Difference between revisions of "Beginners Route"

Revision as of 07:16, 3 December 2025

What Every Super Metroid Speedrunner Should Know

Running this game can be fun! It can just be a casual way to enjoy a game you already like. There are strategies to skip parts of the game (making the run shorter) and some of them are fairly easy to do with practice. Much of this wiki uses technical terms familiar to hardcore runners of Super Metroid. This page will endeavor to be light on jargon or at least link to information about the jargon. If you don't understand a word, search it on this wiki -- it might be explained!

Before you run, get a handle on:

• Saving / save states -- dying without saving is a run killer and a mood killer. Use save states (emulator / practice hack) or save rooms while you're still learning.
• Practice hack -- has many useful features, though the HUD is confusing (can be configured to a near(?) unmodded HUD). You need to decide if you're using the practice hack before you start your run. It uses a totally different ROM (game file) than the normal game.
• Control Schemes -- Set your own control scheme based on what makes sense for you. You can switch later, the choice is not permanent
• Although not acceptable in any leaderboards, you can try the Control Freak hack if you want an (arguably) more intuitive control scheme. You can still practice routing with Control Freak, but you won't be able to learn some of the precise inputs of vanilla Super Metroid because the controls are different. User:Big_Head_Mode enjoys Control Freak and vanilla/Practice Hack and does casual routes in each.

Route

This is very beginner-friendly Any% KPDR route. It's an easier version of Nintendo Power%. This page was originally created by User:UNHchabo. Occasionally we use North/South/East/West to correspond to the Top/Bottom/Right/Left side of the game world.

Full Route

These are the splits from UNHchabo's split file, with their times in (parenthesis). They are in order and correspond to the above video.

You probably want every "safety" described on the KPDR page. (TODO: Some safeties are definitely already in the route. Is every safety in the route? If so, delete this whole paragraph.)

Steps that deviate from the video are in bold.

