Dungeon Orders: A Link to the Past (SNES)

Here's where we start to get into the bigger challenges of this blog: The Zelda games become more linear, but the glitches become greater in number, and it can be hard to make sure that we leave no stone unturned. Regardless, it's always possible that I miss something, whether obscure or obvious, so feel free to leave a comment if you notice something that I didn't.

First, before anything else, let's again define what it means to complete a dungeon. Firstly, you must collect the inventory item in the dungeon. Secondly, you must defeat the boss of the dungeon (defined as the enemy that drops a heart container in the boss room, as shown by the compass). Thirdly, you must collect the Pendant or Crystal at the end of each dungeon. And as always, you must do all of this in one trip unless the game requires you to leave the dungeon in order to complete it (which it does in the Desert Palace and in Skull Woods). This is to prevent you from simply going deep enough into a dungeon to take the item from it, and then leaving to complete another dungeon with that item.
    As a matter of necessity, Lower Hyrule Castle, Upper Hyrule Castle, and Ganon's Tower have different criteria for completion since they do not have Pendants, Crystals, or comparable bosses. To complete Lower Hyrule Castle, you must collect the Boomerang, defeat the Ball & Chain Trooper that drops the Big Key, and bring Zelda to the Sanctuary. To complete Upper Hyrule Castle, you must simply defeat Agahnim. And to complete Ganon's Tower, you must collect the Red Mail and defeat Agahnim again.

Before we take a look at the dungeons in this game, we need to understand a bit about how the game overworld changes as you make progress. There are four 'phases' of the overworld that the game moves through.

• Phase 0: From the beginning of the game until you get a sword and shield from your uncle.
• Even if you somehow collected a sword before seeing your uncle in the castle (whether by hacking or glitches), you will not be able to use it.
• You cannot save the game while in phase 0.
• Zelda's telepathic message appears on-screen once every minute.
• Phase 1: From finding your uncle in the castle basement until you bring Princess Zelda to the Sanctuary.
• If you save and quit or die, depending on how far you've gotten in Lower Hyrule Castle, you can restart at the place you found your uncle, the main doors of the castle, Zelda's cell, or the room leading to the Sewer Passageway.
• If you could get past the guards blocking the exits from the Hyrule Castle area and Link's House, you would find that there are no other sprites in the entire overworld.
• If you entered the Dark World somehow, you would find all of the Light World overworld sprites there.
• Phase 2: From rescuing Zelda until you defeat Agahnim in Upper Hyrule Castle.
• If you save and quit or die, depending on how far you've gotten in the game, you can restart at Link's House, the Sanctuary, or the old man's cave on Death Mountain.
• Sprites appear properly on the maps.
• Phase 3: From beating Agahnim in Upper Hyrule Castle, lasts for the remainder of the game.
• The gates to Upper Hyrule Castle and Lower Hyrule Castle will be permanently closed for the rest of the game.
• The gate to the castle will become a warp to the Dark World.
• A. Bumpkin and B. Bumpkin (the lumberjacks) will have finished cutting down the tree and disappeared.
• Some enemies are replaced by stronger versions (for example, Toppo stops appearing near the Swamp Ruins, and the Red Soldiers begin appearing around Hyrule).

So there are a hell of a lot of glitches we'll need to take a look at.

GLITCH TIME!

There are many important glitches in this game that we'll have to take a look at: The Exploration Glitch, Death Mountain Ascent, Dash Buffered Wall Clipping, Kiki Skip, Early Tempered Sword, Death Mountain Descent, Surfing Bunny, Ether Medallion Glitch, and the Phase 0 Escape Glitch. There are a few other relevant glitches, such as Yuzuhara's Bottle Adventure, Mirror Transitioning (to glitch into the Ice Palace and Turtle Rock early), Fake Flippers, and Hookdashing, but these all only work on the 1.0 Japanese version of the game, and therefore cannot be replicated on a SNES console, so we won't have to really consider them.

