Retro games sadly don’t get enough love for clip of the week entries! I know I’m guilty of this (let’s face it, it’s not always possible to record gameplay of retro games; otherwise I’d definitely have some DKR clips).

In my attempts to break the tie with @mariomaestro for this week’s time trial, I accidentally discovered I could pick up the Koopa shell and fly with it. So I decided to see if I could complete the course doing so (while still getting the best time possible)…

It’s MUCH harder than this video makes it look!
1) The timing of picking up the shell without landing is your first obstacle.
2) If you hit the block with the star, it will screw up your timing. It’s possible, but quite difficult, to recover from that. Plus there’s a lot of lag if you hit the star block while holding the shell.
3) If you don’t get enough height quickly enough, you’ll touch the platform immediately after the shell and lose your ability to fly.
4) Since your goal is to hold the shell until the end, you have to time the landing just right (you can’t simply let go of the Y button).
5) You no longer have the visual of your cape to inform you when you can push back on the d-pad (or joystick) to fly back up.

Despite all of that, I was finally able to pull it off! Sadly, the visible lag at the end where the last dragon coin is ruins any chance of tying the best time (so I have to settle for 1 second less).

P.S. Hopefully this video will serve as a little tutorial for those who didn’t know you could endlessly fly with the cape!