Sequence Breaking: Difference between revisions

'''Note:''' [[We Are Not Game FAQs]]. Details about specific instances belong there, not here.

 

 

* In an old [[Apple II]] game called ''The Alpine Encounter'', you had to find an urn with spy information in it within two days in a ski resort. The game has an incredibly elaborate sequence of how the urn is passed from enemy agent to enemy agent that remains the same each game; the trick being when you can intercept a drop-off. If you don't go ''anywhere'' until 9:45am (you can simply type "wait 2 hours") on the first day, and stay at the front desk entrance, you can steal the first spy's luggage containing the urn and call the Inspector (someone you shouldn't have met yet) and give the urn to him. This should take about ''30 seconds''.

* ''[[Zelda II the Adventure of Link]]'' had a pretty basic sequence-breaking method. You weren't required to defeat any of the bosses until the end of the game, so you could simply grab the item and leave the dungeon, then come back at the end for a laughably easy boss run. This is a pretty effective strategy, since each boss automatically gives you an instant level-up; these are much more valuable if you wait until the end of the game to obtain them.

* In ''[[The Legend of Zelda Oracle of Seasons]]'', after clearing the third dungeon you're supposed to visit the Sunken City first, obtain the flippers, and then head north to Mt. Cucco. In fact, by using the "Pegasus Jump" technique (in which jumping while under the effect of speed-boosting Pegasus Seeds boosts the jump distance) it is possible to head into the Temple Remains from the west entrance. While the Temple Remains is a high-difficulty endgame area crawling with powerful enemies and most of it is still inaccessable at this point, it's possible to head through the southern portion of the region and use another "Pegasus Jump" to enter Mt. Cucco from the area's east entrance. This sequence break presents the opportunity to obtain a new season ability far earlier than should be possible and triggers a number of new events, minigames, and shops in Subrosia that should still be unavailable.

* The "Crystal Room Warp Trick" in the original release of ''[[Final Fantasy IV (Video Game)|Final Fantasy IV]]''. Casting Warp in King Giott's throne room, immediately after the {{spoiler|Calcobrena/Golbez}} boss fight, will send you back into the Crystal Room, with an Underground Crystal still there for you to pick up. This Crystal will register as a valid event flag when you step on a tile just outside the Sealed Cave and {{spoiler|Kain steals the Crystal}}, letting you [[Dungeon Bypass|skip]] [[Scrappy Level|the Sealed Cave]] entirely.

* In ''[[Final Fantasy VI (Video Game)|Final Fantasy VI]]'' it was possible thanks to a glitch to skip the meeting with Celes entirely. The highly amusing result was that the game replaced her character with Kutan (Moghan in the GBA version), a moogle from the beginning. This was more funny than useful, of course, as Kutan is extremely weak, has very bad equipment until the opera scene, after which he has none at all, cannot learn magic, and cannot have his stats boosted. This is especially a problem at the start of the second half of the game, in which you have to play him solo until you reach the first town.

* In one of the first towns of ''[[Final Fantasy IX (Video Game)|Final Fantasy IX]]'', it is possible to view certain cutscenes out of sequence merely by going to part of the town in the wrong order. This will cause Zidane to already know about things he shouldn't, only to be clueless later.

** It's easy to exploit a bug in disc three by getting a gold Chocobo early, then skipping nearly to the end of the disc while skipping a few [[Scrappy Level|Scrappy Levels]] and messing your plot up. This results in the resident [[White Magician Girl]] staying in a state where she [[Fake Difficulty|randomly fails to use her commands]] for the rest of the game unless you hack it back to how it should be at that point.

* ''[[Halo (Video Game)|Halo]]'' has a major sequence break in the "Assault on the Control Room" level. In a stage about halfway through the level, one can get a Banshee fighter by knocking it off of a ledge with the rocket launcher. If you then fight through the following levels past the exit of the underground complex, you can then use the Banshee to fly up to the center column, where a new Banshee can be gotten to replace the (usually) now-damaged first one (even if you don't need it, you want to go get it to keep from being attacked by it as you pass and trigger that opponent). From there, you can fly over the following map sections to the one where you would normally have to proceed on foot underground; if you instead fly up to the overhead bridges, you can then enter at a much later part of the game, and because the triggers for the opponents have been bypassed, the following scenes will now be empty and you can simply proceed to the end on yet another Banshee that appears as you enter the last group of maps.

** In fact, it's possible to simply kill the closer Banshee's pilot with the sniper rifle. No one else will climb in, leaving you free to take it. You not only bypass the areas between the top and bottom of the "room", but also avoid most of the enemies, which don't appear until you enter from ground level.

** ''Super Metroid'' can be broken in many ways, only some of which were planned; the others usually exploit glitches. It's possible, for instance, to fight the four major bosses in any order. [[Speed Run|Speed Runners]] routinely skip certain items and minibosses outright.

** In ''[[Metroid Prime]]'', lots of sequence breaks were found early on, but the one that broke the game wide open was Space Jump First. The Space Jump is normally acquired about a third of the way through the game, but it's possible to get it as your first item, and this in turn lets you do many other things out of order. ''Prime'' proved so malleable in its first release that Retro had to add a number of [[Broken Bridge|sequence break blocks]] in the PAL and Player's Choice versions (Space Jump First survived, but you had to do it differently, and it was much harder.)

** In ''Metroid Fusion'', there is an [[Easter Egg]] that is a prime example of sequence breaking. Normally, the player has to get the Diffusion Missile upgrade to escape from the lower levels of Sector 4. However, it is possible to bypass the upgrade entirely by [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N025nnrcGrc executing a long chain of "shinesparks"]. Unfortunately, once you've 'broken' the sequence, the game gives you a congratulatory message and orders you to go back and get in the sequence again.

