Uploaded July 2022 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
Done on 24th July. Real time 2:09:04. My first completed speedrun of Hard mode No out of bounds. I'll be uploading each pb as and when. This was quite a low hanging fruit as only a few runs existed on the leaderboard. Taking all the acquired knowledge and consistency from the Normal difficulty runs I was able to get a WR by nearly 40 minutes. One of the big strategies for this run was continuing to skip Dark Suit which is an enormous timesave. The Boost Guardian however is the true boss of this category and many runs can and will die here. As long as you pull off the continuous puddle trick and keep taken damage to a minimum though you can survive with just 4 et's like Normal difficulty. I did collect just one extra et in this run which was the Transit Tunnel East one bringing my total to 5 for Boost Guardian. I have since dropped it now to 4. The only thing that really separates this run from Normal is the main boss fights like Boost Guardian, Chykka, Quadraxis and also some of the earlier pirate encounters in Agon. All of which have increased health and so there's the extra battle on your hands staying alive long enough from the atmsophere while chipping away at their increased health.
One thing I learned when watching Tanisan's run is that the Japanese version "fixes" the bosses for Hard mode giving all of them 2x health. Both NTSC-U and PAL have the same mixed bag, with some bosses 2x health, and others not. This makes the JP version inferior to use for runs, despite more care and attention put into Hard mode.
Done on 24th July. Real time 2:09:04. My first completed speedrun of Hard mode No out of bounds. I'll be uploading each pb as and when. This was quite a low hanging fruit as only a few runs existed on the leaderboard. Taking all the acquired knowledge and consistency from the Normal difficulty runs I was able to get a WR by nearly 40 minutes. One of the big strategies for this run was continuing to skip Dark Suit which is an enormous timesave. The Boost Guardian however is the true boss of this category and many runs can and will die here. As long as you pull off the continuous puddle trick and keep taken damage to a minimum though you can survive with just 4 et's like Normal difficulty. I did collect just one extra et in this run which was the Transit Tunnel East one bringing my total to 5 for Boost Guardian. I have since dropped it now to 4. The only thing that really separates this run from Normal is the main boss fights like Boost Guardian, Chykka, Quadraxis and also some of the earlier pirate encounters in Agon. All of which have increased health and so there's the extra battle on your hands staying alive long enough from the atmsophere while chipping away at their increased health.
One thing I learned when watching Tanisan's run is that the Japanese version "fixes" the bosses for Hard mode giving all of them 2x health. Both NTSC-U and PAL have the same mixed bag, with some bosses 2x health, and others not. This makes the JP version inferior to use for runs, despite more care and attention put into Hard mode.
