar0ti 3 years ago
NEW Updated Katana Zero Tutorial Playlist	apoxa 5 years ago
Room restarts and how much time they can save.	Bar0ti 3 years ago
Routes/Conversation for all Categories	TheXButton 6 years ago
Run Essential Lore	Kainalo 6 years ago
Tips for Dragonmod Runners!	RoseIsFluid 5 years ago