Super Robot Wars 30 speedrun (NG Beginner no DLC) [3:05:37] YayMarsha 2022-05-14 | Game: Super Robot Wars 30Platform: PC (Steam)Category: New Game no DLCDifficulty: BeginnerEnding: True (recruited Caruleum)Completion time: 3:05:37 (real-time) and 3:04:01 (game time)I may not like this game, but that didn't stop me from speedrunning it! :)I've spent entirely too long routing this, but I'm pleased with how it turned out. I could consolidate some of the upgrading (Fighter's Spirit EX before Flash Through Space, for example), but I didn't want to test anything substantial during a live run. Deploying Zero during Doorway to the Abyss wasn't actually called for in the route, but a previous attempt came up about 3,000 damage short on the boss. Zero fixes that problem nicely.Considering how the speedruns go for V, X, and T, you might be asking: "Why aren't you using more MAP weapons?" The answer is simple. They nerfed ExC gains into the ground in T, and then took it a step further by removing ExC Actions for battleships in 30. Also, the ExC Assembler is absolutely a no-go in a New Game speedrun.As far as I can tell, I don't think any MAP user (like Ernie or Masaki) competes with Mitsuba. You don't really have the resources to bring that person up to speed quickly enough for it to pay off. Ryoma manages this just fine because he comes in late enough that Mitsuba already has what she needs, so he's not competing with anybody. He's also ridiculously strong and highly useful for late-game boss fights, so the MAP user probably can't handle that role.But yeah, this run went pretty well in my book. It's certainly not perfect (some bad menus and reloads), but I was just looking for a mostly clean run. To give you an idea, my previous personal best accidentally soft reset after defeating the final boss. I couldn't accept a run with THAT mistake right at the end. :)
Sengoku Rance Any% No Bonus speedrun [0:48:25] YayMarsha 2022-03-20 | Game: Sengoku RancePlatform: PCCategory: Any% No BonusEnding: Official HistoryTime: 48:25I play other games sometimes, I promise! This is an almost 11-minute improvement from my previous run, so I'm definitely happy about that. The route itself has changed again. Instead of relying on Rizna to Angel Cutter everything at the end, this run relies on Urza and exploiting the advantage system to win by default.If you've seen the previous Rizna run, most of this is the same outside of the castle battles in Cairo and Morocco. For those battles, I send out a full team of six Instant Advantage characters. As long as Urza can use Advantage Down 1 before going down, the battle is won. She also needs to survive the Cairo battle, so you could still be forced to reset even if you win the battle. An instant kill with Suzume is also acceptable in place of Advantage Down 1, but obviously can't be relied on.This run certainly isn't perfect. I had a rough start, and didn't load as quickly as I should have on Cairo battle 3. I was 99% sure that battle was lost when it started, but I kept it going to make sure. I actually got lucky that Suzume landed a kill in the second attempt, because I would've also lost that battle if that hadn't worked.Regardless, I'm satisfied with this run. I should probably put this category down for a bit, or else someone might think these are my only uploads anymore. :)
Sengoku Rance Any% No Bonus speedrun [0:59:23] YayMarsha 2022-03-06 | Game: Sengoku RancePlatform: PCCategory: Any% No BonusEnding: Official HistoryTime: 59:23 (from Start Game after selecting bonuses until The End appears) (Technically 59:22 by frame count, but who cares?)AGAIN. Every time I'm about done running this game, a new category catches my interest and I'm back to it. This one, however, won't hold my interest in its current state. My goal was at least sub-hour, and that's good enough for me. (I drop safety saves here and there, so you can tell that I'm not overly concerned about optimization.)If you're not familiar with this category, it's essentially a New Game speedrun. You can't take any New Game+ bonuses to start, so you don't have access to Omachi or the Takeda guys. My solution to this was to replace Omachi with Rizna for AoE magic purposes. It works surprisingly well, but requires hefty investment.Speaking of investment, this route calls for Inukai. This means a lot of time is spent grinding Rance up to level 58 with a proper skill set to win the duel. His main purpose is to help with the Honnoji battle, because my testing suggested that winning that battle is essentially impossible without some sort of help. I tried recruiting Nozomi instead, but she's just not enough on her own.While it sucks to slog through so many turns grinding Rance to a proper level, it pays off in various ways beyond Honnoji. Inukai and a stronger Rance helps make the final boss fight cleaner, and you need to have a high turn count for the automatic conquer of the Monster Army territories anyway. (Still, I would LOVE to remove Inukai from the route. I just don't see it happening currently.)As for the investment in Rizna, it's obvious that I overdid it. I haven't nailed down exactly what she needs stat-wise, and with all the mid-game repetition, I'm not eager to look into it. At the very least, I think buffing her speed is probably not necessary. Dropping Absolute Magic Defense for something else might also be wise.Putting Dungeon Scouter on the generic ninja might also be a good idea, but the time save would be small (only six dungeon floors). I thought about doing this, but I didn't want to test it mid-run.Finally, the Xavier battle at the end is very different than other runs. I had changed this to a (minimum) two-man team, but it's volatile. If Xavier uses two AoE attacks, you've lost the battle even if he's at level 20. To counter this, I recently tried adding a third character. In testing, I think I had mostly decided on Seigan as the third team member. Inukai was also an option, but I think Seigan seemed safer overall. I kind of made a snap decision mid-run to go for Inukai this time. Luckily, it worked out well.
Sengoku Rance NG+ speedrun [0:27:50] YayMarsha 2022-01-23 | Game: Sengoku RancePlatform: PCCategory: NG+ Any%Ending: Official HistoryTime: 27:50 (from Start Game after selecting bonuses until The End appears)Yes, another Sengoku Rance speedrun for the same category. I've been working very hard on this run lately, and I've improved the route quite a bit from the previous run. Sum of best suggests this might able to go below 25 minutes, but this was hard enough to get. I think it's time to move on to something else (or a new category?). :)Most of this run is business as usual (fox girl zapping the heck out of everybody), but there are some changes from previous runs. The important ones are:1. Hara is completely ignored. This requires you to (at best) make it through two consecutive turns without them declaring war on you because you're at war with Ashikaga. The wiki claims this is a 50% chance per turn, but my experience certainly made it seem much higher than that. Most attempts ended because Hara wouldn't leave me alone.2. Tenshiism is allowed to run free instead of relying on Ashikaga to reclaim its territory. This is related to point 1 above, because you can't risk being at war with Ashikaga longer than absolutely necessary. Because Tenshiism has restrictions on attacking other territories, this could in theory save time anyway. If you get lucky and they attack less than three times, you've saved time over even the perfect Ashikaga luck.3. Omachi holds the Popularity Staff until mid-game, so the first attack against Ashikaga is slower than usual. This ends up being worthwhile though, because it allows Omachi to hit Mouri and the Monster Army MUCH harder.4. Attacking Izumo is delayed until a very specific time to minimize counterattacks from Mouri. Once the Shimazu house is introduced, that's your sign that the Monster Army will appear on the next turn. Before that scene, you'll see a scene with Sill. I used that scene as my cue to set up Omachi and Masakage Yamagata for the rest of the game. That way, even if Mouri brought an Instant Advantage team against me on the first battle, I could load the auto-save to recover. Not ideal if that happens, but adding any safety to this run is good.5. I don't bother losing the first fight against Xavier this time. There really isn't much point. That was a relic from an older route.6. I took the Mouri house bonus this time around. Mouri himself is useful because he starts with Instant Advantage and hits pretty hard in boss battles. Perhaps more importantly, taking this bonus removes them from the enemy pool.7. I immediately dismiss Mouri's daughters and most of Masamune's wives. None of these characters are useful to the run (as far as I can tell), and it made it easier to navigate the commander menu during the whole run. I think this also means I get less events, since obviously Masamune can't talk to his wives if they aren't in my roster.
