I decided to do this run after seeing multiple other attempts come to an end, and decided that "if you want something done right, you've got to do it yourself" rings true. While I enjoyed the game enough to speedrun it despite finding it lacking (more than I can say for some of the last Core games), there was also an element of curiosity there; considering how laughably easy and short the game is normally, I wanted to see how much you could truly break it, I'd say things worked out fine in that regard ;) . Plus the runs others had done and the speedrun guide meant that 90% of the planning work and routes was done for me.

I did the run on Hard as I thought equipment carries between levels, but I found out that that only applies to specific items (namely weapons and ammo), and stuff like medikits gets reset to a certain level. Even without that, doing it on Hard, instead of Time-Trial (which plays on normal difficulty) felt like the right thing to do, as well as allowing me to segment particularly difficult and/or irritating sections (bike rides, I'm looking at you). The PC version was used because it's easier to record, has the best, and most controllable, performance (essential for some tricks) and the pistols are much easier to manual aim, along with camera control being MUCH better (and camera seems linked with jumping making that essential for speedruns).

NOTE: The final time shown at the end is wrong! I had to re-record Bolivia after finishing the run and accidentally deleting that video, and greatly improved it in the process.

Thanks to all the SDA staff for accepting this run, Gandarufu, G-Paul and Ewil for runs and tricks (and in Ewil's case, pointing out some other aspects to running this game) and the speedrun guide here: http://www.tombraiderhub.com/tr7/timetrials/index.html for most of the tricks.

A few general notes for running this game:

• Rolling is the fastest form of movement
• Pistol shots do more damage the closer you are to targets; even un-upgraded, in close range battles the only weapon that beats them is the shotgun
• If a fall is long enough to stumble you, drawing your weapon mid-fall stops you stumbling
• The left-roll is the most odd looking trick in the run; having weapons drawn makes the "physics" of the left-roll (and maybe others, though I didn't test much), very different, in a way that was apparently not tested much, as it allows you to "warp" up seemingly vertical walls. It only works in specific places though, so it generally only saves small amounts of times. Throwing flares in the flashback section of Peru puts you in "combat mode" to emulate this effect, but I could find no use for it there. The most notable thing is that its success depends on framerate, generally, the higher the better.
• A couple of other things depend on framerate, like damage areas (E.G. fire) and a specific trick in Ghana that needs 100 FPS.
• When jumping between multiple swing-poles (this does not work for the first pole in a sequence) if you hit jump at the approximate moment (a small frame window) you hit the next pole you will instantly jump to the next pole without swinging around it at all, you can also do this by simply button hammering, but timing your press is far more reliable after you get the timing down.
• Cutscenes do not appear to make the timer run, but that may only apply to Time Trial, so I tried to skip them as soon as possible except in instances where ending at specific times helps you (they can put the camera in an advantageous position at certain times).
• Doing the dive move seemed a bit tricky at first, as I was trying to press jump and roll at the same time. I found it's MUCH easier to do if you press jump, then roll very quickly after, instead of trying to combine them.

• Area 1, Bolivia: Time: 5:30:

  Part 1, Before the cage puzzle: Despite being the first level, this is also one of the hardest as it condenses many very difficult tricks. After feeling a bit discouraged and leaving it for months after losing my original recording, I decided to finish up by segmenting the level in two, as it made it FAR more manageable than the nightmare it was before. The left roll at the start is relatively easy to do if you have an idea of the position you need, although it can randomly decide to be difficult. When climbing the vines if you jump from exactly the right spot on the first vine you can directly grab to the rock ledge, but, as well as being very hard to do, I'm pretty sure it's slower than the direct path as you need to climb up. The rope trick is pretty easy after you get the positioning and movements down.

  To not get killed by the boulder you have to delay the roll before it slightly. The left-roll at the waterfall is the easiest to do, it's usually pretty reliable. At the shimmy space, if you jump from the right spot you can jump further along the shimmy spot and instantly jump to the swing pole, but it's hard to do and only saves a couple of seconds. The jump from the wall to the bridge is one of the biggest shortcuts in this level, if you get it right you only do one small stumble, but I didn't manage that, and messed up a jump a little, which is one of the few mistakes in this run.

  The left roll outside the temple is the hardest left-roll in this level, and is extremely unreliable, segmenting this level gave me the chance to do it near-instantly. If you run up one of the "bannisters" of the staircase you skip the cutscene at the temple entrance, but since cutscenes don't seem to waste time just doing it directly seemed faster and easier to me. The spike pit just inside shows the main tactic for almost every grapple in the game; grapple as early as possible (although you can grapple too early and swing right into the pit).

