Bugs and Glitches

This is a list of glitches and bugs in Cuphead.

General glitches[]

If Cuphead dies during a boss transition, the boss battle will still continue and the game will soft-lock. The game cannot be paused after this soft-lock happens and the only way to get past that is to close the game and reopen it.
- Also, if Cuphead parries a damaging parryable object the same time they touch it, the game will softlock.
If you select Expert Mode in the save file with a completed main game, starting a new one stays at Expert Mode. This also affects the DLC bosses.
A boss's current phase is almost always determined by the level of health, with the boss making an effort to go to the next phase after reaching a certain level of health. Some bosses, like Beppi The Clown in the bumper car phase, can only switch phases at certain points in their attack pattern, so it's possible to deal damage fast enough to move at least one phase ahead of schedule. This can cause all manner of weird behavior.
Beating a level will randomly give you 0-1 star on the results screen when you press the confirm button to skip at an exact frame, this usually shows the results of other information immediately but for the stars it caused a visual glitch.
If a Nintendo GameCube controller is used on the Steam version of the game, the player will not be able to do anything in the buildings entered.
- If you enter Porkrind's Emporium, you won't be able to do anything whatsoever.
- If you enter a Die House, you can move around and play normally, but you cannot talk to King Dice or leave.
There is a glitch called weapon swap glitch by speedrunners where the cooldown is still counting down after switching weapons, the cooldown isn't set to zero so you are not shooting a new bullet every time you switch, but it isn't paused so when you switch back it can be shot almost immediately again when the cooldown is off, this glitch is patched by pausing the cooldown correctly when switching the weapon.
- Speedrunners use this glitch for almost doubling the damage output. The preferred choices is Roundabout and Lobber, they both have more DPS than Peashooter and the EX does better damage when used correctly. Spread and Peashooter fire rate is too fast for proper switching when Lobber and Roundabout both have slower fire rate, Spread also has short range so it is really hard to optimize. Charge and Chaser damage is too low, uncharged bullets are very weak because Charge is not meant to be used this way and Chaser is just too weak naturally. The utility of Roundabout and Lobber for staying on screen longer than most shot also help setting a lot on damage on the field before the boss shows up, like shooting both shots upwards while jumping will results in Roundabout coming down later and Lobber bouncing higher on the floor. This glitch has since been removed but is still available on the original patch.
There is a glitch for Roundabout EX, the damage it's supposed to deal is exactly 35, or exactly 7 hits for 5 damage each, but because of how it is coded, it only disappears after it exceeds 35 so one more hit is granted. But in coop mode, the damage is halved normally like everything else, but the damage cap was calculated twice incorrectly, making it only deal a quarter of 35.
There is a glitch for Lobber EX when it hits the ground, it explodes twice for unknown reason, maybe it is intentional for the developer to code it and take pity on the player missing the EX, but it has been found extremely useful for speedruns as both explosion deal the same damage of a direct hit Lobber EX (when directly hit by one, the explosion does not damage that hitbox again unless there is another one within explosion radius, for example: Devil's eyes in phase 3), meaning you always gets double the value from just one card of super meter, double damage Lobber EX even exceed the Spread EX(in first version) if it all hits, it only requires the boss to be close to the ground.
- There are instances when the EX hit the ground and the boss' hitbox at the same time, it will deal triple damage, with special cases like Devil's serpent form (which has a different segment for each ups and downs), Sir Waffington III (his full body and the mouth is a separated hitbox) and when Werner Werman Phase 2 lowering taking four times the damage, and for Devil's serpent form hitting the hitbox directly as well will do five times the damage, doing quick works of these Phases.

There is a glitch speedrunners use called jump lock, when you parry just as you land, instead of jumping, the next input for jump will just be a parry at the same spot, it is very annoying as this game focuses a lot on dodging and maneuvering, you not being able to jump suddenly will end with you being punished by losing your health, maybe even your life.

