IGTAP an Incremental Game Movement Guide

Welcome to our comprehensive igtap: an incremental game that’s also a platformer movement guide, detailing every known physical interaction, movement technique, and underlying mechanic. Whether you are learning fundamental platforming controls or optimizing momentum preservation across challenging sections, this breakdown covers how each ability functions under the hood.

Preface and Terminology

Understanding movement mechanics in this game relies on empirical testing and hitbox observation rather than decompiled engine data. Where applicable, technique names align with established terminology from platformers like Celeste, while novel mechanics follow consistent descriptive conventions.

This compendium focuses on the precise behavior, momentum shifts, and state changes governing each technique. Mastering these mechanics allows you to execute precise maneuvers and anticipate physics interactions across every stage.

Baseline Movement Options

The starting toolkit contains foundational actions alongside subtle engine quirks that experienced runners can immediately exploit:

• Walking: Horizontal movement to the left or right reaches a consistent maximum speed without a sprint button. Mid-air lateral control exhibits instant acceleration alongside negligible deceleration.
• QuickFall: While standard falls cap out at a fixed terminal velocity, holding down accelerates descent and increases maximum downward speed. Releasing the input smoothly restores standard terminal velocity.
• Grounded Jump: Holding the jump button temporarily suspends gravity to produce variable jump heights between a fixed minimum and maximum duration. Jumping completely arrests opposite horizontal momentum but cleanly preserves momentum traveling in the same direction.
• Coyote Frames: Walking off a ledge grants a brief grace window where jump inputs register as full grounded jumps without consuming mid-air resources.
• BHops (Bunny Hops): Air friction is noticeably lower than ground friction. Timing a jump the instant you make contact with the floor preserves horizontal velocity exceeding standard running speed.
• Spike Mechanics: Spikes jut out roughly 10 pixels and possess hitboxes 1 to 2 pixels thinner than their visual tiles. Crucially, spikes cannot damage you if you are traveling in their facing direction, enabling spiked corner jumps where a clean upward jump off a spiked lip remains completely harmless.
• Input Buffering: Pressing jump a few frames prior to touching down buffers the action, executing a frame-perfect grounded jump upon landing.

Subtle character geometry also plays a role in high-level play. Micro-tapping on a ledge lip can suspend your character mid-air, while wall tests demonstrate that the player hitbox extends slightly further forward than backward.

Section 1 Abilities and Tech

Reaching the upper facilities grants essential platforming tools that introduce aerial mobility and momentum-canceling options:

• Wall Slide: Making direct contact with a wall arrests downward velocity and initiates a controlled slide. Holding up slows descent while holding down accelerates it, and holding toward the wall keeps you stationary if your wall jumps are exhausted.
• Wall Jump: Pushes you upward and away at a locked diagonal angle, irrespective of directional inputs. The vertical distance scales with button hold duration, sharing velocities similar to an air jump.
• Side Dash: Propels your character laterally at fixed velocity while ignoring gravity before entering a brief end state. This recovery window restores your pre-dash momentum if traveling in the same direction, and ground contact instantly replenishes your dash count.
• Air Jump: Matches the duration of a standard jump with slightly lower upward velocity. Activating an air jump cleanly stacks on top of existing upward momentum while completely resetting downward falling speed.
• Polarity Switching: Initiating a dash toggles polar blocks and hazards after a slight delay. If a dash finishes inside an activating block, the collision geometry forcefully ejects you backward opposite your dash vector.

Combining these tools yields powerful advanced techniques. Performing a grounded jump during a dash executes a Superdash, combining dash velocity with full jump height. Jumping with neutral inputs results in a failed superdash that drops horizontal speed, while holding backward executes a reverse superdash. Similarly, jumping on the precise frame of a wall-bound side dash triggers a Wall Bounce, yielding massive vertical height without restricting lateral steering.

Section 2 Abilities and Advanced Tech

Section 2 introduces interactive stage elements and omnidirectional dash controls that drastically raise the mechanical skill ceiling:

• Refresh Orbs: Green dash orbs, blue air jump orbs, and combined complete refreshes restore expended charges on contact. Each orb resets wall jumps as a bonus, enters a two-second cooldown upon use, and persists through player respawns.
• Zipper Blocks: Latching onto these moving platforms imparts extreme momentum. Timing a jump, superdash, or wavedash as the block reaches the end of its track preserves that burst of kinetic energy.
• Omni Dash: Upgrades the dash into eight 45-degree directions with uniform travel distance. Dashing down while grounded stalls your character briefly, while downward-diagonal ground dashes default to standard lateral dashes.
• Wave Dash: Jumping and immediately executing a downward-diagonal dash into the floor, followed by an immediate jump, produces an explosive forward launch with half the vertical clearance of a superdash.
• High Jump: Dashing straight downward into the floor and canceling the state with an immediate jump launches you roughly twice as high as a grounded leap.
• Up Flick: Dashing diagonally upward into a wall and wall-jumping mid-dash catapults you away at immense speed without trajectory lockouts.
• Ultradash: Executing a wavedash from a slightly elevated platform onto lower terrain stacks momentum, effectively doubling horizontal velocity. This technique functions even across minute height variations like teleporter pads.
• High Dash: Canceling a downward dash into a jump while carrying horizontal momentum yields the immense vertical elevation of a high jump while fully maintaining lateral speed.

Ongoing Research and Community Tech

Platforming physics and momentum properties in this title continue to be analyzed as more routing optimizations are uncovered. Documenting precise frame windows, pixel boundaries, and acceleration curves remains an ongoing community effort.

Testing ledge alignments, hazard interactions, and chaining dash cancels across various elevations will help refine our understanding of the engine. Sharing new movement anomalies and routing tech helps push the limits of what is possible in each stage.