DKC3 GBA Tricks and Movement

Moving Your Kong

• The speed and acceleration you have when running is the same as when jumping. Hovering with Dixie is barely slower than running. Every 36 frames spent hovering loses 1 frame compared to running.
  • In the optimal wiki videos, hovering is avoided as much as possible, but in practice this makes a small difference.
• For Dixie, rolling is slower than running. The only exceptions are rolling through two or more enemies, or performing a buffered roll through one or more enemies (explained below).
• For Kiddy, rolling is faster than running and rolls can be chained consecutively.
• Rolling through two or more enemies will extend the roll and increase your speed. Dixie gets a bigger boost to her roll speed and duration than Kiddy does. This can be seen at the start of Dingy Drain-Pipe for example.
• After rolling off a platform, you can jump mid air. This can also be done after running off a platform, but only for a brief window after leaving the platform.
• You cannot buffer jumps in this game. You can buffer rolls, although this is not nearly as lenient as the SNES games.

Buffered Rolls through enemies

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• If you land from a jump right in front of an enemy and buffer a roll, you get a boost to the speed and duration of the roll through that enemy, similar to rolling through multiple enemies. This boost is modest for Kiddy and saves a few frames, but with Dixie this boost makes a big difference.

Jump Momentum Conservation

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• When you jump out of a roll, your speed immediately gets snapped to running speed. However, if you have B released prior to jumping, your speed will more gradually decrease from roll speed down to walking speed.
• This is only applicable when the rolling speed is high enough, which in practice means only after rolling through two or more enemies, or after buffered rolls through enemies.
• In the wiki videos, this is currently only applied to the buffered roll through the Sneek in Lakeside Limbo, but potentially has more applications.

Vertical Rope Climbing

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• With both Kongs, it is faster to jump up vertical ropes than climbing these ropes.

Flagpole start/select

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• Only on the North American version of the game, you can press start and select to exit out of a stage as soon as you touch the flagpole at the end. This saves significant time over the course of the run.
• In the Krematoa stages, you don't want to immediately exit the stage upon touching the flagpole as you need to collect the cogs first. As soon as the cog is collected, it is still slightly faster to exit out of the stage with start and select.

Damage Boosting

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• Damage Boosting allows you to skip various sections of levels or get the fastest Kong for a certain section in front. After damage boosting with one Kong, the next Kong will instantly jump once you gain control and gain invulnerability for a couple of seconds. This can be utilized to skip certain sections.

Water Bouncing

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• By rolling towards a body of water with Kiddy, you can bounce off the surface of the water by pressing A before hitting the surface. This can be done up to two times in a row. This can be useful as swimming horizontally is slow.

Cranky Manipulations

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• After defeating a boss, Cranky will walk towards the Kongs and start some dialogue. Cranky walks rather slowly. By setting up a specific team throw when collecting the reward from the boss or collecting the reward in a certain position, Cranky's walk cycle can be shortened, saving some time. This is used in Belcha's Barn, Arich's Ambush, Squirt's Showdown, Kaos Karnage, Bleak's House and Kroctopus Krush.

Wall Climbing

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• If you team throw Kiddy to the left or right, he will start rolling on the ground and bounce off walls. Dixie can then jump on Kiddy. This mechanic can be abused by throwing Kiddy into a wall (or boundary of a stage) mid jump. Kiddy will bounce back and Dixie will immediately land on Kiddy. This process can then be repeated. This allows us to skip large portions of stages or boss fights.

Reference:

• Kaos Karnage
• Tracker Barrel Trek
• Barrel Drop Bounce
• Ropey Rumpus
• Creepy Caverns
• Kastle Kaos

Squitter Instant Platforms

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• When jumping, if you press the R button twice, a web platform will spawn that Squitter can land on immediately. There is a short cooldown after each instant platform, but if you jump from the edge of the previous platform, you can chain the instant platforms without ever releasing the D-pad. If the R button is pressed while Squitter is touching a ceiling, web platform will be eaten by the ceiling unless down is held on the D-pad.

Reference:

• Krack Shot Kroc