There is a glitch that hasn't quite been well documented where a boss does not spawn correctly or at all, a boss not doing an introduction for example and just staying still, this can happen while restarting a boss over and over again and it softlocks the fight, this is fixable by exiting to map then re-entering the fight.
- A special case of this is in the Rumor Honeybottoms fight when this happens only 14 of the office combs spawn and reveal the background behind them, and the platforms rise with the autoscroll, worker bees still come and can hurt and so can the honey.
There is a glitch where player 2 can quit and join in at the same time and that action can create a clone of the player 2 in the overworld or the level, creating an army of player 2, thus the name Mugman Army glitch (or Cuphead Army after version 1.2 allows player 1 to be Mugman). This clone has individual health and doesn't reduce damage further, and can deal extreme amount of damage if a lot of them is spawned. The downside is if player 1 dies and one of the clone also dies, it will result in game over, which can happen very quickly after player 1 dies and player 2 does not enough time to save them as a constant hitbox sweeps through the army.
Plane Peashooter EX can get stuck between two hitbox when one of them is constantly moving because it mostly can as a new hitbox for the EX to damage, in which the EX slows down the movement of both hitboxes and the hitbox slows down the EX movement, creating a loop that advance very little per tick of damage. This can results in the EX from being slowed down slightly to deal a feel more ticks of damage to nearly completely stuck until one is destroyed.
- Notable examples of this happening is when Hilda Berg in her half moon form spawn UFO and when they are moving to the top of the screen overlapping her hitbox. Also at a precise moment for Dr. Kahl's Robot, the lower two hitboxes from the first phase is close enough that the EX is wide enough to hit both at the same time.
The boss sounds in the overworld for Inkwell Isle 2, and Inkwell Isle 3 were silent. This is patched since version 1.2.
If player 2 uses the invincibility Super Art in a level, then gets removed, the music will be sped up until the battle is exited.

Videos of the listed glitches in action[]

Cuphead - 4 players glitch

Cuphead - More players glitch (gameplay)

Rumor Honeybottoms spawn glitch

Inkwell Isle One[]

It is possible to move around while Elder Kettle is talking to you in his house by equipping either Coffee or the Divine Relic to increase Cuphead/Mugman's super meter and waiting for at least one card to appear. Stand inside Elder Kettle facing left and perform an EX move. The player will be shifted to the left then back to the right for a brief moment. Then simply walk left to initiate Elder Kettle's text. You should be free to walk around while he is talking to you and even leave or enter the Tutorial while his text remains on screen
In The Root Pack's boss fight, it is possible for Ollie Bulb's tears to still remain in phase three after he is defeated. However, this is an aesthetic effect since Ollie cannot hurt players with his arching tears.
Chauncey Chantenay's death line has a typo at the apostrophe of the "I'm", results the apostrophe being an unknown character. This was fixed in the patch 1.1.3. Because of this, prior to the patch, Chauncey appeared to say "Im lean, mean, and full of beta-carotene!" in his death line instead of the proper "I'm lean, mean, and full of beta-carotene!"
In Botanic Panic!, when you face Sal Spudder, you can go behind him to defeat him easily. Although, you will have to take one damage, even with Smoke Dash charm. To do this, you have to simply walk behind him when you are in your damage cool down, then lock and turn around. If the player equips the Astral Cookie to play as Ms. Chalice and uses the Crackshot EX downwards to parry-dash onto it to gain necessary height, it is possible to double jump and dash over Sal flawlessly without taking damage. It is recommended to use Spread because you are very close to him.
When fighting Chauncey Chantenay, while the boss is using his third eye attack, if you defeat him, his knockout animation will be active for a second, and then his attack animation will be shown.
Ribby and Croaks' last phase hitbox can be permanently "unlocked" when pausing at the right frame using pause buffer and advancing one frame at a time. This is harder to execute since version 1.2+ made pausing repeatedly require a few frame until you can pause again, making the glitch more on the luck side instead of easily executable.
During Cagney Carnation's boss fight, if the player dashes or jumps into one of his projectiles, Cagney will be frozen for the rest of the fight until his second phase.
If Cagney Carnation uses a lunge attack it has the chance to have the sound that comes from the attack be stuck on a constant loop until he uses another lunge.
Cagney Carnation will randomly stop attacking during his third subphase, allowing the player to get to his final phase with ease.
In the Cagney Carnation boss fight while having Parry sugar you can glitch Cuphead by doing the super and the automatic parry parring the tiny flowers bullet
In Treetop Trouble, you can freeze the dragonfly boss by using your Super Art at a specific time.
Hilda also has a Phase stuck glitch but it is you have to deal very specific damage to her. Too little she will attack in her constellation form and turn back to normal, too much will skip the constellation form immediately. Just when Hilda having the small transforming animation from the last possible moments of flying back from off screen and start technically be in the constellation form to do enough damage to skip her constellation form, she will be stuck at that form until the fight is over. She doesn't went through the transition to become a half moon where she can't be damaged but still able to gain cards from attacking her. She also has a bigger hitbox so speedruns use this to damage her more with Plane Peashooter EX. The mini toy blimps will constantly come out to attack as well, sometimes even three and four of them at the same time, this also give you a bit more opportunity to parry and use more EXes.
Also in Treetop Trouble, pausing the game in the vertical section will cause the flies to turn invisible. This doesn't mean their sprite will vanish, however. The sprites simply float oddly in a single direction, up or down, clipping through terrain, then act as normal as the hitbox continues to fly around.

