Castlevania - Dawn of Sorrow

Aftermath

Edit history:

Aftermath: 2009-10-25 02:13:52 am

2009-10-25 12:59:01 am

Quits halfway

Beating the game in under 5 minutes.

~~I think I will try to submit this, there is only one real error to speak of, and~~ the whole thing is a little harder to do than it looks. I had to segment it since you're required to save in order to suspend.

I'm still working on the New Game run, I just haven't gotten past segment 1 yet (decided to get soul + axe), just wanted a break from luck manipulation. Still working on Boss Rush too, although my luck's been getting worse as the days go by.

So yeah, unless I get super lucky on the New Game run anytime soon, I'll probably keep doing New Game+ runs, as they need little to no luck manipulation.

One thing is that I really would like the "all bosses" to become a category, so was wondering what other people would think about these requirements:

-Defeat all bosses
-Get all non-random souls (only 2)
-Get all magic seals

Mike had said that an all bosses run would be acceptable, but it was up to us to decide on the specifics.

The reason I'm suggesting the gathering of the non-random stuff, is just because I'll be getting nearly all of it anyway (all but 2 boss seals), and this is all the non-random, non-item things in the game. Also, looking at the SotN definition of 100%, this seems to be the same (all bosses and non-random things).

[url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgMxYj0IXvM]Beating the game in under 5 minutes.[/url]

[s]I think I will try to submit this, there is only one real error to speak of, and[/s] the whole thing is a little harder to do than it looks. I had to segment it since you're required to save in order to suspend.

I'm still working on the New Game run, I just haven't gotten past segment 1 yet (decided to get soul + axe), just wanted a break from luck manipulation. Still working on Boss Rush too, although my luck's been getting worse as the days go by.

So yeah, unless I get super lucky on the New Game run anytime soon, I'll probably keep doing New Game+ runs, as they need little to no luck manipulation.

One thing is that I really would like the "all bosses" to become a category, so was wondering what other people would think about these requirements:

-Defeat all bosses
-Get all non-random souls (only 2)
-Get all magic seals

Mike had said that an all bosses run would be acceptable, but it was up to us to decide on the specifics.

The reason I'm suggesting the gathering of the non-random stuff, is just because I'll be getting nearly all of it anyway (all but 2 boss seals), and this is all the non-random, non-item things in the game. Also, looking at the SotN definition of 100%, this seems to be the same (all bosses and non-random things).

groobo

2009-10-25 01:56:40 am

boss

After the cutscene in the bridge area, why don't you use uko+were before the gap? At the dark chapel's first room, why don't you use bat to get to the higher edge on the left, instead of going around? The same applies to the room with the vertically moving platform later on. Also were you really that nervous after the oob part? From there, there's at least one easily avoidable mistake in like each room.

Also, you're planning to get BOTH the axe armor soul as a drop in one segment?

Aftermath

2009-10-25 02:12:37 am

Quits halfway

Yeah, I'll go ahead and redo it with those suggestions. I don't have a good reason for not using them currently.

I wasn't really that nervous after it, I have the zipping down pretty well, but the thing that threw me off was where I reloaded after suspending, so I was running into that wall. That led to the error in the next room as well. The two after that were from misjudging landing times, which is hard to get perfect (i'll just not be as strict with timing it next time so those won't happen). The Hippogryph has no excuse.

Yeah @ both in one segment, I thought you even suggested that? I figured that with all the time I've dumped into it already, I might as well just wait until I actually get it.

groobo

2009-10-25 02:23:15 am

boss

Quote from Aftermath:

Yeah @ both in one segment, I thought you even suggested that? I figured that with all the time I've dumped into it already, I might as well just wait until I actually get it.

I don't remember suggesting it. IMO getting both the soul and an axe in one segment is beyond impossible. Getting just the axe as a drop is ridiculously rare - yorick is a common drop compared to that.

