Bash strats

~Balls~

Ballistix balls will always bounce in set angles because of PS1 limitations, so you can get really good with aiming the balls. Beach Ball vacuum also puts the balls in the same places, so you can aim those, too. In a co-op run communication is key to prevent shooting into your partner's goal.

Keep each CPU at roughly the same health to prevent one's AI from spiking in difficulity.

If a ball is behind your hovership, you can slam yourself against it without using your kick to have it ride the back of your ship back into the arena. If you do use your kick it'll just go into your goal backwards, react accordingly. In Beach Ball, you can also hold X to catch it instantly.

Sky Balls functions differently from the rest and you can't bank on blocking anything without a kick. Make sure to try and hit balls with the tip of the kick to prevent death.

Kick cooldown is based on how many times you consecutively missed. As long as you hit a ball, you can kick every frame.

The AI to your side is the most dangerous, always keep an eye on upcoming cornershots and ideally make predictions if the risk is minimal.

In N. Ballism, N. Gin shoots the balls in a counter-clockwise pattern. If you can tell which angle it comes out on one side, it'll come out in the same angle to your direction. The shields also spawn after each N. Gin wave, so make sure to be hugging a wall for a potential shield, if you aren't busy blocking a horde of balls. In co-op you can cover bottom-left and top-right to have a 75% chance at a shield.

Mash Triangle and Right alternately for entertainment value.


~Polars~

Counter-pushing is pretty much everything you're ever going to be doing. Push the AI right after they push you, and you're always winning. If you're against a doublepush character, it'll take longer to counterpush them all the way to the edge, so you can considering luring them there first.

If YOU get counter-pushed, as in you're pushing while falling off, the game denies you recovery entirely. This is why the strat works against the AI so well.

Recovering from an edge requires you to tap 5 times (I think lol), get accurate with it to prevent getting counter-pushed after recovery.

Items are next to useless, but they make the AI behave differently. If a weight for example is in play, the AI is less resistant to being pushed off the stage, should you be able to catch them. Lightning is a lottery ticket though so take great care of it.

The further into the challenges you go, the more AI starts reading ahead in your movement. In order to avoid engaging with them, juke them like you would a real player. For example, run in a direction and then charge another.

In Polar Panic, make sure to clear out the bottom of the stage from ice before engaging in fights. In a co-op run, P1 can do the clearing and 2 the killing.

Tilt Panic has a potential quick kill, hold upright until you're roughly next to the AI that spawns bottom-right, then push directly to the right. If they don't react to the rest of the AI by pushing, they're dead.

After having lost your polar bear in Manic Panic, you can do neutral pushes to travel at triple the speed or something stupid like that. Push without holding any direction. Also in Manic Panic, shoot a bomb and push right after so the AI has no chance of recovering.


~Pogos~

Pogos are very much decision-making and good plays come with experience. As a rule of thumb, try to be where the AI already isn't to catch a box that won't immediately get stolen.

Hold a direction mid-jump to shoot a missile into a direction you're not currently facing. Also works behind you.

In Pogo-A-Gogo, make constant squares of 4 in your corner to nearly always win.


~Crates~

Jump right after pressing Square to cancel the animation, the hit comes out almost immediately, so it'll hit. You can use this to kick people picking up crates and running away, kicking crates and generally just saving a lot of time.

Kick damage is treated differently from crate damage, and kick i-frames can still be damaged with a crate. What this means is that you can kick and immediately throw a crate to cause more damage. Penta's attack counts as a spin, so you can throw a crate after they get hit by him, too.

Oh yeah and taunts can be cancelled it's funny.

Your character doesn't throw immediately, so you can do really fancy 360s and whatever to misplace where the crate gets sent from, only the final directional input will determine the angle, so if your model has turned slightly backwards, the crate will still fly forwards, but being further back the distance is now shortened. Takes time to get used to but can situationally useful.

You can hold circle after picking up a crate to throw it as soon as possible.

In Snow Bash, you can jump to avoid sliding around. This gives free control and also full speed at the start of rounds.

If a crate is thrown next to you, you can avoid the splash damage by jumping. Only rising frames have invulnerability, so once you've reached the apex of your jump, you can still get hit by splash damage. This means jumping right before the crate hits the ground.


~Tanks~

In co-op, the first few tank challenges can be mashed all the way.

If about to get hit by something, you can shoot yourself by shooting at a wall to take minimal damage. This saves you from mines and other fatal shots.

You can stop the AI, especially in Jungle Fox, by standing in front of them. This is especially useful if they're about to get hit by a mine.

In Desert Fox crystal, the submarine isn't able to reach all the way to the edges, apart from any direction 90 degrees from it.

In Metal Fox crystal, the mines don't drop for as long as you don't stop moving. This is why they always spawn after getting hit.

In Jungle Fox, the tikimon only starts shooting after a specific amount of time has passed. Again, learn this.

Swamp Fox is just hilariously bad in single player just pray my man.


~Dashes~

Learn to drive. Turning slightly while boosting is key, as you lose speed the more time you spend turning. Following the inner curve perfectly is slightly slower than taking a lightly wider line. In Dot Dash you can just boosthug the wall. Tapping boost doesn't do anything by the way.

In Dot Dash crystal, you should always pick up a missile and not shoot it in order to prevent the AI from having one. In co-op you can carry all two missiles that'll ever spawn on the field and win for free.

When doing No MM co-op runs, roles don't do anything and you're better off having both players drive around the track. If the leader gets hit, the one behind can take over the race, minimizing timeloss.

In Splash Dash, the pistons come out at specific times. Developing a feel for them lets you jump pre-emptively and avoid getting surprise pushed out the map. In the crystal, though, the pistons are faster than you and having one push you forward is good shit.


~Bosses~

The mini Crashes in Papu spawn in set patterns. Kick one and throw a crate at the other in solo. In co-op, you can stand where they will spawn and kick 'em all dead, then finish off with a Papu hit.

In Bearminator, the metal bears are very likely to push you off while you have to recover multiple times. Do the final recoveries very accurately, as any push near an edge should kill you.

In Big Bad Fox, death abusing once is faster than clearing the boss immediately, as the brothers will take more damage. The timing for death abusing after the mech is iffy, get a cool visual cue like the helmet spikes spawning in or something. Death abusing twice is also fast, but loses a little bit more time. It is more consistent though.

In Oxide, he's next to impossible on first go. Oxide-1 is a thing but you need good luck for it. 3 death abuses usually works and any additional ones are done for safety. Every death abuse reduces his AI difficulity level by X amount.

In co-op Oxide, get the missile rhythm down and make calls for left/right. Avoiding missiles is a lot more important than shooting balls out.