As we all know, Sonic games have their share of glitches. But have you ever had a glitch work in your favor? Example. Back when I was on my go to get 180 emblems in SA2B (like 2003 or 2004 I was young). Basically the last emblem I needed was the Expert Chao Karate battle. It wasn't looking good for me but suddenly my chao hit the other one and it went flying towards the screen. Then I won. I absolutely shouldn't of won. But hey it worked for me lol.
One I've started using recently (though it's less a glitch and more of a collision oversight) is during the countdown at the end of Metal Harbor, I spindash on one of the slants to get to the higher area by the light speed dash trail to the higher handle. There is no collision on the bottom side of the platforms there. Saves several seconds, but still can't get an A rank for the life of me.
I learned to get past the barrel via the transformation glitch before learning the proper way, so an emphatic YES.
In Green Hill Act 1 in Generations there's a spot in the beginning where it pushes you a considerable amount across the stage if you spin dash and jump at the right time/space. Good for speed running.
Yes I've encountered that. Also Classic Sonics momentum after spin dashing and jumping is crazy. One thing I love to do in Generations PC is equip Classic Sonic with Super, Fire Shield, Electric shield, and Speed Shoes. You're then capable of going stupidly fast. Also Modern Sonic had a similar kind of abuse i never figured out, something call M-speed? You could do it in Unleashed too.
In Sonic Rush Adventure, if you jump immediately after releasing the spin dash during boss fights you can break the speed cap and go at the speed you can normally go during regular levels. Really helps if you're going for S ranks.
I'm quite sure some glitch worked on my favor at some point, but I can't remember a single one of those times. The only one I remember was only useful as a novelty exploit that became counterproductive on the long run and thus non-beneficial: at the very first act in 8-bit Sonic 1, if you roll down the curved ramp and hold forward not only while rolling, but also when leaving the ramp, you'll fly to the end of the act and stop only when hitting the right boundary of the level. This is insanely fast but will leave you encased on the signpost area with very few rings, thus preventing you from entering special stage and getting the related secret bonuses at the end of the game. Getting rings and coming back will take you more time than finishing the act proper, so good for fun but not for anything else. Oh, I also tried the layer glitch at the end of CPZ2 that allows you to past through the loop at the top of the drowning pit once I knew about it just to test it out, but only that time; I never abuse that kind of things when playing proper.
A friend and I were playing '06 co-op multiplayer way back in the day and when we were down to 1 live left (lives are shared in Co-op), we both died at the same time. '06 being the buggy mess that it is didn't know how to handle this and so instead of going down to 0 lives or giving a game over like it would normally do, it rolled over to 99. That was good... Until another friend who was totally useless managed to burn through all of them in Dusty Desert. Granted that level is exceptionally bad in multiplayer (you go through Shadow's indoor section with some very finnicky tubes over bottomless pits), it still annoyed me that results of this awesome glitch got wiped out and we could never replicate it. I may be bit wrong about the specifics of how the lives counter managed to roll over; like if there were any specific circumstances concerning the way we lost the lives, whether we were on 1 or 0 or what the timing was. I think it was some super specific timing that caused 1 to be subtracted from the lives counter before the game over fade out was triggered.
Yeah, it's one of those things that take a bit to practice and figure out, but it's something that's abused a lot in speed runs. There's a decent tutorial on how to do it.
D/M-Speed killed the online leaderboards and especially the super-fun 30 second trials. There was absolutely no point in participating in either when the game had such an easy glitch that up-ended the entire process of setting records.
I've accidentally zipped myself to the end of the act several times, Hill Top being a notable example. I remember a similar glitch involving Hyper Sonic and the crushers in Marble Garden, but I've never been able to replicate it.
I always hated how they made it far more difficult to do in Generations - Unleashed feels way more fun to speedrun when you abuse stuff like that. Alas, it wasn't intended so I can't get too upset. I think I accidentally did the Metropolis Zone skip once by getting pushed through the lava pit as a kid.
I kinda hate that abuse glitch, it destroyed speed running in that game. Instead of getting good at the game it's more getting good at performing the glitch.
It's only natural for the speed-game to change drastically upon discovery of a game-breaking speed glitch. I mean, look at literally any Nintendo game's (especially Mario and Zelda) speed-game.
I mean yes, it is natural, but for me personally it's not fun to watch. It's not fun to watch someone avoid playing the game.
Back in the day I discovered a loop layer collision glitch in Sonic Advance 1 and didn't think it could be useful. Zeupar proved me wrong and used it to set a record on Angel Island 1.
Is it not the nature of speed-game to avoid time spent playing as much as possible? If you're not a fan of that, then maybe high-level speed-running isn't something you're all that interested in; I can almost guarantee you that most games with an active speed-running community have some kind of endlessly high skill-ceiling due to some absurd exploits or glitches.
That's kinda what I meant. I don't know if there's such a thing as glitch-less speedruns, so I don't bother with it. More power to those who enjoy it, but they can keep it.
I get that breaking the game is a corner stone of speedrunning, but still, doesn't take away from the fact that you're still getting good at breaking the game not actually playing it. Sonic 1 speedruns are full of screen wrapping glitches for example. But that's what glitchless categories are for. That being said I really don't get why Sega bothers with leaderboards still. They all become irredeemable within 2 weeks of each game's launch. Hell, the origin version of Sonic Mania scraped its' leaderboard entirely, likely for this reason (PC versions ESPECIALLY shouldn't have leaderboards, those get broken day 1). I do wish they'd put the effort into online multi-player, but oddly that's only reserved for the "B" versions of games (Rush Adventure, Colors DS, Generations 3DS, Sonic 2 mobile, Lost World 3DS, Forces Speed Battle). But thank God, Mania has local split screen. I've played that mode maybe twice.