Aftermath

2009-10-25 02:42:08 am

Quits halfway

Well, I had originally planned to get the axe first, then in the next segment grab the soul and go fight flying armor. I had a save that did that, but one of the times when I was killing the axe armor for the soul, it dropped both the axe and the soul. So, because of that, I'll figured I might as well get both in one go. I'm getting into TAS levels of restarts, but whatever. The goal is to have a save of sub 4:08 before Balore. I had a run with a Short Sword + axe soul get 4:09, and the Flying Armor fight should be 1 second faster or more.

groobo

2009-10-25 03:35:58 am

boss

My eyes are going to explode if you get both drops in one segment. Good luck.

Aftermath

2009-10-25 11:46:44 am

Quits halfway

Found a new trick

You need black panther in order to do this. If you hippogryph while black panthering, and let go of L, R, and left/right on the frame you hit the ceiling, it'll cancel the normal hitting the ceiling animation.

While I could possibly use this in the run (shown in the video), it's a little too difficult still that I wouldn't reset if I don't pull it off. The other option is just to jump on the edge by the save room and then jump over the other thing, which I may do.

Satoryu

2009-10-25 01:29:29 pm

Visually Appealing

When fighting Dmitrii, why didn't you use Werewolf+Clown to hit him on the way to the right edge of the room, then BDS when you're behind him?

That "100%" definition seems right.

Concerning glitched souls, specifically 9+ souls and Julius Mode souls, I was always unsure if they would be legal. Because they're not obtainable through normal means, I would think using a NG+ file with them would raise a few eyebrows. I don't have a preference either way, just saying some might not like them. If they were disallowed, it wouldn't change this run too much. You'd just have to AxeSG over the drawbridge instead.

groobo

2009-10-25 01:37:55 pm

boss

Nice find. Though you could just do this:

Do a normal jump from point A (from the save room) to point B and hippogryph just once from there.

A couple more improvements:
-in the intro, use devil to kill the golem with just one hit
-at the bridge area use were+uko also after getting past the bridge, before you jump above the switch
-I'm not sure about that but iirc it's quicker to change the blue soul instead of morphing out of bat/valkyrie
-use were+uko whenever possible, you skipped a couple of slides for basically no reason (like after you saved)
-you could check if there's no faster way of killing dmitri since you don't have to be standing all the way on the right when his hp reaches 0, you can get there before the cutscene after you deliver the last hit
-when you're falling with black panther on, release R just before hitting the ground so you can jump out of the crouching animation - it's better to release it too early instead of waiting for soma to get back up on his feet

That should be it.

Nice find. Though you could just do this:

[img]http://i37.tinypic.com/ztsknd.jpg[/img]

Do a normal jump from point A (from the save room) to point B and hippogryph just once from there.

A couple more improvements:
-in the intro, use devil to kill the golem with just one hit
-at the bridge area use were+uko also after getting past the bridge, before you jump above the switch
-I'm not sure about that but iirc it's quicker to change the blue soul instead of morphing out of bat/valkyrie
-use were+uko whenever possible, you skipped a couple of slides for basically no reason (like after you saved)
-you could check if there's no faster way of killing dmitri since you don't have to be standing all the way on the right when his hp reaches 0, you can get there before the cutscene after you deliver the last hit
-when you're falling with black panther on, release R just before hitting the ground so you can jump out of the crouching animation - it's better to release it too early instead of waiting for soma to get back up on his feet

That should be it.

Aftermath

Edit history:

Aftermath: 2009-10-25 03:10:33 pm

2009-10-25 03:03:10 pm

Quits halfway

Here's the current segment 1. Time after save is 2:23.

I did this before reading these replies, but I think there's only one deviation from the advice, which doesn't constitute a second of lost time.

In the rising platform room, I took that route because it had the lesser vertical climb, so even with jumping backwards it saves a little over a second compared to taking the other way around. Because of the bat transform time, it's not a timesaver to bat to the platform and jump/bat the rest of the way.

At 1:43 I stall on the ramp, I'm not sure what causes it, but it's always been happening when I try to jump from that thing while werewolfing. You can see that I'm still in teh werewolf animation while it's frozen, so it's not just from not holding forward or something. In the game, it freezes when I hit jump and the jump is delayed.