Sengoku Rance NG+ speedrun [0:38:24] YayMarsha 2021-11-13 | Game: Sengoku RanceCategory: New Game+ (Second Game)Difficulty: StandardEnding: Official HistoryCompletion time: 0:38:24Route notes here: docs.google.com/document/d/1TvIFt0c0h7nOYZyaEycsX-kDH2SBW9UX-BYpmJpYr0w/edit?usp=sharingOh hey, another Sengoku Rance run. This time, I bothered to accumulate enough points to complete a more "proper" New Game+ speedrun. Had to re-route a whole bunch of stuff, so this was definitely a challenge to figure out. I still need to make some tweaks toward the end, but overall, I'm happy with how the route itself turned out. Some extra points would be helpful, but I don't think they would make a drastic change at this point.If you've seen the previous Inukai run I uploaded, the main difference is that this run relies on Omachi instead. She's VERY powerful, so most of the run revolves around defending her until she has time to blast the enemies into dust. The other house bonuses are either to help defend Omachi, or to provide a team that's already capable of beating up Xavier. Unlike the Inukai route, Rance is mostly useless here.You'll also notice that I spent points recruiting special characters instead of taking any other house bonuses. This is actually very important, but the reason isn't obvious. With house characters, you need to have at least some territory claimed in their area to talk to them. This would be slow and not really feasible. The special characters are considered kind of like generics though, so you can speak to them in Owari. That's the key to establishing some Instant Time Pass teams.Worth noting that while I skipped through the ending here, the run finishes so quickly that the ending doesn't make sense. Sill doesn't get frozen, and Kentarou never becomes a fiend. Despite that, the ending still shows both of those things. Oops!
Sengoku Rance - NG+ Any% speedrun [0:56:42] YayMarsha 2021-10-16 | Game: Sengoku RancePlatform: PCCategory: New Game+ Any% (Official History ending)Difficulty: 0-star (Standard)Completion time: 0:56:42Route notes here: docs.google.com/document/d/1Ztekh5jLFwitch8W9g7iLEpcd5kWdvIUpzzM1utcloE/edit?usp=sharingFirst of all: yes, this is an H-game. This is the Manga Gamer version with the censor patch applied to minimize the lewd. Still set the video to 18+ though, for obvious reasons.With that out of the way, what you see here is a speedrun of a "second game." This is essentially New Game+, since you can use accumulated points to buy items and bonuses for the start of your playthrough. It also opens up some new choices during the game. Both of these things are important to this run, but especially the new choices. You can only recruit Inukai in a second game, and he's critical to this route.As for the starting bonuses, I went into this with a rather low score (24). I'm sure you could save time with a larger point pool and more bonuses unlocked, but I kind of like this route as a "low score requirement" type of run. Lower barrier for entry for a new runner, if you're interested in trying this yourself.I won't bother explaining the specifics of the route (see linked notes above for that), but generally:1. It's better to vassal opponents than to conquer them in this run, because you can use them to set up a buffer zone to prevent further enemy attacks.2. Instant Time Pass is very important, and is used heavily in this run. It's used to instantly win battles, turn castle sieges into quick wins, and defend against attacks without any risk.3. Rance doesn't strictly need to get to level 58, but it's one of the safe numbers that I found in testing. I chose to keep him there for the final battle in this run, since extra levels don't make a significant difference at that point. It's better and faster to get some levels for Kentarou.4. I chose to throw the fight against the final boss a few extra times to lower his level even more than usual. Testing has shown level 78 to be a winnable fight, but it's definitely not guaranteed. Since you can't reset your team setup between retries, it seems better overall to intentionally lose a few more times before committing to an actual fight.That should cover the basics for what you see here. If you have any questions, feel free to ask. Enjoy the run. :)
Langrisser: Dramatic Edition - All Major Endings [7:03:07] YayMarsha 2021-09-20 | Game: Langrisser: Dramatic Edition (Der Langrisser)Platform: SaturnCategory: All Major EndingsCompletion time: 7:03:07This was intended more as a route test, but I figured I'd upload it as a demonstration in case I don't get motivated enough to improve this any time soon. I've edited out a couple restroom breaks because health is more important than any speedrun. I made sure to restart the timer before resuming play both times, so no timer shenanigans here.As for the category, my goal was to complete all "major" endings. I define this as the standard Light, Imperial, Independent, and Chaos endings present in the SNES version, as well as the two new Saturn routes (New Legend and Lonely King). Because of that, this run completes the game six times.Since this was partially intended as a route test for my notes, I decided to throw in cutscenes as well. I don't skip ANY cutscenes in this run, and that includes any that I've already seen. You'll see Bozel obtain the Alhazard multiple times in this run. :)As for the run itself, it uses the scenario select code to backtrack to certain scenarios. I initially tried to route this without using that code at all, but I ran into a snag with the Light route. Because of that, I decided that allowing the code for the sole purpose of playing other routes was worth it. If you don't use the code, the run would be significantly longer and a lot more tedious at the end.Worth noting that I specifically used the code in such a way to not skip any content. This means that I replay certain maps so that I hit a route split the natural way rather than skip directly to the first map in a branch. For example, I replay Imperial 11 for the Imperial branch instead of skipping straight to Imperial 12. Allowing a code mid-run was already a rare exception, so I wanted to minimize its impact.Also important to note that you need to go Independent or Chaos BEFORE going Imperial. If you use the scenario select code to replay Imperial 11, the game will force you on the Imperial route. I thought this might be avoidable if you use Leon to grab the Langrisser the first time around, but it doesn't help.Finally, please don't pay too much attention to the mistake in the Hein grind. I wasn't watching Rohga's HP like I should have, so I ended up losing a few minutes of progress by needing to load a save a few turns back. Oof.
Langrisser I (Saturn) speedrun [2:29:21] YayMarsha 2021-08-28 | Game: Langrisser I (Dramatic Edition)Platform: SaturnTime: 2:29:21Route notes: docs.google.com/document/d/1nYWpw_LTH4HV9tn1zh-m5YztaikemwSecnG5T5nLg2k/edit?usp=sharingLooking for a Langrisser run that doesn't involve Heal grinding? Well, here you go! Not a perfect run, but overall, I think this went very well. :)Most of this run should be straightforward since it's mostly Ledin versus the world, but check out the route notes if you'd like a little more detail. Essentially, Ledin has a few level benchmarks early on, but once he hits Swordmaster, he's good to rampage through everything.
