Speedrunning basics

Verified against the spelunky.ai port v0.1.10 on 28 October 2026.

This page describes a secret.

The game keeps its own record of a fast run: the best time in the high scores, the game's clock at a win, which earns a trophy and, at 600 seconds or less, the door to the Moon Room (the high scores). The clock counts only the steps spent in levels, so what a run is timed on is the play itself: how fast the player gets from each entrance to its exit, through all sixteen levels, the last of them Olmec's Lair. One run, a win from the level 13 shortcut, shows the clock stopping at the end and what a shortcut does to the record ^[1]; the clips of those steps are cut from it, and the others from replays of the moves and the high scores room.

• A game started by the title screen's start door. Only a win in such a game sets a best time: the Tunnel Man's shortcut doors mark the game as a shortcut's, and its win leaves the time as it was ^{[2] [3] [4]}.
• A win, which takes beating Olmec (Beating Olmec is the guide for him). Only a win records a time, not a death ^[5].

1. Start from the start door, not a shortcut door. The clock starts at 0 with the game, and from then on gains 30 on each step that the player is alive in a level ^{[6] [7]}. A second on it is 33⅓ steps, about 1.11 real seconds (the clock).

2. Run. Running is twice as fast as walking: 6 pixels per step against 3 pixels per step. The run key runs at once on the ground, and attack held while walking runs after 10 steps (running) ^{[8] [9]}. A jump keeps the speed, as the slower limit is only set on the ground ^[10], and goes farther from a run (the Spelunker's moves). In the clip, the player walks off a pillar, then runs off a ledge and jumps the gap at twice the speed ^[11].

3. Take each level's exit: up, standing on the ground at its door ^[12]. The clock only runs in a level, not in the screen between levels ^[13]: in the run, it reads the same all through the screen between levels 13 and 14 ^[1]. That screen tallies the level's time and the game's (between levels), as in the clip, after the first level ^[14].

4. Beat Olmec and take his door. The clock stops there: the ending isn't a level (the door) ^{[15] [13]}. In the clip, Olmec drowns, the door opens, and the player climbs out of the shaft and goes through it ^[16]; the clock reads the same from the ending's first scene to the credits' end ^[1].

5. Watch the ending through. Its last scene shows the game's time after the final score (the final score) ^[17]. In the clip, the time comes after the money ^[18].

6. Let the credits end. The win goes into the high scores only when the credits fade out to the high scores room (the credits) ^[19]. Its time is the clock's, cut to whole seconds, and it's kept if it's the first or beats the best ^[4].

7. Check the trophy. The high scores room gives the best time a bronze, silver or gold trophy, and a gold one, for 600 seconds or less, puts the Moon Room's door beside it (the thresholds) ^[20]. The clip shows the room with all four gold trophies, each with its door, the Moon Room's under the time's trophy ^[21].

• Pausing stops the clock with everything else, so a pause costs a run nothing (pausing) ^[22].
• Neither does the screen between levels, the Tunnel Man's requests on it included: it isn't a level ^[13]. The Tunnel Man's shortcuts start a game at level 5, 9 or 13 (the shortcuts), a way to play the later areas without the earlier ones, though such a game's win sets no time.
• A level left fast keeps the next one lit. The screen between levels rules out a dark next level when the level just left took 20 seconds or less past the minute on its clock, which the code's comment calls not creating "a dark level if player is attempting a speed run" (the clock's quirks) ^{[23] [24]}. It reads only the seconds, so a level that took 1:05 rules one out as well as one that took 0:05 (the dark roll).
• The gold trophy's 600 seconds on the clock are 20,000 steps in levels, 11 minutes 6⅔ seconds at the game's 30 steps a second ^[25].
• The Ghost comes to a player who stays 5,000 steps on a level after the first (Ghost timer), far longer than a fast run spends on one.
• The time's gold trophy is one of the four that let the player play as the Tunnel Man (playing as him) ^[26].

• Winning from a shortcut. The win counts, but the time stays as it was; with no best time before it, the high scores room shows TIME: 0:00 all the same, as it shows the time whenever there's a win ^{[27] [28]}. In the clip, after the run's win from the level 13 shortcut, the room has WINS: 1 and TIME: 0:00 ^[29].

• Dying. A death ends the game without a time ^[5]. With the Ankh, the player comes back instead, at the level's entrance as a rule, and the clock runs on ^[30].

• Reading the Moon Room's goal as unlocked. Climbing up beside the trophies, the panel shows the Moon Room's goal for any best time, though only the door means it's fast enough (the scores' quirks) ^{[31] [24]}. In the clip, with a win at 11:40, the time's trophy is silver and there's no door, but the goal shows ^[32].

• A best time of exactly 16:00. It earns no trophy, while 15:59 earns the bronze (the scores' quirks) ^{[33] [24] [34]}.