Bastion
From SDA Knowledge Base
This game has a run page on SDA!- Overview
- Bastion is an isometric action game made by Supergiant Games(Bastion, Transistor) and originally released on the XBLA in 2011. The game is now also available on PC, iOS and will be ported to the PS4 and PS Vita in 2015.
- Welcome to the Bastion Speedrun Knowledge Base
- The aim of these wiki pages is to store up-to-date information on Bastion speedrunning - techniques, strategies, routes and glitches for all categories.
- It is not meant to be replace existing tutorials - it will hopefully be more up-to-date and will contain more in-depth explanations to facilitate gaining better understanding of the game's mechanics for future and existing runners, but it is still recommended to start out with a video tutorial to quickly learn the basics of the speedrun, and then come back here to learn the most current strategies and expand your knowledge.
Contents
Community information
- Leaderboards
- http://speedrun.com/bastion
- Make an account to submit your times! Note that submissions will have to be approved by Cereth or Vulajin before becoming visible.
The IRC channel and the SDA thread are great places to ask questions, also feel free to provide feedback on this knowledge base there:
- IRC channel
- irc.speedrunslive.com - #bastion
- SDA Bastion thread
- https://forum.speeddemosarchive.com/post/bastion.html
- Versions
- Currently the fastest version of the game is the PC one due to availability of mouse movement, which is faster than other control schemes. No patch is faster or slower, and all techniques used in the speedrun work in all of them.
Speedrunning the game
Learning
One of the best things about Bastion runs is their great learning curve. If you're just starting out, you can learn the basics of your category and try to complete a couple of runs while following the general route; then start learning, and incorporating into your runs, more advanced techniques and strategies.
Starting with a NG+ category is not recommended, as these are mostly more challenging and require the ability to perform some difficult tricks.
Timing a Bastion speedrun
The time starts when you gain control of the Kid; you can set up your split program to start at -1.1 seconds and start it at the same time as you press to make the Kid get up. If the Kid in your game gets up automatically for whatever reason, you need to set your timer to start at -18.4 for NG and -20.0 for NG+.
Time ends when you select an ending in the Heart of the Bastion.
Load times and cutscenes are included in the timing. Loading screens are nearly the same length for almost everyone(about ~4.4 seconds) and have insignificant of up to 7 frames.
An important thing is making sure that your game is running at full speed. The way you can test if it does is time how fast can you pick up the Cael Hammer after gaining control of the Kid; if that time is around 13.5 seconds, then you're fine. If it takes longer than that, you need to play with your display options(VSync, Fullscreen mode, Resolution).
One solution to the game running too slowly that ISN'T recommended is using the -nofixedstep launch option. This might help you run the game at full speed, but most likely will in some way break your game - causing lag, freezing or unacceptably broken physics.
Categories
- There exist four different categories of Bastion, differentiated by NG/NG+ and ASL/any%.
- NG ASL - Complete all story levels (Proving Grounds not required) on New Game mode.
- NG+ ASL - Complete all story levels (Proving Grounds not required) on New Game Plus mode.
- NG Any% - Complete New Game mode as quickly as possible.
- NG+ Any% - Complete New Game Plus mode as quickly as possible.
- (NG = New Game, NG+ = New Game Plus, ASL = All Story Levels)
- Currently Any% categories are usually 13-15 minutes long, and ASL runs are around 3 times longer at 45-50 minutes
Any% categories include duplicating cores. All Story Levels forbid that, as it would prevent you from accessing(and thus completing) Tazal Terminals.
Routes
NG and NG+ Any% Routes
NG and NG+ ASL Routes
Basic Gameplay Mechanics
Techniques
Item Duplication
The biggest glitch in the any% categories, makes it possible to sequence break the game and skip 2/3rds of it. To execute it you need to interact twice with an item you can pick up(Core, Shard, Upgrade Material) within a very short time window, which will cause it to get picked up twice(also giving you the experience for collecting that item twice). The only way to consistently achieve this effect is to bind the "Use\Interact" key to the mouse wheel and quickly scroll it while standing next to the item. The result is that if you duplicate a core or a shard, while in the Bastion you will have to interact with the Monument twice, and more levels than usual will get unlocked.
After picking up 14 cores/shards(so duping 7 of them - duping a core will give you a shard) the end of the game will be triggered, even though you didn't finish the Tazal Terminals.
Clips
Sometimes, with clever application of rolls, it is possible to get through or around some of Bastion's walls in a reasonably speedy fashion. In fact, nearly all walls and gates in the game can be clipped through, often skipping certain fights, switches or letting you take a shorter route through the level. There is no specific technique to get through every single "nearly-solid" obstacle(even though it always includes rolling), therefore each specific clip will be explained in the individual level pages.
Text Skips
When after collecting certain numbers of shards/cores you use the Skyway for the first time in the Bastion to open the map, Rucks will start saying something and as long as he's speaking, even though you can select the next level on the map, you won't be able to Fly to it. Fortunately, there is a mechanic in the game that prevents Rucks from talking over himself; if he's already speaking, he can't start another narration line. If you get Rucks to talk while you access the Skyway, he won't start his Skyway narration(hence the "text skip") and you'll be able to immediately Fly to a level, thus saving time. Since there is a lot of differences in what happens in the Bastion in any% and ASL, the methods to perform specific text skips are explained on the route pages.
Camera Glitch
Let's just say that the pipe is magical and leave it at that
[coming soon]
Pike Vaulting
[coming soon]
Other Glitches
Jaunting
[coming soon]
Black Screen Glitch
[coming soon]
Softlocks
[coming soon]
Individual Levels Pages
This will be a category of pages that will form a knowledge base on completing each Bastion level in a speedrun, in all categories.
Each of these will eventually be accompanied by a recording of the level being done in both NG and NG+. These videos will not necessarily have perfectly optimized movement, but should correctly execute all of the current strategies and techniques. If anyone wishes to contribute recordings that are higher quality, are better played, or contain updated strats they are welcome to.
Other Resources
Remember that no tutorial is ever fully up to date - Always watch a couple of the most current runs at the top of the leaderboards to gain a better understanding of the speedrun.
LawyerDog's NG ASL tutorial
The most out of date tutorial, but in general it's still a great resource that every runner should watch at some point, even if you're only running any% categories.
Vulajin's Tutorials
Out of date routes, but lots of detail about individual level strats that are still relevant.
Up to date as of September 2014, intended to be a companion to LawyerDog's tutorial.
SnowySnowWolf's NG any% tutorial
Up to date as of October 2014, good overview of the NG any% route.
Red_Buddha's NG+ File
Very convenient if you want to run NG+ categories. Has full upgrades on the Scrap Musket, Brusher's Pike, Cael Hammer and the Fang Repeater.
"Ok here is my ng+ file it only has the hammer, repeater, pike, and musket so if you use the mortar you would have to go get that yourself.
same thing as vulajin said just change the number to be whatever profile you want it to be."