Inkwell Isle Two[]

The fight with Beppi The Clown exhibits the phase glitch mentioned above since he can only switch phases when dashing from one side to the other in his bumper car. In this case, he enters the balloon phase after taking too much damage from the bumper car phase and immediately starts exploding. Beppi still attacks with balloon dogs but the fight itself is in this phase until the end. If this is done way to quickly and Beppi stays in bumper car phase too long, as the hitbox of phase 2 normally ends with it flying off-screen, it will stay off-screen and can hardly be hit. With a more precise timing, the hitbox can also be at the lowest point possible making the fight even more of a breeze.
Djimmi The Great has the phase glitch too, there is a hidden hitbox of Djimmi's hand that pulls the puppet up below the screen where you can keep shooting mini bombs, in later updates most hidden hitbox has changed such that attack those don't deal damage and only give cards. Here, the fight will be stuck at the sarcophagus phase and Djimmi will still attack with the mummies and planet eyes. After taking enough damage the fight ends with sarcophagus still opened and ends with a lot of explosion effects.

Djimmi, at certain times will also give the Sarcophagus death screen quote if you die right before he goes into phase two. This is due to how the phase is actually coded. The Totems that Djimmi summons in his second phase are a unique attack that is hard-coded to be given it's own mugshot, and shares phase 2 with the Sarcophagus, this is why there is only 4 sections shown in on the Regular/Expert retry screen.
If you kill Grim Matchstick while the boss is doing his flame thrower attack, the other heads will disappear until he finishes that attack and then he will show his knockout animation.

Wally Warbles has a stuck at a Phase glitch. In other words, if you modify the weapons and make them so strong that they have enough time to kill Willy Warbles, then you will be greeted with him not leaving the screen, but staying on it, thus not starting Phase 3 at all.
- Grim Matchstick also has a stuck at a Phase glitch, at the second Phase he has different state of being stuck, however. When you skip Phase 2 before he even comes out, he remains in Phase 2 but the Fire marcher will also come out. When you defeat Phase 2 before he starts producing Fire marcher he will just be stuck there with Fire marcher spawning. The third is when you finish his Phase 2 just as he is about to produce Fire marchers, his tongue will roll back but fire will never stop coming out of his nostrils.

In the first version of the game Grim's third phase doesn't have a hitbox on the necks so you can hide there and the fire bubbles and flame thrower cannot hurt you, the downside being you have to stay on the clouds when the neck block your view.

Inkwell Isle Three[]

At the start of Phase 2 in Dr. Kahl's Robot, blue orbs randomly appear inappropriately, it's unknown what causes the short glitch to happen.

Cuphead_-_Rugged_Ridge_-_secret_glitch_for_easy_win — Cuphead - Rugged Ridge - secret glitch for easy win

In the run n' gun level Rugged Ridge, if you stand on top of the enemy with the pink face, then kill it while on it and wait for it's knock out animation to pass, you will be able you walk the rest of the level on a invisible floor. If you jump, the invisible floor will disappear. This is helpful when the Cyclops starts chasing Cuphead through his section of the level.
If you damages Cala Maria too much in the first phase, same phase glitches happens but Cala's third phase head and the stone body just disappeared after the transition, luckily there is a small spot under the middle of the ocean where the head went and still be able to damage by the splash damage of mini bombs or Super Bomb morph.
Beating Railroad Wrath will sometimes not list the use of super meters in the victory screen, making getting an S-rank somewhat luck-based.
Sometimes after defeating the third phase of Phantom Express the train just won't advance at all and you will be stuck there until you restart the fight.
If enough damage is done, it is possible to entirely skip Rumor Honeybottoms' third phase at the second phase or the transition while she is finding the transformation spell.
In the first version Sally Stageplay's phase 3 hitbox is exposed and can be damage anytime by shooting up with shots that can reach like Roundabout being shot at the highest point of a jump or charged Charge, even when phase 2 starts and the Sally on-screen is immune to damage, damaging the phase 3 hitbox still contributes to her overall health. This is fixed in version 1.1+ by giving the property of phase 2 start where you can attack but not damage them, only gain cards in the process.
With 1.2.0 update when the player defeats Sally's first phase after lowering both cherubs and before the husband get crushed (which makes Sally invulnerable), Sally will shown to be defeated in phase two instead and completely skip that phase. Both Sally and her husband cut out god form will be lowered after that. This might be caused by lowering both cherubs that will immediately skip to the second phase but the total health hasn't increased yet in that split second of transitioning, by defeating her phase 1 in that time frame the game got confused by thinking she is defeated at phase 2 thus skipping it entirely. This glitch combines with her third phase having two hitboxes for Area-of-Effect damage EX. This makes defeating her even faster than with weapon swap glitch.
In the fight with Dr. Kahl's Robot, getting up close to the heart and spamming the mini bomb EX while the black smudge is on it would cause an instant knockout, skipping Phases 2 and 3. For some reason the damage in Phase 1 would not be counted in the hidden health bar that appears when you die, thus it won't show your progress for Phase 1. When you entered Phase 2, the game thought all of the health for phase 1 was depleted in one attack. With the mini bomb EX having nine projectiles that hit the heart at the same time, doing this when it is just about to transition to Phase 2 made the game think all projectiles did an entire Phase 1 worth of damage at the same time, ending the fight immediately. This is patched since version 1.1.

