1-Up!
Game Page: http://speeddemosarchive.com/MegaMan9.html
SS any% run (Real Time)
Verifier Responses
*Note that the verifiers refer to this as a RTA, but it is an RTA purely from the standpoint of being manually timed. No resets are used. It was decided long ago in the MM9 thread that MM9 would have real-time and in-game time categories.
Decision: Accept
Congratulations to ‘Exo’!
SS any% run (Real Time)
Verifier Responses
Quote:
Audio quality: Perfect
Video quality: Perfect
No signs of cheating.
This is an RTA of Mega Man 9, which differs significantly from the current SDA run (MasterZED - 21:37 in-game time) in both the route taken and the strategies used throughout each stage. Because this is an RTA, weapon switching is minimized as the time it takes to pause, switch weapons, and unpause is counted against the runner in an RTA. This is not true for runs timed according to the in-game timer. Since RTA-timing is clearly what the runner is minimizing, this is how I will judge the run.
Start time of video (first enters stage select screen): 00:12
Comments for each individual level:
Concrete Man - The runner takes some intentional hits on the elephant balls to gain invulnerability to enter the elephants and destroy them. This is definitely faster than avoiding damage here. Boss fight goes very well with good rng as the boss only jumps in the air once (where he cannot be damaged for a bried moment).
Magma Man - Sub-optimal concrete shot position at the end of the first set of screens (probably costs less than half a second, so nothing to worry about). More intentional hits to pass through vertical fire beams. Lots of skill shown on boss fight.
Galaxy Man - More intentional hits to clear parts of the stage faster (one near the beginning, one near the end of the stage). The runner missed a jump off a ladder for another loss of a small fraction of a second. Also appears to jump one extra time for safety near the end of the stage right after getting grabbed by the thingy that pulls Mega Man along at a faster speed, perhaps losing another fraction of a second. Again, no worries in either case. Great rng on the boss fight and executed nicely.
Hornet Man - Another intentional hit to damage boost past an enemy. Great rng on flower miniboss. I couldn't see any mistakes. Nearly optimal boss fight, maybe another fraction of a second lost.
Jewel Man - Another very clean level with another intentional damage boost before the boss gate. There may have been a mistake in the boss fight. The runner manipulates Jewel Man to jump twice while travelling to the left, taking the boss longer to turn around and come back to the right. It may be faster to have the boss travel to the right before manipulating the second jump, followed by a quick pause cancel after the boss takes its fourth hit. I have not tested this so I could be wrong here. In any case, not much time would be lost from the runner's strats here (maybe at most a second).
Splash Woman - About a quarter of the way through the stage, the runner walks off an edge through a small hole with spikes on the sides underneath. Not quite sure why the runner doesn't make a small jump before falling down the hole to increase downward acceleration, perhaps for consistency purposes. I have no problem with this. The rest of the level is very clean with a very nice boss fight.
Plug Man - Yet again, a very clean level. Perhaps some time could be cut off if another tic of rush jet energy could be saved for the last disappearing block room. Not sure if it's possible to save antother tic, though. Perfect boss fight with good rng.
Tornado Man - Great level yet again. Maybe slightly missed an optimal jump onto the last rush jet, but nothing that could have possibly cost any reasonable amount of time. Perfect rng for a plug ball kill on the boss as Tornado Man stays on the ground and takes his medicine.
Wily 1 - The runner doesn't quite use rush jet optimally in this level, having to wait a few moments for rush jet to spawn. This is likely to save a bit of jet energy for the later Wily levels, so ok. The boss is done solely with the buster. It is faster to use plug ball, though it requires a weapon switch after it runs out and maybe this makes the plug ball strat not worth it. The rest of the level is fantastic.
Wily 2 - Very impressive use of concrete shots to pass a few of the screens. Finally some bad luck for the runner with a suboptimal flower miniboss pattern (though not the worst one possible). Another intentional hit is taken later on, though the runner could have used an extra damage boost late in the stage to get past the second-to-last tall stomper guy. Good rng comes back to the runner on the final boss fight with the final phase opening up for hits as fast as possible for both of the 2 iterations it takes to kill it.
Wily 3 - Two intentional hits to get past sniper joes. Level goes really well. The one and only time the runner uses pause buffering in the run is in this boss fight as it is way faster in real time to kill the Twin Devil boss in one iteration with the required pauses. It looks like the runner spends a bit too long on the pause menu on the first pause buffer. Oops. No biggy though.
