Animation Cancels

Save time by using animation cancels

1. cancel hit animation by jumping 

2. cancel dash animation by using sunstone energy

3. cancel shockwave attack by jumping (only works after you hit the ground)

4. cancel dash animation by jumping

Farming Gadgets / Diamonds reliable

The game randomizes what you can get in a chest, but it generates the drops the moment you open a chest and save it once you accept the item. So what you can do is open the chest and close the game (via the playstation menu), repeat until you get the item you want (as far as I know your friends loot always stays the same)

How to Fly

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-PGr-5WWco

HOW TO FLY:

In order to get knack to fly, you need to climb a ladder wall. Before you reach the top make sure to jump that way you vault on top of the climb. Now you need to pause during the animation of when knack is pulling himself up to the top. You can't be mounted on the wall. You can't be standing up top. If you pause during this animation go ahead and close the level or if it's a time attack go ahead and hit retry. The next level you start when you jump you will start flying.

EASIEST WAY TO START THE FLYING GLITCH:

Load up time attack 9. Grab the sunstone at the start using it to kill the 3 enemies. Go up to climb ladder wall. Climb up the wall but stop right before the end. Jump so knack vaults up the wall. During the animation of knack vaulting up the wall pause the game. Now hit retry to restart time attack 9. If it worked you will fly once you jump. If it did not work. Try again.

HOW TO STOP THE FLY GLITCH:

if you want to return your game state to normal there are currently 3 methods of cancelling flight.

#1. you can climb a wall to the top and do the vault over animation.

#2. you can load into chapter 13-5, the boss sucking in knack at the beginning returns game state to normal.

#3. You can close your game application and re launch the game.

WHAT IS KNOWN ABOUT THE FLYING GLITCH:

The glitch will remain in effect in the campaign, all individual chapter levels, time attacks and coliseums. The entire game.

If I mention being "soft-locked" what I mean is you are stuck and need to restart the level. The game isn't crashed but there's no way to get unstuck.

Sunstone shock wave and sunstone projectile attack will soft lock you as you will just float in the air. Sunstone tornado attack is save to use.

If you get hit by an enemy there is a 90% chance it will soft lock you. Sometimes it doesn't but more often than not it will.

If you jump and immediately jump again to initiate a double jump. Then you will still go flying but you can be brought back down to the ground by attacking. 90% of the time when you land you will be soft locked but sometimes knack can wall.

If you jump to start flying. And mid air you dash. You will floating stationary and not be able to move. If you wiggle your left joy stick you can regain movement and you'll be able to steer and fly to wherever you want. This isn't that great because you can't land unless you find a surface at your height level. This is however useful sometimes. I make use of this in a couple of my time attack runs because it's the fastest method.

If you run of a ledge you will just start floating. This can be beneficial in a lot of areas as it's not always optimal to start randomly flying. If you ever start unintentionally floating slightly off the ground you are not soft locked. Try to fly around until you find a surface that is at the same height as you or slightly more elevated and you will be able to land and run again.

MOST IMPORTANT MOVEMENT FLIGHT TECH: If you jump you will start flying. Don't attack, don't dash, don't jump immediately. If you jump again later then you will be brought back to the ground and you will not be soft locked. You will be able to run again 100% of the time unless you landed in a kill trigger or fell through the map.

Unknown: There's probably a lot of about this glitch still unknown because it's a brand new tech. When more info is discovered I will try to make sure to update this.

Back Story: On July 21, 2014 Kasht-pr posted a video to his channel "Knack - Flying Glitch?" This was the first and only known discovery of the flying glitch. The video does not give insight on how to do the glitch. And there's no footage of prior to the glitch happening. This glitch would remain a mystery for 9 years. 11/6/2023 Elat catches covid and gets 5 days off of work. I decided to spend this time playing knack what else was I to do. I was going after several iL speedrun records. I decided to take on 3-4. On 11/8/2023, I climb a wall in 3-4. I wasn't liking the run so I decided to reset. I closed the level during the vault animation off a ladder wall. When I reloaded 3-4 I tried to bunny hop and instead I flew. The glitch had been discovered. I saved my last 30 minutes of footage. However all I needed to understand the glitch was the ending of my last 3-4 run before the start of the next. Which is the first clip of this video.

