You may (or may not) be aware that Star Fox's iconic Arwing craft are contained within the code for The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. The devs used the craft to test the flight patterns of Death Mountain resident Volvagia – and the new-fangled Z-targeting system – but they were never removed from the game's code.
In the past, players have been able to access the Arwing by using special cheats, but now a speedrunner has caused them to spawn within the game via more 'legitimate' means.
As explained in this Reddit post, the was achieved via what's called an "Arbitrary Code Execution," a process which allows players to force the game to load and run the save file like game code. By using this system, speedrunners can finish the game super quickly, but, as Twitch streamer Zfg1 has discovered, it has the side-effect of calling in a swarm of angry Arwing craft.
According to Zfg1:
By doing ACE three times with different specific filenames, you can remove the character limit on the file name creation. With no character limit, you can type in any payload you want at any length. With this, you can do basically anything, and is known as Total Control.
A consequence of finding the ACE exploit is the shattering of the "Any%" world record time in the game, which was taken below the 17-minute mark last year. Since the discovery of ACE, speedrunner Lozoots has set four world records this year alone, each one under 13 minutes.
Have you pulled off this trick yourself? Or is this the first time you've heard about it? Let us know by posting a comment below.
[source gamasutra.com, via clips.twitch.tv]
Comments 39
Oh yeah, already did this. Been there, done that. J/K.
I have never pulled this trick off, or should I call it a hack?
People will never let Ocarina die, will they
Sorry but playing with filenames to me is hacking therefore should not be seen as a speedrun. But I also don't think using bugs should be used in speedrun either.
@Bunkerneath some people prefer this way of speedrunning. Some prefer 100% excellent execution. I prefer the middle ground, where bugs and features are still used and "gamed" to play faster, but you still required to see most of the game. That only depends on what do you want to see from the game and what entertains you. That is exactly why they have so many different categories in speedrunning (100%, no-glitch, no out-of-bounds, any% and so on).
Haha. Young Link just destroyed an Arwing with a wooden boomerang.
See you Smash Starfox.
They clearly didn't kill all of the witches.
I saw something years ago about how wiggling the cart around while the N64 is powered on and running the game could sometimes make them appear. I never tried it though cause i was afraid of damaging my system. It's also been done with game shark. Who remembers those?
This is definitely the first time I have heard about this!
Yeah, just two days ago, Lozoots accomplished the first sub-12 Ocarina of Time any% speedrun.
It's still heavily debatable though if a credits warp abitrary code execution glitch can be considered beating the game, as it doesn't fulfill the end win condition for displaying the end credits, it changes that condition.
@Bunkerneath What counts as a bug?
@Folderoll Indeed, it’s a very grey line. I’m replaying OoT at the moment and I always make use of the glitch where you can drop bugs from a bottle onto a soft soil patch and then quickly hammer the bottle button again to re-capture them which saves me having to find new bugs to capture.
I’m not a speed runner or anything but am I cheating or just exploiting a flaw the developers left in the game? (Incidentally they fixed it in the 3DS version).
Actually, I did not know the Arwing was in OOT. I am surprised, I thought I knew most things about OOT, good to know there are still things for me to learn. Regarding speedruns, it is cool to see what can be done, but I still prefer watching full playthroughs over speedruns; the bugs and such whilst interesting ultimately take away the fun for me.
This is absolutely insane!! I wasn’t aware of any of this! I seriously do not know how people think of, and then are able to do, this stuff!
It's not a speedrun if you cheat.
I dont what anyone has to say glitching a game at speed running its cheating
Speed run is playing through the game like it's meant to be played
How does this count as a speedrun?
Once you start altering the game's code, it's just cheating.
But I loved watching it
This should be called "glitch run". It ruins the any% Speedrun and is uninteresting to watch.
Also, why would they leave a working model of the sewing in the code when they had very limited storage in N64 cartridges?
@xpownz Nope. Just like we’ll never let Lawrence of Arabia, or King Kong, or Metropolis die. Innovative, ground-breaking works.
Ocarina is the pinnacle of 3D game design. It wrote most of the rules, and it STILL holds up as a brilliant game.
If testers and programmers miss bugs then that just becomes part of the finished product and people will use and exploit these. In my opinion most speedruns are not a valid way to finish the game. If you are using bugs and code issues to skip things you otherwise would not be able to then I say it is technically a cheat.
Dang, I never realized there were so many people that just dont like the idea of speedrunning and consider it cheating for one reason or another. Speedruns take soooooo much time and skill and require such an intimate knowledge and love of the game, that I personally am always impressed to see any game get destroyed to shreds.
However, I am unsure if this should qualify as an any% run or something else. Its really neat to see the time being taken even lower, but maybe it needs to be part of a different category? Idk, we'll have to see what the community decides overall
@Whispy
Super Mario World has had a credits warp glitch for many years now, and their speedrunning community opted to separate this from the any% run which has 11 exits, calling the new category 0 exits.
https://www.speedrun.com/smw#0_Exit
The Ocarina of Time community may decide to also make their credits-warp finish a separate category, as I feel it's a valid run in a different capacity, similar to the Hall of Fame glitch in Pokémon Yellow where you can beat the game with a 00:00 timer and 152 Pokémon caught. There is no category for that run because too many people could have the same time.
I'd call this "cheedrunning". Anyway, am I the only one thinking it'd be cool if cuckoos get Arwing back up when you attack them?
@Rhaoulos Speedruns use glitches as default. For rules to make logical sense, you have to have a category where everything within the game is allowed to be used. If the game's code allow it, it is allowed. The "previous" any% category is also using glitches.
