Fish Tank Climb

Fish Tank Climb is a term used to refer to climbing Fish Tank from the bottom left to Mt. Everest without Gravity Suit, Hi-Jump Boots, Spring Ball, Ice Beam, or shinesparking.

This is required in a number of esoteric low% categories, like 14% GrappleChargeless and 14% Pb-Pb. It is used in the current 13% TAS, and is required in a number of theoretical low% categories. The fact it is possible simplifies analysis for low% versions of other categories.

General Method

The general method is to get caught in the door unusually high, but while standing. This can be done due to the slope tile immediately above the door.

From here, you can jump and begin single-wall underwater walljumping. The initial jump will be a Flatley from the door shell.

After an appropriate resting point is reached, the fish is killed.

Single-wall underwater walljumping is again used, to reach the top ledge.

Then, the door is shot. A jump is performed, and single-wall underwater walljumping is used to get to the door transition.

NTSC vs PAL

PAL can jump from the door to the wall on the right side directly. This makes this "simple" to do on PAL with L+R Walljumping, although very long, since it is just a right wall climb.

Due to lower jump height, NTSC cannot make it all the way to the right wall. It must, instead, do a left wall climb. Due to a tile being mislabeled as solid instead of slope, this has to be done higher than it may visually appear. It is a short climb, but this small amount of left wall makes this much harder on NTSC.

Is L+R Needed?

This strategy "only" requires single-wall underwater walljumping. The surface of the water is never broken. Thus, strictly speaking, left and right never have to be pressed simultaneously.

However, to do this without pressing left and right simultaneously would require extremely fast switches between left and right. It seems unlikely that this could be accomplished by a human on unmodified SNES hardware. To the author's best knowledge, anyone who can gain height with single-wall underwater walljumping without Hi-Jump and without L+R use a keyboard (or similar input device), rather than a dpad. It is difficult to claim it to be "impossible" on a SNES dpad, since it, strictly speaking, does not require "impossible inputs". It would be somewhat similar to performing TAS dance, but while also rhythmically pressing jump.

Clips

Here, clips of the various forms will be collected.

PAL without L+R

This clip shows the full strategy, and thus has a few failed attempts. The successful long climb starts at 10:55.

Note this clip starts with a left wall climb. Since this is PAL, it could instead be done with a right wall climb. So you only have to learn one input pattern. The left wall climb is shorter.

NTSC without L+R

This clip shows the full strategy on NTSC, with all differences from PAL evident. It is also an incredibly clean climb.