Note: This is not considered a "Restart Glitch" which are banned in time attacks and coliseums. This is a glitch that can be done in the campaign, in individual levels, or in time attacks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baMkk8LUCIo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WoX_qNsC31M

How to use Co-Op effectively

This is gonna be a few quick tips to help you get faster times in co-op speedrun.

Since it feels like the seond player is useless at first, I'm gonna show you how exactlly the second player can be used effectively and how you can benefit from a co-op treammate.

1. The most obvious way is to kill the enemies while the 1st player goes straight to the next door

2. Also pretty obvious: Fight together

3. In 11-2 there is a room with a lever which spawns green walls to block your way. The 2nd player can hit the lever with the 1st player already being on the other side so that you skip the whole section.

4. In some levels there laser beams which by contact will hit you with a lightning. If the second player runs into them, the lighning will kill him, but also all the enemies in range of the lightning

5. Healing the 1st player by pressing triangle

6. Giving the 1st player extra relics to do certain skips

7. Healing on Wood-Knack Stage for skips or if no wood is left for a furnce

8. Using sunstone energy for a mini shockwave. The second player uses only a quarter of sunstone energy for a supermove and can also do a double supermove with less sunstone energy

Bonus: In Coliseum Attack you get extra points for defeating enemies with sunstone energy. The second player can kill way more enemies with sunstone energy than the first player due to lower energy cost.

Journey to Knack Any% wr

So with Knack Any% you can play any of the different versions of Knack, but I recommend that you play as Diamond Knack as well as on Easy mode, as with that mode Knack will still take damage, but he won't die as if you were playing on Normal mode.

Journey to Knack NG+ wr

First of all this is not your normal journey, you should have beaten the game once on easy so you have the needed gadgets on Knack as well as any upgraded Knack, my personal favorite and recommendation for the run is Diamond Knack. His stats are maxed out at 5-5-5, so that means on Easy mode the enemies won't be killing Knack as much as if the game is on Very Hard mode.

Knack Speedrun Guide

I'll try to make this all as short as possible.
First of all constantly single jumping is the fastest version of movement in this game.
Backdashing means lining up to a wall (with your back facing the wall), jumping and dashing towards it.
If you go out of bounds the game will kill you after a certain time (it will start counting from the last camera move onwards and reset when the camera moves again).
If you skip cutscenes you also skip save points so be careful.
The game won't save mid level, so if you quit out and reload you will start from the beginning of the level.
The Guide might not show the fastest routes (so if you want to make sure check out the IL section, but remember, some skips might be too hard/risky for full game runs) 

Now to the specific skips:
quick note (R#) describes the recomended amount of Relics for the skip (meaning sometimes it can be done with less relics, but is not as consistent)
Example: (R2) means you should have at least 2 containers worth of Relics (Relics you get without destroying containers yourself aren't counted)
"Level Only" Refers to the skip either being risky or only worth if u get everything first try (use at your own risk).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6P4fUAU91MI&t=