Wily 4 - Uses concrete shots to get past most vertical lasers, then grabs energy for concrete before refights. Is it faster to just take the hits from the lasers and save the concerete shots? If so, it probably doesn't save much and this appears safer (takes less damage), so ok by me. More good rng against Galaxy Man refight, but bad rng from Tornado Man refight. Magma Man refight suboptimal as runner uses 3 magma bazookas when only 2 are required if done right following the Tornado Blows. The rest of the refights look very good to me. Wily phase 1 perfect. The runner appears to take some caution on Wily phase 2 as a few opportunities to go for earlier oncrete shots are not taken, which is understandable at the end of a single segment run. Wily phase 3 rng isn't optimal, but about as good as you could ask for after all of the other favorable rng throughout. The final blow with hornet chasers may not have been necessary as the runner may have lost a second or two by switching weapons. This isn't clear though and was likely another safety precaution.
End time of video (final blow on Wily capsule): 32:31
Overall time: 32:19 real time (21:19 in-game time)
My recommendation: Accept
This is a fantastic RTA that not only will be a very tough run to beat in real time, but is also a full 18 seconds of in-game time faster than the current SDA run. The latter achievement is quite incredible considering the runner is not pause buffering or weapon switching as often as is done in in-game time runs. This is an easy accept. Any criticisms in my comments above are very nit-picky and couldn't have cost the runner much time overall anyways.
Video quality: Perfect
No signs of cheating.
This is an RTA of Mega Man 9, which differs significantly from the current SDA run (MasterZED - 21:37 in-game time) in both the route taken and the strategies used throughout each stage. Because this is an RTA, weapon switching is minimized as the time it takes to pause, switch weapons, and unpause is counted against the runner in an RTA. This is not true for runs timed according to the in-game timer. Since RTA-timing is clearly what the runner is minimizing, this is how I will judge the run.
Start time of video (first enters stage select screen): 00:12
Comments for each individual level:
Concrete Man - The runner takes some intentional hits on the elephant balls to gain invulnerability to enter the elephants and destroy them. This is definitely faster than avoiding damage here. Boss fight goes very well with good rng as the boss only jumps in the air once (where he cannot be damaged for a bried moment).
Magma Man - Sub-optimal concrete shot position at the end of the first set of screens (probably costs less than half a second, so nothing to worry about). More intentional hits to pass through vertical fire beams. Lots of skill shown on boss fight.
Galaxy Man - More intentional hits to clear parts of the stage faster (one near the beginning, one near the end of the stage). The runner missed a jump off a ladder for another loss of a small fraction of a second. Also appears to jump one extra time for safety near the end of the stage right after getting grabbed by the thingy that pulls Mega Man along at a faster speed, perhaps losing another fraction of a second. Again, no worries in either case. Great rng on the boss fight and executed nicely.
Hornet Man - Another intentional hit to damage boost past an enemy. Great rng on flower miniboss. I couldn't see any mistakes. Nearly optimal boss fight, maybe another fraction of a second lost.
Jewel Man - Another very clean level with another intentional damage boost before the boss gate. There may have been a mistake in the boss fight. The runner manipulates Jewel Man to jump twice while travelling to the left, taking the boss longer to turn around and come back to the right. It may be faster to have the boss travel to the right before manipulating the second jump, followed by a quick pause cancel after the boss takes its fourth hit. I have not tested this so I could be wrong here. In any case, not much time would be lost from the runner's strats here (maybe at most a second).
Splash Woman - About a quarter of the way through the stage, the runner walks off an edge through a small hole with spikes on the sides underneath. Not quite sure why the runner doesn't make a small jump before falling down the hole to increase downward acceleration, perhaps for consistency purposes. I have no problem with this. The rest of the level is very clean with a very nice boss fight.
Plug Man - Yet again, a very clean level. Perhaps some time could be cut off if another tic of rush jet energy could be saved for the last disappearing block room. Not sure if it's possible to save antother tic, though. Perfect boss fight with good rng.
Tornado Man - Great level yet again. Maybe slightly missed an optimal jump onto the last rush jet, but nothing that could have possibly cost any reasonable amount of time. Perfect rng for a plug ball kill on the boss as Tornado Man stays on the ground and takes his medicine.
