Hello there! I'm one of the co-authors of this new TAS! It's been an exciting set of months for the Sonic 3 & Knuckles speedrunning community since the discovery in May 2024 of the techniques showcased and I can't wait for you all to enjoy our work. I highly encourage viewers that are interested as to the... interesting things happening in the Sonic 3 half to check the Author Notes available following the link in the description. Every weird strategy you'll see done in that half has a particular reason described, but the overall summary is the following: ``` The main new star of this TAS is the "break of the lock-on technology" that defines Sonic 3 & Knuckles. We do this by exploiting buffer overflow errors in Angel Island 2 and Hydrocity 2 that combined let us temporarily trick the game into thinking it is Sonic & Knuckles without changing or adjusting cartridges. The game will revert to being Sonic 3 & Knuckles again after a soft reset or power cycle, so we exploit the fact that a game over doesn't recheck the lock-on status, allowing us to skip the remaining stages in the Sonic 3 half. ```
I had no idea you could do it like this! I remember using Debug Mode back in the day to trick the game into loading up Sonic and Knuckles from Hidden Palace Zone, but this is super rad!
Anyone notice how Marble Garden's title card had the Sonic & Knuckles label on it even though it's a Sonic 3 zone and the game hadn't properly reverted to Sonic & Knuckles yet?
You somehow managed to find a half game skip while keeping a corruption in memory even after several reloads.... i dont even wanna know how long it took you to find this craziness but well fuckin done man, thats insane
Sonic: Instead of meeting Knuckles for the 2nd time, just turns around and yeets himself off the stage. Also Sonic: Got Through Act 1 .... while freaking Drowning.
I was listening to this on my drive home because I love listening to games im familiar with on my drive home (especially in TAS form since i know sone wacky stuff can occur). I knew something wacky was gonna happen when I heard the immediate Special loss, but I wasn't prepared to hear what happened next. Even seeing it after the fact is insane
I've noticed that when it comes to Sonic 3 & Knuckles TASes, people often do this with Sonic alone than Sonic + Tails. But why? To me, it's so adorable to see Sonic and Tails as best friends working together especially with glitch chaos. But I suppose Sonic + Tails cathegory is more difficult to TAS, because you have you optimally manipulate two characters, so that's probably the reason why Sonic alone TAS cathegory is more common.
In this TAS, he would get removed at the 6:25 mark. So he would only be useful in a handful of stages. We thought as we were finishing with Sonic on his own, we should start like that. There are other TASes that use 2P tails very extensively, e.g. The Ring Attack and the TAS that the previous one to this one obsoleted are very good examples.
Soo the glitch he used was a wrong area glitch (same thing that happens when you put sonic in knuckles boss area in level 3, however he somehow kept that corruption in memory even through several reloads, and im not 100% on how
The author's notes in the description gives a very detailed explanation of what's going on. But simply, it's a specific memory corruption that the bits we need from it survive a soft reset. Basically hitting the checkpoint after being rejected in the tunnel incorrectly saves that you've already been through the tunnel, so when the stage reloads from the death it gets confused as the event trigger for going through the tunnel never executes, and causes the game to crash - we need it to crash in a very specific way though to set the memory up in a way that is useful for the later glitches to add on to.
@@BenIsInSweden wait wait wait, wouldnt that mean you could easily tell the game to 'warp to credits' given enough time?? even through a soft reset is fuckin wacky
@@VegetaFH1 Credits warp would require an ACE or some such, which whilst this may have the possibility for, it's unlikely. If we leave the crash for 1 more frame, then the checksum at the end of memory gets overwritten which forces the game to hard reset and completely wipe the memory.
Question: Why did the TAS do the sprite glitch? (2:06) And then go into a special stage in hydro city? And then game over at the start of Marble Garden? Really wish this one had some creator commentary to explain the weird choices.
There is extensive creator commentary on this, just look in the description where it says "We encourage viewers to read the authors' submission text ( [link] ) for more details". (Not including the actual link in this comment because then youtube will eat it for spam)
But to answer each of your questions in turn... It does the glitch in the tunnel so that it activates the first part of the bombing run cutscene before hitting the checkpoint, because this sets it up for the crash that comes later. They enter a special stage because they need the part of memory that stores which special stages you've entered to not be empty, because this affects how the glitch plays out. They game over in Marble Garden because at this point the glitch is done, the game thinks it's S&K alone instead of S3&K (notice that the Marble Garden title card says "Sonic & Knuckles" instead of "Sonic 3 & Knuckles" in the lower left), so they just need to get back to the title screen to start the game over in Mushroom Hill. The authors' notes go into a lot more detail about these, and more, so they're well worth reading.
@@Oscaragious Are you sure you looked at the right one (it's obsoleted now). But one of the specific goals is "This run also avoids using a glitch called horizontal underflow, which is explained in the author's comments"
This is not a S3&K speedrun - this is taking 6 minutes to start a S&K speedrun. Technically VERY impressive... but I don't think it counts as getting to the end of S3&K. Should be another branch.
