Individual Techniques

Lilac:Techniques specific to Lilac

Carol:Techniques specific to Carol

Milla:Techniques specific to Milla

General Mechanics

Zips

When a character is inside a wall, the game will usually try to eject the character out of that wall. In Freedom Planet's case, the player will generally be 'ejected' directly upwards(rather than the standard backwards that most other games use). This is particularly noticeable on the disappearing blocks in Pangu Lagoon and Final Dreadnought 4. The game's tendency to push players upwards limits the usefulness of zips in Freedom Planet, as it is rare for desirable locations to be directly above you.

There are a handful of useful zips, but since each character performs them differently, they will be discussed in the individual characters' pages.

Air Friction

Air Friction is what slows you down in the air.

The rules for air friction in this game are very simple - If you are airborne and moving upwards(at any angle), then your horizontal speed will decrease until it reaches your character's normal running speed. If you're travelling flat horizontal or lower, your speed will be maintained.

Certain techniques, however, will completely negate air-friction for the duration of the jump - Lilac's Dive Kick, Carol's Boost-Jump, and Milla's Super Shield Burst.

Slopes

Since characters cannot simply run to their top speeds, slopes become an important source of momentum.

Obviously, running downhill will speed you up, and running uphill will slow you down, however if you land on a downhill slope, your downwards momentum will be converted to forwards momentum at a ratio depending on the angle of the slope. Conversely, slamming down into an uphill slope will pretty much stop you dead in your tracks.

This also works somewhat in reverse; Jumping from a slope can drastically affect your jump height & arc; jumping from an uphill slope at high speed will drastically increase your jump height, and jumping while running quickly downhill can have you jumping flat horizontally(which is actually ideal, as it will push you further forwards and ignore air-friction in the process)

Momentum Stacking

If you do two things that push you in the same or similar directions at the same time, the game will add the 2 momentums together. Since deceleration is linear, this nets you a huge speed or height boost.

For example, if Lilac uses Cyclone at the same moment as hitting an upwards-facing spring, it will send her much higher than the added height of a spring and a cyclone; Usually about twice as high as the spring would normally have sent her.

Damage Thresholds

This is the way most bosses work in regards to health. They take a specific amount of "damage" and when that amount of damage is done the boss takes a "hit" Some bosses also require parts to be broken that each have their own damage thresholds. "Damage" dealt by the player is determined by what moves they use to hit the boss, but going over the threshold will still deal a single hit. A few bosses have this threshold set to one, and any damage taken will deal a "hit". In most cases upon passing a threshold a boss has a longer set of invincibility. Other bosses only require one threshold to be reached to be killed.

Let's look at an example of Mantalith in Relic Maze as Carol to explain the thresholds. To complete one phase of the fight, both arms must be broken and then the eyes must be broken. This must occur 5 times, so we can say it takes 5 hits to beat Mantalith. The arms each have a set amount of damage they take before they break, which increases in the third phase. As soon as this threshold is reached, the arm will break off. When the head comes down it also requires a set amount of damage to break. Using Carol as an example the head takes either four hits from her kicks or a single Wild Claw. Going over the threshold on the head does not do additional damage and will always apply only 1 out of the 5 "hit"s required to kill Mantalith.

Hitboxes and Hurtboxes

Hitboxes and hurtboxes work in weird ways, and an attempt to explain them will be below.

Enemies

Enemies have 3 states for their hurtboxes, and 3 potential different hitboxes:

Hurtboxes:

Hurtboxes refer to the areas that a target can take damage. For instance Robo-Panther's only hurtbox is its head. There are three separate states that hurtboxes may be in with regards to enemies taking damage.

Normal:

This is the neutral state of most enemies. In this state the enemy is able to be readily damaged. This will be the most familiar state.

Intangible:

This usually occurs when damage thresholds are in effect. When an enemy is flashing after taking a hit and is unable to take damage, this is referred to as Intangible. Attempting to hit a hurtbox in this state will do nothing and waiting until the hurtbox is back to normal is the only option.