Langrisser: Dramatic Edition - New Legend ending speedrun [2:40:09] YayMarsha 2021-08-14 | Game: Langrisser: Dramatic EditionPlatform: SaturnCategory: New Legend ending (Saturn-exclusive "true" Light ending)Completion time: 2:40:09Route notes: docs.google.com/document/d/1qdQKhlLXj2YcTnzjERSlMzlGLkbLSKHYOgR4_1NQkyI/edit?usp=sharingOh hey, an actual speedrun for a Langrisser game this time instead of a route WIP. Hurray!I've linked the route notes above, which should explain anything you need to know about this run. I've tried to make them as easy to follow as I could, but feel free to ask questions too.The main thing about this run is that you spam Heal to grind Erwin to Sage, and Liana to Agent early on. This lets you steamroll the rest of the game with ease. It might look like a waste of time, but currently, I think the time investment pays for itself easily. It's not really fun to watch the grinding parts, but we can't have everything. :)
Langrisser V - Any% speedrun route WIP [5:54:08] YayMarsha 2021-06-19 | Game: Langrisser VPlatform: SaturnEmulator: Bizhawk 2.6Category: Any%Time: 5:54:08 (timed from Start at the title screen to final Scenario Clear)This is an Any% speedrun route for the Saturn version of Langrisser V. This was played on an emulator with a bunch of savestates, but I decided to keep the whole run from start to finish because I'm too lazy to cut out all the dialog. It's meant to be a video complement to my written notes, which you can find here: docs.google.com/document/d/1iLXqgmRCzX-REEqgm0rnCnCl6fGWew3imu_XcWCIBqw/edit?usp=sharingAs for the route itself, I initially thought a Sigma solo would be the way to go. It worked well for Landius in Langrisser IV, and Sigma's base stats are even more ridiculous. Problem is, the battle system change kind of nerfed the offensive power of archers (at least without Teleport). Because of that, Sigma's brute force approach becomes less useful as the game goes on.While I was working on my initial route, I noticed that a FAQ mentioned that summons can cheat the judgment system. I decided to try it out with Lambda to see what would happen, and...yeah. Without a doubt, summons in this game are unbelievably broken. What you see here is a re-route that focuses on Lambda instead of Sigma. (In fact, Sigma barely does any work despite being the protagonist...)Most of the specifics for this route are mentioned in the written notes (see above link). This route could definitely be tweaked in a few spots, so if you plan to pick this run up, you might not want to copy this completely. Most notably, I picked up the secret tile in Scenario 11. This was meant for a plan to summon Seraphim later, but I forgot that I didn't have a flier for the other necessary item.By the way, Sigma strikes out with Lambda at the end of the game. Thanks to mashing through dialog boxes, Sigma is doomed to remain single forever. Choosing to speak to Alfred or Lanford instead would preserve his dignity, but speaking to Lambda is just the fastest option. :)
Saints Row: The Third (Remastered) - Hit the Powder Room [HNU Pacifist] YayMarsha 2021-05-31 | Game: Saints Row: The Third (Remastered)Platform: PC/SteamDifficulty: HardcoreRestrictions: No upgrades + pacifistMission: Hit the Powder RoomI've done a bunch of Hardcore, no upgrade, no Friendly fire runs for this game over the years, but I had the idea to try a pacifist version of this mission while making practice saves. It's obviously possible, but to say this is wildly inconsistent is an understatement. (I purchased basic level 1 flashbangs for this mission.)I was able to finish the first three checkpoints in one go (after the brute), but the last section is extremely dangerous. I removed the failures for the sake of the video. As it turns out, recklessly charging at a bunch of enemies is bad for your health. Who knew?It's worth noting that the brute doesn't appear to be an avoidable kill. Even if he's the only enemy around, Shaundi and Pierce won't attack him while he's down. Barring some weird bug, this means you need to finish him personally.The last section didn't go as cleanly as I would've liked, but some amusing stuff happened that kind of makes it worth it. The cardboard box is too powerful for enemies to handle. It's a shame the enemies took out their frustration on Pierce, or else I would've just stayed there until the mission ended. :)
Miracle Girls - Any% speedrun [17:59] YayMarsha 2021-02-20 | Game: Miracle GirlsPlatform: SNES (Emulator)Emulator: Bizhawk 2.5.2 (BSNES core)Completion time: 17:59.436Timing begins: Full brightness frame before you gain controlTiming ends: Final minigame timer hits 0Ever since Solarcell007 and pals decided to pick this game up for their regular SSL challenge, I've been grinding the heck out of this game. Picked up a lot of cool new tricks from their work, so many thanks to everyone involved. I don't currently hang out in the Discord, so I can't thank you all by name, but know that I really appreciate your help. Especially Mr. Freet, who came up with the legendary Freet Stairs technique that makes stage 4 much faster and really cool to watch.Much of this run is probably straightforward given that it's a basic platformer, but if you have any questions, please feel free to ask. My sum of best (as of this writing) is 17:56, so this is still very much improvable. If you can nail the spring jump in stage 3, you'll be in very good shape to improve this. I think I actually slowed down my old stage 5, because I'd lost so many runs at that point that I just decided to start playing it safe. Losing a run to a piece of candy going straight through a floating enemy with no effect is an awful feeling.All this said, I should note that the flower jump in stage 1 (the second set) is a 1-frame jump. You'll die if you miss it, so it's a big reset point. The spring jump in stage 3 is also a 1-frame jump, but you have a better visual cue for it. For what it's worth, I tend to have better luck with the stage 1 flower jump if I begin with a short hop. This might be a personal thing, but I find that it helps turn the 1-frame jump into more of a rhythm-based jump. Give it a try if you're having trouble.Other than that, enjoy the run. I'm definitely done with this category now. The seconds are there for the taking with the spring jump, but I'm more than satisfied with this run. :)
Undertale NG+ Glitchless Speedrun (Soulless Pacifist) [1:31.21] YayMarsha 2021-01-23 | Game: UndertalePlatform: PC (GOG)Version 1.08Category: New Game+ Glitchless True Pacifist endingSub-category: Soulless (purely for fun)Timing starts on name selection and ends when clearing Toriel's final text box. I split slightly late, so I had to retime it manually.After replaying this game quite a bit recently, I thought to myself: "Why not learn the speedrun?" Weeks later, here we are. The True Pacifist ending was the most appealing option. I opted for New Game+ to skip fighting Flowey (a fight I've never liked). Adding Soulless to the mix was purely for fun, because I like the bad ending and how it taints future runs. I named the save file accordingly even though I know it costs time.Worth noting that the splits are comparing against my personal best with English text, so it's a bit unfair. Still, it was a pretty good run overall.(Some stupid copyright stuff that apparently I'm supposed to place here):Composer: Toby FoxCopyright: Materia Collective
Commandos 2 - Saving Private Smith [No Traces] YayMarsha 2021-01-03 | Game: Commandos 2: Men of CourageVersion: 1.20 (GOG/original release)Difficulty: NormalNote: Quick loads were edited out of this video so that it's easier to watch. I left quick saves in.Restrictions:- No enemy detection (blue/red lines)- No attacking enemies- No shots fired- Minimal guard interaction (item lures and other distractions)After streaming this recently, I wondered if I could "ghost" this level. It took a fair amount of planning and practice, but this is what I came up with. It unfortunately doesn't seem to be possible to completely ghost the level for a few reasons. I settled for two cigarette lures and using the Thief's rat distraction, since those are still sort of in the vein of a "no traces" concept.Some things you need to know about this level:1. The primary objectives are to heal Private Smith and have him use the enemy's radio. You also need to steal the codes, but those are in the safe next to the radio anyway.2. Private Smith can't swim. This is a HUGE problem.3. Private Smith can't climb rope ladders by himself. You need to group select him with someone who can (the Thief), so that you can trick the game into allowing him to climb the ladder. Notice that Smith just warps when he reaches the top of the ladder. Without this trick, the only option available would be the front door...which would be extremely difficult to pull off this way.Because Smith can't swim, your only two options to reach the radio are across either of the two bridges. The lower bridge has ironclad enemy coverage that I couldn't find any way to break, and even if I could get through it, Smith can't safely navigate a minefield to reach the house. This leaves only the upper bridge as an option.The upper bridge is covered by a whole group of enemies, but they actually aren't a huge threat. Instead, the real problem is that there's a guy looking out the window. This guy doesn't get distracted by the rat, and has perfect coverage of the area you need to pass through. Luckily, he can be lured by cigarettes. It's sometimes tricky to get him to actually notice them though.Once the rat is doing its job and the guy inside is going for the cigarettes, you have to deploy the rat again very quickly. If you're too slow, the cigarette guy will see you before the rat starts round two.The radio house is pretty strict on timing too. The lieutenant next to the ladder downstairs will always see you as soon as you climb down. Because of that, you need to lure him away with cigarettes before sending Smith down. However, you ALSO need to deploy the rat at a good angle before said lieutenant reaches a spot where he'll see the Thief. A quick second rat distraction buys just enough time for Smith to climb down and use the radio.Of course, what happens to the Thief, Smith, and the rest of your captured commandos once the level fades isn't my problem. I'm sure they are all fine!
Super Robot Wars V - 68 Levels in One Battle YayMarsha 2020-12-11 | Pretty much exactly what the title says. This is a video showing Lunamaria gaining 68 levels in a single battle (going from level 16 to level 84). I'm pretty sure this is the maximum level gain possible in a single battle, but I'd love to be proven wrong.(And yes, I did almost complete an entire playthrough just for this demonstration. Dedication!)Here's the setup:Lunamaria's ace bonus: +50% experience gainedTessa's ace bonus: +20% experience gained for those in command rangeIron Emblem: +100% experience gainedGain: +100% experience gainedWith Second Attack and enough skill to double attack Emperor of Darkness, the only thing left is to lure a Mechanical Beast beside him to make use of Support Defend. This allows you to kill two enemies in a single battle. You could probably also do this with Support Attack, but this is a simpler method.Note that Lunamaria is at base level (16), but with partial experience toward the next level. If you try this from base level only, you'll gain 67 levels and be 168 experience short of 68. Coincidentally, this video shows a Lunamaria with 68 experience to the next level. :)If you're wondering why I chose these enemies, it's because they appear to be the highest level enemies available that also have a Support Defend available. While the final boss is level 70, she doesn't have Support Defend. You'd only be able to kill one enemy, and being five levels higher than Emperor of Darkness doesn't even it out.Also, if you're REALLY curious, Emperor of Darkness appears to be worth slightly more experience than Black Noir even though they are both level 65.
Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars - GDI 1 (North Carolina Badlands/Easy) Any% speedrun [5:03.041] YayMarsha 2020-08-18 | Game: Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium WarsVersion: PC/1.09Difficulty: EasyCategory: Any%Real-time: 5:03.041 (timed from first black frame after clicking Play until cursor disappears)Game time: 5:11Despite being a tutorial level, this was a real struggle to save any time on. The tutorials bottleneck almost everything, so your opportunities to save time are super limited. As far as I can tell, the only section that's entirely in your hands is the attack on the first NOD outpost.I actually had a 5:14 recorded before this, but I learned from E-Dragon that you can just wreck your own power plant instead of waiting for the fanatics. My assumption was that you need to do it after completing the "train 3 rifle squads" objective (meaning the power plant is next in line), but I didn't experiment with the timing.Only other things worth noting are bringing the harvester along to try to squish militia squads, and purposely capturing a NOD power plant to unlock the sell command. With that, I could sell the Airfield to prevent the Orca from landing and wasting more time. Not sure if the Airfield placement matters, since even if you place it lower, they would still need to fly north.I think there's still a little time to squeeze out of this since my outpost attack wasn't great, but I'm super tired of this level.
Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars - GDI 14 (Cologne/Normal) Any% speedrun [1:34.588] YayMarsha 2020-08-10 | Game: Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium WarsVersion: PC/1.09Difficulty: NormalCategory: Any%Real-time: 1:34.588 (timed from first black frame after clicking Play until cursor disappears)Game time: 1:44I've been replaying this game recently, and just decided to run an individual level on a whim. For the heck of it, I was interested to see if I could complete the level reasonably quickly without losing any units. My first success at that ended up at 1:58 game time. My attempts to improve that ended up getting walled at 1:46 for a while (with/without losing Commando).For a while I wasn't sure I could even go any lower, but then this run happened. Very pleased that it ended up deathless too. Doesn't mean anything, but I think it's neat.The strategy is super straightforward (Commando rush in, blow up thing), but some things worth noting:1. You can't select units to move immediately when they spawn. You can only select Commando once he flashes at the start, and you can't select the engineer group until after EVA is done explaining stuff.2. After Commando uses his jump jets, there's a short delay where he just doesn't want to accept move orders. This doesn't stop him from moving on his own though, so I set him to hold ground stance so he doesn't backtrack during this time.3. The main bottleneck for this level is reaching a point where the game considers the enemy base scouted. It seems best to jump jet into that spot, so that you can trigger that flag during the cooldown period.4. As long as you give Commando the move order to go where the target building is BEFORE the game takes away visibility, he'll still go there. I've actually seen the target show up through the fog early at least once, but it quickly disappears. Perhaps if you could act quickly enough, you could end the level without the engineer section?
Sailor Moon (SNES) speedrun (Venus/Easy) [0:05:45] YayMarsha 2020-04-19 | Game: Sailor Moon (SNES)Category: Easy difficulty/Sailor VenusPlayed on: Bizhawk 2.3.2 (SNES9X core)Personal preference for split timing means that the timer you see here is always about 20 seconds ahead of the timing method on Speedrun.com (which is what you see in the video title).This run is very straightforward. The Y+B special attack (spin to win!) kills all regular enemies in this mode in a single hit. Also, unlike Normal/Hard, this attack doesn't consume HP on Easy. The Crescent Beam, while useless on any other difficulty, has some use here since it also one-shots all regular enemies. In theory, you can use it to hit off-screen enemies from a greater distance than the spin attack. In practice, it's not reliable because you can't actually see what you're aiming at. It's still useful for certain enemy types that follow predictable patterns though. Sliding clowns are the best example.
Sailor Moon (SNES) speedrun (Mars/Normal mode) [0:26:10] YayMarsha 2020-04-19 | Game: Sailor Moon (SNES)Category: Normal difficulty/Sailor MarsPlayed on: Bizhawk 2.3.2 (SNES9X core)Despite owning the actual cartridge for this, I decided to run this on an emulator for video quality and ease for streaming. Figured I'd make note of that, since I know some people frown on emulator runs. Time is from character control to loss of control after defeating the final boss. I preferred to start on character selection, so my timer is about 20 seconds ahead.The run itself should be fairly self-explanatory. If you're not familiar with this game though, you should know a few things:1. The hitboxes are TERRIBLE. It's pretty common to have your attacks overlap an enemy's sprite, but to no effect. Bosses are particularly bad about this.2. Sailor Mars has a four-hit regular combo. A three-hit infinite loop is the main combo used in this run, since the third hit does more damage than the first two. A two-hit loop is safer, and useful for beating up faster enemies that could break free from a three-hit loop.3. Hit stun against enemies can't be trusted. If an enemy wants to sneak a jab in during one of your infinite combos, it will do so. If an enemy wants to turn that into a combo of its own, you may not even be able to do anything about it.4. You DO NOT have invincibility frames after getting up from being knocked down. If you're surrounded while you're down, and the enemy decides to combo again, good luck. Note that the opposite is true for bosses. They can stand back up and be seemingly invincible for days.
Senran Kagura: Shinovi Versus - Hikage story speedrun (New Game+) [0:06:15] YayMarsha 2020-02-29 | Oh hey, a new personal best! :)Not perfect, but I'm pretty happy with this. I probably gained time from the ninjas not jumping very often. The rest of the run doesn't seem that special compared to my other attempts, so that's my best guess for why this is faster. I was more aggressive against Minori though.Using the two scroll ninja art at the end doesn't seem ideal for multiple reasons, but I do it when I enter the last gunner section with less than three scrolls. I don't like going into the Murasaki fight with that effect still going, because she can actually block the attack. Thankfully, the effect wore off pretty much exactly when I needed it to so that I could use a special to take her down (unblockable).
Senran Kagura: Shinovi Versus - Hikage story speedrun (New Game+) [0:06:23] YayMarsha 2020-02-22 | Hikage is best girl, so I had to run her missions too. :[Timing from first frame of selection to first frame that the rank letter appears. Total time is 6:23.808.
Senran Kagura: Shinovi Versus - Hanzo story speedrun [0:47:23] YayMarsha 2020-02-22 | Not a great run by any stretch, but this will have to do for now. Grinding this run is hard on the arms and hands, and I definitely can't afford that. I've had two runs that were on pace to be 30 seconds faster than this, but both of them (literally) died near the end. It's very frustrating, and if you're not having fun with a speedrun, you should probably move on.This is a 30-second improvement over my previous personal best, and it's probably in part thanks to using Muffins_Just's controller setup. I still haven't fully adapted to having dash and weak attack on bumpers (L2 and R2 on a Playstation 4 controller in my case), so you can probably see a few hiccups because of it.Beyond that, the run is self-explanatory. Worth noting that I purposely grind levels with Hibari in 4-4 until she has six scroll slots. With a few extra hits past that, it sets you up for a convenient level up during her next mission.
S.O.S. - Any% Speedrun [0:04:36] YayMarsha 2019-12-03 | Feels pretty good to revisit one of your speedruns from almost a decade ago and reclaim the record at the same time. We'll see how long this one lasts. :)For those who have seen this run before, there's one new strategy. While doing some emulator testing and practice, I noticed that every other frame in this game is a lag frame in most cases. A big exception is the post-death time limit penalty screen, which doesn't lag at all once it loads.I had some theories about how the ship rotation timer works before I started practicing, and it appears that the timer keeps going during that penalty screen. All of my testing seems to suggest that you SAVE time by taking an intentional death early on as long as you stay on the penalty screen as long as possible (don't press anything).I'll leave any exact science behind that to someone with more technical know-how. All I know is that it seems to save time, and that's enough for me. If I'm somehow wrong about this and the death cost me time, then...free world record for anybody who wants it!
