Time Without Loads
Guidelines On “Time Without Loads"
These are the rules on what count as a load in Horizon Zero Dawn Speedrunning. Time is not being counted while the loading screens listed below are on screen during a run. We encourage every runner to read these guidelines and try to learn how to time their own run without loads.
Why are HZD Speedruns timed without loads?
Horizon Zero Dawn Speedruns are timed without loads due to the difference in loading speeds between PS4 HDD, PS4 SSD, PS5 and PC's. Individual consoles or PC's may also have different loading times. In order to have a fair playing field, all runs are timed without loads.
What Counts As A Load
Loading screens are the orange/red screens with the “Loading...” text in the bottom left corner. The text is different depending on the text language you play on.
There are also 4 cutscenes with loading screens at the beginning of the game. These are cutscenes that can be paused, but can not be skipped immediately. The “Loading…” text will appear in the bottom left corner when the cutscene is paused. When the game is done loading the cutscene can be skipped. It only counts as a load when the cutscene is paused and until the skip button goes from greyed out to white. If the cutscene is not paused it does not count as a load.
The 4 cutscenes are:
- The second cutscene between “A gift from the past” and “Lessons of the Wild”
- The training montage cutscene where Aloy becomes an adult.
- The intro cutscene to “The Proving”
- The cutscene right after the “The Proving”
*Note that the first two cutscenes listed above do not appear in New Game+ (NG+) because the Childhood section is automatically skipped in NG+.
How To Time Your Loads
The best and most accurate way is to take the video of your run and put it into a video editing program. Cut the video to exactly where the run starts and ends. Then cut the video to only have loading screens and subtract the amount of loading time from the Real Time of your run. The reason you want to cut out the run instead of loads is to avoid the issue of dropped frames and imperfect recording as much as possible.
Alternatively, you can use the Load Remover to remove loads automatically while you do your run.
Common Questions About Loads
Does it matter how a loading screen happens?
No, as long as the loading screens listed above appears, it counts as a load. The reason as to how the loading screen appears does not matter. If the loading screen is there, its a load no matter what.
If my game crashes/blue screens does that count as a load?
No, only the loading screens listed above counts as loads. If you close the game or it crashes mid run it does not count as a loading time.
If you have any questions after reading this then the best place to ask in on our community Discord server.