Invincible:

The state in which a hurtbox can not take damage, but hits will still connect. Attacking one of these hurtboxes produces a distinct clanking noise, and causes a substanial amount of hitlag during which your character appears to slow down. Attacking one of these boxes also puts the character into a "clanking" state themselves which will be explained later. An example of this type of hurtbox would be Mantalith's head when the eyes are yellow.

Hitboxes:

Hitboxes are the areas covered by attacks an enemy puts out, and how they interact upon encountering the character in the various states they may be in. There are also 3 types of hitboxes that act differently.

Normal:

The most common hitbox by far, and likely the most familiar one. These hitboxes hit the character as long as the character is in a normal state, but will not hit a character in the hitstun, invincible or clanking states.

Combo:

These hitboxes are different in that they will hit a character directly out of hitstun being able to preform a chainstun of sorts. The perfect example of these are the DNA cannon shots. These attacks cannot affect a character in the clanking state or invincible state

Transcendent:

This style of hitbox can hit the character even in the clanking state, but still will not hit the character if they are invincible. These hitboxes are extremely rare, occurring perhaps only five times in the game. Those times are: Trap Hideout lasers, Trap Hideout's first miniboss, Serpentine's purple bullets(as they head upwards), the FD4 laser, and Brevon3's throw. Brevon's throw is unique in that it will hit regardless of the character's state.

It is worth noting that while these attacks cannot hit you while invincible, some of them(the FD4 laser in particular) are capable of removing the invincibility state from you, meaning that for all intents and purposes, it really does hit through invincibility.

Characters

The character can be in four states at any given moment in regards to their hurtbox:

Normal:

The natural hitbox, occurs anytime that another state is not happening. In this state colliding with a hitbox of any kind will cause the character to take damage and be placed in the hitstun state.

Hitstun:

After being hit the character plays a sound and an animation. During this state normal hitboxes cannot affect the character, and the state lasts for a short time after the animation is finished. This state is the reason that things such as spikes don't instantly stunlock a player to death. Combo hitboxes and transcendent hitboxes can still affect the character in this state. After a short time in this state the character will return to the normal state.

Being thrown by Brevon places the character in an odd state where they are essentially in a hitstun state regardless of what state they were in. It plays the animation for being in hitstun and if the character was in a clanking or invincible state it will disable it.

Invincible:

This state occurs either by breaking an invincibility crystal, or preforming Lilac's Dragon Boost. In this state the character can collide with any hitbox except Brevon's throw without being affected. There are occasional strange exceptions, such as the FD4 laser's ability to remove(but not damage through) the invincibility state.

Clanking:

This state is somewhat of an oddity and may perhaps only be a theory. When a character attacks an invincible hitbox they are placed briefly in this state. While in this state The character can only be hit by transcendent hitboxes. The state tends to last an extremely short amount of time. Usually, the only ways to make normal clanking useful are with Lilac's Cyclone or Carol's Roll. This is only useful on a select few enemies such as the spiky hardhats, and the mines in battle glacier

There are however two ways to enter this state for an extended period.

First is Carol's kicks. Carol's kicks place her directly into this state for as long as she is kicking, essentially making her invincible while kicking except for a few exceptions. This leads to some confusion about the kicks being called I-frames, but the transcendent hitboxes will still hit Carol as she kicks. Those hitboxes are very rare however, and using the kicks to block attacks is extremely powerful.

Second is with Brevon. His knife has a very odd property where certain attacks can hit it as if it were an invulnerable hurtbox. If the knife is hit properly though it places the character into the clanking state for an extended period of time. This state will not end by naturally placing the character back into the normal state, instead the character must be forced into another state. The most common ways for this to happen is either Dragon Boosting or being grabbed by Brevon. While in this state Brevon functionally cannot hurt the player.