1. Enter Ridley's Chamber (16.08s)
2. Finish Ridley (26.52s)
3. Ceres Escape (18.12s)
4. Can practice mockballs here at Landing Site. It's the easiest room in the game to practice before you can use them for Early Supers Room. There may be practice setups in the practice hack.
5. Blue Brinstar (41.22s)
6. Morph Ball (10.75s)
7. First Missiles (10.75s)
8. Blue Brinstar Missiles (10.72s)
9. Back to Crateria (16.07s)
10. Bombs (1m09.23s)
11. Bomb Torizo (23.58s)
12. Terminator E-Tank (29.78s)
13. Green Brinstar (15.25s)
14. Charge Missiles (39.78s)
15. Charge Beam (04.82s)
16. Can mockball to skip Spore Spawn. Even with several failed attempts at the mockball, it will still be faster than fighting Spore Spawn. If you forgot to practice at Landing Site, you can practice one room south in Dachora Room when you enter.
17. Enter Spore Spawn Room (42.50s)
18. Spore Spawn (1m19.12s)
19. Spore Spawn Supers (25.40s)
20. Brinstar Reserve Tank Room (the next room over) is also a commonly-recommended safety if you need more health during the run than you currently pick up
21. Green Hill Missile (30.10s)
22. Spazer (45.08s)
23. Norfair Elevator (13.22s)
24. Hi-Jump E-Tank (14.00s)
25. Hi-Jump Boots (09.40s)
26. Hi-Jump Missiles (05.83s)
27. Back to Brinstar (20.77s)
28. Enter Kraid's Chamber (32.25s)
29. Kraid (35.20s)
30. Varia Suit (03.02s)
31. Kraid E-Tank (28.85s)
32. Norfair Elevator (12.43s)
33. Cathedral Missile (29.12s)
34. Lower Bubble Mountain Missile (24.75s)
35. Speed Missiles (2m00.15s)
36. Speed Booster (01.75s)
37. Wave Missiles (28.58s)
38. Wave Beam (05.73s)
39. Can backtrack North to the top of Bubble Mountain. From here, you can use the Bubble Mountain#Randomizer strat to damage boost to the Northwest Green Bubbles Missile Room. That also leads to Norfair Reserve Tank Room. Useful safety items? If you fall, you can just keep going towards Croc's Chamber. (3m0s)
40. Enter Croc's Chamber (48.13s)
41. Croc E-Tank (1m01.83s)
42. Crocomire (32.35s)
43. Post-Croc Power Bomb (12.03s)
44. Grapple Beam (21.33s)
45. Upper Bubble Mountain Missiles (2m33.25s)
46. Norfair Reserve (18.93s)
47. Hidden Missile (00.75s)
48. Ice Beam (1m01.40s)
49. Brinstar Elevator (35.78s)
50. Alpha Power Bombs (1m01.00s)
51. Power Bomb Missiles (18.07s)
52. Crateria Elevator (33.28s)
53. Moat Missiles (31.28s)
54. Enter Wrecked Ship (27.17s)
55. Enter Phantoon's Chamber (26.85s)
56. Phantoon (1m57.15s)
57. Wrecked Ship Left Supers (17.83s)
58. Gravity Suit (1m49.48s)
59. Elevator to Brinstar (25.83s)
60. Turtle E-Tank (2m00.00s)
61. Turtle Missiles (11.05s)
62. Crab Supers (43.23s)
63. Aqueduct Missile (28.02s)
64. Aqueduct Supers (02.18s)
65. Enter Botwoon's Room (27.93s)
66. Botwoon (35.05s)
67. Botwoon E-Tank (14.28s)
68. Precious Room Missiles (2m33.98s)
69. Enter Draygon's Chamber (08.28s)
70. Draygon (1m16.07s)
71. Space Jump (05.35s)
72. Plasma Beam (1m20.80s)
73. Back to Norfair (1m01.00s)
74. Lower Norfair Elevator (54.20s)
75. You don't need to fight Golden Torizo or get the Screw Attack. I'm not sure why this was recommended. It presumably leads to significant time savings and an easier run (screw attacking through enemies).
76. Enter GT Room (50.92s)
77. GT Missiles (02.48s)
78. Golden Torizo (30.25s)
79. Fireflea E-Tank (1m14.47s)
80. Enter Ridley's Chamber (1m41.28s)
81. Ridley (49.65s)
82. Ridley E-Tank (02.98s)
83. Exit Lower Norfair (1m31.30s)
84. Leave Norfair (44.42s)
85. Crateria via Everest (45.80s)
86. Golden Four (33.65s)
87. Baby Metroid Room (2m02.68s)
88. Bring enough missiles to kill Mother Brain 1. Don't softlock lol
89. Mother Brain's Room (1m11.53s)
90. Mother Brain 1 MB1 (43.78s)
91. Mother Brain 2 MB2 (1m35.32s)
92. Mother Brain 3 MB3 (1m27.32s)
93. Can Save the Animals during the escape (60s)
94. Escape Climb (38.70s)
95. RTA End (25.45s)
96. IGT End (10.93s)

Time Estimate

If you're finished the game a few times and can do an adequate job with intermediate techniques (single wall jump, Space Jump, Grapple Beam, shinespark) you should finish with an in-game timer well below 2:30 (h:mm). The example video clears at 0:59 (1:22 Real Time Attack) but the runner is experienced. With some meandering, and having beaten the game around 7 times prior, I got an IGT of 1:37 (RTA around 2:30) roughly following this route (but with Mockballs and skipping Crocomire and Golden Torizo).

Explanation

This video is a demonstration of a route that I think would be excellent for anyone who has played Super Metroid casually, and wants to do their first ever speedrun of the game. There is already an excellent beginners' tutorial by Mishrak, but that route has several techniques that you want to learn early on when speedrunning, but still might require some practice to get them reliably.