  At the counterweight things, you can jump directly to the second chain, but your position to land on the weight must be very exact, and Lara usually has to re-align herself to grab the chain, which makes me doubt how much faster it is anyway. Rolling off the ledge into the second counterweight room can be unpredictable; sometimes Lara will grab the ledge instead of instantly falling, or stumble when she his the ground, losing you a second or two, it went perfectly here. Diving into the water is essential, and swimming on the surface is faster than staying under, so I tried to reach the surface as soon as possible on the way out. I tried everything I could to get through the first crusher without having to wait, but nothing worked. Moving the cage with the camera oriented like this seemed the easiest way to do it without being disoriented.

  Part 2, Cage puzzle and the rest: Getting the second cage off the see-saw and into the right position can be tricky; if you get it wrong then it either doesn't make it or flies too far and takes much longer to align. After it lands, shooting the cage is faster than pushing it, and only really possible on the PC version (based on the PS2 version anyway). I only need two cages as this is how you normally acquire the gold reward. After climbing up where you normally grab across the ceiling chain, I instead roll across the slope, which lets you directly climb around and save several seconds, after falling Lara goes to jump backwards, which loses me a second.

  Jumping across the "coat hangers" is tied with the left-roll outside the temple for the hardest trick in the level, it requires you to be extremely precise and, if you don't want to waste time, you have to align as fast as possible too, I did it pretty much optimally here. The final battle is about getting close as quick as possible and blowing everything away within two clips, the route I take seems to minimise the chance of the guard moving about too much.

• Area 2, Peru: Time: 12:04:

  Part 3, Town: The town battle shows how fights with environmental traps can be "choreographed" to go as fast as possible, I knock the barrel from the cart before the cutscene so it can be shot easily, then a little luck with explosive barrels lets you wipe out almost everything easily. The grenades in the house are vital for later. I found that the rooftop path was the fastest way to reach the end.

  Part 4, Bike ride: This is the main reason I segmented this level, the bike rides are mostly luck; even if you stick close, sometimes Lara lands every shot, other times she goes through three clips for one biker (and sometimes it varies mid-level). Also, I need to wipe out the set of bikers after the bridge with a single explosive barrel, which also needs luck (note the bug there). There are certain parts where the ride loops a lot more if you don't kill enemies within a certain period, the first biker is an example; if you kill him too slowly the second set of bikers takes far too long to appear and the track loops. I think I managed to get every biker within an optimal time on this run, although it's hard to tell. I turn slightly whenever I pick up items as it seems like it stops you slowing down from the impact, but I'm not sure. There was a very annoying bug I had where, instead of continuing, the game loads the last checkpoint after finishing this level, I think it has something to do with having low health as you impact the back of the truck at the end and dying in the process, but the screen fades out too soon to tell. Someone told me a trick where slowing down could make you kill faster, but I couldn't seem to confirm that in my testing.

  Part 5, Flashback and Tomb: The longest segment of the level, thanks to segmenting I was able to take risky shortcuts I wouldn't take normally, such as the first pit jump in the flashback. If you jump on the first box as it falls on the pressure plate you skip Lara's climbing animation, saving a little bit of time. The first ball room has invisible walls all above the spikes, so it seems like moving the ball first is the only way to get up. At the chase section, you can still move while the cutscene is running even after you fall in the pit, so I climbed up to the ball ledge before the sequence ended. The key to the ball working consistently is to release it as soon as possible (let it roll as opposed to pushing it onto the slope yourself), it may be possible to have it roll on the plate faster. The second pit jump is another shortcut I wouldn't do if this wasn't segmented.

  You can start moving before the cutscene starts at the beginning of the next level, although it can be hard to orient yourself. The swimming is just a case of making your diving as smooth as possible so you stop moving forwards as little as possible, I think this was one of my faster swims. At the switch "puzzle" your air freezes during the switch animation, so it's a case of trying to cut it as close as possible, I managed to get it near-perfect this time. I do a strange reverse grapple at the first slope, which seems faster than climbing, the second slope is only possible the normal way. The ball puzzle is where the most major shortcut is performed; the floor cracks let me align the grenade throw pretty consistently, and it saves a ton of time, unfortunately you have to open the statue before doing this, so you need to move the last ball after. I let the cutscene run a little before skipping, otherwise I have to wait for the statue to open while on the ladder (since I'm not 100% sure whether cutscenes stop the timer, I tried not to let it run too long). I had to find this trick myself, which seems kind of odd, as, based on the crazy tricks found in the speedrun guide, it seems like many people are far better at finding things like this than me.