Senran Kagura: Peach Beach Splash - Gessen Arc New Game+ Speedrun [0:12:34] YayMarsha 2019-09-07 | I've been uploading a lot of these recently, I know. I'm really pleased with this run though! I refined my card setups once I realized that buffs don't stack, and I changed the Episode 7 strategy.Beyond that, you should probably check my 13:10 run for more in-depth comments. I'm too lazy to go over it all again. I should note that I swapped Asuka for Kagura though. Kagura's melee is a viable option for Episode 6, but it's risky. If you only draw a Yuyaki card, then you can melee into a Yuyaki card to sweep the Crimson Squad. Slightly faster than Yomi, but more can go wrong.I apologize in advance for the all the controller and chair noises. I didn't think to figure out how to capture only game audio on the local recording before starting the stream, so...oops. On the other hand, you get to hear some of my thought process during the run. That's worth something, maybe?
Senran Kagura: Peach Beach Splash - Gessen Arc New Game+ Speedrun [0:13:10] YayMarsha 2019-09-01 | Console: Playstation 4Category: Gessen Arc New Game+Difficulty: NormalTeam setup and roles:Hikage: Assault (and best girl, of course). Carries around Leo cards for nuking generic waves, and has a decent weapon for everything else.Minori: Heavy. Rocket launcher for putting out fires, and Ryobi cards for team attack buffs.Yozakura: Support. No specialized purpose, but carries a lot of Soji cards for team fire rate buffs. Probably contributes a lot (with luck) in Episode 10.Asuka: Crimson Squad nuker in Episode 6. It's her only purpose, but it's super important.Naraku: Sniper. Useful for one-hit KO's in Episodes 8 and 9. Also carries Kafuru cards for team reload speed buffs, but eh.Other than that, enjoy. I've worked really hard on this recently, and I'm pretty pleased with this result. Sub-13 minutes is definitely possible though.
Senran Kagura: Peach Beach Splash - Gessen Arc [Episode 6] YayMarsha 2019-09-01 | As you can see, I'm still hard at work on this game. I've been grinding Gessen Arc New Game+ runs recently, and I wanted to see if I could find some more individual level optimizations to lower my time further. What you see here is probably my new favorite level strategy by far.Here's how it works:1. When any character gets damaged down to 50% HP or less, she will be launched backwards.2. When this happens, she'll receive an automatic barrier that blocks ALL damage for a fairly long time (ten seconds?).3. All of the Crimson Squad girls have 200 HP each in this battle.Keeping all of this in mind, the goal was to weaken all of them at the same time, but deal LESS than 100 HP worth of damage. After that, I'd need a finisher that deals 100+ damage in a SINGLE hit. That last part is very important.For example, if you used a Murasaki card to deal 200 damage in a single use, the auto-barriers would activate once they reach 100 HP. That's because Murasaki's cards (and many others) are technically multi-hit cards.Yuyaki cards, on the other hand, are single-hit cards. Because of that, they are the only cards that work for a finisher. I didn't need them to be super strong, so I chose a bunch of level 1 cards that would charge quickly.Finding a suitable first card was tricky too. I needed something that would do less than 100 damage (hit count didn't matter), but would also give me time to prepare the second card. Yomi's vertical tornado cards work perfectly for this. They launch the Crimson Squad into the air, and while they are all faceplanted on the ground, I have a brief moment to set up the Yuyaki card.
Senran Kagura: Peach Beach Splash - New Game All Stories speedrun [2:12:41] YayMarsha 2019-08-11 | After poking around with this game a little for streaming, I decided to go ahead and see what I could do speedrun-wise. What you see here is my first attempt at a standard All Stories run.Not really planning to take this seriously, so I might not bother improving this. Getting a good time seems heavily reliant on luck with how the AI moves when fighting other teams, and that doesn't sound fun to me.Pretty much the only parts I put much practice into were the fire levels, Hebijo 10 (Giant Ryona), and the three machine boss stages. I was just winging it for almost everything else, and I'm sure it shows. What can you expect for like two days of actual effort though? :)The P-1 arc's fire level was definitely poorly executed. It's supposed to look pretty smooth blasting all those fires from orbit, but I got distracted around halfway through the run and never fully got my head back in the game.I used my Low% file to test Giant Ryona, which was probably a mistake for a regular run. That's the reason I never switched Murasaki away from the gatling gun even when I had a better weapon available. In testing, the gatling gun seemed pretty effective at consistently dealing with that stage. Given the upgrades though, the assault rifle probably would've been the better choice.The same thing might apply to Hanzo 10 and Crimson Squad 10, but I'm not sure. The former benefits from the extra range, and the latter benefits from splash damage because the tongue is annoying to hit.Also, dealing with Jet-K and Jet-R with the full team of gatling gunners probably wasn't worth it, but boy is it fun. It took a little while to convince my team to start splashing me after Jet-R, but Jet-K absolutely melted once he showed up.Worth mentioning as well that I'm pretty sure I lost time by setting the system voice to random. Not just from changing the setting, but it looks like the game waits for voice clips to finish before continuing after a skipped scene. Some lines are longer than others, and Yumi (the default) keeps it shorter than some of the others. I just don't like Yumi much, and it seemed boring to hear the same line over and over. Changing the control scheme was necessary though. I refuse to have R2 as the shoot button, regardless of lost time.Also, my favorite part of this run happens around the 45:10 mark. I threw the Katsuragi card at Ryona from way too far away, but Miyabi comes charging in like a champ to eat it instead. A total accident, but funny anyway. :)
Super Robot Wars F Final - Speedrun Route WIP (EVA ending) YayMarsha 2019-03-13 | This is a (very) rough draft speedrun route for the Saturn version of Super Robot Wars F Final by itself (no transfer from F). This one goes for the EVA ending, since it's the shortest actual ending. Played on an emulator for save states and turbo, obviously.As I understand it, the requirements for the EVA ending are:1. EVA Unit-01 goes berserk 5+ times before Episode 61 (解かれた封印).2. Don't recruit Quatre.3A. Don't let Four get kidnapped.AND/OR3B. Deploy Shinji for Episode 59 (異質なるモノへの挽歌)4. Choose the Earth route split.5. Shinji needs to have a higher synchronization rate than Rei before Episode 62 (決戦、第2新東京市).Pretty much the only one that's relevant to speedrun planning is #1, since the Dummy Plug's usefulness is kind of limited in F Final. It only has a 3,000 power 1-range attack, so while it has the high synchronization rate, morale, and stats to make it decent, it's not a good option very often.As for the route itself, I should point out that I hadn't played this game in years before starting this project. I had vague ideas about what could be useful though. For this ending, you don't see Ideon at all. So while a regular run becomes Ideon Gun spam, this run doesn't have that option. (I have sort of routed the regular ending. It's about eight and a half hours long right now.)This run does exploit a few Saturn version bugs even though I wanted to avoid doing that. In particular, provoking the Dummy Plug is used multiple times to control it. I also used the bug that allows you to restore Shinji's control of Unit-01 to avoid repair costs.I don't know how much of the run is self-explanatory to someone less familiar with the game, so please ask questions about anything you find confusing. I was going to provide audio commentary, but after recording for a few hours, I realized I'm too boring and didn't have much to say. :)Some notes:1. Two of my primary goals were to maximize Rally and Provoke users. Rally increases morale (and therefore damage output), and Provoke allows you to line up enemies for map weapons. I definitely overdid it though.2. I was trying to avoid exploiting too many bugs, so I didn't use the Dream bug at all in this run. I probably should have.3. Some of the stuff I did in this run was purely for fun, such as discarding Puru 2's Quebley instead (Puru is cuter) and recruiting Sayla.4. I hope you don't like Gundam Wing, or you're going to be sorely disappointed. Duo is the only Wing boy that exists in this run, and he gets wrecked very hard. (Point-blank High Mega Cannon to the face!)5. I had Char speak to Haman twice because I didn't know if recruiting her would be useful at all (it isn't). The EVA ending stops before that's even possible, but I felt like being safe.6. Episode 48 (動乱、ヨハネスバーグ) probably has the most complex routing goal. You need to complete it specifically on the third player phase to skip Scirocco's appearance and save time. Any earlier or later won't work.7. Because the deployment slots are based on your character levels, re-routing this game would require a ton of work. Changing something early is almost guaranteed to strategies for later maps, so I'd pretty much need to start over each time. Haven't decided if I'm motivated enough yet.I can't think of much else to note, but again, if you have questions about what's going on, please don't hesitate to ask. It's hard to know what might be confusing when you've played this game a lot.
