Final Fantasy IX Speedrun

2006-09-15 06:15:51 pm

Everything's better with Magitek

Yeah, I've been setting the PS2 to fast disk speed, if that's what you're referring to. I'm pretty sure it would be faster to skip FMV's with a PS1, because you wouldn't have to wait for the drawer to open and close.

I've started wondering if I've been saving too often. Right now I'm at the moogle in the Ice Cavern (time 51:34), and it's save number 7. I've been saving so often because of all the randomness in enemy encounters and attacks. Do you think that will be too many segments?

Lag.Com

2006-09-15 06:21:36 pm

sda loyalist

That seems quite high. You probably don't want to end up with a 100 segments, but if it's what it takes to get a smooth run, go for it.

It better be REALLY good for 7 segments up until that. :p Can you give us some info?

Essentia

2006-09-15 10:25:39 pm

Everything's better with Magitek

Below are some notes on each segment that I've got. The places and times listed are at the end of the segment. I also skipped every FMV except for the one noted, and didn't pick up any treasure unless noted.

1 Alexandria/Steeple 00:05:53
-set Config options
*cursor->memory
*default run
*fastest battle and message speed
*target window->always
-stole Wrist from Baku with Cinna, everyone else attacked

2 A. Castle/Guardhouse 00:14:47
-started using Fast Disk option
-Baku, Genero, and Benero all used stage magic, so fight was longer than it should have been
-impressed all 100 nobles on first try in swordfight and picked up the Moonstone (not sure if I'll need it, though)

3 Prima Vista/Crash Site (right after crashing) 00:28:02
-stole Silk Shirt from Steiner (first fight)
-during second fight with Bomb, killed everyone off except Garnet to decrease the dialogue spoken

4 Prima Vista/Crash Site (right before entering Evil Forest second time) 00:38:58
-equipped Zidane optimum (might not have needed to do this)
-no random encounters in Evil Forest
-forced battles went fine
-didn't have to heal during battle with Baku because he missed with one attack

5 Evil Forest/Spring 00:40:06
-forgot to use Fast Disk option on this segment
-no encounters in Evil Forest first part

6 Gunitas Basin (right outside Ice Cavern) 00:47:10
-no enocunters in Evil Forest second part
-watched FMV of Plant Brain (6 seconds faster than skipping)
-Zidane suicided to bring in Blank right away
-killed Plant Brain in one round with Fire, Fire Sword, and Blank's attack
*Plant Brain used Pollen, but luckily Blank didn't miss his attack
-revived Zidane and unequipped Blank
-battled 3 Plant Spiders
*Zidane killed Blank for more experience
*all spiders got a chance to attack, but didn't kill anyone
*Vivi killed all with one Fire spell
-walked to Ice Cavern while the words "Mist Continent" were on the screen to avoid random encounters

7 Ice Cavern/Cave 00:51:34 11644 gil
-didn't have to wait for wind to disappear in first room
-2 encounters (I haven't ever gotten through without fewer than 2)
*first: 3 enemis, all attacked, then I used Flee & lost 33 gil
*second: ran away naturally before anything attacked
-used Vivi to get the Mage Masher (so Sealion battle will go quicker), also got the Potion right above it (because you have to before you can get the Mage Masher)
-in last room with wind, I ran straight through the first but had to run around the second to avoid a battle

After looking at this, I think I could combine the first 3 segments--I split it up because of the swordfight, because I've practiced it so much that I can almost always do it on the first try. I could also combine 4 and 5, but I split that up to make sure that I didn't get any random encounters in Evil Forest. Putting them together increases the chance that I'll get one, though

Below are some notes on each segment that I've got.  The places and times listed are at the end of the segment.  I also skipped every FMV except for the one noted, and didn't pick up any treasure unless noted.

