The Mesa update in Peak introduced the Scout Cannon, and with it, the infamous cannon glitch. As the name implies, the Scout Cannon allows players to shoot themselves a great distance. The glitch, however, makes it possible to skip entire areas altogether, potentially getting to the peak without dropping a sweat.
The glitch was discovered shortly after the Mesa update, which introduced the namesake biome. The developers acknowledged it in patch 1.25.a, and applied some changes to the game. If you’re wondering how to do the Scout Cannon glitch in Peak and whether or not it still works after the patch, we’ve got you covered.
How to Do the Cannon Glitch in Peak
The cannon glitch in Peak requires a few pieces to fall into place. Since every new run is randomly generated, meaning that the items are always different, it might take you a while.
For starters, here’s what you need for the glitch:
- A Scout Cannon, which is one of the items added in the Mesa update.
- A flare.
- A backpack.
- And, last but not least, speedy hands.
The Scout Cannon has a chance to appear in suitcases, albeit the rate is quite low. As a reference, I restarted the game about 20 times, and only saw the Scout Cannon three times.
The glitch works best if you do it from the starting point of a run in the Shore biome, meaning that, if you want to save time, you should only open any suitcases that are close to the start. If you don’t see the cannon in any of them, go ahead and restart and try again.
Doing the glitch from this location is also beneficial since there’s always a flare and a backpack nearby–you can get them from inside one of the crashed planes and the shore, respectively.
Now, it’s time to prepare the cannon. A good reference spot is behind and to the right of one of the broken plane wings on the shore, which is set on fire. Make sure the cannon is pointing toward the peak. In terms of angle, I didn’t adjust it, and just left it as is. Moreover, make sure that there aren’t any palm trees nearby that might cause a premature collision.
The second step involves the backpack. After grabbing it, head to the Scout Cannon and jump inside. Your character must be standing in it. Then, select the backpack and drop it. The idea is that the backpack needs to be inside the cannon. Then, go ahead and exit.
Stepping outside the cannon after dropping the backpack is admittedly a bit buggy–we’re prepping a glitch after all. If you’re having trouble exiting, grab the backpack and repeat the steps. Also, the position of the backpack itself doesn’t matter, but it needs to be inside.
Now comes the fun part. Make sure to have the flare with you, and once ready, light the back of the cannon to start the explosion. As soon as you do this, run around and jump inside with the backpack.
The explosion will trigger shortly. Now, as soon as you’re in the air, you have to spam the Play Dead emote. Using a mouse and keyboard, this requires opening the emote wheel with R and moving the cursor toward the emote. You must repeat this multiple times and in quick succession.
If you’re successful, you’ll start skipping entire levels. You’ll know this because you’ll see the title screens appear rapidly. Depending on the achievements that you’ve gotten so far, you may also have a few new ones pop up–for me, that was the Cool Cucumber Badge for climbing past the Mesa biome without ever having more than 10% heat.
You’ll eventually stop flying and be at the peak, which will look, well, glitched. You’ll be surrounded by light blue walls, which will slowly give you the cold debuff. As soon as you stop moving, go ahead and light the flare. This is so you can trigger the helicopter, which you can then use to escape and finish the run. Try not to take too long, or the cold might overtake you.
As one last note: it’s likely that you won’t make it to the peak on the first try. It’s a tricky glitch to pull off. But I was able to do it on my third attempt, so keep on trying.
Can You Still Do the Cannon Glitch in Peak After the Patch?
The short answer is, yes, the cannon glitch in Peak still works after patch 1.25.a, which was issued in late August.
One of the major fixes made fog walls taller, which are the walls that separate biomes from each other, in order to prevent people from exploiting the glitch too often. That being said, I can confirm the glitch still works. It took me three tries to pull it off, as the first two attempts had me colliding against a surface and killing me on the spot. Your mileage may vary, of course, but the patch itself didn’t outright remove the glitch.
Best of luck skipping all levels using the cannon glitch in Peak. If you’re looking for more guides, we’ve also covered how to find the Scoutmaster and the different methods to encounter him.