Eggs
Contents
Egg Types
Each type of egg will normally bounce off of walls up to 3 times. Bouncing an egg off of any surface (wall, ground, or ceiling) will upgrade it to the next stage, in the progression of Green -> Yellow -> Red. Tonguing an egg will stop its flight, bobbing it downward in a predictable direction. An egg will break after making contact with standard enemies or interactive sprites (flowers, winged clouds, etc). On the last collision with a wall, the egg will become inactive and fall off-screen. Eggs can destroy certain enemies without breaking (e.g. bats), but will become inactive upon hitting the next surface.
Green Eggs
The basic type of egg: can be made by swallowing enemies or obtainable from standard green egg blocks.
Yellow Eggs
Spawns a single coin after breaking. Coins are only useful for obtaining extra lives, so they are essentially useless for speedrunning purposes.
Red Eggs
Spawns 2 stars after breaking. Red eggs are a quick way to get stars compared to clouds or rings, but require very specific planning or egg shots to collect stars without losing time. Commonly used in 100% to skip save rings and recover lost stars after getting hit.
Level Specific Projectiles
Some projectiles can only be found on certain levels, and thus are only specific to speed running those levels.
Flashing Red Eggs
Flashing Red Eggs only appear in 3 levels: 1-6, 1-7, 4-E
These eggs contain a red coin and are a part of the standard 20 red coins in each level. Read: THESE ARE NOT OPTIONAL.The red coin can be obtained by either breaking the egg on an enemy/interactive sprite or carried into the goal ring. They behave like normal eggs otherwise.
Big Eggs
Big Eggs only appear in 2 levels: 2-7 & 3-4 Boss Fight
Big Eggs can be made by swallowing a fat shy guy. These eggs travel on a downward curve, instead of a linear path like normal eggs. When a Big Egg hits the ground, it will turn all enemies on screen into stars.
This is used in 2-7 to fill up all the available sprite slots, preventing the Bullet Bill Launchers from spawning. They can also be used to create additional stars for 100% routes. See: 2-7 Sprite Overload
Since giant eggs fall downward after being thrown, it is possible to "Baxter" the egg, and the Yoshi after the goal ring will collect it, adding to the egg inventory for the next level. The egg's sprite be glitched, but will otherwise act normally. This is an important technique to master for the Any% Warps category in order to perform the 3-3 Glitch (Submarine Skip).
Chickens
Chickens only appear in 2 levels: 4-7 & 5-6
The official name is Huffin' Puffin, but everyone calls them chickens. These projectiles resemble baby ducks/chickens and act as boomerangs, returning to Yoshi after being thrown. Obtained by touching them after shooting or jumping on the "mother" chicken. Unlike normal eggs, chickens will become inactive after touching 2 surfaces. When canceling the aiming of a chicken, there is a 1/3rd chance the chicken will run away. It's possible to manipulate their flight path by dancing around them. Can be used to fly continuous circles around Yoshi, often known as doing loop-de-loops.
It is also possible to bring chicken to the next level doing a Chicken Baxter
Egg Aiming and Egg Shots
Neutral Eggshot
When the egg controls are set to hasty, you can press and quickly release A to do an eggshot that will always have the lowest possible angle. You must release A within 9 frames to get the lowest possible angle. This is very useful because it allows certain difficult eggshots to be made consistent. This technique is used countless times in speedruns. By constrast, if egg controls are set to patient, there is a one frame window to press A to get the lowest possible angle. Because of this, for a category like 100% where consistent eggshots are incredibly important, it is highly recommended that you play on hasty.
Rising and Falling Neutral
Whether Yoshi is moving up or down influences egg trajectory, which can be seen in neutral eggshots. Doing an egg shot then immediately jumping results in a lower angled shot (also works if you jump then almost immediately fire an egg as well, assuming you continue to hold down jump), whereas firing an eggshot while falling has the opposite effect: the egg angle will be higher.
Upwards Eggshot
There are 2 types of Upwards Eggshots.
Straight up-shot: To do a completely vertical up-shot you have to stand still and:
- A) Tap A and hold up for less than 10 frames
- B) Wait until your cursor is out before releasing A.
Angled up-shot: This happens when you make an up-shot by tapping A and holding up for longer than 10 frames, it's inevitable when running and shooting upwards. This also makes Yoshi face the opposite direction.
Egg Catching
Tonguing Eggs
Eggs can only be tongued after a certain amount of time has elapsed after throwing them, i.e. you cannot throw an egg and immediately tongue it. The general direction an egg moves when tongued is dependent entirely on Yoshi's speed and direction. If Yoshi is standing still, the egg will move towards Yoshi. If Yoshi is running to the right and tongues an egg, the egg will move with Yoshi to the right. The faster Yoshi is going, the faster the eggs can go. However, the position of Yoshi when the egg is tongued changes exactly how fast the egg will move.
- If an egg is behind Yoshi when you tongue it, it will speed up to "try to catch up."
- If an egg is in front of Yoshi when you tongue it, it will slow down to let you catch up.
Therefore, to produce the fastest moving eggs, you want to tongue an egg while moving as fast as possible when the egg is behind Yoshi.
First, eggs tongued when standing simply move towards Yoshi. Then, all the eggs in the room are tongued while Yoshi is still in front of them. This causes them to move forward, but slowly. Lastly, all of the eggs in the room are reset, and tongued again, this time while Yoshi has already passed them. They fly much much further. This is very relevant for achieving the Baxter Shot.
Juggling Eggs
Eggs can be tongued indefinitely, and since they follow Yoshi's movement more or less, they can be continuously juggled to follow Yoshi.
Bringing Special Eggs Into The Next Level
Under normal conditions, Chickens and Big Eggs cannot be taken out of the level they came from. However, they can be brought to other levels by performing a Baxter Shot.
Baxter Shot
Named after the TASer Baxter, who discovered them, the Baxter Shot (Baxter, for short), is performed when an egg is tongued over the goal ring at the end of the level. If the egg flies far enough, the next Yoshi will pick up the egg, and it will be useful in subsequent levels.
Doing a Baxter Shot you can bring pretty much anything into next level, for example:
- Flashing Red Egg
- Giant Eggs (See: 3-3 Glitch)
- And even Keys! (Not RTA viable)
Baxter Cancel
There's a trick to let Baby Mario carry over chickens or big eggs to the next Yoshi. To do this, you have cancel egg-aiming on the same frame you hit the goal ring. Not recommended for new players. See: Chicken Baxter for more information on the Trick.
1-1 Warps
Main Article: 1-1 Warps
As a result of 1-1 Warping, both big eggs and chicken can be brought to 1-1. Both will act normally but will have glitched sprites, since the Big Egg doesn't exist in the level tile-set. They act normally in every other aspect.
Note: Levels that have Fat Shy Guys do not have any 1-1 Warps, therefore Big Eggs must be baxtered and taken to another level.