[b]1 Alexandria/Steeple 00:05:53[/b]
-set Config options
 *cursor->memory
 *default run
 *fastest battle and message speed
 *target window->always
-stole Wrist from Baku with Cinna, everyone else attacked

[b]2 A. Castle/Guardhouse 00:14:47[/b]
-started using Fast Disk option
-Baku, Genero, and Benero all used stage magic, so fight was longer than it should have been
-impressed all 100 nobles on first try in swordfight and picked up the Moonstone (not sure if I'll need it, though)

[b]3 Prima Vista/Crash Site (right after crashing) 00:28:02[/b]
-stole Silk Shirt from Steiner (first fight)
-during second fight with Bomb, killed everyone off except Garnet to decrease the dialogue spoken

[b]4 Prima Vista/Crash Site (right before entering Evil Forest second time) 00:38:58[/b]
-equipped Zidane optimum (might not have needed to do this)
-no random encounters in Evil Forest
-forced battles went fine
-didn't have to heal during battle with Baku because he missed with one attack

[b]5 Evil Forest/Spring 00:40:06[/b]
-forgot to use Fast Disk option on this segment
-no encounters in Evil Forest first part

[b]6 Gunitas Basin (right outside Ice Cavern) 00:47:10[/b]
-no enocunters in Evil Forest second part
-watched FMV of Plant Brain (6 seconds faster than skipping)
-Zidane suicided to bring in Blank right away
-killed Plant Brain in one round with Fire, Fire Sword, and Blank's attack
 *Plant Brain used Pollen, but luckily Blank didn't miss his attack
-revived Zidane and unequipped Blank
-battled 3 Plant Spiders
 *Zidane killed Blank for more experience
 *all spiders got a chance to attack, but didn't kill anyone
 *Vivi killed all with one Fire spell
-walked to Ice Cavern while the words "Mist Continent" were on the screen to avoid random encounters

[b]7 Ice Cavern/Cave      00:51:34      11644 gil[/b]
-didn't have to wait for wind to disappear in first room
-2 encounters (I haven't ever gotten through without fewer than 2)
 *first: 3 enemis, all attacked, then I used Flee & lost 33 gil
 *second: ran away naturally before anything attacked
-used Vivi to get the Mage Masher (so Sealion battle will go quicker), also got the Potion right above it (because you have to before you can get the Mage Masher)
-in last room with wind, I ran straight through the first but had to run around the second to avoid a battle

After looking at this, I think I could combine the first 3 segments--I split it up because of the swordfight, because I've practiced it so much that I can almost always do it on the first try.  I could also combine 4 and 5, but I split that up to make sure that I didn't get any random encounters in Evil Forest.  Putting them together increases the chance that I'll get one, though

darkwasabi

2006-09-16 12:04:10 am

King of hearts

Looks good so far. I'd say if you are tempted to start over, you should do so once you complete the run. When I did VIII the first time, I discovered some things to save time, and also many things I did that were completely unnecessary.

Essentia

2006-09-24 07:41:50 pm

Everything's better with Magitek

I've decided I'm not going to start over until I've finished this run. I'm being conservative on this run--buying more than what I'll probably need, things like that. I want to see what will actually help, and then on my next run I'll get only what I need.

After reading the FFVIII thread, I started wondering if it would be faster on this run to shorten people's names. However, I don't think it'll really help much on this game because of the way the text works. As soon as you press X, all the text appears on the screen instead of scrolling on, so I don't think it'll matter how long the names are.

BTW, update on my practice run: I just left Lindblum and am outside Qu's Marsh with time 01:51:56. This last segment didn't go so well, though. I did the cotton robe trick to make money, but since I didn't have much money to begin with, I had to synth/sell cotton robes 7 times. That'll be something to improve on the next run.

killswitcher

2006-09-25 06:28:53 am

This is my favorite FF next to VII. I'm looking forward to this one.