Wily 1 - The runner doesn't quite use rush jet optimally in this level, having to wait a few moments for rush jet to spawn. This is likely to save a bit of jet energy for the later Wily levels, so ok. The boss is done solely with the buster. It is faster to use plug ball, though it requires a weapon switch after it runs out and maybe this makes the plug ball strat not worth it. The rest of the level is fantastic.
Wily 2 - Very impressive use of concrete shots to pass a few of the screens. Finally some bad luck for the runner with a suboptimal flower miniboss pattern (though not the worst one possible). Another intentional hit is taken later on, though the runner could have used an extra damage boost late in the stage to get past the second-to-last tall stomper guy. Good rng comes back to the runner on the final boss fight with the final phase opening up for hits as fast as possible for both of the 2 iterations it takes to kill it.
Wily 3 - Two intentional hits to get past sniper joes. Level goes really well. The one and only time the runner uses pause buffering in the run is in this boss fight as it is way faster in real time to kill the Twin Devil boss in one iteration with the required pauses. It looks like the runner spends a bit too long on the pause menu on the first pause buffer. Oops. No biggy though.
Wily 4 - Uses concrete shots to get past most vertical lasers, then grabs energy for concrete before refights. Is it faster to just take the hits from the lasers and save the concerete shots? If so, it probably doesn't save much and this appears safer (takes less damage), so ok by me. More good rng against Galaxy Man refight, but bad rng from Tornado Man refight. Magma Man refight suboptimal as runner uses 3 magma bazookas when only 2 are required if done right following the Tornado Blows. The rest of the refights look very good to me. Wily phase 1 perfect. The runner appears to take some caution on Wily phase 2 as a few opportunities to go for earlier oncrete shots are not taken, which is understandable at the end of a single segment run. Wily phase 3 rng isn't optimal, but about as good as you could ask for after all of the other favorable rng throughout. The final blow with hornet chasers may not have been necessary as the runner may have lost a second or two by switching weapons. This isn't clear though and was likely another safety precaution.
End time of video (final blow on Wily capsule): 32:31
Overall time: 32:19 real time (21:19 in-game time)
My recommendation: Accept
This is a fantastic RTA that not only will be a very tough run to beat in real time, but is also a full 18 seconds of in-game time faster than the current SDA run. The latter achievement is quite incredible considering the runner is not pause buffering or weapon switching as often as is done in in-game time runs. This is an easy accept. Any criticisms in my comments above are very nit-picky and couldn't have cost the runner much time overall anyways.
Quote:
A/V quality is fine, and I see no signs of cheating.
Before I go into the individual levels I must point out that my comments may seem rather nit-picky at times but, if anything, this is a compliment to the runner because I had to look really closely to find mistakes. Also I have a lot of experience at RTAing this game, so I can spot the mistakes that other people can't.
Concrete Man: The minibosses went great, but he didn't jump to resume movement after taking damage during the first and second elephant fights, which is faster than simply walking to resume movement (much like how it is faster to start movement at the beginning of the stage by jumping instead of walking). In fact, the runner neglects to do this throughout the entirety of the run, although it only saves frames in each instance, so whatever. With that aside, the level went great and the Concrete Man fight was extremely good. A missed shot allowed Concrete Man to make an extra dash, but this only cost about half a second.
Magma Man: At the end of the first screen, the Concrete Shot onto the ladder was placed lower than is desirable, but not by much. The miniboss was amazing as he manages to hit the dragon with all five shots in one jump, which is very hard to do. This is better than having to spread the five shots across two jumps because it means he can get to the next screen transition quicker. The only mistake in the remainder of the level comes in the screen with the single magma beam, where he seems to pause for a fraction of a second on the ladder and then doesn't jump at the top of it to save frames. This slows things down to the point where the beam is allowed to cross the platform directly beneath it, and under normal circumstances it shouldn't. The boss fight was as good as you could hope for; he gets off four shots at the beginning and then pretty much alternates between hitting him with two and three shots, which is optimal.
Galaxy Man: Apart from two missed ladder jumps, the level was perfect. The boss gave his best pattern, but the runner didn't finish the fight bang in the centre. This results in a tiny loss in real-time because Mega Man has to walk to the centre after defeating a robot master.
Hornet Man: Perfect miniboss pattern, and the hit taken in the screen before is intentional. The only real mistake I can see in the level is that he stopped to kill the big jumper guy. Sometimes it is necessary to do that if he does a long jump, but it wasn't in this case because he did a short jump which affords enough distance to kill him without stopping. Don't be fooled by the fact that he got hit by Hornet Man, as this was a near perfect fight.