The game is still S3K. I have a "What happens without the Game Over" video on my channel that shows that if we carry on through the S3 stages, the game still thinks it's S&K (including playing S&K's MH1, despite coming from LB2)
![[TAS] [Camhack] Genesis Sonic 3 & Knuckles "Sonic" by BenInSweden, eandis, Chrezm & kaan55 in 22:...](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/MDUwUhMO-k8/mqdefault.jpg)
![[TAS] [Camhack] Genesis Sonic 3 & Knuckles "Sonic" by BenInSweden, eandis, Chrezm & kaan55 in 22:...](/img/tr.png)
![[TAS] Genesis Sonic Spinball "100%" by Flip in 13:03.45](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/tsLzIHfQNhk/mqdefault.jpg)
![Sonic 3 & Knuckles - All Emeralds Glitchless Speedrun with Sonic (100%) in 1:10:25 [Current Record]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/tRzIN35-UUs/mqdefault.jpg)
![[TAS] Genesis Sonic 3 & Knuckles "no left or right" by Tuffcracker in 35:54.19](/img/n.gif)
Hello there! I'm one of the co-authors of this new TAS! It's been an exciting set of months for the Sonic 3 & Knuckles speedrunning community since the discovery in May 2024 of the techniques showcased and I can't wait for you all to enjoy our work. I highly encourage viewers that are interested as to the... interesting things happening in the Sonic 3 half to check the Author Notes available following the link in the description. Every weird strategy you'll see done in that half has a particular reason described, but the overall summary is the following:
```
The main new star of this TAS is the "break of the lock-on technology" that defines Sonic 3 & Knuckles. We do this by exploiting buffer overflow errors in Angel Island 2 and Hydrocity 2 that combined let us temporarily trick the game into thinking it is Sonic & Knuckles without changing or adjusting cartridges. The game will revert to being Sonic 3 & Knuckles again after a soft reset or power cycle, so we exploit the fact that a game over doesn't recheck the lock-on status, allowing us to skip the remaining stages in the Sonic 3 half.
```
How many seconds did you gain ?
06:27 => !!!!!!!!!!!!! Really ??????
@@stk3702 just shy of 365s.
@@BenIsInSweden just insane !!!
I had no idea you could do it like this! I remember using Debug Mode back in the day to trick the game into loading up Sonic and Knuckles from Hidden Palace Zone, but this is super rad!
That skip to get to the Sonic & Knuckles part early was crazy!
It's so Crazy the game just decided to skip the S3K menu entirely.
⚠ To prevent damage to either the game, console, or the LOCK-ON Sonic & Knuckles cartridge, turn the power OFF before removing or inserting games.
Anyone notice how Marble Garden's title card had the Sonic & Knuckles label on it even though it's a Sonic 3 zone and the game hadn't properly reverted to Sonic & Knuckles yet?
It's officially "reverted" by the time the title card after Hydrocity's boss pops up. The game just hasn't gotten to go to the title screen again.
@@Spiderpig2398 That means Sonic & Knuckles on it's own has variants of the title vards for the Sonic 3 zones. Interesting...
You somehow managed to find a half game skip while keeping a corruption in memory even after several reloads.... i dont even wanna know how long it took you to find this craziness but well fuckin done man, thats insane
i was like "oh great another generic s3k TAS with nothing differ- what the fuck is happening rn"
Sonic: Instead of meeting Knuckles for the 2nd time, just turns around and yeets himself off the stage.
Also Sonic: Got Through Act 1 .... while freaking Drowning.
I Could Only Imagine How Insane A Sonic 06 TAS Would Be
Considering that you have to deal with the game breaks and trying to break the game as the same time i assume terrifying lol
@@TheProblemChannelA Glitchfest TAS Would Just Never End
90% of the run would be loading screens
@@UmbreonAnimate Damn. Your Not Wrong 😂😂
Well considering that game just does not work properly, it’d be quite the sight to witness
Still the best Sonic game after all these years
I was listening to this on my drive home because I love listening to games im familiar with on my drive home (especially in TAS form since i know sone wacky stuff can occur).
I knew something wacky was gonna happen when I heard the immediate Special loss, but I wasn't prepared to hear what happened next.
Even seeing it after the fact is insane
Sonic at one point made a journey across Angel Island and saved the world from the Death Egg, and he did it all in under 30 minutes.
End of Old Era of Sonic 3 TAS
Wait MGZ can warp to the S&K title? I've never seen that before.
I've noticed that when it comes to Sonic 3 & Knuckles TASes, people often do this with Sonic alone than Sonic + Tails. But why? To me, it's so adorable to see Sonic and Tails as best friends working together especially with glitch chaos. But I suppose Sonic + Tails cathegory is more difficult to TAS, because you have you optimally manipulate two characters, so that's probably the reason why Sonic alone TAS cathegory is more common.
In this TAS, he would get removed at the 6:25 mark. So he would only be useful in a handful of stages. We thought as we were finishing with Sonic on his own, we should start like that.
