Fly'N's four playable characters split hard across three incompatible optimization paths: raw speed, puzzle manipulation, and combat safety. No single character dominates all three. Your "best" pick depends on which of the game's friction points actually slow you down.
Ranking Scope & Criteria
This tier list evaluates Fly'N's characters across three weighted dimensions, with adjustable priority based on player goal:
| Dimension | Weight (Speedrun) | Weight (First Clear) | Weight (100%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Movement velocity & skip potential | 50% | 20% | 30% |
| Puzzle manipulation efficiency | 30% | 30% | 40% |
| Combat safety & checkpoint recovery | 20% | 50% | 30% |
Scope limits: Rankings reflect current Steam build behavior as of late 2023. Console ports (PS3, Xbox 360) show minor timing variance on specific vine-grab animations. No mobile or delisted versions covered. Patch history is effectively frozen—Ankama ceased active development in 2014, so "meta" here means community-optimized routing, not balance changes.
S-Tier: Fly'N
The Protagonist, Unusually
Best for: Speedrunners, routing learners, players who want one character to master. Skip if: You specifically enjoy off-meta challenge runs or find his glide arc unintuitive.
Fly'N sits at S-tier not because he's overpowered but because he's orthogonal—his glide mechanic creates routing options no other character replicates. Where others hit hard stops at gap sequences or vertical climbs, his sustained horizontal drift opens skip lines that shave 15-40 seconds per applicable stage in practiced hands.
The hidden variable: his glide has a terminal velocity floor. You cannot stall indefinitely. This creates a failure state where players misread "floaty" as "forgiving" and die on precision landings they assumed they'd recover. The elimination logic is simple—if a section rewards exactly the glide's arc, he's irreplaceable; if it punishes horizontal overshoot, he's actively worse than alternatives.
Decision archaeology: Why Fly'N over Lyra for speed? Lyra's dash covers ground faster in flat segments, but her dash-end recovery locks her into animation commitment. Fly'N's glide can be canceled into grabs or vines at any point. The plausible alternative loses on optionality at decision points, not raw speed.
Meta caveat: Any% runs have largely settled Fly'N as mandatory for 6+ stages. IL (individual level) records on non-glide stages sometimes use Lyra instead, so "S-tier" is goal-dependent.
A-Tier: Lyra
The Speed Specialist with a Tax
Best for: Players who value burst mobility, flat-stage dominance, aggressive playstyles. Skip if: You struggle with animation-commit windows or frequent checkpoint recovery.
Lyra's dash-doubletap defines her. The non-obvious axis: her damage state during dash. She's not invincible—she's hitbox-displaced, which reads as iframes until you clip an enemy on the recovery frame and die confused. This is the most common A-tier demotion trigger in player surveys.
Her puzzle manipulation is adequate but not efficient. She can reach certain switches faster, but her lack of sustained positioning (no glide, no grab-and-hold) means multi-step puzzles require more player inputs for the same outcome.
Supported contrarian: Lyra is arguably S-tier for deathless runs on stages without vertical skip potential, where her raw clear speed outpaces Fly'N's glide setup time. The community consensus of "A" reflects averaging across all stage types, not her ceiling.
Patch sensitivity: None for base game, but one community patch for PC removes a frame-perfect wall-clip that was Lyra-exclusive. This changed her IL standing on two stages; verify your build if comparing records.
B-Tier: Nyls
The Combat Anchor, Map-Dependent
Best for: Combat-heavy stages, players prioritizing checkpoint recovery, methodical clearers. Skip if: You're optimizing for time, need vertical mobility, or dislike resource-monitoring.
Nyls introduces the game's only genuine resource mechanic: his projectile charges. This creates controlled cognitive friction—you must track ammo for puzzle solutions, not just combat. The self-correction worth noting: early community tier lists (2012-2013) overrated him as "easy mode" because his ranged attack trivializes certain enemy formations. Later routing discovered that ammo expenditure on enemies often costs more time than melee alternatives, as reload animations are unskippable and checkpoints don't refill to maximum.
His ranking at B rather than C hinges on specific stages where enemy density outpaces other characters' safety options. The elimination logic: if a stage has >4 mandatory combat encounters between checkpoints, Nyls's risk reduction outweighs his speed tax. Below that threshold, he's slower without compensating benefit.
Role-specific note: Co-op speedruns (rare but documented) sometimes use Nyls as a "pocket pick" for specific combat-gate stages while another player runs Fly'N or Lyra. Solo, this flexibility doesn't exist.
C-Tier: Kick
The Mechanical Outlier
Best for: Challenge runners, players who've exhausted other characters, specific puzzle archetypes. Skip if: You're new, optimizing for any standard goal, or value consistency.
Kick's wall-jump is technically unique but practically redundant. The hidden variable: Fly'N's glide reaches most Kick-exclusive positions with better recovery options, and Lyra's dash reaches them faster. Kick's wall-jump requires two contact surfaces where alternatives need one or none.
The non-obvious axis is his damage output. Kick has the highest DPS in sustained melee, which matters in exactly one context: boss phases with damage-gates and no checkpoint during the fight. There are [inference: approximately 2-3 such encounters in the full game]; this is too narrow to lift him from C-tier for general play.
Decision archaeology: Why doesn't higher damage matter more? Because most "combat" in Fly'N is enemy avoidance or single-hit elimination, not DPS races. The plausible alternative—building Kick for damage—loses to building any character for movement and simply not engaging.
Meta caveat: One documented any% route uses Kick for a specific wall-clip on an early stage that saves ~3 seconds over Fly'N's glide route. This is a single-stage pocket pick, not a character re-evaluation.
Quick Reference: Who Suits Your Goal
| Your Priority | Pick | Acceptable Fallback | Avoid |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fastest any% time | Fly'N | Lyra (stage-dependent) | Kick |
| First clear, minimal frustration | Fly'N or Nyls | — | Kick |
| Deathless / no-damage | Nyls | Fly'N | Lyra |
| 100% completion / all collectibles | Fly'N | Lyra | — |
| Challenge / self-imposed restriction | Kick | — | Fly'N (too easy) |
FAQ
Is Fly'N pay-to-win or unlock-gated?
No. All four characters are available from the start of standard progression. Some stage-select modes require initial unlocks, but this doesn't affect tier list applicability.
Why isn't Lyra S-tier if she's faster on some stages?
Stage-specific excellence doesn't generalize. Lyra's dash-commitment creates hard stops on vertical or precision segments where Fly'N flows through. S-tier requires fewer "do not pick" stages, not more peak performance stages.
Can I complete the game with only Kick?
Yes, with significant time investment. No stage is character-locked. Some collectibles and optimal routes are Kick-inaccessible or prohibitively difficult, but a full clear is mechanically possible.
Does character choice affect story or endings?
No. Fly'N's narrative is fixed regardless of playable character selection. Some optional dialogue varies; no route branches or ending differences exist.
Methodology & Limitations
This tier list synthesizes: (a) documented any% and 100% speedrun records from speedrun.com leaderboards, (b) community routing discussions in archived forums and Discord logs, (c) direct mechanical testing on current Steam build. No original developer input was sought or received. No compensation from any party.
Explicit inference markers: Framerate variance effects, exact console latency values, and specific encounter counts are reasoned estimates based on community reports, not directly measured. Platform-specific tier adjustments would require native hardware testing not performed.
Source boundaries: Pre-2014 guides may describe mechanics changed in patches; where conflict exists, current Steam build behavior is treated as authoritative. No mobile or regional version testing performed.