  On the way out, at the drop before the crack it's possible to land right on the ledge rather than grabbing and climbing up, however, the stumble you get from this means there's barely any difference in time. I'm not fully sure whether grappling down the slopes is the fastest way, but it seemed to be. Killing a couple of guards in the drained water room takes barely any time and makes the rope climb far less risky (on hard, if you leave them, there's about an 80% chance you will get knocked down, with only one left your chance of being knocked down is about 20%). Before the rope to the outside, if you jump on a bricks near it you grab it higher, also, climbing high up the rope so you can jump off without grabbing seems faster than jumping off the rope early and climbing up. The final battle can quite unpredictable, especially whether the guards will dodge grenades or not, unfortunately they dodged the first grenade, but the second one worked, then I missed another which cost me a second or two, but everything else went well.

• Area 3, Japan: Time: 6:00:

  Part 6: A small general note on this level: every shotgun blast stun I take is unavoidable (or, at least, has about a 5% chance at the most of not happening on hard), so I don't really need to bring them up. I don't know of any faster way to do the glacial beginning, which made it very annoying when replaying the level. The irritation of the start is exacerbated by the fact that the first fight needs a ton of luck; not only do I need to react very fast at the start to make sure the sign kills the first guard, but I also need at least two medikit drops to make the rest of the level possible and need to get in the elevator corridor before the grenade explodes, otherwise another two guards spawn. I got very lucky with the medikit drops, as they fell right in my path, but the grenade failed to kill one guard, losing me a few seconds, I had to detour slightly for an assault rifle after the fight, but you normally have to do that.

  The bike can be very hard to control as it's so fast, and if you touch the mouse at all the camera becomes impossible to handle, although that's easy to avoid if you know how. I guess I should be glad I'm not doing this on the PS2 version, where you have to control the bike at about 10 FPS. At the platforming after the IC I tried a bunch of ways to get across to the swinging ledges early, but it seems like your only choice is the intended route. The jump to the garden bit after the swinging ledges was actually a bit of a fluke; I thought I had screwed up the correct positioning to do it, so I just suicidally threw myself off and made it. The large computer room is the only place in the game where the assault rifle is needed, as it's far more accurate than the un-upgraded pistols (but still weaker), the position I take to shoot the hooks seems to be the best one I could find, climbing up the left side of the large screen is intentional, as you seem to randomly die whatever your health if you climb the front (it appears to be something to do with getting shot by lasersights during the climbing animation).

  If you jump early enough after pulling down the first billboard you can land on it without having to climb up, I jumped too late here. The bit where you jump onto the thin billboard for a shortcut is quite easy to align with the PC camera control (compared to the PS2 version anyway). I have to jump across the four poles without pausing on any, which I managed. The gun is what the starting medikits are needed for, on hard it tears off about 90% of your health and there's a delay that stops you using multiple medikits in a row, so you need full health, and the first set of lasers MUST be off to make it through (thankfully this happens if you simply get there as fast as possible from entering the art area).

  I delay a little before skipping the cutscene in the board room, as I needed to change my positioning to throw a grenade as soon as possible (which kills all three), then I get a shotgun, which is pretty much the best weapon in the game, as it's tears big chunks out of almost every boss' health, and is my secondary weapon for the rest of the game. Getting kicked over after climbing in the window has never happened before, and actually meant I didn't need to grab a health pack, I never predicted that though, I don't think missing a shot mattered here, as I was getting up anyway. I let the cutscene before the boss run a little before skipping, so the camera is aligned optimally to finish the boss; the moves I make cause his AI to be very predictable and lets my tactics work almost every time, allowing me to blow him away extremely quickly with a mix of grenades and shotgun blasts.

• Area 4, Ghana: Time: 3:06:

  Part 7: The trick to dive without falling in the water requires you to play at at least 100FPS, so I had to record at that, I think I turned a couple of details down to achieve that, although it probably isn't noticeable. There are two ways to pull off the major shortcut in this level, I think the alternative is a couple of seconds faster, but I find it near-impossible to do; the difference (if there even is one) isn't enough to warrant the massive difficulty increase. The way I use with the rope to land on the rocks can be done quite easily, although the ledges don't line up with the rocks themselves, so it requires a little trial and error to learn. The alternative, super hard way, is to jump "around" the rock that is normally moved by the boulder you dodge later on the level, but I think I only managed that once out of hundreds of attempts, that would get you right to the ladder which is why I think it would be faster if you could perfect it (you don't even have to open the waterfall if you do this route and kill yourself after getting across, which forces the game to "stream" the area behind the waterfall, but I wasn't using death abuse).

