“Imagine beating aSoulsgame without fighting anything”
Speedrunners are relentlessly whittling downElden Ring, and as someone who’s only been casually following the recent times they’ve been clocking, I got whiplash from thisunder-nine-minuteAny% Unrestricted speedrun fromDistortion2. With a finicky “zip” technique, it was possible to get through the Lands Between in 8 minutes and 56 seconds.
This run popped up in my feed yesterday and I couldn’t believe it.
I mean, Icouldbelieve it — things tend to getpretty wildin FromSoftware speedruns when the idea is to just reach the credits through any means possible. But after spending dozens of hours withElden Ring, it’s hard to wrap your head around just how efficient a speedrun can become, glitches or no glitches. I spent more time on the Tree Sentinel!
“Imagine beating aSoulsgame without fighting anything,” Distortion2tweeted.
In this case, the runner made full use of wild-looking (yet really meticulous) zips to clear huge distances, as well as “kill” some mandatory late-game bosses, like Maliketh.
Zipping across the Lands Between
So what are zips, exactly? A helpful pinned YouTube comment fromSketchyhas our backs with a quick rundown: “A zip is performed by guarding and then walking at a specific time afterward for a specific number of frames. These are frame perfect. The zip is caused by the specific way the walking and guarding animations overlap. Zips are reliant on hardware (and are therefore only allowed in unrestricted runs) and lower resolution makes them more consistent. Macros are not allowed, these are done manually.”
If you’re looking for a more in-depth breakdown, here’s an explainer video fromDaravae:
It’s the kind of technique that proficient runners can nail down to a staggering degree.
As for why many zones (and their bosses) can be bypassed but not Crumbling Farum Azula, that location “cannot be zipped to because it is not loaded in unless you get there legitimately.” The current solution is to zip toThe Four Belfries, catch a teleporter to Farum Azula as FromSoftware intended, thenwrong warp— an Any% staple.
This record-breaking Any% UnrestrictedElden Ringspeedrun ends in a fittingly strange way — we never even see the final boss! — which is just icing on top. It’s chaotic af.
[Update: Distortion2 hassince posteda 6:59Elden Ringspeedrun,adding, “This category has been quite the ride. Still some room for improvement but I am done with this for now.”]
I know Any% runs aren’t to everyone’s tastes, so if you’re curious to see more of the game’s content cleared quickly rather than outright skipped,here’s a 1:32:45 All Remembrances runofElden Ringfrom Qttsix. The Sword of Night and Flame puts inwork.