***About half a second of real-time was lost by not exiting the forth-robot-master-defeated cutscene quick enough.***
Jewel Man: Only mistakes I see here are ever so slightly sub-optimal execution on the third pendulum and a missed edge jump after the miniboss (which itself gave a nice pattern as the boulder dropped near the door). The boss fight was perfect.
***Again, about half a second of real-time was lost by not exiting the Rush Jet cutscene quick enough.***
Splash Woman: Rush Jet could have been made to spawn higher in the last bubble room, but this would only have saved a few frames. Two screens after, it is possible to finish the first moving-platform room before the shot splits into six, again saving a few frames. Boss fight would have been perfect had he not got hit by the fish, which prevented him from finishing in the centre.
Plug Man: The fear in this level is that, if you get hit anywhere before the first set of blocks, you won't get to them in time. This is probably why he stopped momentarily to kill the turrent right before the first set, but it's possible to kill it without stopping. The reason why he doesn't use Rush Jet in the final dissappearing block room is that you really need two pixels of weapon energy to reach the ladder and he only has one, and so he opts to use the remaining energy to Rush Jet over the last enemy. I have since found that it is possible to save a pixel earlier on the level and thus reach that room with two pixels of energy. Even though all of the remaining Rush Jet energy will be spent in that room (and so you would have to kill the big jumper guy instead of using Rush Jet to jump over him), this strategy saves about a second over the one used in this run. This isn't a fault of the runner, though, because that strat wasn't known at the time. The boss didn't give a perfect pattern, but the execution certainly was.
Tornado Man: I can only see two very small mistakes in this level; the damage boost off the Shield Attacker wasn't quite optimal, and he stopped for a fraction of a second before jumping over the life energy in the next screen. But much like most of the mistakes made so far in the run, we are talking about a loss of mere frames. The boss gave a perfect pattern and the fight was great, but Tornado Man could have been killed slightly faster had he timed his Plug Ball shots instead of spamming them.
Wily 1: A few frames were lost by not jumping at the beginning. (must have forgot to hold the jump button :P) The dragon fight was great again and he didn't miss a single shot, which is important as it allows him to use the fastest strat in one particular room in Wily 2. Before the boss fight he chooses to jump over the last enemy with Rush Jet and then switch to the buster for the boss itself. This differs from my approach, which is to damage boost off the enemy (or Rush Jet over him if I have picked up a random energy drop) and use the buster with Rush Jet equippped. Although it's more convinient to use the buster on it's own than it is to use with Rush Jet equipped (with the latter, you have to wait for Rush to spawn before you can fire), this involves a weapon change which costs a second. And in my experience, this boss can be beaten just as quickly with the Rush Jet buster as it can with the normal buster. With that aside, the boss went smooth.
Wily 2: This is easily the hardest level in the game and the runner handles it really well. Since he didn't miss with a Concrete Shot in Wily 1 or the first part of this stage, he is able to use a great C.Shot strat in the third projector room that I discovered, which involves freezing two enemies to use as mid-air platforms. Two screens later the boss doesn't give a good pattern, but it isn't the worst one either. There are only two real mistakes in the rest of the level. One is in the screen with the five UFOs and the enemy which hugs the right-most wall, where he intentionally takes damage so that he can use invulnerabilty frames to proceed. It's faster to use Rush Coil on the ladder and that way you don't have to take damage, but it only saves two tenths of a second and is quite risky to do, so it's hard to complain with the safety-first approach taken here. A larger chunk of time is lost in the very next screen at just under a second, where he is overly hesitent to proceed. Phase 1 of the boss went nicely, although it could have been done a hair faster had he got three shots off after using Rush Coil instead of two. The execution in phase 2 was sub-optimal and just over two seconds was lost here, but to be fair it is really difficult to consistently achieve the best execution in this phase. Phase 3 was perfect.
Wily 3: The only mistake I can see is right at the beginning. I think the first enemy could have been killed a tiny bit quicker, but that might just be me. No issues at all with the rest of the level and Twin Devil goes down with no problem, but he spent too long on the first pause.