1-1 (1): R2: 
1-1 (2): R0: Skips a time gated tutorial
2-2 (1): R0
2-2 (2): R0 - Your double jump should be straight to the front as a invisible wall blocks the right side
2-2 (3): R0 
2-3 (1): R0 - You need to double jump to get on top of the stone
2-4 (1): R0 
3-2 (1): R0 - Try to jump on the right edges 
3-4 (1): R0 - Position the tank on the right side of the wall, then destroy it and jump on the edge of the tank (facing the 
                    middle of the tank). Double jump, pick the tank up and double jump/dash/attack to the position in the video and 
                    immediately jump off of it on top of the gate. You have to do the second part as well, because the encounter on 
                    the other side that would open the gate doesn't spawn.
3-4 (2): R0 - You have a 50% chance to get this skip. Do the same as the skip beforehand with the tank on top of the skip
                     and then climb up on the right (note: normally the camera changes a lot quicker so you actually see where you 
                     are going). If the tank does his drilling attack first destroy it and go through the gate. You should be facing a 
                     structure with a tinier structure on the left. Do two backwards jumps on top of it and jump on a higher point right 
                     next to it and continue upwards (you can also wait if the tank drills first, since the backup also takes some extra 
                     time) 
4-3 (1): R0 - Important to note when you line up to transform back into normal Knack you need to stand on the edge facing 
                    the right (or else the laser will destroy you). Now double jump/dash/attack towards the right enemie, as Knack 
                    gains more distance attacking an enemie.
4-4 (1): R2 - Not much to say just follow everything in the clip and head straight up the path
5-2 (1): R0 - I wouldn't recommend going for this skip unless you find a safe setup as you can die doing it. First you have to 
                    destroy a robot right at the first jump that blocks your view and a good spot to set up the jump. After you jump 
                    on the edge of the second structure you have to double jump/dash on top of it (or else you won't make it). Now 
                    walk off of it and immediately double jump/dash/attack to the right (sometimes the invisible wall will push you 
                    back in)
5-4 (1): R0 - Keep track of the enemie as he can attack you while you try to do the skip
6-1 (1): R1
6-1 (2): R2
6-1 (3): R2 - Just backdash 4 times up the wall (the push comes automatically)
6-2 (1): R0
6-2 (2): R0 - Also doable without wood but much harder 
7-4 (1): R0 - You can backjump from the tank but you have to be fast (he always fires a missle first). When you are on the 
                     screen with the sawblade robot and mines just jump to the top right until the camera changes (you can also go 
                     inbounds again at any point in the skip to be safer as you can die on the last screen of the skip)
7-4 (2): R0 - You actually want to take damage at the beginning of the skip (when you are on the railing), because it perfectly 
                     sets you up for the jump 
8-3 (1): R0 - Make sure you prefectly stand on the rock (otherwise you won't make the jump)
8-4 (1): R4 - Follow the route, until you are on top of the part where you see the platform you want to jump down now. Walk 
                    slowly until you see Knack hitting a wall and jump slightly to the right around the wall: Either you will hit and 
                    edge you can jump off again or you will be pushed in by an invisible wall.
9-2 (1): R0 - Make sure to keep at least 1 Energy bar as the two axe enemies can easily kill you (also the magnet oneshots 
                    you). You have to kill yourself on the collector, otherwise you won't be able to get any metal.
9-3 (1): R0
10-1 (1): R0 - Try to do the backdash on the left side.
10-2 (1): R0
11-1 (1): R0 - You can fall off and die so be careful.
11-2 (1): R0
11-2 (1): R0 - Quite precise, but if you die there are sunstones right next to it, so you can farm Energy if you need it.
12-2 (1): R2 - Don't jump too far to the right or the game will kill you.
12-2 (2): R2 - Still haven't found a decent setup for it (soon tm). I always try jumping to the left after landing on it and then 
                       jumping front left (I wouldn't recommend anyone to go for it in a run).
12-3 (1): R0 - Only really worth it if you get it first try or want to save Energy
12-3 (2): R2 
12-3 (3): R2 - Remember to double jump/dash/attack after landing on the second edge. Jump top-left after going off screen 
                      (you can also die doing this skip). Only really worth doing it first try or to save Energy.
13-1 (1): R0
13-1 (2): R0
13-1 (3): R0
13-1 (4): R0
13-2 (1): R0
13-3 (1): R0 - Don't kill the enemies until you are up on top as you need them to get enough height/distance from attacking 
                       near the right one.
13-3 (2): R0
13-3 (3): R0
13-3 (4): R0
13-4 (1): R0 - This setup gives me 60-70% success rate. Line up where I'm standing walk a bit and then dash/jump/dash 
                       straight (If he pushes you out on the back the skip sometimes won't work and you have to do it again from the 
                       start). If you get stuck between the structure and his barrier try to get up on the right and jump to the back to 
                       your death and you should spawn at the top. This skip pretty much skips all of 13-4.