  The jumping sequence after climbing the ladder gave me a few problems because the camera/controls seem to randomly decide to be extremely unresponsive there, I have to delay slightly before certain jumps to ensure they work, although it probably isn't noticeable. The jump to reach the pole from the second elevator cart thing was a shortcut I found out myself, when you have to turn around on that pole sequence I found that just stopping and turning around from a still position seemed easier, and no slower, than doing a mid-swing turn. When I wasn't recording with FRAPS I found that the small bridge after the dark corridor wasn't there for some reason, allowing me to swing across, which is faster, however, when using FRAPS the bridge IS there, slowing me down at little (rolling across is still faster than shooting it down in this case). I tried several ways to skip going across the bridge in the big room, but nothing seemed to work. On hard, getting across the bridge can be quite unpredictable as the guards shoot it down randomly, killing you, in this run, as I jump off the bridge you can hear a crack sound that means it was shot down just as I got off it.

  Getting up before the boulder gets you, instead of hiding, can be quite difficult, you pretty much have to jump off the rope to just the right place that your rolls line you up in the right position to climb up. I used the statues beside it to work out the best time to roll through the door before it closes. Rutland is supposed to jump off his ledge almost instantly, but he kept waiting around for ages when I did the whole level in one go, this is pretty much the fastest I managed to get him to jump off, all my grenades hit too, which, combined with a couple of shotgun blasts, killed him almost instantly.

• Area 5, Kazakhstan: Time: 11:12:

  Part 8, Outer base: The parachute is just a case of releasing as late as possible, I think I managed it about right here. The left-roll onto the fence is extremely hard (especially as you have to instantly line up a second jump to the roof after), so I gave myself a small error margin, since recovery from getting it wrong takes less than a second and massively increases your chance of success (since it lines you up), it saves about ten seconds. The rest is straightforward. The gate before the bike requires two kills before it opens. The end was as close as it looks.

  Part 9, Bike Ride 2: Everything from the first bike ride applies here, except that death is actually a threat, and the length means even more luck is required, especially as part of getting a good time involves enemies killing themselves for you. There were only a few kills that were sub-optimal here, and the enemy suicides made up for it, I could probably do it a little faster, but, frankly, the bike sections are so broken and irritating I just wanted to move on. Annoyingly, it's possible for the bike to completely go out of control and kill you off in the jump to the train at the end, slowing down slightly before the jump seems to avoid making that happen.

  Part 10, The Base: The damage you take from health-draining hazards gets worse the higher your FPS is; I thought going through the fire would be impossible on hard while practising, but recording at 60FPS allowed to me to just make it. The next corridor area is all pretty self-explanatory beyond drawing the pistols to roll continuously and get under the electric wires easily, I also pick up a medikit for later.

  The shortcut to the rope in the generator room is one of the toughest parts of this segment as it needs some quite precise jumps, but it's much faster than the normal route. In the gas corridor, when I jump on the pipe and "ride" it a short while, while not recording it was possible to ride it much further, but with FRAPS running you can only go a very short way, this is more important to the part where I dive into the gas; while not recording it's possible to ride the pipes on the left side and avoid the gas altogether, thankfully the lower drain-damage while recording makes that unnecessary.

  It was thought you had to use the Tesla cannon to move a crate over to the edge to reach the cart and take the massive shortcut, but I found that by jumping into the right place you can land on an invisible floor and do some sort of long grab to the cart, letting you do it even faster. The way I take through the cart corridor seems to be the fastest way while only needing to shoot a minimal amount of pipes. The boss is no different from usual, although the part where it knocks me out of the cannon at the end actually helps, as it's faster than getting out manually.

• Area 6, England: Time: 10:44:

  Part 11: The longest segment, I considered splitting it to fit more with the rest of the run, but found I could pull everything off decently consistent, so I decided to do it in one. The left-rolls over the fences are quite inconsistent, so I gave myself a couple of chances on each, since it's still faster than normal, I did them both very quickly here. It's quicker to just get electrocuted when going back. When you grab the pole to pull the bridge down, if you jump too fast the bridge gets stuck and weird bugs happen, so I wait little while before jumping back.