Let's take a look at one of the most famous glitches of the game first, the Exploration Glitch!

EXPLORATION GLITCH

'Jump and Save' method. Video taken from FlopMcblob's channel.

'Levitation Glitch' method. Video taken from doominagravyboat's channel.

(Note that there are two other methods of activating the Exploration Glitch, but they require pressing up and down at the same time, which is impossible on an unmodified SNES controller). So there's a lot happening here, so let's take a second to explain what's going on. The first thing to realize is that all of the underworld maps are connected to each other, as a necessity for programming. It's something that should never come up in regular play because you're theoretically stuck within the boundaries of the room, and therefore unable to access one underworld area from another.

This is a HUGE map of every single underworld room in the game, and how they're connected in the game. Image taken from http://zanapher.free.fr Right-click to see the full size image.

Now, imagine if you were able to go outside the boundaries of one room, walking along the walls behind the collision detection of the game. Obviously, you'd be able to walk from one room to the next, even if they're not supposed to be connected! While you're in this state, you're considered to be in the Exploration Zone. There are a couple of ways to do this, as shown in the videos.

This game is divided into two different 'levels' so that you can walk underneath certain hallways and paths, depending on whether you're on the upper or lower level of the room. By using the Jump and Save method, you confuse the game and trick it into thinking that you're constantly in the 'jumping' state since you never landed. Then when you take damage, it tries to pull you out of the jumping state. And the game is programmed to realize that when Link leaves the jumping state, he's on the lower level, so it tries to put you on that level. If there is no standard floor on that part of the lower level, then you can walk around under the floor and along the 'outside' of the rooms.

The Levitation method generally requires a turbo controller, as it requires you to press the A button once each frame (roughly 60 times a second), but it can technically be done without one: Some speedrunners have mastered using the Levitation Glitch over very short distances. However, we're going to assume that it's virtually impossible to perform this glitch over long distances (such as is needed to perform the Levitation method Exploration Glitch) without a turbo controller.

Notice that the developers never thought to put a wall along the right side of this room, because they never expected players to be able to get there. That means that all you have to do is use the Levitation Glitch to get to the edge of the screen and you can simply walk into the next room, which puts you inside the Exploration Zone.

Unfortunately, much of the fun that the Exploration Glitch can do is not going to be useful to us, since you can't interact with the normal sprites (collect items, fight the boss, etc.) while you're on the level beneath them. There are only a handful of rooms where you can return from the glitched level of the Exploration Zone back to the regular level of the underworld map (this is referred to as 'hopping' and rooms in which you can do this are called, intuitively enough, 'hoppable' rooms).

DEATH MOUNTAIN ASCENT AND DASH BUFFERED WALL CLIPPING

Video taken from LTTP4HTTP's channel.

The Death Mountain Ascent glitch is the most common use of the Dash Buffered Wall Clipping glitch. Essentially, your goal is to tap the A button to prepare a dash with the Pegasus Boots and press up and right for exactly one frame, then do the same thing while holding down and right for one frame, and continue in this pattern until you're in the proper position (Alternatively, depending on where you do the glitch from, you can simply tap the A button and the right button for exactly one frame, and repeat this multiple times to get into the proper position).  Either way, you then walk to the right position and 'jump' down onto Death Mountain, which is located there on the overworld map, but is not supposed to be accessible from that screen. The game will be very confused about Link's position, so you'll have to maneuver a bit in order to find a cave entrance: Once you walk into a cave, the game reorients itself.

There are many other ways the Dash Buffered Wall Clip can be used: You can use it to get into the Swamp of Evil early, to skip some rooms in the Ice Palace, Misery Mire, and Mountain Tower, to get into the east of Death Mountain early, and to start the Kiki Skip glitch. To see how to use these Dash Buffered Wall Clips, check out speedrunner Kryssstal's website, http://notesmash.org/krystal/alttp/clips/.