There's the possibility of werewolfing slightly faster, but my thumb speed is either this or way too fast, so I couldn't manage it better.

I'm a little cautious with the platforms in the Ghost Dancer room, they are weird and hard to see.

Groobo: Ah, yeah, I'll use that route then. I liked the inclusion of the !
-In the inrto, i Just used Uko back + weapon hit to kill him semi-instantly.
-Valkyrie always ends in a nice spot so it's not necessary to soul switch for it.
-Soul switching out of bat form still has the animation, so won't save time.
-I didn't ukoback before the switch, because it's an annoying jump, and the slides save something like only 8 frames.
-I'll go with what Satoryu said for Dmitrii, what I did was just dumb. I'll also equip the Kaladbolg for the INT boost, as I'm hoping for timing the menus won't count against me (I will provide timing notes along with the videos). The Dmitrii part has to be manually timed, but since menus normally don't count against you, I don't think they should for the manual timing either.
-I'll include the ukokback after the save.
-Yeah, I worked on the Black Panther canceling and shouldn't have any mistakes on that end.

Satoryu: Yeah, dunno why, will from now on though.

My view on glitched souls would be that if the run itself has the opportunity to get them (ie goes out of bounds) then they should be allowable, since the same methods used in the run also procure the souls. In non-OoB runs I think they should be disallowed though. Whether they should be used on the 100% idea I think is open for debate.

I'd have to double-check the route with having a Bat company soul from the start, but I don't think glitched souls would change the route, it'd just make the easy boss fights even easier if I can find a place for 16 Stolas souls. So yeah, I guess they should be included, as the run is pretty much just a showcase of interesting ways from point A to point B.

Speaking of the Axe SG, how long is an acceptable time to position myself for it? Currently, I can only check if I'm within the trigger range when standing still, so I run close to the side, stop, check how many pixels away I am, do a final adjustment, stop to doublecheck the distance, then do the SG. In total, I think it's less than a second (I'll have to relook at my all boss thing on youtube), but if you guys can do it either an easier way, or just flat out better, I'll work on learning it while moving. Judging from the jump after flying armor (without the flying armor soul), I don't think my success rate will go much over 10%. That's not really meant as a complaint, if it seemed like one.

[url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCVU_8QJ6mM]Here's the current segment 1.[/url] Time after save is 2:23.

I did this before reading these replies, but I think there's only one deviation from the advice, which doesn't constitute a second of lost time.

In the rising platform room, I took that route because it had the lesser vertical climb, so even with jumping backwards it saves a little over a second compared to taking the other way around. Because of the bat transform time, it's not a timesaver to bat to the platform and jump/bat the rest of the way.

At 1:43 I stall on the ramp, I'm not sure what causes it, but it's always been happening when I try to jump from that thing while werewolfing. You can see that I'm still in teh werewolf animation while it's frozen, so it's not just from not holding forward or something. In the game, it freezes when I hit jump and the jump is delayed.

There's the possibility of werewolfing slightly faster, but my thumb speed is either this or way too fast, so I couldn't manage it better.

I'm a little cautious with the platforms in the Ghost Dancer room, they are weird and hard to see.

[b]Groobo:[/b] Ah, yeah, I'll use that route then. I liked the inclusion of the !
-In the inrto, i Just used Uko back + weapon hit to kill him semi-instantly.
-Valkyrie always ends in a nice spot so it's not necessary to soul switch for it.
-Soul switching out of bat form still has the animation, so won't save time.
-I didn't ukoback before the switch, because it's an annoying jump, and the slides save something like only 8 frames.
-I'll go with what Satoryu said for Dmitrii, what I did was just dumb. I'll also equip the Kaladbolg for the INT boost, as I'm hoping for timing the menus won't count against me (I will provide timing notes along with the videos). The Dmitrii part has to be manually timed, but since menus normally don't count against you, I don't think they should for the manual timing either.
-I'll include the ukokback after the save.
-Yeah, I worked on the Black Panther canceling and shouldn't have any mistakes on that end.

[b]Satoryu:[/b] Yeah, dunno why, will from now on though.

