IMPORTANT WALL OF TEXT @Doodletones !

First of all, I'd like for us to iron out a clear definition of what is out of bounds in this game.

In order to maybe open a few talking points I'm posting a video below that showcases some examples of jumping over obstacles.

So let's think about it for a bit and play devil's advocate

1. Only the ocean is OOB: Since the playable area is an island, we could consider that everything out of the boundaries of the island, i.e the ocean, to be out of bounds. This rules most of the current Any% route. However, this doesn't rule out the Fence skip where you land on the side of the moutain. Like here (timestamped)

2. You are only considered OOB if you land and touch the out of bounds ground. This excludes the old Fence skip mentionned above. This means flying above out of bounds areas is considered inbounds since you shoot up and land from and to inbounds areas. Like here (timestamped)

3. Ban the collision jump glitch (CJG) altogether In that particular case, this doesn't prevent you at all from going out of bounds during the prologue by squeezing yourself inbetween the stone fence and the wooden shack. You'd have to find ways to get back on the map without CJG somewhere else than Brennan's Folly beach because you'd be locked behind the fence.

3.5) Ban both CJG AND walking on out of bounds areas This should cover every single trick found in the game. This would basically be just puzzle solving, which doesn't require skill or anything. This would basically defeat the purpose of speedrunning this category, because it would be like trying to make the speedrun slower by any means necessary; which in my opinion is contrary to what speedrunning stands for.

Any of these options would lead to renaming the category accordingly and stating what is or isn't allowed in the rules.

I can't think of any more possibilities to raise at the moment but allow me give my personnal opinion about this matter. I'm currently all for the 2nd option because it's the one that makes the more sense considering how MM works as a speedgame.

However, defining what areas are out of bounds might be tricky sometimes. So I re-recorded the tricks I showcased in the first video of this very post, except I intentionnally messed them up (because it can very easily happen in runs depending on the amount of air you get). You can easily compare with my very first video. n°1 AND n°2

In both videos, I purposefully land on "out of bounds" areas before quickly going back inbounds. What do you think of these instances ? Are they bannable ? Do you think you should just clear every jump without landing at all on out of bounds surfaces ?

Also, to me, the pipe we walk on at the wooden bridge section is technically out of bounds :O you don't really walk on it, you walk on invisible geometry and getting back inbounds is wonky as hell. So, depending on how we decide what is allowed and what isn't, you might have to clear the entire gap and land back inbounds instead of using the pipe to cross the water below.

One last thing, here is a small clip I found on Fisherman's Beach for inbounds and 100%. This one is straightforward and uncontrovertial :)

I suppose everyone here is familiar with how speedrunning communities tend to time their runs. There are common rules that runners follow as much as possible when it's feasible. Usually runners go for 1st player input and last player input. For Montague's Mount timing runs that way is not only possible but it is also the most logical way of doing things considering the tradition of speedrunning.

That's why I'd like to change the rules regarding how to time Montague's Mount runs. start: when the player gets control of his character (on the beach, as soon as you can move forward, or if you're looking at the cane, as soon as the eye icon appears). end: when the player clicks on the piece of paper inside the safe, thus give away control of his character (when the "hand" crosshair disappears).

So i've messed around with Dream a bit to see what it was all about. I understand the basic structure of the game with the dreams/nightmares.

True Any% aims at reaching the last Black Portal before it disappears. (you get a specific "broken" ending) Now, knowing that you can do the same for the Resort portal, would it be allowed to blindly manage to access Resort, complete it and then go to the Black Portal ? I'm guessing this would trigger the Bedlamite ending right (that's different from the bugged True Any% ending) ? Or do you require Bedlamite runs to have accessed every single main Dream in the game ? I think that the endings you get should determine the categories and not some subjective parameters. What do you think ?

Also, one thing if you want your FPS to be uncapped (because it's annoying to be stuck at 61/62 fps): Go to Dream\Engine\Config\BaseInput.ini Look for bSmoothFrameRate=TRUE and change TRUE to FALSE Save the file and start the game to check if that worked.

I've looked around Resort with the debug console, and while it would be possible to get to the Nightmare portal using collision around the bridge, I have not yet found a way to get on top of either the huts or the collision that's above the fences preventing you from falling out of bounds.

One last thing. I've tried to replicate the elevator skip in Dream 2 but I just can't seem to do it properly. The doors of the Basement elevator do not open. I've tried following instructions in your tutorial found in the Guides section but it seems old. And I still don't know what button I'm supposed to be pressing when I'm on top of the elevator.

ps: If there is no way to skip the conveyor puzzle, I might just never run this game :D Unless what I talked about in the first paragraph is allowed. That would basically make Bedlamite only conveyor xD

So yesterday I messed around with this game a bit.