Super Robot Wars F - Episode 9 YayMarsha 2019-01-01 | Against my better judgment, I've been poking around with a speedrun route for Super Robot Wars F again. Last time I got about twenty or so maps into the Real route before accepting that it's not a good speed game. This time around though, I've been poking around with the Super route instead. (The results aren't that much different...)What you see here is possibly one of the dumbest strategies I think I've come up with for one of these games. Ordinarily, you'd probably want to have a level 13+ Kouji use Strike/Iron Wall to Rocket Punch the reinforcements for two turns. In my testing though, he was only level 9, and I didn't want to spend money on Rocket Punch. Therefore, I needed to improvise.The fun thing about this method is that it's darn near 100% consistent. The only two attacks that can fail are Gespsent's missiles, but it'd only be a minor nuisance if that happens. Of course, you also gain barely any money and no parts from this. Still, I thought it was silly enough to record.Fun facts though: Bernie retains spirit commands used by the Super Gundam's copilot if you self-destruct, but not if you separate instead. This also causes the Gundam Mk-II to retain some of the boosted stats of the Super Gundam, but I'm not sure that's useful at all.
Langrisser IV - Speedrun Route Demonstration (Emulator) (B Route) YayMarsha 2018-10-13 | I came up with a rough draft speedrun route for Langrisser IV's B route. This is a reference video to go with that route. This is PURELY for demonstration purposes, so don't expect anything great execution-wise.For the most part, story scenes have been edited out to reduce video length. About all you need to know is that you answer A to Listell's question before Scenario 17A, and C to Bozel's question after Scenario 20A.This route is for the Saturn version only. The battle system is different for the Playstation version, so I highly doubt this route would work.Video goes with this route: docs.google.com/document/d/12eom5vuTE8OcxIc5DRYB8qh6L7lZvjEcRyzw0WHxCqg/edit?usp=sharingIf you try this out and notice any major problems with the documentation, please let me know. I've revised the route so many times that it's hard to keep the documentation up-to-date.
Super Robot Wars EX - Shus Story (Neo Granzon) Any% Speedrun [1:32:51] YayMarsha 2018-07-15 | I’ve been toying with the idea of routing an old Super Robot Wars game for a while now, but it wasn’t until this past weekend that I decided to actually do it. Just for the heck of it, I decided to try out the Neo Granzon code in Super Robot Wars EX, because I wanted to see how absurdly broken it would be in that game. I wasn’t disappointed. (Awful flashbacks to fighting it in Super Robot Wars 3 though…)I know what you’re thinking: “Man, this run is so lame because it uses a code!” While Neo Granzon does utterly break the game, it actually makes a speedrun somewhat interesting. Instead of stressing about survivability, accuracy, and all that other junk, the entire focus here is how to optimize Shu’s path of total destruction. It’s closer to a modern Super Robot Wars run in that sense, but with an old coat of paint. Of course, being a lot shorter than any alternative doesn’t hurt either.The route and execution here still have room for improvement, but I think this was a solid attempt overall. Some of the routing decisions might seem strange, but keep in mind that experience routing is HUGE in this run. Fatal critical hits on enemies that you wanted to weaken can/will ruin the route if they happen before Map 12, and I’ve lost multiple runs to that.Full route is here: docs.google.com/document/d/1IVarFAEfDuBICbqGNT6nPy7fXB_WwZ07U8qmXkP6R4c/edit?usp=sharingQuick route notes:1. Gravitron Cannon usage is a main focus for obvious reasons.2. Black Hole Clusters are avoided as much as possible because of the slow animation.3. Upgrading agility on Neo Granzon is so that Shu has 100% hit during Map 12 (otherwise, it’d be 92%).4. It’s impossible to complete the Tellius training map in one go without wasting an enormous amount of time.Enjoy watching Shu wreck everything in the known universe. :)
Super Robot Wars V - Any% Speedrun [2:22:10] YayMarsha 2018-02-04 | Category: New Game Any% Normal Ending with DLCDifficulty: Standard modeUnlike last time, this run is completed from a fresh start. I still have the first print DLC enabled, but I specifically routed this run to make it irrelevant. It actually costs me time to have the DLC, but that's okay.As for the run itself, this is pretty similar to the New Game+ category from before. Ruri and Okita are still by far the MVPs of the run, but since I don't have access to multiple ExC Banks and ExC Lasers in this run, you will see brief contributions from some other characters. Ryoma sees the most use, because he's the best choice for Scenario 8, and is probably the only character capable of reliably taking down the Seventh Angel in Scenario 30.I botched one map strategy and some of my execution leaves a lot to be desired (oof, Scenario 29), but overall, I'm pretty happy with how this went.If you' re interested in the route notes for this run, I've placed them here: dropbox.com/s/wgpw7zrq3pkq3qs/Super%20Robot%20Wars%20V%20-%20Any%25%20Speedrun%20Notes.pdf?dl=0
Super Robot Wars V - New Game+ Speedrun [1:57:03] YayMarsha 2017-06-04 | More of a proof of concept than a really good run, but hey, it's my first main series Super Robot Wars speedrun!While this is a New Game+ run (and therefore I can stomp everything immediately), I'm not entirely sure the route would be dramatically different from a fresh start. You'd still be wrecking everything with Okita and Ruri, but you couldn't pull off as many fun world tours. Maybe I'll route that someday just to see?Some run notes:- Protagonist choice is irrelevant, but I prefer Chitose so I picked her.- This run includes the Day One DLC, so I use Velt for combat from time to time. It probably costs time to have the DLC though, because Velt only truly shines on Scenario 31 and the DLC forces an extra map.- The kill count spread isn't ideal for this file, so I end up getting two secret scenarios: Black Mightgaine and Thought Patterns. If I cared enough, I'd set up a new file just for speedrun purposes that avoids both. Luckily, they are fairly short.- I botched the first map with Frontal (obviously). It was supposed to be a 1-turn.- I chose the "fighting is over" route simply for final battle ease. I never even bothered planning the other route, so I don't know if it would be that much more difficult. After all the world tours in the run, I think the single final boss objective is more fun anyway.Route notes here, if you're interested: pastebin.com/1XbgvGZ6
Saints Row: The Third - Any% Hardcore, no DLC speedrun (4:40:26) YayMarsha 2017-01-03 | This is an Any% speedrun on Hardcore difficulty without any DLC. Completion time is 4:40:26 from starting a new game to the last input against Killbane during Gangstas in Space. Final in-game time was 4:23.I've done a LOT of challenge runs, but speedrun attempts for this game are still a little new to me. This is my fifth full attempt (fourth on PC), and I've never watched a full run, so keep in mind the routing is probably a bit rough. My driving is atrocious too, so you've been warned.As for the run, I might as well point a few things:- Character customization obviously wastes time, but I don't care. My initial setup menu was terrible though.- You can do the Professor Genki and Tank Mayhem activities before Pierce asks you to. I picked this up from someone else's run, but I'm not sure if it's really that much faster. It's neat at least.- The rocket launcher isn't available for purchase early on. However, if you manage to pick one up, you can buy ammo and upgrade it just fine. The best place I found to do this in a speedrun is during the last section of Party Time. This saves time in a few places because of brutes. (And yes, Party Time is muted thanks to Twitch VOD exporting.)- Warping to the bottom floor in Nyte Blade's Return is consistent from that particular couch. No idea why. If you're lucky, it's possible to skip a trigger and get the "Enter the elevator" objective right away. I don't know how that works though.- Ignore my comments about the difficulty during Gangstas in Space. I checked after the run and it was still set to Hardcore. I must have made it a default, because that's the only mode I play. :PEnjoy the run. It's certainly not perfect, but I don't know if I feel like trying to improve it right now.
Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow (Playstation 2) - 1:36:33 YayMarsha 2016-06-28 | A speedrun of the Playstation 2 version of Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow completed in 1 hour, 36 minutes, and 33 seconds.
Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow (1:12.31) YayMarsha 2016-03-22 | This was the run I did for Japan Relief Done Quick back in April 2011. I probably should've uploaded it a lot time ago, but I was lazy...for almost five whole years. :P
Super Robot Wars Z3: Rengoku-hen (40:40) YayMarsha 2015-10-04 | On a whim, I decided to try out rvlast's suggestion of tackling a shorter Super Robot Wars game. Planning this was obviously a much easier task than Z3-1, so it only took a day to get a route. I didn't spend much time on the run itself either, which you can probably tell from the execution. :PMost of this run is straightforward since it's only 15 maps without any route splits. Conveniently, Advent has a very powerful ALL weapon and has almost 100% availability. A lot of the strategies boil down to "throw Advent in the horde and win," but I'll explain a little more just in case:Episode 1: One of the enemies randomly decides to attack Blue instead. This wastes a few seconds because the music changes and Blue has pre-fight dialog for this map. The enemy still dies from the counter though, so it's only a nuisance.Episode 2: Killing that enemy on the player phase is necessary, because he'll move toward Setsuko and pass the line. I guess you could also move Setsuko back a little more instead, but I don't remember testing it.Episode 3: It's possible to skip the weapon upgrades here, but it involves a little luck. If the first enemy to attack Advent dies (requires a critical, I think), you should have enough morale to use the ALL weapon on the Land Module enemy. That, or just hope for a critical on the latter. I didn't want to do either of those things, so I upgraded the weapons to guarantee I got the Land Module.I'm fairly sure you can knock out the boss on the player phase with Accel and a critical, but I never tested whether the Land Module is critical to the route or not. (My guess is "yes.")Episode 4: Crow probably has some risk of dying here, but it's small enough not to care.Episode 5: Advent isn't strong enough to guarantee kills on some of the initial enemies, but it doesn't seem worth spending time upgrading to fix that. When I planned this, Advent was at base weapon rank. That meant he didn't kill his last enemy on turn 3, so both him and Crow finished off the two remaining enemies on turn 4. That's why in this version, Advent doesn't do anything after the reinforcements arrive. The planned called for him to still be in that spot, and I was too lazy to readjust to see if I could save time.By the way, those two enemies are apparently coded to attack specific targets. Crow's enemy was actually going for Setsuko, while Advent's enemy was going for Crow. The latter is also why Crow had to move up. He had to lure that guy to the right, so that Advent could get him as he passes.Episode 6: The new guy can take out everything on his own, but I made a mistake by moving him an extra space down on turn 3. The map would've ended on turn 4 otherwise. You'll also notice that I fumble with his weapons a lot. That's because the game automatically chooses weak weapons when that's sufficient for a kill. The issue is that his weakest weapon is his ALL, which burns energy that I wanted to save for his strongest attack. Perhaps not that important, but I didn't test it.Episode 7: Crow can die in this map, which causes a game over during the first half. The Booster and Red's rescue action guarantee that Crow reaches the destination on turn 3 regardless of what's in his way.The choice to use Analyze was completely spur-of-the-moment, and the execution shows. The boss has survived two rounds before, and it's a massive pain when it happens. Not sure if Analyze guarantees a two-round, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.Episode 8: Retreating to the left at the start (instead of up) prevents one enemy from getting a shot in. Every little bit counts!Episode 9: Isn't it great when an event allows a second action?Episode 10: The initial enemies on this map are headed toward a specific area of town and will ignore you entirely unless they stop in range of you. Because of that, the +5 morale item on Advent is a big deal. He needs it to use his ALL weapon immediately to take out groups as they pass.Episode 11: Advent can actually die here, but that's nothing a little Trust spam can't fix! o/Episode 12: Totally straightforward.Episode 13: It's technically possible to skip the weapon upgrades here, but there's no point. It's useful against the final boss anyway, so I just do it here to be sure that this boss goes down on turn 2.Episode 14: I could actually defeat the boss here and end the map, but there's no point. It's faster, easier, and safer to just run away.Episode 15: Not sure if Advent really needs Single Attack or the ranged weapon stat boost, but it certainly can't hurt. Blue's only real purpose in life is to carry parts around for Advent, so that's what he does here.Advent could've moved to a better spot on turn 2, but the boss has a double terrain bonus skill. I moved there to keep her on a 0% tile.So yeah, there's a rough Super Robot Wars run. Probably not going to do much more with this one, but at least I can scratch this off the to-do list. :)
Super Robot Wars Z3 - Episode 60 YayMarsha 2015-02-06 | For the past week or so, I spent some time creating a speedrun route for this game. I chose to do this from a fresh start, since all my previous mock runs were on New Game+. When I reached this map, I was pleasantly surprised to find that I could 1-turn it without any ridiculous setup.You'll notice that I have two Miracle Fragments available, but the game only thinks I have one of them. This is due to an easily exploitable bug that happens with certain robots when the route splits at Episode 45. Conveniently, the fastest route for a run is the same one that allows you to duplicate up to four items. Since I only had one Miracle Fragment to begin with, I obviously couldn't duplicate it more than once. I definitely would've liked to though!As for the strategy, it's very straightforward. I give Simon the Pursuit and Dash skills, so that he can reach the boss and do more damage. He needs 309 skill to double the boss, and I just gave him extra strength to be sure.Arc Gurren gets a full upgrade bonus for S rank in space, since it helps my damage output. From there, I equip the two Miracle Fragments. When Simon auto-combines, he gains access to the other group's items too.Basara boosts Simon's morale by 30, Genome's skill gives another 30, and the Miracle Fragment gives the last 10. Zero uses All-out Attack, which gives Simon enough strength to start the second phase in just two rounds. Analyze helps with this as well.The second phase is mostly the same, but Simon loses his All-out Attack bonus. This isn't a big deal though, because he gets a stronger attack to make up for it. The Miracle Fragments are restored because of the way Simon re-enters the map, so the boss had no chance. Kallen and Four easily handle the last hit, but it's worth noting that if I didn't use Analyze, they would've needed two rounds instead.(Source for duplication bug: http://kamikouryaku.xsrv.jp/srw-z3-jigoku/?%BE%AE%A5%CD%A5%BF)
Miracle Girls (Speedrun) - 18:26 YayMarsha 2014-11-26 | Currently sitting in the SDA submission queue, so if you can verify (ha ha), please go over there and volunteer. I was going to paste my submission comments as a description, but apparently they are too long for YouTube. I guess people don't like reading? (Also, YouTube kind of destroyed the quality. Not worth upscaling to prevent that.)All you really need to know is that throwing candy at enemies to make them leave you alone is a great game mechanic. Boss mini-games though? Not so much.