My view on glitched souls would be that if the run itself has the opportunity to get them (ie goes out of bounds) then they should be allowable, since the same methods used in the run also procure the souls. In non-OoB runs I think they should be disallowed though. Whether they should be used on the 100% idea I think is open for debate.

I'd have to double-check the route with having a Bat company soul from the start, but I don't think glitched souls would change the route, it'd just make the easy boss fights even easier if I can find a place for 16 Stolas souls. So yeah, I guess they should be included, as the run is pretty much just a showcase of interesting ways from point A to point B.

Speaking of the Axe SG, how long is an acceptable time to position myself for it? Currently, I can only check if I'm within the trigger range when standing still, so I run close to the side, stop, check how many pixels away I am, do a final adjustment, stop to doublecheck the distance, then do the SG. In total, I think it's less than a second (I'll have to relook at my all boss thing on youtube), but if you guys can do it either an easier way, or just flat out better, I'll work on learning it while moving. Judging from the jump after flying armor (without the flying armor soul), I don't think my success rate will go much over 10%. That's not really meant as a complaint, if it seemed like one.

groobo

2009-10-25 03:13:54 pm

boss

Great segment :). Can't wait for the next one.

Satoryu

2009-10-25 03:47:20 pm

Visually Appealing

How'd you get the timer to read 0?

Aftermath

2009-10-25 04:30:35 pm

Quits halfway

I used Action Replay to reset it to zero. I don't think there's a way to do it otherwise.

Serris

2009-10-25 06:08:26 pm

The Aria of Sorrow NG+ run just uses a save that makes it easy to do the math (29:00:00), though you probably don't even need to do that. I guess you could ask an admin if it's okay, but I don't see why you would resort to questionable methods if you can avoid it.

Aftermath

Edit history:

Aftermath: 2009-10-25 07:23:43 pm

2009-10-25 07:12:37 pm

Quits halfway

I asked mikwuyama about it and he said it was fine. When I went to get the glitched soul for the bat, my timer went to 99:59:59. In the recordings, I show the system from power on, just in case people were overly suspicious.

Satoryu

2009-10-25 08:20:45 pm

Visually Appealing

That's surprising.

Aftermath

Edit history:

Aftermath: 2009-10-28 08:35:16 am

2009-10-28 08:08:13 am

Quits halfway

Finished the run. The time this time is 4:10. I went ahead and cut out menu time from the timing of the zip part.

Annoyingly, my computer stalled during capturing, so the Dmitrii "fight" is desynced and slowed down. I couldn't really go back and redo the segment (can't copy copied files for some reason), and it's only 3-4 seconds of weirdness, so hopefully it's okay.

Other than that, the segment went well. The only point of concern might be when I come back after the suspend, I'm on the far wall again (first time it happened out of a couple dozen times) so I lose about half a second from bad reaction times. I do the black panther land cancels correctly and don't fail after The Abyss warp. I played around with trying to get the faster Menace skip that the TAS uses, but I wasn't able to do it even once.

Timing breakdown:

Segment 1:
2:23

Segment 2: (Frames come from the non-youtube cuts of the video)
733 start
869-1116 menu | 247 frames
1259-1328 menu | 69 frames
1522-1600 menu | 78 frames
2483 menu

1750 menu time included
58.3 seconds
1434 menu time excluded
45.2 seconds

3:21 or
3:08

Segment 3:
1:52:20 start
1:53:22 stop
1:02

4:23 or
4:10

For manual timing, I used an emulator with a RAM watch on the value for the game's timer and tested when it starts/stops. When loading the game, it starts when the HP/MP bar appears, which is 2 frames before you actually gain control/the rest of the game appears. For going in/out of menus, time will stop when the screen fades to black when going into the menu, and start again when the menu fades to black. Those are the only considerations for timing that part.

I took longer to finish this than I had planned since I switched back to trying to get the axe/soul drop, but still no result there.

Edit: I just thought about it, and it seems silly that I fight Dmitrii when I can just use the SG instead of his cutscene to do the zip. However, I'm pretty sure it's faster just to use his cutscene for the warp, so that isn't a problem.