• This route assumes you can walljump, but have trouble chaining multiple walljumps together
• This route avoids mockballs entirely
• This route assumes you can shinespark vertically, but don't know how to do horizontal shinesparks
• This route assumes you don't know how to short charge the speed booster
• This run does one diagonal shinespark, but you could use the Grapple Beam to traverse Mt. Everest instead
• This route doesn't do the Zebetite Skip, so you need to pick up enough Missiles to destroy the Zebetites
• This run avoids Arm Pumping entirely. It's a "free" timesave, but I didn't want to introduce new runners to it in a video with no commentary, because then I can't explain why you want to avoid it on downward slopes.

I was inspired to create this video because of the recently-added Nintendo Power% category, which follows the route laid out in an issue of the magazine. The problem is that the route is very inconsistent in the skill level that it expects out of the player -- it makes you get Grapple Beam before you can pick up Wave Beam, even though that's a fairly simple walljump, but it expects you to get the Norfair Reserve Tank before Grapple Beam, which means you need to get there through either a very precise walljump, or by using a Damage Boost. This run collects largely the same set of items, but doesn't require even a moderate level of skill to do so. Compared with Nintendo Power%, this run collects one less missile pack (the Grapple missiles), skips Spring Ball, skips X-Ray, and collects one additional Energy Tank (the Fireflea E-Tank in Lower Norfair).

I uploaded my splits file here. I use the autosplitter script, which is included in LiveSplit. The Autosplit settings used for the video included splitting on every item pickup, as well as certain door transitions.

Caveats

A few mechanics I think may not come across by watching the video:

• Stop on a Dime -- There are many times during the run that I'm holding an angle button and tapping the d-pad to scooch Samus forward a small amount without wanting her momentum to carry her further. Also, you can hold an Angle button as a room loads in order to stop immediately
• Walljumping -- Many casual runners don't realize that the walljump inputs must be pressing away from the wall then jumping, and instead try to do those inputs simultaneously

Some mistakes that I made in the video:

• I really meant to turn on my input viewer when recording this, so you could see what buttons I'm pressing for any given move
• I left the room after grabbing the Alpha Power Bombs without grabbing the missiles behind the statue, so then I had to go back to get them
• I grabbed the Golden Torizo Supers before fighting Golden Torizo, which is a perfectly valid order to do it, but it's not what's reflected in my splits
• At the start of Mother Brain's Room the autosplitter splits twice. At the time this was a known bug that sometimes popped up, and it's since been fixed. Hitting the "Undo Split" button once put the timer back where it should be.

Variations

If you're already familiar with some tricks of the standard run, you can save a substantial amount of time over this route by implementing some aspects of Mishrak's route. Over time you can drop these safety items to speed up your route, as long as you're comfortably able to complete a run without that safety.

• Walljumping up Bubble Mountain is significantly faster than taking the long way through Volcano Room.
• If you're able to do the shinespark across The Moat, you can skip Grappling Beam, including the need to fight Crocomire. If you have trouble with the West Ocean shinespark or can't afford the health, you can just turn off Hi-Jump Boots and jump across those platforms
  • Hardest parts of not having Grappling Beam:
    • Crateria: shinespark across The Moat
    • Maridia: wall jumping up overhangs OR jumping on frozen Mochtroids (see Colosseum), consecutive wall-jumps, shinespark "needed" for Energy Tank in Mama Turtle Room (you can skip this)
    • Skipping the Grappling Beam also means that you'll need to kill Draygon with some other method, such as the "Beginner" strategy listed on Draygon's page
• If you are still getting Grappling Beam, it's faster to walljump up Post Crocomire Shaft than going through the Grapple Tutorial rooms
• If you can do the Zebetite Skip, you can skip several missile packs, which can save substantial time from both traversing to the location, and the item fanfare (a rough guess is that a beginner needs around 80 Missiles and 15 Super Missiles to get through Mother Brain 1 without the Zebetite Skip [see Mother Brain Room])