KIKI SKIP

Directions on how to do the Kiki Skip glitch, taken from http://notesmash.org/krystal/alttp/

The Kiki Skip glitch is a somewhat special use of a Dash Buffered Wall Clip. The cave that you use it in (on a ledge on the side of Death Mountain) just happens to be on the very bottom of the underworld map: If you check the Exploration Zone map posted earlier, it's on the bottom row, seventh screen from the right. Conveniently, on the top row, seventh screen from the right, is a room from the Dark Palace. Maps in this games loop vertically and horizontally (you'd never notice this in standard gameplay since you should never get out of bounds like this), so Wall Clipping in this cave and jumping down to the next screen causes you to 'land' inside of the Dark Palace, skipping the need to have Kiki the monkey open it for you.

EARLY TEMPERED SWORD

Video taken from speedrunner Tompa's channel.

This glitch can be very helpful since it allows you to get the Tempered Sword even before collecting the Master Sword! If you use the Magic Mirror while in the Dark World at the exact same frame as you jump down from the cliff, the warp portal will move one pixel further each time you do this. After doing this three times, you can reach the ladder to the library while in the Light World with the portal just below you. Touching the very upper edge of the portal while on the ladder will move you a bit closer to the the transformed smithy, allowing you to eventually reach him without using the Titan's Mitt.

DEATH MOUNTAIN DESCENT

Video taken from Desbreko's channel.

This is one of the most famous glitches in A Link to the Past, and has been used for ages in speedrunning this game. The explanation for the glitch is given in the video. It's very important for us since it allows you to access much of the Dark World earlier than intended.

SURFING BUNNY

 

Images taken from the ZeldaChaosWiki, at http://www.jaytheham.com/zcw/Main_Page

In order to do this glitch, you must get to the Plains of Ruin in the Dark World with the Flippers but without collecting the Moon Pearl, which is easiest to do by using the Death Mountain Descent glitch. If you repeatedly move left while stepping into deep water (since in his bunny form, Link cannot swim even if you have the Flippers), you can trigger the screen transition while you're on the deep water. This will allow you to stand on the water, as seen in the first image. If you get killed by an enemy while standing on the water, but have a bottled Fairy, you'll be revived as normal Link, since the game is not programmed to revive bunny Link while in the water. This will last until you enter and then exit a cave or dungeon, or until you use the Magic Mirror. Either way, once you return to the Dark World, you'll be a bunny again.

This glitch can also be done in the Swamp of Evil, but you'll have to stand on the deep water by using a warp portal from the Magic Mirror instead of a screen transition.

Alternatively, if you die or save and quit while in a Dark World dungeon (since the Light World and Dark World dungeons are all on the same map), the game automatically assumes that you're human, and sets you back to human Link until you leave the dungeon.

ETHER MEDALLION GLITCH

This glitch is basically a side effect of the Exploration Glitch. Keep in mind that the game is programmed to drop a Heart Container after a boss is defeated, and then to drop the Pendant/Crystal corresponding to whatever dungeon you're in. But if you enter, for example, the East Palace dungeon and then use the Exploration Glitch to get at the Dark Palace map, the game doesn't know that you're no longer in the East Palace. So when you defeat Helmasaur King, it will still drop the Pendant of Courage instead of the first Crystal.

But what if you do the Exploration Glitch from Lower Hyrule Castle? Well, instead of a Pendant or Crystal, the prize for defeating a boss in this dungeon just so happens to be the Ether Medallion! Normally, we wouldn't be able to use this glitch, since it would require permanently defeating a boss before entering its dungeon, making that dungeon impossible to complete. However, if you go to a boss room of a dungeon that you have already completed, for some reason the Ether Medallion will still fall into the room, allowing you to collect it early!

PHASE 0 ESCAPE GLITCH

This is a very annoying glitch, to say the least. There are a few important facts to recognize about Phase 0 of the game. First, Princess Zelda's telepathic message will occur once every 60 seconds, but the time for her message will not count down while a text box is on the screen. Secondly, if you are holding an item above your head or tugging on a wall, the internal timer for her message will count down, but the message will not be displayed until you throw the item or stop tugging on the wall. Because of this, you can approach the guards that block your way to the east and get as close as possible to them (this will cause their text box to automatically open). Then, tug on the wall for at least a minute. When you let go of the wall, hold right and you will successfully move one pixel to the right before Zelda's telepathic message appears.

