Agata Bridge Skip
Note: This page describes a glitch, trick, or exploit. To see others, click here.
Explanation
Progression from Agata Forest to Taka Pass is blocked by a wide river which cannot be swum through due to the rapid current. Casually, you are intended to complete Tsuta Ruins and a minigame with Kokari and Susano to place a log bridge across the river, allowing you to cross. If Ammy touches the water even for a frame, she will be dragged away and void out, losing half a unit of health and getting placed back on solid ground. The river is too wide to simply jump across, regardless of the timing or angle of approach, but there are no other barriers preventing runners from reaching Taka Pass early.
Getting across the river allows runners to skip a few other things, saving minutes of time in total:
- The bridge minigame itself is skipped, as one can return to Agata later via the mermaid spring.
- You can leave Tsuta Ruins immediately after obtaining Vine, skipping the Spider Queen fight.
- If you leave Agata without fishing with Kokari, then return after fighting Tei in Kusa Village, when you attempt to fish for the Whopper, the game will spawn the Giant Salmon instead (requiring 1 fewer PS), but will still give Ammy Crescent, start the Ume fight, and give Ammy the Tsuta key afterwards. This means that 1 fishing minigame is totally skipped.
In NG+
By doing a Liquid KT you can skip finishing Tsuta Ruins and get to Taka Pass early. The difficulty in this specific KT is in the fact that it's harder to see how close Ammy is to the water because of all the white water, zooming the camera out does help. Going to far to the left side of the broken bridge on the other side will also push you back into the water, making you drown instantly.
Demonstration: https://youtu.be/6zAyWckl-58?t=787
In NG
There only one known way to simply jump across the river without touching the water, regardless of the movement tech employed (including Slope Storage and Air Ground Tackle). PR Move is a new game technique that can cross the river, but it is highly volatile in a speedrun setting. Instead, glitches can be employed to block the cutscene of Ammy being swept away by the river. By interrupting the cutscene of successfully bringing a ball-shaped object (Cabbage, Walnut, or Wasp Nest) to Sleepy the bear with another cutscene, it's possible to force the game into a state where Ammy is treated as being in a cutscene while the player has control. This allows her to simply swim across the river.
Demonstration: https://youtu.be/vPgBrd6I-g8
The method is roughly as follows:
- Bring a ball (the cabbage is closest) just outside Sleepy's trigger.
- Push the ball against the torch at the edge of the trigger.
- Power Slash the torch and push the ball into a position such that the torch will push it into the trigger when respawns 10s after being PS'd.
- This is the most precise part of the trick, as the margin for error is extremely small given the fickle nature of ball physics.
- Before the torch respawns, position Ammy in front of the bench next to the torch so that the Examine dialogue appears.
- The textbox for collecting an item does not work, as this freezes the ball and torch, unlike regular dialogue which allows the torch to respawn and push the ball.
- Any NPC or examine dialogue can work, but the only really usable dialogues for this trick (being reachable within 10s) are examining either of the two treasure bulbs on lake level below Sleepy. Note that, to access these buds, you must have already defeated Waka (or cleared his trigger by reloading the map somehow after blooming the Agata Sapling), and must not have Bloomed a bud before (or else Issun's dialogue won't be available).
- Without moving Ammy, perform a Brush Adventure to the cursed patch by Kokari, but do not Bloom it yet.
- Release the brush and quickly press the bark button to examine or talk to whatever Ammy is in front of.
- Wait until the torch has respawned by counting out 10s (accounting for any time spent between Power Slashing the torch and performing the Brush Adventure), then close the dialogue using either the Bark or Dig button while holding the brush button.
- Bloom the cursed patch
- Sleepy's cutscene will play, but be immediately interrupted by the cursed patch restoration cutscene. Skip it.
- You will have control over the camera, but not Ammy. Brush and draw a dot tree near Ammy to attract the hares that spawn from the restored patch.
- Feed the rabbits an Herb feedbag, then skip the feeding cutscene. This will give you control of Ammy while maintaining the cutscene-blocking effect of the Sleepy cutscene.
- Go to the river and swim across.
History
- The method of Agata Bridge Skip used in NG is called Half Blue Skip, after community member Half Blue who documented most of the behavior of Walking While Talking and related glitches, including those pertaining to Sleepy. An RTA-viable setup for the trick was discovered by Auride on 27 November 2020.
Trivia
- This trick has been failed at least once during both SGDQ13 and SGDQ17 making failing the trick sometimes be called "Doing an SGDQ13/17"