Hey guys, my name’s tomatoanus, the Air
Bud of Speedrunning, and this is an Any% speedrun
of Fallout: New Vegas.
Recently, the biggest discovery in New Vegas
in over three years occurred, which has allowed
for about 90 seconds to be saved in the run.
Before we get into it though, let me preface
this with I won’t be going full in-depth
on all the strats and tricks used in this
run.
There just isn’t enough time for that with
how this run is now, plus I’ve done a few
New Vegas heavy commentaries recently that
explain most things.
If you’ve never seen a New Vegas run before,
I recommend you watch my video covering the
run before this discovery was made.
Link should be in the top right corner now,
and also in the description.
Speaking of the description, there’s also
a link to this run with just game audio there,
if you prefer to watch without my incessant
blabbering.
There isn’t a version of this run with original
audio from my stream, because I got this run
in an offline session when I was doing a couple
runs before heading off to work.
With all that out of the way, as I said before,
this is an Any% run.
That means that glitches and exploits are
allowed, while console commands are not.
If you would prefer to watch a glitchless
run, there is a link in the description to
the current glitchless world record by Akarion.
The run begins, as always, in the Italian
Doc Mitchell’s house.
When it came to S.P.E.C.I.A.L.
stats before, we would always lower our Strength
to 1 and Perception to 4 in order to be able
to bring both our Endurance and Charisma up
to 10.
The new glitch that you’ll be seeing in
a moment requires us to cripple our legs with
an explosion.
In New Vegas, each of your limbs have an individual
health bar, which has a maximum value that
is a set percent of your maximum HP.
If you have a lower max HP, then naturally
your limbs will have a lower max HP as well.
If we kept our Endurance at 10 like we used
to in the run, then the max HP for our legs
would be so high that an explosion might not
cripple them.
Because of this, we just keep our Endurance
at 5 and max Charisma alone.
You may have noticed that at the start of
the run I had two DLC pop-ups instead of just
the typical one for the Caravan Pack.
The second pop-up was for the Mercenary Pack,
which has the Mercenary’s Grenade Rifle
in it.
If you’re of an average intelligence, you
may have put two-and-two together and realized
that this is what we’ll be using to cause
the explosion that will cripple our legs for
the glitch.
We could just tag the Explosives skill and
start the game with dynamite, but the glitch
requires precise timing and the grenade launcher
allows for us to easily time it right.
The second thing that we need to perform the
glitch is the .357 revolver.
Chet refused to sell us the gun, so we had
to resort to turning his head into chunky
marinara sauce, seeing as the game is in Italian
and all.
With Chet dead, we manifest destiny the gun
and ammo off his body, and then head outside
to perform the glitch.
That’s right, the glitch that I’ve avoided
mentioning the name of, is what we have dubbed
the Infinite Dash.
Never before has the Mojave Wasteland been
such a tourist destination, now that you can
become a fighter jet here.
I’ll explain how it works in a moment, but
first let me explain two things.
First is that I’m sorry for all the loading
screens.
It’s required to quicksave quickload every
second or so to keep the glitch going, and
I understand that it can be hard to watch.
The glitch is only used for a couple minutes,
and if you find it hard to watch, feel free
to close your eyes and I’ll let you know
when it’s over and you can open them again.
The second thing to explain is what my goal
is now that I’m a plane.
Typically in a New Vegas run, we have to go
to several isolated locations in the wasteland
to meet various tribes.
This was done by fast travelling to a nearby
location, and then reload dashing all the
way to the tribe.
Instead, we perform an Infinite Dash at the
very beginning of the run, and proceed to
discover each tribe location that we would
typically have to reload dash to.
This cuts out the long reload dashing segments
to meet the Great Khans at the Red Rock Canyon
and the Boomers at Nellis Air Force Base.
It also allows for us to discover the El Dorado
Substation directly, instead of discovering
Black Mountain and reload dashing over later
on.
Pretty much, we take any part from later in
the game that would require multiple reload
dashes, and do them now with an Infinite Dash.
My end goal right now is to make it to Nellis
and meet the Boomers now, bypassing having
to meet them later.
Unfortunately we can’t actually meet the
Khans now like we do with the Boomers, because
the trigger box in the canyon to meet them
only becomes active when we have the quest,
after we speak with Yes Man.