Wily 4: Before the re-fights the Concrete Shot on the last laser was placed kinda low, but this is a minor mistake. As for the re-fights themselves, Galaxy Man gave his best pattern and Plug Man was handled well enough, but Tornado Man was a dick and cost him about 4 seconds. Magma Man was in prime position to be finished off with the Bazooka but the runner decided to jump and shoot which caused him to miss, and instead he should have just waited for him to land before firing. On the plus side, the fights with Hornet and Concrete Man were great, and Jewel Man and Splash Woman were done perfectly. Phase 1 of Wily Machine was perfect, and even though Phase 2 didn't give the best pattern, it was handled very nicely. Switching to Hornet Chaser during the Wily Capsule fight didn't seem necessary and lost a second of real-time, but this was probably done for safety so that's understandable. Wily only disappeared four times before being defeated, which is great luck to get in a single-segment run.
Start frame of run: 726 (moment the robot master screen appears)
End frame of run: 116991 (moment that the chip is picked up after defeating Wily)
116265 frames at 59.940059 fps gives a final time of 32:19.41
Easy accept. SDA has been crying out for a high-quality RTA run of MM9, and this is it. The vast majority of mistakes that I pointed out are so minor to the point of hardly being noticeable, and don't cost much time in the grand scheme of a single-segment run. This will be damn hard for anyone to beat, including myself.
Before I go into the individual levels I must point out that my comments may seem rather nit-picky at times but, if anything, this is a compliment to the runner because I had to look really closely to find mistakes. Also I have a lot of experience at RTAing this game, so I can spot the mistakes that other people can't.
Concrete Man: The minibosses went great, but he didn't jump to resume movement after taking damage during the first and second elephant fights, which is faster than simply walking to resume movement (much like how it is faster to start movement at the beginning of the stage by jumping instead of walking). In fact, the runner neglects to do this throughout the entirety of the run, although it only saves frames in each instance, so whatever. With that aside, the level went great and the Concrete Man fight was extremely good. A missed shot allowed Concrete Man to make an extra dash, but this only cost about half a second.
Magma Man: At the end of the first screen, the Concrete Shot onto the ladder was placed lower than is desirable, but not by much. The miniboss was amazing as he manages to hit the dragon with all five shots in one jump, which is very hard to do. This is better than having to spread the five shots across two jumps because it means he can get to the next screen transition quicker. The only mistake in the remainder of the level comes in the screen with the single magma beam, where he seems to pause for a fraction of a second on the ladder and then doesn't jump at the top of it to save frames. This slows things down to the point where the beam is allowed to cross the platform directly beneath it, and under normal circumstances it shouldn't. The boss fight was as good as you could hope for; he gets off four shots at the beginning and then pretty much alternates between hitting him with two and three shots, which is optimal.
Galaxy Man: Apart from two missed ladder jumps, the level was perfect. The boss gave his best pattern, but the runner didn't finish the fight bang in the centre. This results in a tiny loss in real-time because Mega Man has to walk to the centre after defeating a robot master.
Hornet Man: Perfect miniboss pattern, and the hit taken in the screen before is intentional. The only real mistake I can see in the level is that he stopped to kill the big jumper guy. Sometimes it is necessary to do that if he does a long jump, but it wasn't in this case because he did a short jump which affords enough distance to kill him without stopping. Don't be fooled by the fact that he got hit by Hornet Man, as this was a near perfect fight.
***About half a second of real-time was lost by not exiting the forth-robot-master-defeated cutscene quick enough.***
Jewel Man: Only mistakes I see here are ever so slightly sub-optimal execution on the third pendulum and a missed edge jump after the miniboss (which itself gave a nice pattern as the boulder dropped near the door). The boss fight was perfect.
***Again, about half a second of real-time was lost by not exiting the Rush Jet cutscene quick enough.***
Splash Woman: Rush Jet could have been made to spawn higher in the last bubble room, but this would only have saved a few frames. Two screens after, it is possible to finish the first moving-platform room before the shot splits into six, again saving a few frames. Boss fight would have been perfect had he not got hit by the fish, which prevented him from finishing in the centre.
Plug Man: The fear in this level is that, if you get hit anywhere before the first set of blocks, you won't get to them in time. This is probably why he stopped momentarily to kill the turrent right before the first set, but it's possible to kill it without stopping. The reason why he doesn't use Rush Jet in the final dissappearing block room is that you really need two pixels of weapon energy to reach the ladder and he only has one, and so he opts to use the remaining energy to Rush Jet over the last enemy. I have since found that it is possible to save a pixel earlier on the level and thus reach that room with two pixels of energy. Even though all of the remaining Rush Jet energy will be spent in that room (and so you would have to kill the big jumper guy instead of using Rush Jet to jump over him), this strategy saves about a second over the one used in this run. This isn't a fault of the runner, though, because that strat wasn't known at the time. The boss didn't give a perfect pattern, but the execution certainly was.
