Halo CEA: Keyes Shield Bump: The Key to Keyes on Legendary

Keyes is an infamous level to beat on Legendary, with its tight narrow corridors full of Flood and Elites. Fortunately there is a trick employed by Speedrunners that allows you to skip most of the level. As a result of this trick's discovery and usage, the speedrun World Record for Keyes is only 2 minutes 18 seconds... Crazy, right?

Introduction

Keyes can be described as a "Pretzel-shaped" level, as in it loops around itself. The starting point of the level is one wall away from the final room, and this can be abused by a trick that allows you to "bump" yourself into the next room and skip the entire ground sequence.

This trick however is incredibly precise and it will take you a lot of tries to get a successful attempt.

Step One: Pre-Shield Bump Set Up

The first spawn in the game is right next to the final and most important room of the level.

This is the room we are going to bump ourselves into, thus bypassing the entire sequence on the ground.

Proceed forward, kill the Grunt that runs past, but for a consistency checkpoint keep the armless buddy Flood alive!
If you wish, keep this guy alive. Once the other enemies are dead, and you successfully bump yourself out of the map, he will run away, and the game will give you a checkpoint which will allow you to not have to keep doing the bump over and over again if you make a mistake.

Kill the 3 grunts in the room and the 2 Flood Combat Forms/1 Flood Carrier. Pick up the shotgun from one of the Combat Forms and take out all the infection forms so it's just you (and your buddy Flood if you're going for the consistency checkpoint.) Take care not to let your Buddy see the Elites fighting on the other side of the chasm, otherwise he will lose interest in you and fall off the map.

Moron!

This is where it gets tricky. Switch now to Classic graphics as you will need the old-school textures to line yourself up.
For this trick you will need your plasma pistol only. Keep your shotgun for the next room. You will need it there.

Step Two: The Bump Itself

Every Speedrunner/Player who uses this Strat implements a different set up. Once you understand the line-up, find a set up that feels right for you. Remember to shoot the shield every 2 or 3 seconds in order to keep the shield from respawning.

Use your pistol to dissipate the shield. Jump on it. Make sure your aim is perpendicular to the length of the shield, as per above.

Jump and very gently tap your D key, so you move ever so slightly to the right. The aim here is to have the right-most triangle of your Reticle be aligned to the grey ridge on the right of the shield as per above. You do not want the top right corner of the triangle to go over the black ridge. Once the right triangle is aligned as per above, you can now do your Y-axis adjustment.

Gently tap your W key and jump, doing precise jumps. Make sure your aim is perpendicular to the length of the shield as per above, and that the right triangle stays within the grey box. If the corner sticks too far out, readjust with gentle movements.

The red lines indicate the areas I look at to ensure I am lined up properly. Experiment also with your view angle. For the first part of the preparation, you should be looking fully down, but try and lift your view a little bit. Sometimes a little twist of the camera to line up works too. Experiment and see what works for you.

Once you are confident, stop shooting the shield and wait for it to respawn. You will either be bumped to the right by the shield, which indicates an unsuccessful attempt.

If you are bumped into the room above the shield, your alignment was almost perfect, but not quite there. Jump down and try again.

The sign of success is when you are bumped and see this sight. There is an invisible ledge you can stand on in front of you (where the reticle above is aimed on) and you may need to move forward a little bit to catch it, but be careful as it is narrow and you may overshoot it. Note that it is normal to be caught by surprise if you get a successful bump, and you may end up falling down and back into the game world. Try again with what worked last time.

Once you successfully land onto that ledge, you have done a successful shield bump.

Step Three: Navigating the Map to the Bridge

You're not out of the woods yet. Now you need to navigate to the bridge on a ledge that you cannot see. The actual ceiling of the map has no collisions, and you will fall straight through. However, the decorative light fixtures are solid, and this is what you must find next.

Jump in this direction. As you jump you will be able to see the ledge you are aiming for a split second, so adjust your trajectory gently.

Next, face toward the visible room and try to be as straight as possible so as to follow the length of the ledge you are standing on without falling. Gently explore which part of the ledge you've landed on and align yourself. Note the purple ledges on the left corridor. Those are what you are standing on.

Move back slowly, using the room in front of you as a guide to line you up. As you walk back, you will run into an object on your path, so you will need to jump. There are about three or four jumps you will need to do. With each jump, make sure you are straight and don't walk too far to the right. If you start sliding, gently move back to the left. If you slide too much to the right, you will end up back in the corridor and have to start again.

If you kept straight, you will fall into the Bridge room. The hardest parts are now behind you! However there is still one last thing you need to do in order to complete this trick.

Step Four: Resetting the Level Triggers

The game is now confused, as you have entered the map without activating the required triggers. Thus, the room is empty and the cutscene trigger will not activate.

As in the level Truth & Reconciliation, proceed to the hallway that leads to the prisoner rooms. Turn right and walk to the end of the hallway until you reach the doors. There should be a black wall blocking your path, which indicates the trigger. Walk right up to it, turn around and you should receive a checkpoint.

When you return to the Bridge, you will notice that Covenant & Flood have spawned. The game is very confused, so the enemies have no animation and AI. Kill all the enemies. You will notice their death animations may be delayed, but make sure all enemies are dead. Point your reticle on any remaining standing figures and kill any that still appear as red. Once you're satisfied, walk up to Keyes and start the cutscene.



NOTE: YOU MUST KILL ALL ENEMIES IN THIS ROOM! ONCE THE CUTSCENE STARTS, ANY REMAINING ENEMIES WILL REGAIN THEIR AI AND WILL BEGIN ATTACKING/KILLING YOU IN THE CUTSCENE.

Chief can take damage and die in cutscenes, so be careful!

Conclusion

Once the cutscene ends, you may complete the remaining portion of the level as normal.

Note: Doing this trick in Co-Op seems to cause the other player to experience some control bugs after the cutscene ends. The level did not register as completed on their side as well, and we had to finish the level normally.

[Bomjahed]

Flood bump is way easier, had zero expirience and still made it on 3rd try.

[Exodus]

Speedrunners use the flood bump now, more consistent, easier and faster.

[KLX300r]

Or get this do what i did and use the shotgun and frags mixed with iq of 179
and play it the best way period

[Viktor]

do the flood bumb instead its faster and easier

[Bear]

Way too hard