https://youtu.be/D-ybaWLX9r4

2-1 (1): R1 - You have to jump of the last invisible wall to get oob (Level Only)
2-2 (1): R0 - (Level Only)
2-3 (1): R0 - When jumping to the first gate, jump to the front and dash attack to the back like in the clip
2-4 (1): R0 - (Level Only?)
2-4 (2): R0 - (Level Only)
3-4 (1): R0 - Jump a bit to the left of the middle to get a better chance of getting up. After that just jump straight forward (there is a gap you'll have to jump over to not get pushed back in)
3-4 (2): R0
4-4 (1): R0 - Don't instantly backdash after the double jump (can be a bit tricky). When you get on the ledge make sure to walk a bit forward before jumping again to not hit the top (when on top be careful to not get pushed back in like i nearly did). You can do the same on the left side but since the enemies spawn there it's not a safe setup.
5-1 (1): R0 - You need the relics a bit further along the way (auto pickup) (Level Only)
5-2 (1): R0 - Position yourself a bit to the left, jump straight and then slightly dash attack to the right (You can also stay oob longer and skip the cutscene, but there's a risk of dying)
5-3 (1): R0 - Get all the relics in the room and when you're on the last ledge make sure to walk off a bit before jumping
5-3 (2): R0 -  Get everything in the room before (can be done without 5-3 (1))
5-3 (3): R0 - The clip is a bit missleading since something on the wall didn't spawn which makes the skip seem easier (this skip can softlock you. There is a way to kys but you will go back to 5-3 (1) so i wouldn't go for it)
5-4 (1): R? - I take all relics in the big room, but never checked how many you need exactly
5-4 (2): R? - You can just double jump dash attack over it (needs 5-4 (1))
5-4 (3): R? - When you are up double jump once to the left and then double jump dash attack to the left as well (needs 5-4 (2)
6-2 (1): R0
6-2 (2): R0 - Clearer on where to back dash than the first video 
7-2 (1): R3 - (Level Only)
7-2 (2): R2 - (Level Only)
7-3 (1): R0
7-4 (1): R0 - Once up just move to the right (Level Only)
8-1 (1): R0 - Very precise movement to not die / get pushed in bounce (Level Only)
8-3 (1): R0
8-3 (2): R0
8-4 (1): R0
9-2 (1): R0
9-2 (2): R1 - (Level Only)
9-2 (3): R0
10-1 (1): R0 - Make sure to trigger a camera change once you are oob
10-1 (2): R0 - You'll still need to trigger the cutscene 
10-1 (3): R0
12-1 (1): R3 - (Level Only)
12-2 (1): R3 - Do exactly what I do and the camera won't change, but it also means the longer version is impossible (due to the game killing you earlier)
12-2 (2): R4 - (Level Only?)
12-2 (3): R3
13-2 (1): R0 - You have to jump extremly late 
13-3 (1): R0
13-3 (2): R0 - (Level Only?)

https://youtu.be/IfMQ7m_NSNI

3-4 (1): R0
4-1 (1): R0
4-3 (1): R0 - Try not to dash to go to the left, otherwise enemies won't spawn
4-3 (2): R0
4-3 (3): R0 - Skips the cutscene
5-2 (1): R2 - I like to use this route without the other 5-2 skip before it, because I want the relics from the vehicle you skip. I also destroy the vehicle in the arena just before this skip to make it fairly easy
5-2 (2): R0 - Get on top of the platform on the left and then walk into the rock in the direction of the platform, until it feels like you are rob. Then just jump/dash/attack to the right and you should get it every time. With this skip you can jump over every gate, until the elevator cutscene.
5-3 (1): R? - Use energy to destroy the 3 rings in the room (make sure to take all relics from the 3 lanes as well)
5-4 (1): R1 - The setup in the video is a bit outdated (check IL run for gate skip (Any% / NG+ DISCLAIMER: I did the skip 3 times and the setup was different for each one, so I don't know how it works))
6-2 (1): R? - Easier to the left, but a bit slower
6-2 (2): R? - Make sure to jump/dash/attack to the left after the second back dash
7-1 (1): R1 - As far as we know it"s pure rag to get over the wall (just wiggle your left stick around and pray)
7-4 (1): R0 
7-4 (2): R0 - Make sure you get over the invisible wall on the left. When the camera changes just move up-right
9-3 (1): R1 
9-3 (2): R1
13-1 (1): R0 - Faster way found (check IL run)
13-3 (1): R0 - Faster version of the old skip. After getting on top walk a little up and then jump/dash/attack up

https://youtu.be/oFGrRxrhDY4

Guide soon

If you want to find more skips here is a video of oob's I couldn't find a use for (for some we already found skips)

https://youtu.be/alloCR2mXvQ

If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask me.

Name	Author
Animation Cancels	Tayro778 2 years ago
Farming Gadgets / Diamonds reliable	Drint 6 years ago
How to Fly	Elat 1 year ago
How to use Co-Op effectively	Tayro778 2 years ago
Journey to Knack Any% wr	AGenderFox 7 years ago
Journey to Knack NG+ wr	AGenderFox 7 years ago
Knack Speedrun Guide	Drint 5 years ago