Also, for the NG+ all bosses run, I'll probably be using a new route.

[url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4Jm1cq2B6s]Finished the run.[/url] The time this time is 4:10. I went ahead and cut out menu time from the timing of the zip part.

Annoyingly, my computer stalled during capturing, so the Dmitrii "fight" is desynced and slowed down. I couldn't really go back and redo the segment (can't copy copied files for some reason), and it's only 3-4 seconds of weirdness, so hopefully it's okay.

Other than that, the segment went well. The only point of concern might be when I come back after the suspend, I'm on the far wall again (first time it happened out of a couple dozen times) so I lose about half a second from bad reaction times. I do the black panther land cancels correctly and don't fail after The Abyss warp. I played around with trying to get the faster Menace skip that the TAS uses, but I wasn't able to do it even once.

Timing breakdown: [spoiler]Segment 1:
2:23

Segment 2: (Frames come from the non-youtube cuts of the video)
733 start
869-1116 menu | 247 frames
1259-1328 menu | 69 frames
1522-1600 menu | 78 frames
2483 menu

1750 menu time included
58.3 seconds
1434 menu time excluded
45.2 seconds

3:21 or
3:08

Segment 3:
1:52:20 start
1:53:22 stop
1:02

4:23 or
4:10

For manual timing, I used an emulator with a RAM watch on the value for the game's timer and tested when it starts/stops. When loading the game, it starts when the HP/MP bar appears, which is 2 frames before you actually gain control/the rest of the game appears. For going in/out of menus, time will stop when the screen fades to black when going into the menu, and start again when the menu fades to black. Those are the only considerations for timing that part.[/spoiler]

I took longer to finish this than I had planned since I switched back to trying to get the axe/soul drop, but still no result there.

Edit: I just thought about it, and it seems silly that I fight Dmitrii when I can just use the SG instead of his cutscene to do the zip. However, I'm pretty sure it's faster just to use his cutscene for the warp, so that isn't a problem.

Also, for the NG+ all bosses run, I'll probably be using a new route.

groobo

2009-10-28 09:49:30 am

boss

Can't you SG to dmitrii from the ledge above the sealed door (or from the one even higher)? Also, why don't you jump up slopes with black panther - it does save time.

Quote:

I just thought about it, and it seems silly that I fight Dmitrii when I can just use the SG instead of his cutscene to do the zip. However, I'm pretty sure it's faster just to use his cutscene for the warp, so that isn't a problem.

IIRC you acn't suspend during boss fights.

Aftermath

Edit history:

Aftermath: 2009-10-28 10:56:25 am

2009-10-28 10:46:14 am

Quits halfway

Quote from groobo:

Can't you SG to dmitrii from the ledge above the sealed door (or from the one even higher)? Also, why don't you jump up slopes with black panther - it does save time.

No, you reappear in a wall then zip to appear outside of the huge room that leads to Gergoth.

I timed it and I lost .30 seconds to not jumping with Black Panther. Of the slopes I didn't jump up, from time of the screen not scrolling to changing rooms was .533 seconds, normal Black Panther use does this in .433 seconds. There were 3 slopes where I could have easily jumped up, so .30 seconds. I don't think that I'll redo the segment/run because of it though, I lost more time from cutscene and text skipping not going perfectly.

groobo

2009-10-28 11:24:14 am

boss

It's fine then. I hope you'll submit it.

Aftermath

2009-10-28 11:48:25 am

Quits halfway

Double-checked on some timing stuff and found a couple things. Time doesn't pass during the warp select screen, which is awesome, no need to try to rush that part anymore (resulted in a couple resets in this run, too). Also, loading between rooms pauses the in-game timer for .15 seconds (9 frames). When the screen goes white to warp, it does the same.

Persona

2009-11-10 11:25:03 pm

Castlevania?

http://bbs.cvcv.net/thread-57790-1-1.html

Did Flying Armor always die to one Killer Clown attack? Unless I'm not seeing something after it because of the flash.