That being said, once we’ve discovered all
necessary locations and meet the Boomers,
I’ll fast travel to the Aerotech Office
Park, which is a location I’ve discovered
while Infinite Dashing.
From there, I’ll do two reload dashes to
board the monorail, enter the strip, and begin
the part of the run that you’re probably
more familiar with.
If you still have your eyes closed, I’ve
just now landed at Nellis and you can open
them again.
That is if you haven’t fallen asleep to
the sound of my nasally Chicago accent.
Now that we’re beginning to enter familiar
territory again, let’s talk more in-depth
about Infinite Dashing, how it’s done, and
how it was found.
Infinite dashing is done by beginning to perform
a reload dash, up to the point where we pull
up our Pip Boy.
Instead of unequipping our gun though, we
just put our Pip Boy back down.
This is then followed by quicksaving and quickloading,
with us crippling our legs at the same time
as us quickloading.
Yep, New Vegas pretty much has speedcripple
in it again.
Luckily, the timing for doing this with an
explosion is pretty lenient compared to doing
it by running off a cliff like in the Any%
run of Fallout 3.
The timing for the quickload is made even
easier with the grenade launcher.
Firing the grenade launcher straight up into
the air gives you just enough time to perform
all the actions, wherein doing so quickly
will perfectly time out the glitch.
The reason why we have to quicksave quickload
so much is two-fold.
The first reason is that the glitch stops
working if you begin to lose altitude and
enter a falling animation.
By spamming quicksave quickload while in the
air, it continually resets our vertical velocity,
allowing for us to continue to dash without
fallout or stopping.
The second reason why we have to quicksave
quickload so much is that if we didn’t,
the game would surely crash.
New Vegas, as well as all other Gamebryo and
Creation Kit games, have a hard time loading
a lot at once.
If you travel across the overworld quickly,
the game won’t be able to keep up, and will
just stop functioning.
Having said that, quicksaving and quickloading
does not fix all crashes with this glitch.
I’d say that about 40-50% of runs I attempted
with this glitch ended with a crash on the
initial Infinite Dash.
Now, the fact that losing altitude causes
for us to lose the dash kinda sucks.
We have a lot of locations to discover, and
some of them have pretty low triggers for
discovering the fast travel location.
That’s why with some locations, namely Red
Rock Canyon and El Dorado Substation, we try
to avoid bumping into as many objects along
the way to keep our altitude low.
If we do accidentally get launched into the
air, we can either just continue to dash in
circles, or we can pull up our Pip Boy.
As you dash, you gradually lose altitude,
but at a rate that doesn’t end the dash.
By just continuing to fly around, we’ll
eventually lower far enough down to discover
the locations.
The other method, pulling up our Pip Boy,
is a lot more risky than just stalling.
While flying, you can pull up your Pip Boy,
which drops your height by a sizable amount.
The only issue is that after you put your
Pip Boy away, you have to spam quicksave quickload
to get the dash going again, and it doesn’t
always work.
Sometimes your dash will just stop.
Speaking of stopping your dash, you may be
asking, how do I stop when I decide it’s
time to stop?
Well, that’s simple; just stop holding W.
Doing so will just cause you to fall and for
the dash to stop.
You wanna know what doesn’t stop your dash
though?
Fast travelling and saving/loading.
The fact that you can fast travel while having
Infinite Dash is how we got back to Goodsprings
from Red Rock Canyon without losing the dash.
All you have to do is make sure that you’re
slammed against a rock or a slope though when
you pull up your Pip Boy.
Otherwise you’ll lose height and therefore
the dash, or you won’t be able to fast travel
since you’re not on something the game considers
to be ground.
As I said a moment ago, saving and loading
doesn’t stop your Infinite Dash.
By this I mean that if you have the dash,
and then make a save, you can then load that
save at any time and you’ll still have the
dash.
However, if you have Infinite Dash and load
an old save where you didn’t have it, then
when you load in you won’t have the dash.
The dash only works when loading a save where
you had it, and not the other way around.
With that being said, there’s a download
link in the description to a setup save that
has Infinite Dash upon leaving Chet’s store
in Goodsprings.
If you play New Vegas on PC, feel free to
download the save and try it out for yourself.