There are other TASes that use 2P tails very extensively, e.g. The Ring Attack and the TAS that the previous one to this one obsoleted are very good examples.
@@BenIsInSweden Ah, ok.
Only 26 minutes !?!?!!
6:25 is this even legal?!?
7:53 Eggman: Why did you hit me? I wasn't even doing anything!
6:28
Wha- wha- WHAT? How did you enter Sonic & Knuckles too fast? I don't think this is the way to get Sonic & Knuckles game.
I think Sonic is a pretty cool guy. Eh skips entire games by dying and doesn't afraid of anything.
Crazy big... game bug... no chaos emerald... extremely...
Can someone please explain to me the glitch that the speedrunner did after the Angel Island Act 2 boss, and the purpose of it?
Soo the glitch he used was a wrong area glitch (same thing that happens when you put sonic in knuckles boss area in level 3, however he somehow kept that corruption in memory even through several reloads, and im not 100% on how
The author's notes in the description gives a very detailed explanation of what's going on. But simply, it's a specific memory corruption that the bits we need from it survive a soft reset.
Basically hitting the checkpoint after being rejected in the tunnel incorrectly saves that you've already been through the tunnel, so when the stage reloads from the death it gets confused as the event trigger for going through the tunnel never executes, and causes the game to crash - we need it to crash in a very specific way though to set the memory up in a way that is useful for the later glitches to add on to.
Finally an easy and viable way to beat sandopolis act 2. Thanks Mr TAS
@@BenIsInSweden wait wait wait, wouldnt that mean you could easily tell the game to 'warp to credits' given enough time?? even through a soft reset is fuckin wacky
@@VegetaFH1 Credits warp would require an ACE or some such, which whilst this may have the possibility for, it's unlikely.
If we leave the crash for 1 more frame, then the checksum at the end of memory gets overwritten which forces the game to hard reset and completely wipe the memory.
I see you chose the high path.
Question: Why did the TAS do the sprite glitch? (2:06)
And then go into a special stage in hydro city? And then game over at the start of Marble Garden?
Really wish this one had some creator commentary to explain the weird choices.
There is extensive creator commentary on this, just look in the description where it says "We encourage viewers to read the authors' submission text ( [link] ) for more details".
(Not including the actual link in this comment because then youtube will eat it for spam)
But to answer each of your questions in turn...
It does the glitch in the tunnel so that it activates the first part of the bombing run cutscene before hitting the checkpoint, because this sets it up for the crash that comes later.
They enter a special stage because they need the part of memory that stores which special stages you've entered to not be empty, because this affects how the glitch plays out.
They game over in Marble Garden because at this point the glitch is done, the game thinks it's S&K alone instead of S3&K (notice that the Marble Garden title card says "Sonic & Knuckles" instead of "Sonic 3 & Knuckles" in the lower left), so they just need to get back to the title screen to start the game over in Mushroom Hill.
The authors' notes go into a lot more detail about these, and more, so they're well worth reading.
5:58 Skeleton Zone
It's remarkable how much it looks like the word skeleton despite not having any identifiable letters other than O...
2:07 please comment
Upd. oh shi...)
That half game skip...
I suspect there's another 6 minute skip to be found if you just remove the top cartridge entirely ;)
then i feel like this would just be [TAS] Genesis Sonic & Knuckles "Sonic"
I like how you slide throughout the whole stage 😅
Nice Video ! Sub & Big Like ! And Love Retro Sonic Games !
As cool as this is, I wish someone did a "all levels, no underflow wrap" TAS just to see how else you can break the game.
Check out Genesis Sonic 3 & Knuckles "Sonic, 100%" by marzojr in 55:48.80. It does that with getting all the emeralds.
@@BenIsInSweden Unfortunately, that one still uses the underflow wrap. That's a good TAS too though.
@@Oscaragious Are you sure you looked at the right one (it's obsoleted now). But one of the specific goals is "This run also avoids using a glitch called horizontal underflow, which is explained in the author's comments"
@@BenIsInSweden Oh, I see. Thanks! I would still like to see it with the other characters.
HUH?!?
This game was definitely the beginning of the end for Sonic games.
Это точно законно?
Законно это просто баг Игры который заставляет игру загрузить в память Часть игры Sonic & Knuckles пропуская несколько зон.
@@henryyengibaryan9510 я к тому, что тасер должен после такого жениться на игре, наверное
This is not a S3&K speedrun - this is taking 6 minutes to start a S&K speedrun. Technically VERY impressive... but I don't think it counts as getting to the end of S3&K. Should be another branch.
The game is still S3K. I have a "What happens without the Game Over" video on my channel that shows that if we carry on through the S3 stages, the game still thinks it's S&K (including playing S&K's MH1, despite coming from LB2)
2763
fix your game sega 💀
aren’t playtesters paid to find stuff like this, those fiends are slacking
Ok. Sooo who at Sonic Team is fired for all this? I don't care it's decades later, or that Sega doesn't even make hardware anymore.
Bro is Karen certified 💀