Null Egg

Individual Level Strats

World 2 2-3 2-4 2-5 2-6 2-7 2-8

World 3 3-1 3-2 3-3 3-4 3-5 3-6 3-7 3-8

World 4 4-1 4-2 4-3 4-4 4-5 4-6 4-7 4-8

World 5 5-1 5-2 5-3 5-4 5-5 5-6 5-7 5-8

World 6 6-1 6-2 6-3 6-4 6-5 6-6 6-7 6-8

Introduction

This is a glitch that was originally thought to be a random occurrence at the end of 2-2, where some people would get a strange crash without reason. That was until ArneTheGreat discovered that it had something to do with the rat carrying an egg. He looked into it further and the first truly broken category was born: Magical Journey
The following video explains the sprite IDs regarding the Null Egg and also demonstrates the different uses of it.

Null Egg Demonstration

How To Get The Null Egg

• In 2-2, enter the final screen with 6 eggs and do not use any eggs.
• Near the end of the level, grab the rat as it jumps out of it's hole and spit it into the green Shy Guy.
• Next, tongue the Skull Rat and then spit it into the Piranha Plant.
• Jump and grab the egg that the rat is carrying before it falls down.
• Then, go up the hill and tongue the first rat and spit it into the second.
• Go back down the hill and follow the rat carrying the egg to the left, up the other hill.
• Finally, scroll the screen up and jump, then complete the level as normal. Do not use any eggs or kill the final Piranha Plant.
  
  Even Faster Setup. Skip to 15:45

Null Egg Tutorial/Demonstration

Fast Null Egg Setup

How To Get The Boss Key Sprite

• After getting the Null Egg in 2-2, re-enter 1-8 and fight Salvo to get the boss key sprite into your egg inventory.
• You want to end the fight with 2 eggs + the Null egg if you're running the "Beat Bowser" category and 3 eggs if you're running "Magical Journey". (Both categories are more or less the same except Beat Bowser uses a trick called save corruption which makes the run even faster). Regardless, these eggs will be used for the upcoming levels.
• You can use your remaining eggs to throw at the fish in the second room, the red switch in the room after and one for the boss.
• Throw one egg at Salvo and then finish the fight by tonguing and spitting the small slimes into him.
• Do not tongue and catch the egg after you throw it, otherwise it will mess up the sprite ID slots and the trick won't work.
• Once you complete the boss fight, the boss key sprite will replace the Null Egg which will allow you to beat every level thereafter really quickly.

Tutorial/Recommended Strats For All Levels

1-8 Salvo Re-fight Demonstration

How not to Null Egg (Crashes)

Many sprites can crash the game upon entering the goal ring if the glitch setup is done incorrectly.

Null Egg Crashing The Game

The game will also crash on many stages when using the boss explosion sprite to complete levels. This is due to the stage being completed before it has been properly loaded. While in theory this would be faster than using the key sprite, it is much more unstable.

Further Information

Now that you know how to Null Egg, it is time to learn some more specifics about the Null Egg.

Key Position

The position the key is in affects how quickly it ends the level.

Compared to having 3 eggs in front:

• Having 2 eggs in front loses 9 frames per level
• Having 1 egg in front loses 47 frames per level
• Having no eggs in front loses 49 frames per level

Version Differences

The Boss Key sprite affects a few levels differently between versions. The version that a strat works on is specified for each level that has differences. The strats are from slowest to fastest. Version tiers: J1.0 >>> J1.2 >>> J1.1 >>> U1.1 >>> PAL >>> U1.0

Null egg in other levels

As said earlier, the Null Egg is not 2-2 exclusive. Here are 2 examples.

3-6 Null Egg

As shown in the next video, the Null Egg can also be acquired in 3-6. A screen transition sprite is then loaded into the null egg to trigger a 1-1 Warp. Unfortunately, for the IL run of this level the null egg warp strat is slower than doing the level normally. If null eggs were allowed in 100% the 3-6 null egg strat could be used multiple times to save a lot time.

3-6 IL warp route (slower)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jkXXeH8s9g

How 3-6 Null Egg could save a huge amount of time if it was allowed in 100%
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHkVhsFkhe4

6-4 Null Egg

The next video shows how to get a null egg in 6-4. While harder than in 2-2 it is possible and unlike in 3-6 this is actually a little bit faster in an IL run, since it can skip a large portion of the room right before the boss where you normally do a Lava Skip (or take the log).

6-4 IL null egg route IDEA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAVquE4jNwI

6-4 IL Speedrun (w/ Null Egg)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzaYuIm2jKQ

Save Corruption

Doing specific stuff in 3-1 can corrupt save data when having the boss key in your egg inventory - sometimes it can unlock arbitrary stages (usually w6).
See: Any% No Credits Warp for the category that was spawned by this new discovery.

Any% No ACE TUTORIAL (2-2 to 3-1 + Save Corruption)

*NEW* Any% No ACE Info (2-8 + 3-1) [Read the description of the video]

Script

Head over to the DLC page to find useful tools that will help you a lot learning Null Egg specific stuff.