Inkwell Hell[]

Simple Mode is unavailable in the stages here, but finishing an earlier fight on Simple and coming to All Bets Are Off! or One Hell Of A Time immediately can sometimes result in the game trying to give the player a Simple version of these fights, even though it should not exist. This can cause weird behavior (including some of the All Bets Are Off minibosses, including Pip and Dot (out of bounds), Tipsy Troop (not attacking), Hopus Pocus (never appearing, having two floating cards platform), etc.) and may softlock the game in rare cases.
In All Bets Are Off!, Mr. Chimes was able get stuck in the edge of the screen when the screen slightly scrolls. Also, during this glitch, after picking two cards successfully, he can get stuck in the permanent pre-attacking animation and he can be damaged and beaten even when the cards show up. This glitch is patched since version 1.1 so that Mr. Chimes can shield his weak point when the cards do appear.
- Alternately, a well-timed selection of two mismatching cards can send Mr. Chimes flying off of the screen, resulting in an instant knockout.
You can beat The Devil without leaving the first phase. To do this, when the hole to the second phase appears and the walls of fire close in, stand on the left edge of the hole where you are safe from both the hole and the fire. From there, you can attack an invisible hitbox until you defeat the devil, all while not having to worry about any damage coming your way. This is patched since version 1.1.
Holding the fire button as you progress to The Devil's second stage can result in Cuphead's firing animation not producing any projectiles. This can be resolved if you switch weapons or use a super art.
During The Devil's second phase transition, if the player stays at the top and stands between the fire and the hole for a couple seconds and then jumps in, the firing animation will appear from behind Cuphead, rather than his fingertips. This can be fixed by moving left.
King Dice will randomly freeze, making his battle effortless.
The title screen lists it as "Inkwell Isle Four".
Inkwell Hell was referred to as "Inkwell Isle Four" on the main menu. This is patched since version 1.1.

Inkwell Isle Four[]

If you speak to Unnamed ghost detective while wearing the Broken Relic that's been upgraded to a Divine Relic and having beaten the conditions necessary for Unnamed cactus girl (beaten every boss while playing as Ms. Chalice) but not yet spoken to her, you will get the cactus' girl's prompt stating you have the new skin available for Ms. Chalice in the options menu even though you haven't spoken to them yet.
Similar to Hilda Berg, when damaging Esther Winchester in Phase 2 and Chef Saltbaker in Phase 1 trigger a new phase in the same frame they start a new cycle of attack, they can be stuck at a phase, making their battle effortless.
Using some weapons like charged Charge, it can deal double damage to the Anteater in Moonshine Mob, with weapons that dealt enough damage, it can skip the Announcer Snail phase completely.
Chef Saltbaker's last phase sometimes continues to use his normal animation after he is knocked out.
Chef Saltbaker’s heart can sometimes be a white blob. When dying anytime during the fight like this, even before the final phase, a white bar will appear before the death screen.
Sometimes, Chef Saltbaker's second phase’s music will still play during the third and fourth phase, instead of it being replaced with the third phase’s music.
While using the heart ring, if you parry anything when Chef Saltbaker grabs you in the start of the second phase, Cuphead( or Mugman) turns pink for the entire battle.
Cannonballs can deal double damage to The Queen when hitting her between her head and body.
When parry the heads back at The Rook the same frame it hits him, it can deal damage to him once again; this can be a good way to speed up the fight, although this can be risky as the Rook can still damage if his opponent misses.