Speedrunning Tactics: Super Mario Odyssey

[Fizzle]

Thought I'd make a new category(ish, I guess?) that covers the speedrunning paths and tactics of various games, this thread in particular being about Super Mario Odyssey's speedrunning group. Obviously, there will likely be spoilers, so be warned if you haven't beaten the game just yet. (Although its somehow been 8 years already...)

What are some of SMO's speedrunning tips that are useful in most runs? I've never really attempted speedrunning SMO, nor have I completely understood what all the quicker movement options are used in runs (like the cap return jump).

I feel like the closer I get to games I've speedran, the more information I can place into the thread then asking you all for it.

Anyway, let me know what tricks you have used or seen in speedruns, please, and I'll make more threads like this in the future

 

[ViableBunnyBudd]

Never done a speedrun of this game myself, but I'm somewhat familiar with it.

I'm assuming you're talking about the main Any% category for this game? I'll be talking about that one.

Before you start a run, there's a few things you should do:

• Use a controller that has motion controls in it, like the Joy-Cons or (preferably) a Pro Controller. Shaking the controller is vital for speeding up many actions such as rolling and Bullet Bill boosting, and it also gives access to motion exclusive moves.
• Set your language to Chinese. You don't need to read anything in the game so having text that scrolls faster is optimal.
• Update your game to version 1.3 if you haven't already, the game will load a lot faster in that version.

Some general movement used throughout the game includes lots of rolling, cap jumps, spinpounds, and vectoring (where moving in a slight diagonal angle can make Mario move faster - this is more advanced and is complicated but is used frequently).

There are two really easy tricks in the run that save a LOT of time, so they're always worth going for: Dino Skip and Moon Cave Skip. Here's a video I found that explains them more concisely than I can.

If you're new, I'd highly recommend using a moon route. The route that the experts use is incredibly optimized and NOT beginner friendly at all (there's a required frame perfect I can think of off the top of my head), so for a casual speedrun, honestly, I say make up your own! Do what you're comfortable with. A few general guidelines though:

• Outside of instances where story moons are required like in Cascade or Bowser's, I'd refrain from getting those since they're usually attached to long boss fights and/or cutscenes. You'll need some in Luncheon and Snow, and Lake's and half of Wooded's are decent options, but that's about it.
• For Lake, absolutely do a cap jump up to the courtyard area, you have no reason to go around the long way.
• Shop moons are a great option in some kingdoms like Wooded, Snow, and Luncheon, but they'll cost coins. If you're relying on these for your route make sure you grab enough coins along the way.
• Go through the game at least once to test your route before starting for real.

That's all I can think of immediately, if you're planning on speedrunning this game hopefully this helped a little.

 

[Fizzle]

Thanks, I probably should have stated that these threads are going to be based on Any% routes