Tornado Man: I can only see two very small mistakes in this level; the damage boost off the Shield Attacker wasn't quite optimal, and he stopped for a fraction of a second before jumping over the life energy in the next screen. But much like most of the mistakes made so far in the run, we are talking about a loss of mere frames. The boss gave a perfect pattern and the fight was great, but Tornado Man could have been killed slightly faster had he timed his Plug Ball shots instead of spamming them.
Wily 1: A few frames were lost by not jumping at the beginning. (must have forgot to hold the jump button :P) The dragon fight was great again and he didn't miss a single shot, which is important as it allows him to use the fastest strat in one particular room in Wily 2. Before the boss fight he chooses to jump over the last enemy with Rush Jet and then switch to the buster for the boss itself. This differs from my approach, which is to damage boost off the enemy (or Rush Jet over him if I have picked up a random energy drop) and use the buster with Rush Jet equippped. Although it's more convinient to use the buster on it's own than it is to use with Rush Jet equipped (with the latter, you have to wait for Rush to spawn before you can fire), this involves a weapon change which costs a second. And in my experience, this boss can be beaten just as quickly with the Rush Jet buster as it can with the normal buster. With that aside, the boss went smooth.
Wily 2: This is easily the hardest level in the game and the runner handles it really well. Since he didn't miss with a Concrete Shot in Wily 1 or the first part of this stage, he is able to use a great C.Shot strat in the third projector room that I discovered, which involves freezing two enemies to use as mid-air platforms. Two screens later the boss doesn't give a good pattern, but it isn't the worst one either. There are only two real mistakes in the rest of the level. One is in the screen with the five UFOs and the enemy which hugs the right-most wall, where he intentionally takes damage so that he can use invulnerabilty frames to proceed. It's faster to use Rush Coil on the ladder and that way you don't have to take damage, but it only saves two tenths of a second and is quite risky to do, so it's hard to complain with the safety-first approach taken here. A larger chunk of time is lost in the very next screen at just under a second, where he is overly hesitent to proceed. Phase 1 of the boss went nicely, although it could have been done a hair faster had he got three shots off after using Rush Coil instead of two. The execution in phase 2 was sub-optimal and just over two seconds was lost here, but to be fair it is really difficult to consistently achieve the best execution in this phase. Phase 3 was perfect.
Wily 3: The only mistake I can see is right at the beginning. I think the first enemy could have been killed a tiny bit quicker, but that might just be me. No issues at all with the rest of the level and Twin Devil goes down with no problem, but he spent too long on the first pause.
Wily 4: Before the re-fights the Concrete Shot on the last laser was placed kinda low, but this is a minor mistake. As for the re-fights themselves, Galaxy Man gave his best pattern and Plug Man was handled well enough, but Tornado Man was a dick and cost him about 4 seconds. Magma Man was in prime position to be finished off with the Bazooka but the runner decided to jump and shoot which caused him to miss, and instead he should have just waited for him to land before firing. On the plus side, the fights with Hornet and Concrete Man were great, and Jewel Man and Splash Woman were done perfectly. Phase 1 of Wily Machine was perfect, and even though Phase 2 didn't give the best pattern, it was handled very nicely. Switching to Hornet Chaser during the Wily Capsule fight didn't seem necessary and lost a second of real-time, but this was probably done for safety so that's understandable. Wily only disappeared four times before being defeated, which is great luck to get in a single-segment run.
Start frame of run: 726 (moment the robot master screen appears)
End frame of run: 116991 (moment that the chip is picked up after defeating Wily)
116265 frames at 59.940059 fps gives a final time of 32:19.41
Easy accept. SDA has been crying out for a high-quality RTA run of MM9, and this is it. The vast majority of mistakes that I pointed out are so minor to the point of hardly being noticeable, and don't cost much time in the grand scheme of a single-segment run. This will be damn hard for anyone to beat, including myself.
Quote:
A/V quality - Perfect
Cheating - N/A
Concrete - I question whether it might possibly save time to switch to Rush Coil before the first ladder and keep it up throughout the level...probably not, as it may waste too much time on the elephants. At any rate, very minor mistakes on the stage, decent luck on the boss.