** In ''Metroid: Zero Mission'', it's possible to exploit a Morph Ball tunnel in Norfair to get to Ridley extremely early, before you go to Kraid, in fact. This allows you to get quite a few power-ups, such as Super Missiles, earlier than intended. Said experience allows for a highly amusing battle when you finally do tackle Kraid, as you're then powerful enough to kill him with two hits. However, this specific example is one of few cases in video games where the game's designers added in specific sequence breaking pathways on purpose.

* Levels in ''[[Super Mario Galaxy (Video Game)|Super Mario Galaxy]]'' and its sequel typically consist of a linear sequence of small planets which must be cleared in order, but the combination of the game's semi-realistic modeling of gravity and the protagonist's super jumping abilities sometimes makes it possible to skip entire sequences by taking a leap of faith through the void from one planet to another. This is [[Turned Up to Eleven]] when you unlock Luigi, who can jump longer and higher than Mario (for whom the game was most meticulously playtested) or if you exploit Yoshi's Infinite Flutter glitch.

* ''Mario Vs Donkey Kong'' for the Game Boy Advance had one in Forest Level 3. Instead of climbing up to activate a lever to give access to the exit door, simply run to the left and use the summonable ladder to block the lock from closing, grab the key next to you and run off. Not a great effect but still useful.

* Several obstacles in the various ''[[Pokémon]]'' games require you to beat a Gym Leader, then get an HM from a separate area to use to advance. However, trading from another copy of the game can let you bypass the areas where the HMs are obtained. For instance, trading a Pokémon with Cut into the original games could let you bypass the S.S. Anne, beat the game, then go back and hear your rival boast about his Mons that are 30-40 levels lower than they were a few hours ago.

** In ''Pokémon Red'', ''Blue'', and ''Yellow'' you can skip getting the Silph Scope entirely, simply by using a Poké Doll on the Marowak Ghost in the Pokémon Tower. Fixed in the remake.

* In ''[[Thief the Dark Project]]'' you can skip most of the "Return To The Cathedral" level by simply using a skull as a door-stop. If you prevent the entrance door from closing, then when the intelligent gem you have to steal locks the doors on you it doesn't do anything and you don't have to appease a priest ghost to get the explosives needed to blow open the side door. This lowers the difficulty of the level from much harder than the rest of the game to simply very hard.

** You have to be careful about sequence breaking in this game. In an earlier level "The Lost City", you can get the water talisman early by jumping across a moat of lava without the bridge extended. Doing so leaves you in an unwinnable situation, since you cannot jump back. This is not an issue in the gold version, where the water talisman isn't in the lost city.

** In ''MGS3'', it is possible to snipe The End, a boss one encounters later, ''immediately'' after a cutscene. The developer accounted for this, and replaces that boss with a previously-encountered [[Quirky Miniboss Squad]]. All of whom the player may ''also'' have already killed.

* ''[[Chrono Trigger (Video Game)|Chrono Trigger]]'' and games like it, not only encourage some degree of sequence breaking, but reward it. Largely this comes from allowing the player to attempt to beat the game at any time (and with a new game plus, it can be beaten just a few minutes in with only one or two party members).

** A glitch involving setting the Retreat Psynergy to a shortcut and using it when your PP is too low allows the player to skip recruiting Mia in the Mercury Lighthouse. One effect of this glitch include carrying more than seven Djinn per character. An even better effect is that when the game recalculates your party during the Colosso, it'll clone one of your party members, giving him two turns in battle.

** Then there's the continent of Osenia. When you first cross the bridge from Madra, you're supposed to go south to Mikasalla, a boring little town that has almost no purpose but to inform you about the village of Garoh, which is where things pick up for Air's Rock. Only once you've finished at Air's Rock are you supposed to go through the Yampi Desert to Alhafra. However, there is nothing in the game to ''tell'' you this, and the entrance to Yampi Desert is much easier to find than the path to Mikasalla, meaning that it's quite easy to end up in Yampi Desert much earlier than you ought to. (There's also a southern exit to the Yampi Desert that takes you out to Air's Rock--which will make solving Garoh almost unbelievably easy, and would make Mikasalla all but pointless to visit if it didn't contain a Djinn--which, if you play things in order, would require a return visit to get, since you need Scoop from the Yampi Desert to reach it.)

* In ''[[The Matrix|Enter The Matrix]]'', one level has you evading an army of Smith clones around a city. However the entire level can be bypassed simply by heading right at the start of the level instead of left, as the game tells you. Can save you from a great deal of heartache, believe me.

** In the office building level you have to navigate the outside of the building on the construction frame. When you reach a specific part the game spawns a Agent Smith dropping down in front of you and breaks the platform you're standing on. But if you are in the middle of a wall-run your character continues the wall run, watches Smith break the platform before reaching the next platform. Doing so allows you to skip the rest of that part of the level, since no Agent Smiths spawn.

* Technically speaking, there's nothing stopping you from charging [[Final Dungeon|Meduna]] directly in ''[[Jagged Alliance]] 2'' after landing. In practical terms, though, you ''need'' to capture and secure the cities on the way to Meduna, because while enemy weapons [[Sorting Algorithm of Weapon Effectiveness|get more and more effective the further south you go]], your weapons do not (at least, not until you capture cities). Even a modest upgrade in enemy capabilities -- like, say, going from submachine guns to rifles -- is going to be a major challenge if you're still wielding machine pistols.

** But, there is a 7 minute speed run [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osQkMLquCoM here]

** There are several missions in San Andreas that can be done in a way different from intended:

*** ''Robbing Uncle Sam'': instead of opening the gate immediatelly after you enter the military base, you can kill every soldier already spawned on the place, then use the forklift to place the boxes near the entrance neatly waiting for when you finally shoot the gate's control panel to open and let Ryder take drive inside.