Norfair

Ice Cream Spark

Named after the Ice Beam room which is immediately after this spark, this is one of the toughest shinesparks to pull off in the game. The window for climbing the first room and recharging on the slope is very tight, and the room for activating the spark itself is just about pixel perfect. Too low and you'll bonk the platform, too high and you'll clip into the ceiling and bonk without traveling anywhere.

This spark is used in the 100% run when doing the original Norfair route, you do not have the opportunity do attempt this spark in the Newfair route.

Mapo Ice Cream Spark

There is an extended version of this spark which is used in the 100% Map Completion category.

Shinebreak

Used in the 100% run on the way to Hi Jump. Saves a second or two in Normal Mode, saves a bit more time in Hard Mode because without this spark you have to wait longer for the harder enemies to move out of your way before getting Hi Jump.

Money Spark

Also written as $park, this shinespark was named after a donation bounty sent by Kirbymastah during an ESA run. This spark is very hard to pull off because of the random enemy patterns underneath a 1 tile wide gap. Your options are to either spin jump into the gap to kill the enemies with screw attack, or walk into the gap and fire a missile straight down. The missile strat will not work if both enemies are underneath you, and since their patterns are random and you don't have time to see them and react, the missile strat is more of a yolo strat. You have to make sure to fall all the way down the room and spark into the lower half of the door, if you spark too high you will miss the slope in the next room. Getting this spark successfully saves about a second.

Newfair Spark

One of the routing choices for 100% involve going down into Norfair first and saving the Ice Beam as one of the last items, and this route is called the Newfair route. There is a difficult shinespark which saves enough time to make this route a viable option, so because this trick ended up defining the route it became known as the Newfair Spark.

After collecting the Energy Tank behind the caterpillar miniboss, you need to run back enough to have enough room to get a speedbooster going into the next room. I like to jump into the corner of the ceiling the drops to the left because it sets up a nice consistent distance that doesn't require running all the way to the left. You need to be holding a charge shot going into the door, so you can open the door early by firing a missile at it and then holding charge, or you can time a beam shot right as samus's sprite touches the first purple plant behind the caterpillar's pupa and holding charge when the shot is fired. You don't need a fully charged beam entering the door, just enough of a charge started that samus will automatically fire the shot when you enter the next room after letting go of B during the door transition.

When you enter the next room after letting go of B during the door transition, samus should automatically fire a shot that breaks the block in the way and you should start your speedbooster animation around the same time if you did the ceiling setup. Here you need to perform a Shine Break by pressing down to store your shinespark late enough that the speedblock in the floor breaks, but early enough that you don't fall off the ledge. The next step is collecting the missile below because you can't shoot the missile block behind it until it's collected. I like to press down twice when storing the shinespark so that I morph on the ledge above, and roll off the ledge and springball into the missile.

After collecting the missile you need to roll to the right where you can stand up again, face left and shoot out the missile block, then run off the ledge to the right and spark straight up. You need to shoot this missile block because it allows you to fall back to this area later without having to break the speedblocks or climb into the long shortcut room that gets used in any%.

Norfair Spaceboost

This trick is used during the cleanup portion of the 100% run. There is a room with a Green Door and it has a speedblock in the floor, which will break and cause you to fall and lose your speedbooster if you run over it. The safe way to continue your speed into the next long room is to store your shinespark before this speedblock, walk into the next room, and active it in there. This is slow because you need to stop moving, and then deal with the windup and bonk animations of the spark itself.

To do the spaceboost you need to fire your super missile as soon as you enter the room, and then jump shortly afterwards. Don't jump too soon or your position won't line up right with the blocks above your head and you'll jump into the side of them. If you delay your first jump a tiny bit, your first jump hits the blocks above you and your second jump hits the ceiling right in front of the door. With this setup you should be entering the next long room while falling, and you need to do a third full space jump soon enough that you don't hit the pillar in front of the door. Once you're this far, you just need to mash A at a steady rhythm to stay close to the ceiling.

Newfair VS Late Ice Route Comparison Video

Load video

YouTube

YouTube might collect personal data. Privacy Policy

ContinueDismiss