Now, once you close her message (assuming you're always holding right), the guard will automatically talk to you again since you're exactly one pixel too close to his dialogue trigger. Once you close his dialogue, it'll open one frame later since you're still within his trigger, as long as you're holding right. Since one frame passes in between each of his text boxes appearing and there are 60 frames in a second in this game, after 3600 of his text boxes appear (a total of one minute worth of frames), Zelda's telepathic message will reappear, allowing you to move one more pixel to the right. If you do this for about 20 hours, you'll have successfully moved enough pixels to the right to get past them and explore Hyrule during Phase 0! Of course, you cannot save any progress with the save and quit, and you cannot use any swords, meaning there isn't much use for this glitch to us.

ANALYSIS

There are a lot of possible glitches and a lot of dungeons in this game, so we're going to have to be

thorough with each one.

Lower Hyrule Castle is always the first dungeon you must enter, since all of the other paths are blocked off by guards. You could use the Phase 0 Escape Glitch to access other dungeons early, and you could technically complete East Palace without a sword, but the inability to save and the inability to return back to the castle (not to mention the dozens of hours this glitch requires) makes this impossible. And once you enter a dungeon, you must complete is, so we cannot use the Exploration Glitch to leave Lower Hyrule Castle while in Phase 1.

East Palace can be completed anytime after Phase 2 has started, as it has no special rooms that require items beyond the Bow.

Desert Palace can be glitched into with some Dash Buffered Wall Clips, but those require the Pegasus Boots, which means you'll have to have already completed East Palace anyway! While you could use the Exploration Glitch to enter it early, the only hoppable room in this dungeon is in the second half of the dungeon. This means that, since the boss is behind a big door and the Big Key is in the first half of the dungeon, you would not be able to fight the boss or reach the Power Glove (keep in mind that the entrance to the second half of the dungeon is blocked off by heavy rocks, so you can't exit it without the Power Glove). In other words, you must complete the East Palace before this dungeon, no matter what.

The Mountain Tower is more interesting: If you have the Pegasus Boots, you can enter it without the Power Glove by doing the Death Mountain Ascent glitch. However, once inside the dungeon, the Pegasus Boots, Bow, and Power Glove are never needed, and since you can the first room of this dungeon is hoppable, you can use the Exploration Glitch to get into here early. Simply hop into the first room and then walk out the door (this does not count as leaving the dungeon for the purposes of our definition for the same reason that completing a dungeon while in the Exploration Zone would not) and immediately walk back in so the game recognizes that you are in Mountain Tower (otherwise you would trigger the Ether Medallion Glitch and make completing this dungeon impossible).

Upper Hyrule Castle generally requires the Master Sword to enter, which would require the Pendants from completing the three Light World dungeons. Alternatively, you could use the Death Mountain Ascent glitch to get up to Death Mountain (which would only require the Pegasus Boots from completing East Palace or use of the Exploration Glitch to get through the Mountain Tower entrance), then the Death Mountain Descent to get to the Dark World's Village of Outcasts. From there, it's easy to make it to the smithy and use the Early Tempered Sword glitch to turn your sword into the Tempered Sword, which can also break the barrier leading into this dungeon!

    Because Agahnim is special, you can fight him normally even while the Exploration Glitch is active, but we won't accept that as completing this dungeon for the same reason we won't penalize using the Exploration Glitch as 'exiting' a dungeon: Being inside of a dungeon with the Exploration Glitch is not considered actually being inside that dungeon for the purposes of this guide. Regardless, you can make this your first dungeon after Lower Hyrule Castle by simply doing the aforementioned glitches to get the Tempered Sword before entering any new dungeons (aside from the Exploration Glitch to get outside of the Mountain Tower).

