The game will record your fastest time for each floor. Furthermore, it has online leaderboards to compare your fastest time to what others have been able to do. This guide discusses how to finish floors as quickly as possible.

There are two fundamentally different types of floors. On most floors, you must get the key, then go to the exit. However, floors that are 7 modulo 11 have a mini-boss, while those that are multiples of 11 have a "champion", that is, a major boss. Boss floors require you to kill the boss to proceed.

Speed running on normal (non-boss) floors is all about moving fast. You go get the key, then go reach the exit. Each normal floor has separate leaderboards for the fastest time while getting all gems and for the fastest time without regard to gems.

Normally, you move at four squares per second. The shoe power up will allow you to move faster for a short period of time. Dash characters can use their skill to move faster. The Coward can do likewise. Portals characters can warp to places that they've previously laid a portal. These sometimes allow you to finish a floor faster than would be possible by normal running. Ultimately, there are four characters that are useful to speed running on normal floors.

Mazeman, the starting character, is most commonly the fastest. Dashing allows you to move five squares in 0.5 seconds, which saves you about 0.75 seconds on net. He has shorter cooldowns than the other dash characters, and also moves faster than The Ghost.

The Ghost's ability to travel through walls will often make him the fastest character by far where this is useful. On many floors, it isn't. And on many floors where it is useful, it is only useful if you're willing to ignore the gems. If you don't have large gains from passing through walls, then The Ghost will be much slower than Mazeman, as he has fewer skill uses, a longer cooldown, and doesn't move as fast when he does dash. The Ghost is unlocked with 200 gems, and the earliest that this is possible is floor 81.

The Escapist can lay portals, then warp back to where he has previously been. On most floors, this is useless, but this can save a lot of time if you need to double back very far. In the most extreme case, on some floors you start at the exit, have to go to the opposite end of the floor to get the key, and then have to return to the exit. The Escapist can leave a portal at the start, traverse the floor only once, and then warp back to the exit. The Escapist is unlocked by completing floor 29.

The Crusader has unlimited sword slashes, which probably sounds very powerful. And it is powerful, but having no speed boost and then stopping frequently to attack will get you through a level, but not quickly. Still, it's useful for getting all of the gems on floors where it's hard to get them and clear the level at all. None of the no gems records were set using the Crusader, and the earliest all gems record that was set using him is floor 87.

The Coward is only rarely useful, as he gives less of a speed boost than Mazeman and can't travel through monsters. His advantage is his ability to change directions whenever you please, rather than needing to dash five squares in a straight line like Mazeman. For example, on floor 1, if you want to get all gems, Mazeman never has a good spot to dash five squares in a line, so The Coward will be the fastest character. The Coward is unlocked by getting 80 gems, which can be finished at floor 32 if you collect all gems.

You might think that The Unsung Hero would be useful here. The problem is that he has a longer skill cooldown than Mazeman. He's useful for killing monsters in a lot of floors if you just want to beat it, but not for speed running.

You might also wonder why I specify The Escapist and not The Intergalactic Fisherman. The Escapist can readily lay multiple sets of portals if you need them. I haven't found any speed running situation where The Intergalactic Fisherman is preferable to The Escapist.

Finally, you may have noticed that The Firestarter moves faster when his skill is active. This doesn't get him any net speed boost, however, as it only compensates for his needing to stop when he activates his skill.

You normally move at 4 squares per second. I have counted squares to see what the fastest possible time is without using skills or speed boosts. I assume that you go from the center of one square to the center of the next, and ignore the ability to pick up a gem or key without going all the way to the center of the square.

For comparison, I list the current record time on each floor. I do this separately for with and without gems. Skills generally allow record times to be faster than the theoretical. Records only slightly faster than theoretical are usually done by Mazeman. Records that are faster than theoretical by more than 6 seconds or are less than 0.727 * (theoretical - 0.57 seconds) are generally the work of ether The Escapist or The Ghost.

The table is split across multiple sections because Steam restricts the length of a single section.

Speed running on boss floors usually isn't about moving fast. Rather, it's about killing the boss quickly. You mainly want something that can hit the boss as quickly as possible, and that usually means skills that deal damage rather than moving around more quickly.

The Zealous Soldier is usually the fastest at boss floors. The ability to shoot through walls allows not merely hitting the boss from a distance, but doing so even if there are walls in the way. The Zealous Soldier is unlocked by completing floor 62.

The Repentant is typically the fastest on floors where you cannot get a clean shot off due to tight hallways. The ability to slash a boss through a single wall segment also helps a lot. The Repentant is unlocked by completing floor 7.

The Firestarter is usually pretty useless, but gets his turn to shine against one particular boss. The boss will follow you around, including over fire trails. Meanwhile, the boss's movement pattern makes it impractical to safely shoot him with a gun or slash him with a sword. You'll know the boss when you see him. The Firestarter is unlocked by getting 20 gems, which you can do as soon as floor 8.

Bomb-Building Droid Model Zero is the fastest for one particular boss that shields up to be invulnerable for extended periods of time without moving. Plant a bomb so that the fire trail will be on top of the boss when his shield goes down and then you damage the boss the instant that his shield goes down. Furthermore, the boss shield is necessarily down for slightly longer than his invulnerability period after taking damage, so you can sometimes hit him a second time before he becomes invulnerable. Bomb-Building Droid Model Zero is unlocked by completing floor 73.

The Escapist is fastest for one particular boss that warps back and forth to predictable spots, but has a shield to be invulnerable except from melee range. This makes it so that you only have to run the length of the floor once to set portals, then can chase the boss around by warping back and forth. You'll know this boss when you see him. The Escapist is unlocked by completing floor 29.

The Hitman is never strictly the fastest character possible, but is notably useful for speed running against two particular bosses. In both cases, the boss has a lot of other monsters on the floor, making it difficult to get a clean shot off. Furthermore, the boss moves around randomly, so trying to shoot him from a distance will usually miss. The Hitman's ability to force the boss to hold still so that you can hit him allows for more reliably having a decently fast run.

There are two types of bosses. What I'm calling minor bosses here is the ones where you recruit a character by defeating him. These are on floors numbered 7 modulo 11. The minor bosses all take three hits to kill, and generally become invulnerable for about 2 1/2 seconds after taking damage. This generally results in record times against such bosses being only a little over 5 seconds.

Champions are the major bosses on floors that are multiples of 11. They generally take 5 hits to kill (with the exception of the end boss, who takes six) and become invulnerable for at least 3 seconds after each time that they take damage. They also tend to change their movement or attacks to become more difficult after each hit. Some champions become invulnerable for much longer periods of time after taking damage, which can make the battles much slower.


Yes, there is a floor 99. The game won't show it to you until you've beaten floor 98. As of this writing, only one person has ever beaten the Champion of the Maze, and it's not me, so I'm not listing a record time just yet.