Our reference route for any% was this run by "Unimaginative Handle" () The problem is that their strats are super inconsistent, so I had to find out how we could still run this route, without having a reset heavy run solely dependent on luck.

Like I said, yesterday I found a new way to get out of bounds in the prologue. Probably slightly slower than the old technique (even though I'm not that certain) but WAY more consistent.

Then today I started tackling the BIG ONE, Fence skip. The way Unimaginative Handle does it is optimal but neither Doodletones or I could replicate it consistently. So I found a new way to do it. Just rub against the invisible wall and when you reach the edge of the rock it should shoot you up. I don't know what effects height although I suspect that when rubbing against the wall you must be accumulating speed that then gets transfered to upwards mouvement when you get shot up.

Then I found a brand new skip, called "Epilogue skip" that allows the player to avoid watching the 2 minutes cutscene before accessing the safe at the top of the epilogue tower. In the video I line myself up aligned with the staircase handlebar, then I orient myself towards the begining of the letter N, lock my orientation with RightMouseButton, then rub against the edge of the staircase

I'm currently uploading a video of a "new" glitch that works almost in the same way the quick save/load (QSL) collision glitch does.

It's a QSL glitch that doesn't involve collision but that allows you to skip the intro sequence in the Institute. This skips 40 seconds if executed on the first try. However, this fucks up the Quick Load trick used later on in the Rembrandt room. So all in all, this isn't useful, YET. If we'd be able to find a way to make both tricks work at the same time, this would bring the time down 40 seconds.

Will update once the video is up.

EDIT:

If you try to quick save at the very end of the initial load, then quick load, you'll eventually skip the intro cutscene. I'm not sure how this works exactly but I know what it does. It allows you to save the game in this portion of the game (not normally possible), and it messes up with the Rembrandt sequence at the end of the level. I don't know why that is, but here is the glitch anyway.

This thread will be used to discuss categories and rules around each of them. Use common sense when submitting ideas. This will define the framework of The Occupation as a speedgame.

I will open this thread myself with a brainstorm around the Any% category of the game. I'm currently in touch with the game developpers (White Paper Games) to learn more about how the game is made and how it works, so I shall update this post once I know more about the inner workings of The Occupation.

As far as we know right now, the fastest way to finish the game is to fail every single investigation and then make a beeline for the end. This is of course because the game runs in real-time within these "investigation" levels and there is no known way to trigger the interviews before the one hour mark.

This Any% run leads to one of the 4 endings possible. You can find this ending in the games' files under the name "Failed Objective". The last cinematic's headlines read: Alex Dubois exonerated, Espionnage! Journalist Harvey Miller on trial, Scarlet Carson on trial, Union Act PASSED

I won't get in the details of the 3 other endings before I talk to the devs. I have some idea of how they each work but I'd like to have confirmation on how everything work before thinking about how to define their Any%/100% runs.

One last thing. And it's quite important. I've discovered a glitch that if used in a certain level leads to some kind of "wrong warp" to the very last after credits level "Harvey Miller's Flat". Before you enter that level, the message "Your investigation is complete. Feel free to exit when you're ready". Without giving too much away, this would make this any% wrong warp category less than 10 minutes long.

There exists an interesting out of bounds in the Redux version of the game PC | PS4. The trick/Oob/sequence break was posted in 2015 on Speed Demos Archive (a speedrunning website that was pretty active back then) by user Pewable. Here is the video If you are too lazy to go read the description of the video on youtube, here it is, explaining out the oob and clip were performed.

"Too lazy to explain how I found it so I will just explain what is happening at the end. There is no way to clip the ceiling to be next to the crystal, so I had to find another way. When you go to the hub (by pressing Δ when playing on the PS4 controller) then go back to the game, she (the character) will look in front of her and everything will be fine. But if you sit down while in the hub, move your viewpoint around, then go back to the game, she will look where she was looking in the hub. So, I found out that by looking down while sitting down, the fact that you are not looking where you are supposed to + the fact that the game is lagging a lot because of what you are asking it to show you, will make you clip the floor (be careful where you do it or you will be stuck forever). Maybe I am making half of it up, I don't know, but it works. That's it for the explanation. I don't know the game at all so maybe we can use this OOB to go somewhere else, I will try to play the game without glitching it before then take a look again. I am not very happy about the OOB using the tree because it's really easy, but the second glitch... It's a beautiful one, I mean, to sit down to glitch!"

I have tested the OOB myself on PC it works. However, I couldn't get the clip to work at the end. It might be tied to the PS4 version of the game tagging @Stefan78987 (who has the WR for all ribbons on the PS4) because he might be able to test it, or include it in his runs.

Ether One (PC, normal version) Category: 100% Detail: all ribbons, knocker pieces, projectors, answering machines, plaques and photos.

This will be the space where we brainstorm and post videos of tries/PBs/strats and discuss routes and stuff. Welcome !