Getting Started

Welcome! This is the ZeldaSpeedRuns site with general knowledge and speedrun resources for Ocarina of Time and Ocarina of Time Master Quest. Please read below if you are interested in learning to speedrun either of them! You can also see the full list of pages in the navigation sidebar; after reading this page be sure to check out the others under the "Getting Started" category!

No matter where you start, here are some of the most important resources available to you:

  • OoT community Discord server, where you can (and should) freely ask for help with setting up or speedrunning the game
  • Speedrun.com leaderboards for vanilla Ocarina of Time as well as Master Quest, where you can view and submit videos of speedruns for any category! This is also where you can view detailed rules for the game and for each category
  • gz (the Practice ROM), by far the most important tool for practicing this game. It patches an Ocarina of Time ROM or WAD file with the practice tool, which can then be run on a Nintendo 64 (using a flashcart), a Nintendo Wii with homebrew tools, or a PC-based emulator.

What category should I start with?

There are a lot of speedrun categories for Ocarina of Time! And for Master Quest! And even more extra categories!

Where should you start as a beginner? Everyone likes different categories for different reasons, but there are some that are generally agreed to be good recommendations for new runners (the times shown are expected times for an intermediate learner). The routes for each of these below have been specifically written with detail for new learners and links to all the tricks you have to learn:

Main categories

  • Any% (5m) : the fastest way to complete Ocarina of Time! Its popularity in the community and its incredibly short length are some of the big appeals for beginners, and the central glitch of the run, [Lightnode SRM], is used in many other SRM categories which makes Any% a good place to start if you are interested in running those categories. The main downside to Any% is that it contains almost no overlap with any non-SRM categories you may wish to learn later.
  • Nocturne RTA (45m - 55m) : doesn't complete the game but gets Nocturne of Shadow after Forest, Fire, and Water temples! This is quite a popular category because it completes a significant amount of the game while clocking in at well under an hour. It's great for beginners because it includes many strats that are used in other categories. More difficult categories like All Dungeons and MST will be easier to learn if you know Nocturne RTA!
  • Defeat Ganon (Classic Kak) (20-25m) : overall a very good beginner recommendation! The beginner-friendly route (linked here) is rather easy to learn and finish runs with, and the category is short too! The one drawback is the category is somewhat unique, so if you move to other categories later on you will have to learn a lot of new stuff.
  • Glitchless AMQ (4h+) : "All Main Quests" is the restricted Glitchless category, meaning it bans a lot of "glitch-like" techniques that are allowed in the unrestricted ruleset. This is a very beginner-friendly route in terms of difficulty, and it's popular too! The big drawback for most people is the length; if you want to run this category but find it too long, you may be interested in running on the "Faster Quest" rom hack, which removes about 1 hour 15 minutes of cutscenes.

Extension categories

These are categories which aren't located on the main leaderboards, but are on the extension leaderboard. A lot of these are less serious or less competitive categories (including more "challenge run" categories) but many of them are really cool and some of them are relatively easy to learn as a beginner, including:

  • 37 Water Temple Keys (45m) : an acccessible, silly category that gets 37 small keys in Water Temple. If you are interested in learning Reverse Bottle Adventure (RBA), this is a great category to start with!
  • All Fairy Rewards(50m - 1h) : a fun category where you play as Child Link most of the time, with lots of overworld movement around the map! There are many, many HESSes in this run but the great part is you can easily skip them until you're comfortable doing them.
  • Ganonless (1.0) (35m - 40m) : although it only works on the 1.0 version of the game, there is a beginner route for this category that is very accessible to learn

Of course, there's also other ways to speedrun the game, such as Bingo! And don't feel limited to these recommendations; if you're prepared to learn longer/harder categories then go for it! The full list of routes is available in the dropdown categories on the side of the page.

How do I set up my game?

Almost all routes mentioned above can be done on any console or version of the game (see also Version Differences) At minimum all you need is a way to play the game and you can do a speedrun. Note that Ship of Harkinian, the PC port of Ocarina of Time, is considered a different game due to fundamental changes to the code that make it run natively on PC.

Along with the base game, you will likely also want to set up the Practice ROM, known by its codename "gz". You can create a gz ROM by using the patcher downloaded from the website and supplying an existing Ocarina of Time ROM. If you aren't sure how to get a ROM for your copy of the game, ask for help in the Discord.

Below is a short overview, but for full details on whichever method you're using to play the game, see Emulation, Console Setup, Controllers & Adapters, and Capture & Streaming.

Emulators

If playing on a PC emulator, download an allowed emulator for the console you want to emulate (you can see the allowed list on the Speedrun.com rules). Most people recommend using Dolphin, a Gamecube/Wii emulator that can run the Wii VC version of Ocarina of Time, but you can also use Project64 Versions 1.6 or 1.7 only at this time. Emulator runs are allowed for submission unless your time is within 10% of the current world record, tracked here.

Wii Virtual Console

If playing on a Nintendo Wii, you'll likely need to homebrew your Wii to install WAD files. Be sure to follow the Wii Hacks Guide closely to safely mod your Wii and this video by Fig that ensures you're playing on an official, standard version of the Wii's IOS9 (required for leaderboard submissions).

Nintendo 64

If you're playing on a Nintendo 64 and are buying a game cartridge, see Version Differences for how to identify the different versions of the game. You can use a flash cart (most commonly an Everdrive or a SummerCart) and an SD card to load games, important for practicing on a gz rom. If doing vanilla runs using a flash cart, submissions are allowed unless your time is within 10% of the current world record, tracked here.

There's so much to learn! Where should I start?

Be sure to check out the other Getting Started pages on this site and get the Practice ROM! Before learning a route it is HIGHLY recommended to read Basic Mechanics & Tips which contains very foundational knowledge needed to understand how to perform setups and tricks in this game. Afterwards, check out the pages in the General Knowledge category (on the site's sidebar) to read more about the game mechanics. But that's it, you're ready to start learning! Find a route on this site you want to learn and start practicing!