So it's worth pointing out that this guide is really for the Perfect Run Relics (no deaths; all boxes). If you aren't going to bother with these then this guide is less helpful. Coincidentally these are the hardest items to acquire in the game.

The short of it is: we're going to be doing what people normally do for the 'all boxes' gem. Retrying sections of a level, dying, respawning at a nearby checkpoint, and repeating until we perfect it. Or at least, until we get far enough to a satisfactory point.

Which is why I say this is 'kind of' save stating. You're saving your button presses. So that when you perfect a particular section, you can just playback all of your button presses when going for the Perfect Run Relic.

You'll obviously need software to record all of your button presses. What I used is the following:

https://www.jitbit.com/macro-recorder/

If you have a recorder of choice, by all means go for it. This is the one that worked for me. It's worth noting that I did try a different key recorder, and whilst it could record my mouse movements and key presses on my desktop it failed to playback in-game. So some keyloggers/macro recorders might not work.

The macro recorder/keylogger I linked up top is self explanatory, but here's a short section on setting it up.

It brings a 30 day 'trial' period, with all features available. Hit on 'evaluate'.


Afterwards, go to settings and set your keybinds how you wish.


Since I'm using keyboard and I didn't alter the default settings on the game, I used 'Q' as my 'start recording' button and 'E' as my 'stop recording' button. 'P' is my 'playback' button. I didn't bother with the other keybinds and left them as-is.

And that's pretty much it. Now when you get to a section you're having issues with, you can keep retrying it and respawning at the nearest checkpoint until you perfect it. Record each attempt before beginning, and stop recording when done.

You don't have to 100% a section. If you can complete even half of it I'd say that's good enough. That way when you retry it for the Perfect Run Relic (or even just the regular gem) you already have a portion of it completed.

Now, there's some caveats to this method, and this is going to be a long one:

• You'll want to start your playback on the same spot that you began your recording. If you begin playback of your recording 7 feet from where you recorded it, you'll obviously be 7 feet behind in all of your actions. Which will lead to death.

• If there are moving enemies/platforms/hazards, you'll want to start your recording and playback when those hazards/enemies/etc are in the same spot. In other words, if there's a moving platform in front of you you want it to be in the same spot during playback as it was in the recording. If there's a moving platform 7 feet in front of you, you want it to be the same distance when playing back. Otherwise you might miss your jump or run into something that wasn't there before.

• Make your jumps and hit boxes with more than just a pixel's worth of wiggle room. If you're barely hitting boxes and making landings on your jumps, then you'll probably miss them on playback. Because odds are, you aren't going to begin playback in exactly the same pixel that you were on when you recorded. So try not to just barely get boxes and make landings.

• This doesn't work too well on levels with slippery surfaces. You can slide 40 feet across on ice when recording, but on playback those same button presses have you sliding only 30 feet across. Which messes up the rest of your actions, obviously, because you won't be where you were when recording. I haven't tested this out everywhere but it seemed to be the case on 'Crash Landed'.

My advice for all of these issues is to begin your recordings and playbacks from the same spot everytime. I used the checkpoint boxes as a reference point, standing right in the middle of them and facing the same direction everytime. If there are any moving enemies or hazards in front of me, I'd wait for a particular point in their animation and pause the game, then begin recording. When replaying, I'd do the same.

Remember that keyloggers record key presses and duration of those presses. Nothing else. As long as everything is in the same condition as it was when you recorded the button presses, you should get the same results. So keep that general idea in mind when recording.

I used this method to pass the alien riding sections in 'Crash Landed', so I can't speak for the rest of the game. But it worked precisely as intended. Hopefully this helps out anyone else that is facing similar issues in their Perfect Relic runs. There's some work involved in getting the replay and playback to matchup, but I found the hassle better than having to replay entire levels for hours on end.