Dark Palace can be entered early with the Death Mountain Ascent and Kiki Skip glitches, and can be completed with only the Bow, which would be required to access the boss' room in this dungeon even if you used the Exploration Glitch. Without these glitches, you'd need to use the Death Mountain Descent glitch and a Dash Buffered Wall Clip to get to this dungeon early, you'd need the Flippers to get from the Death Mountain Descent spot towards the dungeon, and you'd have to have the Moon Pearl to get Kiki to open the dungeon for you (or to just have the Moon Pearl and complete Upper Hyrule Castle like normal).

Swamp Palace is a rather annoying dungeon, unfortunately. First of all, you absolutely need the Hammer and the Flippers in order to get through it (The former requires you to complete Dark Palace, the latter requires you to collect the Power Glove or Titan's Mitt to move the heavy rock in the way). Additionally, there is a bit of trickery with entering this dungeon that means the Surfing Bunny glitch will not work in it: In order to get past the first room of the dungeon, you must have pulled a switch in the Swamp Ruins in the Light World. Of course, if you use the Surfing Fairy glitch before doing this, the glitch will be cancelled by the time you enter the dungeon and you won't be able to get past the first room. And if you tried to pull the switch and then do the Surfing Bunny glitch, it would require you to leave the screen and reset the switch to its default 'off' position, setting you back to square one. For this reason, you need the Moon Pearl as well to complete this dungeon. Because you have to exit a dungeon and re-enter it to properly 'set' the dungeon to drop the correct Crystal once the boss is defeated, even the Exploration Glitch cannot help us here.

Skull Woods can be entered almost immediately with the Death Mountain Descent glitch, but since you need to use the Fire Rod on the overworld to access its second half, and bunny Link cannot use it, you'll need to be human to access it. If you tried to use the Surfing Bunny glitch to get into the second half of this dungeon, you'd find that there is a large black rock blocking the way back to the Village of Outcasts and Skull Woods, meaning you'd need to have the Titan's Mitt or Hookshot to get back to it (both of which require the Moon Pearl to collect anyway). Even by using the Exploration Glitch, you will get stuck in the unburnt bug if you try to leave and re-enter the second half of this dungeon, and there is nowhere in the first half of the dungeon to use the Exploration Glitch to safely explore the second half.

Thieves' Town is very similar to Skull Woods: For the same reasons, we cannot use the Surfing Bunny glitch to access it early, and since its entrance is blocked by a trident that we need to use human Link to pull off, we must have the Moon Pearl before entering it. Inside the dungeon, the only other item we really need are the Pegasus Boots and the Hammer. Note that if you complete this dungeon before Desert Palace, your Titan's Mitt will be downgraded to the Power Glove when you collect it, meaning you must then also complete the Turtle Rock before Desert Palace (As this are the only point in the game where the Titan's Mitt is absolutely required. You would also need to complete the Ice Palace between these dungeons if you weren't using the Exploration Glitch). Once again, trying to use the Exploration Glitch will just get you stuck in the trident when you try to exit and re-enter the dungeon.

Though the Ice Palace can be entered early with the Mirror Transition glitch, that only works in the Japanese 1.0 version of the game, and not on the SNES cartridge. Because of this, you'll need to use the Titan's Mitt to enter this dungeon. You can skip past the room where you'd normally need the Hookshot by using the explosion of a properly placed Bomb to throw you across the gap. Aside from that, you'll need to use the Hammer to get through the dungeon, and either the Fire Rod or the Bombos Medallion to destroy particular Freezors and the boss, Kholdstare. This means you must complete Skull Woods for the Fire Rod or collect the Master Sword (or use the Early Tempered Sword glitch) for the Bombos Medallion. With the Exploration Glitch, you can hop into a room in the first basement and work your way back to the entrance, but this would still require the Hammer and either the Fire Rod or the Bombos Medallion (but not the Titan's Mitt).