Clock Tower 2 - Jennifer A (Speedrun) [56:16] YayMarsha 2014-09-14 | Unlike the other Clock Tower 2 run I have on this channel, this one goes for the A ending. This means I actually go to Scenario 3 and complete the game properly. This is also an "all survivors" run, but that's just a result of being a speedrun.Carcinogen came up with a route, and was kind enough to share it with me. I follow it for the most part, but I tweaked it a little to save some time. The only difference is that I grab the dagger immediately after finding the map, instead of talking to Tim first and returning to the bookshelf room. He also noted the possibility to skip the Star Plate, since it just shows the right ladder to choose later. It works, and I got the best luck this time (moon).Normally, the route only involves forced Scissorman encounters, so he's quickly dealt with. Unfortunately, I think using Fast disc speed on the Playstation 2 causes the Scissorman timer to get screwed up. He shows up much earlier than he should, which didn't happen when I ran the game using normal settings. The window shouldn't be small enough to blame this on my own mistakes. The only other explanation is pure RNG, but I doubt that.Speaking of Fast disc speed, you'll notice that the voices are all sped up. That's just an unfortunate side effect. Since the scenes all seem to be on timers anyway, I don't think it makes them end any quicker.Anyway, you'll notice a few mistakes in this run. I'll admit that I didn't put much effort into this run, and it shows occasionally. Specifically:- I narrowly averted disaster at the end of Scenario 1 when I forgot to select the key.- For some reason, Nolan didn't want to throw anything at the mask. It seems like having your pointer on the correct item too early won't let you use it, so I had to wiggle around to smack some sense into him.- I entered the wrong room after leaving Nolan's room in Scenario 3. I hadn't played this game in days, so I honestly forgot which door to enter.- When the Scissorman timer went off in Scenario 3, I didn't react quickly enough to retreat to the kitchen. I don't know where he would've been if I had been fast enough, but I might have saved a room transition and panic sequence.Possible improvements:- Figure out how to run. Seriously, this game is picky about double-clicks.- Memorize cursor placement, so you can interact with important objects immediately. (This either requires a lot of runs, practice, or an emulator. I'm currently too lazy for any of them.)- Time Fast disc speed advantages versus the extra Scissorman encounter. If Fast is better, figure out a good spot to take him down. It's probably worth waiting in the kitchen for him after Beth, but the frying pan might not be the best option. (Don't use the pot! It's incredibly slow.)
Super Godzilla (Speedrun) - 43:31 YayMarsha 2014-08-24 | I really should've uploaded this ages ago, since I finished this run back in March. It should be up on SDA eventually, so you can read the comments there. They would be too long for YouTube anyway.[Edit]: It's up: http://speeddemosarchive.com/SuperGodzilla.html
Super Godzilla (Speedrun) - 51:18 YayMarsha 2014-03-15 | Unlike the previous video I uploaded, this is a full game run. My goal for this run is somewhere around 48 minutes, so this isn't too shabby. I would've had it here, but I was stupid and took my usual direct path to Mecha-King Ghidorah in stage 5, so the city took too much damage. This forced me to wait a long time in the Bagan battle, so I lost over three minutes on that split. It's good to know I'm almost there though!I had a much longer description that explained things in more detail, but Youtube apparently hates the concept of people reading more than a couple lines of text. Oh well?
Super Godzilla - Stage 1 YayMarsha 2014-02-23 | Since I've been playing this game a lot in the past couple days, I decided to just go ahead and record a speed run for the first stage. It's not optimal, but I think it's pretty good for something that didn't take much effort.Some notes about the plan for this stage:- King Ghidorah randomly spawns in one of two places: 1-B or 2-B. It's faster to reset until he shows up in 1-B.- You could move east at the start to take down two buildings instead of going through more water tiles, but the building smashing animation takes too long. It's better to just let Godzilla move north once at the start, since he starts going that direction anyway.- I tear down the second building because it's faster than going through the three recovery stations. Each one would trigger a very long unskippable animation.- The item I pick up along the way is random. I get the red orb here, which is the best for this type of run. Unfortunately, it didn't do much here because I attacked too quickly.- The ideal fight would involve a lot more hyper fire breath, but I wasn't able to get it this time. You'd probably need to push him back once before each punch to do that, but I wasn't willing to take that risk for a silly video like this.The strategy for King Ghidorah is pretty much the entire reason I recorded this. Normally when you fight a monster in this game, rushing in constantly will only end in tears. Since this is stage 1 though, the boss is so tame that you can get away with it as long as you're reasonably quick on your punches. (Pay attention to when his bar fills all the way up right as I punch. That's what I mean.)I think that covers everything worth noting in this video. Other than that, just enjoy watching King Ghidorah getting wrecked no-damage style. :)
X-Men: Mutant Apocalypse - Practice Run (18:39) YayMarsha 2013-12-26 | This is a practice run for Awesome Games Done Quick 2014. It's actually not that great, but it's my personal best so far. The Magneto fight is the most important part for a run, and it went very well here.
Fire Emblem (Practice Run) - 1:35:21 YayMarsha 2013-10-24 | This is a full game practice run for Awesome Games Done Quick 2014. I don't have time to go into all the route details, but note that this is meant to be a "low RNG abuse" run. I need to keep the route easy to remember for marathon consistency, so it helps to keep the RN burning to a minimum. I left some extra restarts in the video because I was too lazy to edit them out. I reset after every chapter for RNG purposes (and therefore safety).I took some bits of the route from Thomaz' segmented improvement and other parts from the TAS. Everything else is my own work, so if some of it looks bad, that's probably why. Feel free to suggest route improvements, but keep in mind that I don't want to burn RNs unless absolutely necessary.(Don't suggest execution improvements, because I'll just ignore them. :P)
Lollipop Chainsaw - Stage 1 (Time Attack) YayMarsha 2013-08-23 | I recorded this back in April during a random urge to do some time attack runs. I quickly realized that while the game is fun to play casually, it's a pain to go for low times. The in-game timer continues to run during sparkle hunting screens, so in most cases you're better off killing only two zombies at a time. This really got on my nerves, so I didn't bother improving this further or continue long enough to record other stages.Also, I realize there are quite a few mistakes in this video. It's not meant to be perfect, but I think it's pretty good overall. (And for the record, Shiro costume is best costume.)
X-Men: Mutant Apocalypse - Gambits Stage YayMarsha 2013-06-15 | I've been considering improving the run on SDA, but so far, I've only really put much time into Gambit's stage. This is sort of a proof of concept because I can still tweak the movement in the beginning. Most of this attempt went well, but I don't know how it compares to the current run's version of this stage because I'm too lazy to time the thing. It looks faster in multiple areas, if nothing else.
Valkyria Chronicles - Chapter 18-2 YayMarsha 2013-04-23 | The Edelweiss seemed to have better accuracy than Largo, so I used it for the initial shot. I lost far too many attempt to that stupid shot, which is ridiculous because the rest of the plan involves only a little luck.Mica is death incarnate as far as anti-personnel power in a run, so it's mostly his job to go after Maximilian. With the setup I had though, he couldn't do it alone. The T-MAG11 makes it barely possible to use Mica and another shocktrooper to finish him in one team attack, but it's extremely unlikely because you can't afford to miss much.To fix this problem, I'd need a third character. Unfortunately, the only other shocktroopers I had available were both female. (If you don't remember, they fire much slower than males.) It then occurred to me to use the Shamrock instead, since I had the spare CP and I could still finish the left tower with a Kevin team attack.Worth noting that Mica needed to trigger Damage Boost, Mid-Range Skills, and Fearless Will to make this plan work. Luckily, only the first one is pure luck and the other two can be manipulated. It wouldn't be ideal to take the time to manipulate them, but the option was there if I needed it.So yeah, that's the run. Hopefully you enjoyed it, because I certainly didn't enjoy making it (most of the time).
Valkyria Chronicles - Chapter 18-1 YayMarsha 2013-04-23 | Earlier on, I found out that you could complete this battle in one turn by pulling off this crazy shot that destroys both heatsinks in the same action. From there, two Metal Head activations (in two CP) will give you enough power to take down the Valkof. Obviously that method involves a disgusting amount of luck, so it would've involved a battle save after the shot and Metal Head activation.It turns out that I was missing the obvious and fairly recently learned that Kevin can just go to the ramp on the front of the Marmota instead. He can hit the heatsinks individually on the way over and he has three CP to finish the Valkof. The problem? He's at longer range and therefore does less damage.With the method you see here, he needed to activate Metal Head twice AND hit with every single bullet. So the idea was to trigger it once and hit with the first thirty shots, then battle save. This made things a lot less painful in terms of luck.Amusingly enough, Kevin trolled me by triggering Metal Head three times in three actions (at 11% each). I'm not complaining, but it is kind of ridiculous.If you wonder why I hesitated after the battle save, it's because I hadn't done that before in the run, so I forgot that I needed to check the save time. (Yes, this was my first successful attempt. I'm not doing it again.)
Valkyria Chronicles - Chapter 17 YayMarsha 2013-04-23 | The battle part is the easiest segment in the run. One of the only ways you can even lose an attempt is to screw up when placing your units, but that's not hard either.The base visit was a bit annoying though, because leveling so many times is really time-consuming and makes multiple attempts a chore.