All you have to do is download the save file
and drag it into your New Vegas saves folder.
When you load the save, just make sure you’re
holding W and don’t stop holding it.
That’s the only trick to doing the glitch.
Infinite Dashing was initially discovered
by a runner named Elias.
Elias was doing a bingo run of New Vegas when
he got launched high into the air.
While he was falling, he began to reload dash
and pulled up his Pip Boy.
Remembering you can’t reload dash while
falling, he put his Pip Boy away and quicksave
quickloaded to break his momentum and survive
the fall.
The timing on the quickload was perfect, and
he performed the first known Infinite Dash.
Well, it wasn’t necessarily infinite since
he just got launched into the air and fell
shortly after, losing the dash.
This was on June 3rd, 2019, and the New Vegas
speedrunning community quickly got to work.
Within half an hour of Elias’s initial messages
explaining how he achieved the glitch and
a video of it, a primarily Fallout 4 runner
named Jinjenia was able to reproduce the glitch.
It was quickly noted by both Elias and kungkobra
that the glitch will continue infinitely as
long as you stay grounded.
Elias also noted shortly after how the glitch
is stored through saves.
It was later in the day when current world
record holder Sharo discovered that quicksaving
and quickloading in the air will continually
chain the dash over and over.
At this time, our only setup for the glitch
was launching ourselves into the air off a
rock with a reload dash, and then manually
timing out the setup and quickload.
Runners began testing to try a theoretical
dash from Goodsprings all the way to the monorail.
Both myself and Sharo were able to successfully
compete this trek by the start of day two
with the glitch, but you would know that if
you followed me on Twitter when I shared a
video of it.
Later on in day two, kungkobra was able to
get an Infinite Dash that took him from near
the Hidden Valley, all the way up to Nellis,
and then back towards the strip before his
game crashed.
The glitch certainly was fun, but the idea
of grinding for a good launch early in the
run, followed by trying to get a hard glitch,
further followed by inconsistent crashing
certainly didn’t sound like a fun way to
run the game.
That was until our lord and savior Brongle
discovered the grenade launcher setup we use
in the run now.
Near this time, kungkobra found the dynamite
setup, which is rather consistent, but ultimately
we gravitated towards using the grenade launcher
since it’s just slightly easier to use.
After Brongle discovered the grenade launcher
setup on day two, we were able to get much
more practice with the glitch, and increase
our volume of attempts at the run.
By the end of day two, we had ironed out the
details of the route as it is now, and within
72 hours of the glitch being found, Sharo
was able to lower his world record from 12:17
to 11:31.
At the time of this recording, he has lowered
the world record to 10:59, becoming the first
person to finish New Vegas in under 11 minutes.
We believe that the best possible run a human
can get right now, is somewhere around 10:40,
and Sharo has set his goal for under 10:50.
kungkobra has also been doing runs with Infinite
Dashing, and is setting his sights on a time
near Sharo’s as well, since those two are
far and above the best runners of the game.
As of right now, the three of us are the only
ones to complete a full run with Infinite
Dashing, and I have to say, I’m pretty fond
of the glitch.
Sure the crashing sucks, but overall it’s
a pretty fun feeling flying around the Mojave
and imagining the denizens panicking as they
see a body zip around.
Overall though, that’s about all there is
to Infinite Dashing.
We do actually do it one more time in this
run though.
When we arrive at Hoover Dam in a moment,
instead of reload dashing along the whole
length of the dam, we instead just perform
one Infinite Dash and fly the whole way.
Other than that, there isn’t much else to
say about infinite dashing.
Oh, one thing is that if you’re going to
do this glitch, and you successfully fast
travel without losing height, but when you
load in you aren’t dashing, just let go
of W for a second and then hold it again.
That should restore the dash.
And if you’re actually going to trigger
the dash yourself with a grenade launcher
or whatever, and when you perform it and initially
quickload you aren’t moving, despite holding
W, just jump once and the dash will begin.
You can see me do this at the beginning of
my run when I initially get the dash.
With that being said, I don’t have much
else to say about the run or the glitch, so
I hope you enjoy watching this run come to
a close.
This was an Any% run of Fallout: New Vegas
with Infinite Dashing, I’ve been tomatoanus,
and I hope you have an above average day.