For Misery Mire, you can use a Dash Buffered Wall Clip to get into the Swamp of Evil without the Flute or Titan's Mitt, but this would require you to be able to use the Pegasus Boots while in the Dark World, meaning it would have to be after the Surfing Bunny glitch (which requires the Flippers, which requires the Power Glove or Titan's Mitt) or with the Moon Pearl. You can either use the Ether Medallion Glitch or the Early Tempered Sword glitch to get the Ether Medallion, and the gap in the first room that would normally require the Hookshot to cross can be crossed without it by letting a Bomb's explosion propel you past it. You could use the Exploration Glitch to access this dungeon, but it would still require the Ether Medallion to re-enter (and therefore either the Moon Pearl or Flippers to do the Surfing Bunny glitch, since bunny Link cannot use the Ether Medallion).

Turtle Rock could be glitched into with the Mirror Transition glitch in the Japanese 1.0 version as well, but in the SNES version, you must use the Titan's Mitt, which would require the Moon Pearl. Additionally, you'll need to use the Quake Medallion and the Hammer to get into the dungeon. Inside, it's theoretically possible to use the Levitation Glitch to cross the gaps in the floor without the Cane of Somaria, but to do so would require thousands of presses of the A button in a perfect rhythm of 60 times a second, making it essentially impossible without a turbo controller. In addition, you'll need to use the Fire Rod and Ice Rod to defeat the boss, Trinexx. There is no known way to use the Exploration Glitch to get through this dungeon early.

Ganon's Tower, on the other hand, can very easily be entered with the Exploration Glitch. The first room of this dungeon is hoppable, and you can exit and then re-enter the dungeon even without collecting the seven Crystals. In order to complete the dungeon, you only need to use the Fire Rod and either the Hammer or the Cane of Somaria (the part that normally requires the Hookshot can be passed with a few seconds of precise use of the Levitation Glitch, which is well within the realm of possibility of practiced speedrunners). Without using the Exploration Glitch, of course this requires you to have the seven Crystals from the Dark World dungeons.

FINAL RESULTS!

• From the start -> Lower Hyrule Castle
• After Lower Hyrule Castle -> East Palace, Mountain Tower, Upper Hyrule Castle
• After East Palace -> Desert Palace, Dark Palace
• After Mountain Tower -> Skull Woods
• After Mountain Tower and Dark Palace -> Thieves' Town
• After Dark Palace -> Ice Palace
• After [Mountain Tower, Dark Palace, and Desert Palace] or Thieves' Town -> Swamp Palace
• After [Desert Palace] or [Mountain Tower] -> Misery Mire
• After Skull Woods, Thieves' Town, and Misery Mire -> Turtle Rock
• After Skull Woods and [Dark Palace] or [Misery Mire] -> Ganon's Tower
• NOTE: If you complete Thieves' Town before Desert Palace, you must also complete Turtle Rock before Desert Palace

 If we do not allow the Kiki Skip glitch or the Exploration Glitch (so we really crack down on the 'you cannot leave a dungeon after entering it unless absolutely necessary' rule), these are the possible dungeon orders:

• From the start -> Lower Hyrule Castle
• After Lower Hyrule Castle -> East Palace
• After East Palace -> Desert Palace, Mountain Tower, Upper Hyrule Castle 
• After Mountain Tower -> Skull Woods
• After [Desert Palace] or [Upper Hyrule Castle] and Mountain Tower -> Dark Palace
• After Dark Palace -> Thieves' Town
• After Thieves' Town -> Ice Palace
• After [Dark Palace and Desert Palace] or Thieves' Town -> Swamp Palace
• After [Desert Palace] or [Mountain Tower] -> Misery Mire
• After Skull Woods, Thieves' Town, and Misery Mire -> Turtle Rock
• After Swamp Palace, Ice Palace and Turtle Rock -> Ganon's Tower
• NOTE: If you complete Thieves' Town before Desert Palace, you must also complete the Ice Palace and Turtle Rock before Desert Palace