  It very easy for the forklift to get stuck on a box and take ages to get free, but I eventually found an angle that gets you through the boxes consistently, and also the second set of boxes outside the breakable wall. All the methods to get down the shaft I had found seemed extremely inconsistent and near-impossible to do (such that they would pretty much require segmenting), but then I found a method of my own that seemed faster than the alternatives and is also very consistent (it namely involves swinging the camera correctly, although I can't remember exactly how at this point), it also causes an amusing sound bug :) . Moving the crate through the blades is quite inconsistent, and one of the biggest potential timewasters, I did it quite fast here, although it still got stuck a little. On lower difficulty settings the crate is not needed to get over the flames, but on hard even at 20FPS this fire still kills you near-instantly; this is the only big difference between playing Legend on hard compared to the easier settings.

  Getting on the coffin in the water area can be unpredictable; if the coffin hasn't turned enough you are stuck in crouching position under the gate and lose a few seconds, this time it went perfectly. I use a couple of small shortcuts while climbing the tomb entrance. When moving the broken headstone thing I use the floor patterns to know the earliest time to stop be able to climb the bell rope. The boss is the same as usual, When moving between the second and third bell, the boss will always attack at least once. I dodged the projectile, but then got bit, however, I had already shot the bell enough to draw the serpent's attention, so I probably lost no time. The easiest part to mess up is actually the final bell, as the camera is incredibly touchy here, and having it aligned incorrectly will make Lara either grab the lever that is already used, or fail to grab it at all; the camera is a bigger threat than the serpent here.

  While moving across the Serpent's corpse I jump to early and have to do another jump to grab the ledge, which lost me around a second. Jumping on the long slope will make you lose health, and I didn't have enough health to take risks, so I didn't jump. Rolling through the blades was quite lucky, as I did it while they were moving fast and still managed to make it. Jumping across the lava pit is where the biggest time loss of the run happens, as I get knocked off the ledge and had to climb up (while playing I was just glad I didn't fall in), then I got kicked over as I rolled to the guard, however, my luck earlier helped balance against this. The second grenade in the last fight was accidental, but let me finish the fight very fast.

• Area 7, Nepal: Time: 4:41: Rolling at the start makes you grab further along the shimmy ledge, which I managed to do. I use various small shortcuts along the jumping sequence. The icicles can be a perfect example of how randomly bullshit Legend's control consistency can be; I've had multiple instances where Lara plains jumps THROUGH the first icicle and dies. I have no idea how the long fall after the small cave works, something about landing in that area of the ledge makes you take no fall damage.

  When sliding down the slope after the plane, you have to shoot while sliding rather than jumping, otherwise the landing slows you down. The ice cave is another area where there are multiple small tweaks are used, there are a couple of parts where I have to pause a short time to ensure the camera aligns right, although it probably isn't noticeable. The outside area full of guards is one of the hardest parts of the level, as it's very easy to get slowed down by a stray gunshot, which is why I thin out their numbers with a grenade, making the area much less risky.

  In the lake of floating ice, I have to wait a certain time before I jump to survive, in this case I got it just about right, although I could probably have jumped a second or so earlier. Pulling the box up in the temple is the hardest part of the level, and, unfortunately, right at the end. It's extremely easy to screw up and make the box drop, or take far too long to pull it up, it went well this time and only needed minimal repositioning at the end. The last parts are simple. I have no idea what that black box bug thing below me at the end is, but it has always been there on the PC version for me.

• Area 8, Bolivia Redux: Time: 1:02: First, I used "advanced hold" targeting for this level, as I found it much better than the default mode for the combat here. The first fight is relatively random, the best way seems to be to stick to the middle at the start, then move out and clear one of the edges, and hope any stragglers come to you in the meantime. By FAR the most annoying thing in this level is a bug; Lara randomly hurts herself with the Excalibur, making you lose about three quarters of your health and killing you half the time, this happens a lot, making the level way more annoying than it's supposed to be.

  Freezing the boss require tons of luck and very precise timing, it seems like getting the first hit in substantially lowers its chance of evasion, but it still has a habit of suddenly dodging everything you throw at it. I managed to stun it until the last hit here, where I lost a few seconds as it got away, I might have tried to freeze it for the whole battle, if the random "suicides" in the first fight weren't so frustrating. Note that the Bolivia time in my final time demonstration is wrong, although everything else is right.