Aftermath

Edit history:

Aftermath: 2009-11-11 02:49:59 am

2009-11-11 02:18:36 am

Quits halfway

The person does a Rycuda after unpausing, if you stop the video at the right spot, you can see the two damage values on Flying Armor (141 then 118). The person's setup makes no sense at the start. It starts with Skelerang (enhance throwing ability) when the person throws the card, which does 141 damage, then they switch to Stolas for the next attack, whereas if the person had just started with Stolas, the card would have done 193 damage.

I really don't know why unequips and reequips the Death Scythe in the later parts. It basically means that this person doesn't know how to hit down after backdashing (as evidenced in the attack-attack-special sequence that comes up). It shouldn't add time if the person is already on the limits of the Axe rate of hit timer (have to wait 40 frames between regular swings, about double that for specials), but it looks horrendously ugly and I'd actually bet that the person does lose a few frames each cycle.

What they definitely lost time on was the Balore fight. It would have been faster to turn left before the first swing of the Death Scythe, backdash, crouch, turn right and special. Doing that would be 11 frames (if I remember the axe animations correctly), whereas attacking like that was more than 20 frames.

Bah @ the card throwing. Especially on Zephyr and getting Dead Pirate to activate.

I definitely hate TAS videos, although somehow there are actually a couple usable strategies.

I will say that I did like that the person used the Final Guard canceling in a few places. Although it definitely boggles my mind that the person knew about that obscure technique, but not about backdash canceling.

Edit: If you could, would you ask the person if throwing the Bomber Armor at the bottom of Rahab's room is faster than from the top? I haven't tested it and I think from the bottom is faster, but just wanted to know if it has actually been tested.

The person does a Rycuda after unpausing, if you stop the video at the right spot, you can see the two damage values on Flying Armor (141 then 118). The person's setup makes no sense at the start. It starts with Skelerang (enhance throwing ability) when the person throws the card, which does 141 damage, then they switch to Stolas for the next attack, whereas if the person had just started with Stolas, the card would have done 193 damage.

I really don't know why unequips and reequips the Death Scythe in the later parts. It basically means that this person doesn't know how to hit down after backdashing (as evidenced in the attack-attack-special sequence that comes up). It shouldn't add time if the person is already on the limits of the Axe rate of hit timer (have to wait 40 frames between regular swings, about double that for specials), but it looks horrendously ugly and I'd actually bet that the person does lose a few frames each cycle.

What they definitely lost time on was the Balore fight. It would have been faster to turn left before the first swing of the Death Scythe, backdash, crouch, turn right and special. Doing that would be 11 frames (if I remember the axe animations correctly), whereas attacking like that was more than 20 frames.

Bah @ the card throwing. Especially on Zephyr and getting Dead Pirate to activate.

I definitely hate TAS videos, although somehow there are actually a couple usable strategies.

I will say that I did like that the person used the Final Guard canceling in a few places. Although it definitely boggles my mind that the person knew about that obscure technique, but not about backdash canceling.

Edit: If you could, would you ask the person if throwing the Bomber Armor at the bottom of Rahab's room is faster than from the top? I haven't tested it and I think from the bottom is faster, but just wanted to know if it has actually been tested.

In_Pieces

2009-11-12 03:04:21 pm

...?

I started a practice run on julius mode today and realized that the route i used didn't work. I want to plan out a route and come up with strategys for julius mode, simply because its one of my favorite parts about the game.
First question i have, and this will determine how i plan out the route, is what triggers the opening of the mine of judgement. I started by going through lost village, beat flying armor, get yoko, go through demon guest house by triple jumping over the drawbridge, through garden of madness, beat dario, get alucard, go back and through dark chapel, alucard sword special to open up the gate to go to condemned tower, and then into mine of judgement, but it was closed.

I feel pretty dumb that it didn't work, and i can't for the life of me remember the trigger to open it. I restarted and tried beating dmitrii before dario and that didnt work either. Anyone care to shed some light on the situation for me? I thought that maybe it was beating every boss, but i'm unsure.

Satoryu

2009-11-12 03:22:25 pm

Visually Appealing

Pretty sure it's every boss. The only one I'm not 100% on is Paranoia.