Magma - Flawless level execution including a single jump dragon. Solid boss fight.
Galaxy - Minor mistakes on the stage. Again, I question whether it might save a little time to switch to Concrete Shot until the end of the first room. Perfect boss pattern.
Hornet - Very minor mistakes on the stage. Is shooting the cannons in the rooms before the Clock Flower while falling not possible with Rush Coil equipped? Good boss fight.
Jewel - Just a couple small mistakes, like missing a zip and a ledge jump. Great boss fight.
Splash - The stage was basically perfect, and the boss fight also went extremely well.
Plug - Very minor mistakes on stage, faaaast boss fight.
Tornado - Very clean throughout. The Sniper Joe room before the rain was sexy.
Wily 1 - Good stage, just a couple tiny mistakes. Is buster-only really the fastest boss strat in RTA? I feel like it would almost definitely save time to switch, even factoring in the extra pause screens and weapon refilling with M tank. Regardless, some time was lost because of the boss being uncooperative.
Wily 2 - The room right before the leap of faith to the Clock Flower was metal. Unfortunately, the Flower had a bad spawn...didn't waste too much time, though. Small time loss in the ladder rooms towards the end. Extremely good boss fight, just lost a second or two on the second part.
Wily 3 - Great stage with just a couple very minor mistakes. Nearly flawless boss.
Wily 4 - Time could possibly be saved before the boss rematches by taking more damage, but probably not more than a few frames. Pretty bad luck on Tornado Man rematch, and lost a little time on Magma Man. Could have had marginally better luck on Wily phase 2 and 3, but the fight was still very quick overall.
Verdict: Easy accept.
As this is RTA, it should have its own category on the game page. However, since it also beats the current in-game time run, it should replace that one as well until a faster in-game time run comes along to stand alongside this one.
Cheating - N/A
Concrete - I question whether it might possibly save time to switch to Rush Coil before the first ladder and keep it up throughout the level...probably not, as it may waste too much time on the elephants. At any rate, very minor mistakes on the stage, decent luck on the boss.
Magma - Flawless level execution including a single jump dragon. Solid boss fight.
Galaxy - Minor mistakes on the stage. Again, I question whether it might save a little time to switch to Concrete Shot until the end of the first room. Perfect boss pattern.
Hornet - Very minor mistakes on the stage. Is shooting the cannons in the rooms before the Clock Flower while falling not possible with Rush Coil equipped? Good boss fight.
Jewel - Just a couple small mistakes, like missing a zip and a ledge jump. Great boss fight.
Splash - The stage was basically perfect, and the boss fight also went extremely well.
Plug - Very minor mistakes on stage, faaaast boss fight.
Tornado - Very clean throughout. The Sniper Joe room before the rain was sexy.
Wily 1 - Good stage, just a couple tiny mistakes. Is buster-only really the fastest boss strat in RTA? I feel like it would almost definitely save time to switch, even factoring in the extra pause screens and weapon refilling with M tank. Regardless, some time was lost because of the boss being uncooperative.
Wily 2 - The room right before the leap of faith to the Clock Flower was metal. Unfortunately, the Flower had a bad spawn...didn't waste too much time, though. Small time loss in the ladder rooms towards the end. Extremely good boss fight, just lost a second or two on the second part.
Wily 3 - Great stage with just a couple very minor mistakes. Nearly flawless boss.
Wily 4 - Time could possibly be saved before the boss rematches by taking more damage, but probably not more than a few frames. Pretty bad luck on Tornado Man rematch, and lost a little time on Magma Man. Could have had marginally better luck on Wily phase 2 and 3, but the fight was still very quick overall.
Verdict: Easy accept.
As this is RTA, it should have its own category on the game page. However, since it also beats the current in-game time run, it should replace that one as well until a faster in-game time run comes along to stand alongside this one.
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A/V Quality: Good
32:19 Real Time
21:19 In-Game
Concrete Man: Good stage, just a small mistake on the boss.
Magma Man: Great execution all around and a fantastic boss fight.
Galaxy Man: Lost a very minimal amount of time in the stage and a small amount of time lost on positioning while killing Galaxy man, but still a great stroll through the level.
Hornet Man: Perfect miniboss pattern, very minor mistakes on the stage, and a very good boss fight.
Jewel Man: Good stage, just a few small mistakes. Boss fight is Jewel Man and Jewel Man is fabulous, and fabulous mans are not fabulous fighters.