Sometimes, heavy glitches can indeed make the run uninteresting. This type of glitch can be done in many different games, Super Mario World in 45 seconds being one of them. But because these ways of beating the game exist, there are also other categories where certain, or all, glitches are disallowed.
I'm so glad any% is a thing so I can see the endless salt coming from people who can't fathom speedrunners using glitches and exploits to beat the game rather than "beat the game the way the devs intended".
@Zidentia The problem is defining what a bug/glitch is in every single scenario. There have been glitches were developers have claimed that they were left in the game on purpose. Shigeru Miyamoto talked about glitches in Super Mario Bros. being "more like features". Some indie developers have reached out to speedrunners, the runners found a huge exploit and the developers made it into a major feature in the game.
It's impossible to define everything. That's why we instead let the game decide: If it works according to the game's code, it is allowed to be used. It's neccesary to have such category where everything within the game is allowed to be used. As soon as you start banning stuff, you need to carefully state what and why, which can often result in quite arbitary definition where it's solely based on opinions.
There's also the side that glitches, in most cases, make the run a lot more skillful than without. Super Mario Bros. being a perfect example where the minor glitches used don't save much time at all, the run still look quite similar but it's insanely difficult to execute. There is no challenge in glitchless, there is nothing impressive about it in comparision. It's just an "easy mode" category that lacks serious competition.
But because glitches can be quite major, there are different categories on how to play the game. Where certain, or all, glitches are banned. But, as mentioned; this can be tricky to define, it can take a community years to come up with a good ruleset (Ocarina of Time being such example).
@sleepinglion He's using the game itself to alter the game's code. If he was using an external device like a Gameshark or linking the console up to a computer running a TAS, I can see why someone would say he's cheating. However, he's performing ACE with his own hands using a Nintendo 64 controller and nothing else.
@TheDragonDAFan
The main point of contention here is the game's expected win condition is being bypassed, not the method of bypassing it.
The previous world record route involved beating Gohma, and then wrong-warping to the Ganon's Tower collapse sequence, which lead up to beating the game under near-standard conditions.
It would be less contested if you were to somehow load a game state where you're in the middle of the final battle with Ganon.
I wish this didn’t devolve into arguments on whether this constitutes as a speedrun (I think even if the speedrunning community, those that think it shouldn’t be a separate category entirely are a minority).
Because really, the cool thing here is spawning the arwings. That was hilarious as he was trying to escape them and they just kept coming! I really wish it was possible to accidentally stumble upon this glitch through normal play!
@Zeldafan79 Ohhh man- GameShark. That takes me back! Stacking your game carts on top of each other just to get a few cheats, what a hoot!
Looked ridiculous but it got the job done; I also remember blowing on the carts a few times when the system would freeze. Haha.
@RupeeClock I mean going straight to the credits scene is entering a state in the game where the win condition has been satisfied to some extent. Plus, timing in OOT any% speedruns end when Link makes the final interaction with Ganon, so at least skipping the final cutscene in the game isn't drastically affecting the run's timing.
@Tompa
I am not going to debate this item for item because we are very far apart on this issue. Quite frankly I do not consider speedruns a valid form of playing the game. Certainly there exists a community that enjoys it much like Twitch but for me it holds no validity or interest. You did make me laugh though when you said you let the game decide.
Cheating is not a form of granular manipulations on a sliding scale. If you are deviating from the intended gameplay to achieve some type of outcome by utilizing glitches or code malfeasance then it is cheating because you have taken an advantage other players either did not or could not because they chose to follow the rules of play. Obviously you felt you needed to reply since you joined under this user name this morning.
It would've been better to use a Ocarina song to call in Star Fox to make a bombing run.
I thought the Arwing thing was fake!!
I always love seeing the little arwings fly around in OoT.
They're kinda adorable as they fly around blasting Link to death.
@Zeldafan79 A friend did the 'cart wiggle' trick to show me that you can get out of Kokiri forest without the sword/shield when we were younger...was cool to witness.
Hey everyone! Total Control for OOT was discovered by MrCheeze - https://www.youtube.com/user/MrCheezeMrCheeze please check out his channel for more cool OOT and other game glitches. Cheers!
This is really interesting, an army of angry Arwing come after a speedrunner using that trick! So cool.
@Zidentia I have a hobby to reply to these kind of comments, trying to explain basic stuff to those who do not understand the concept of speedruns. So yeah, I joined for that purpose =).
What exactly is "intended play" in every single scenario? For Ocarina of Time, you were likely not intended to play it fast to begin with. The developers must have intended you to take your time to explore, to talk to NPCs, to open random chests, to struggle with enemies, to die against bosses, to get lost in Lost Woods etc. Yes, stretching the "intended" term a bit, but when that's the kind of definition you want for a speedrun, it becomes and impossibility to define. It doesn't matter what the developers may or may not have intended for you to do with a game, it's up to the player to decide. The person who invented the ball didn't make the rules for all the ball sports in the world, the players did.
Yes, we let the game decide. The game's code is the rules. We can not change what was originally made, the code is what is intended. "Glitchless" runs do exist, as mentioned, but there are many grey zones to what you should and should not be allowed to do. There are still many skips that can be done without using glitches.
I don't mind people not enjoying glitches, it's not for everyone and I agree that they can be a bit too much. Though as for speedrunning, they have been a part of them since speedrunning began in mid 90's, it's part of the default rules, no cheating, no matter what one's opinion may be on the matter.
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