Splash Woman: Nothing wrong here with the stage or boss; basically as good as you can get it.
Plug Man: Great execution once again; good boss RNG as well.
Tornado Man: Awesome stage and perfect boss RNG.
Wily 1:
Nothing to complain about with this stage. I'm just a bit skeptical of the plug ball switch losing time in RTA, as others have suggested, but I'm not the guy who's submitting to SDA.
Wily 2:
Really good stage, although the flower clock decided to be a durian this time. Great boss fight with just one small mistake.
Wily 3:
Only minor problems here, awesome boss fight as well.
Wily 4:
The Robot Masters had a small revenge going here, but no more time lost than you would expect from a little bad luck right at the end. Really good first boss form with great RNG; shovin those balls down that dino-bot throat! The second and third forms didn't have as great RNG, but they still went very well.
Decision: Accept Get!
This is a very solid run that beats the crap out of Master ZED's also very good, although quite outdated, Any% run. It is, however, an RTA, meaning that being so much better than the previous Any% run is even more of an accomplishment, since the player was unable to take advantage of tricks that involve switching weapons more often and pause buffering. All mistakes were very minor; the run will probably be the fastest MM9 SS on SDA for long time, and the best RTA on the site for even longer.
32:19 Real Time
21:19 In-Game
Concrete Man: Good stage, just a small mistake on the boss.
Magma Man: Great execution all around and a fantastic boss fight.
Galaxy Man: Lost a very minimal amount of time in the stage and a small amount of time lost on positioning while killing Galaxy man, but still a great stroll through the level.
Hornet Man: Perfect miniboss pattern, very minor mistakes on the stage, and a very good boss fight.
Jewel Man: Good stage, just a few small mistakes. Boss fight is Jewel Man and Jewel Man is fabulous, and fabulous mans are not fabulous fighters.
Splash Woman: Nothing wrong here with the stage or boss; basically as good as you can get it.
Plug Man: Great execution once again; good boss RNG as well.
Tornado Man: Awesome stage and perfect boss RNG.
Wily 1:
Nothing to complain about with this stage. I'm just a bit skeptical of the plug ball switch losing time in RTA, as others have suggested, but I'm not the guy who's submitting to SDA.
Wily 2:
Really good stage, although the flower clock decided to be a durian this time. Great boss fight with just one small mistake.
Wily 3:
Only minor problems here, awesome boss fight as well.
Wily 4:
The Robot Masters had a small revenge going here, but no more time lost than you would expect from a little bad luck right at the end. Really good first boss form with great RNG; shovin those balls down that dino-bot throat! The second and third forms didn't have as great RNG, but they still went very well.
Decision: Accept Get!
This is a very solid run that beats the crap out of Master ZED's also very good, although quite outdated, Any% run. It is, however, an RTA, meaning that being so much better than the previous Any% run is even more of an accomplishment, since the player was unable to take advantage of tricks that involve switching weapons more often and pause buffering. All mistakes were very minor; the run will probably be the fastest MM9 SS on SDA for long time, and the best RTA on the site for even longer.
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I have to admit that RTAs usually aren't my bread and butter, however I have to say that it was interesting to see one in action with this run.
It is very interesting to see just how the runner doesn't utilize the menu as much as what I've seen in other games and how in spite of of not going in to the fights without the powerups, the runner does finish the stages quickly.
Very effectively done. If this is what RTAs look and play like, then I can't wait to see more in the future.
Accept.
Now my only other concern is what happens with the current run. I mean yes, I know that the runs are under two separate categories, however this run is still technically faster than Zed's run. Someone should really consider doing an updated run for Megaman 9...
It is very interesting to see just how the runner doesn't utilize the menu as much as what I've seen in other games and how in spite of of not going in to the fights without the powerups, the runner does finish the stages quickly.
Very effectively done. If this is what RTAs look and play like, then I can't wait to see more in the future.
Accept.
Now my only other concern is what happens with the current run. I mean yes, I know that the runs are under two separate categories, however this run is still technically faster than Zed's run. Someone should really consider doing an updated run for Megaman 9...
*Note that the verifiers refer to this as a RTA, but it is an RTA purely from the standpoint of being manually timed. No resets are used. It was decided long ago in the MM9 thread that MM9 would have real-time and in-game time categories.
Decision: Accept
Congratulations to ‘Exo’!
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