Lag.Com

2006-09-25 10:21:37 am

sda loyalist

What's your plan for Gizamaluke then? I always had to level a tad before attacking him. Auto-Potion all the way I guess Smiley

Essentia

Edit history:

Essentia: 2006-09-25 04:59:14 pm

2006-09-25 04:33:29 pm

Everything's better with Magitek

I'm not planning to level up. Right now everyone in my party is on level 2, but they should gain some levels from the forced black mage battles in the grotto. My plan for Gizamaluke is this: I'll have Quina learn Limit Glove before entering the grotto (can be learned from Mandragora just outside of South Gate), then just before Gizamaluke I'll have Quina get knocked out in a battle, then revive Quina until he has exactly 1 hp (may take a few resets...). Then one Limit Glove should finish Gizamaluke off. This is the plan for most of the bosses where I have Quina.

Quote:

This is my favorite FF next to VII. I'm looking forward to this one.

I'm glad to hear that, although this is still a long way from being finished. It's nice to know that people are looking forward to it, though.

CubbieBlue66

2006-09-25 07:08:46 pm

Drunken Fool

Quote:

I'm not planning to level up. Right now everyone in my party is on level 2, but they should gain some levels from the forced black mage battles in the grotto. My plan for Gizamaluke is this: I'll have Quina learn Limit Glove before entering the grotto (can be learned from Mandragora just outside of South Gate), then just before Gizamaluke I'll have Quina get knocked out in a battle, then revive Quina until he has exactly 1 hp (may take a few resets...). Then one Limit Glove should finish Gizamaluke off. This is the plan for most of the bosses where I have Quina.

I'm glad to hear that, although this is still a long way from being finished. It's nice to know that people are looking forward to it, though.

Well if it's encouragement you're looking for, I'm eagerly awaiting the run too.

miluda

2006-09-25 08:10:23 pm

Good luck on the run.

Brings back memories from the Excalibur II run I did years ago :).

darkwasabi

2006-09-25 08:12:43 pm

King of hearts

Quote:

Well if it's encouragement you're looking for, I'm eagerly awaiting the run too.

Ditto, I can't wait for this either. [smiley barrage deleted]

CannibalK9

2006-09-25 08:16:25 pm

give me your eyes!!!

Quote:

[smiley barrage deleted]

You wrote that yourself didn't you... it was too fast and I don't think any mods are on... ahhh *pop*

Encouragement! This was one my favourites and I would really enjoy watching it through again, I still can't get over the tactics used for rpg speedruns so all the more because of that!

darkwasabi

2006-09-25 10:02:44 pm

King of hearts

Quote:

You wrote that yourself didn't you... it was too fast and I don't think any mods are on... ahhh *pop*

Yup, I'm one step ahead!

Fragmaster01

2006-09-26 01:36:34 am

Wiggle wiggle

Wow, not bad. I did a trial run a while back, and I was wondering how you beat my time of 53:23 at the Ice cave, but I see that you didn't have any encounters in the first part of Evil forest(I had 2). Lookin good.

Essentia

2006-09-26 03:54:09 am

Everything's better with Magitek

Oh wow, look at all the encouragement! Just keep in mind that I'm working on a Master's in computer science right now, so I don't have tremendous amounts of time right now to devote on this. Still, it's something to keep me from going insane from homework and working on my thesis.*

Quote:

Wow, not bad. I did a trial run a while back, and I was wondering how you beat my time of 53:23 at the Ice cave, but I see that you didn't have any encounters in the first part of Evil forest(I had 2). Lookin good.

I'm trying to avoid encounters as much as possible. So far, I'm right before Gizamaluke's Grotto with a total of 4 random encounters (although one of them was on purpose so I could get Limit Glove).

*Instead, I get to go insane from repeats of R+L+Start+Select! BTW, mandragoras are evil.

Lag.Com

2006-09-26 11:28:33 am

sda loyalist

Ah, Limit Glove. Fair enough. Ready for lots more resets? Roll Eyes

burnin_angr_inside

2006-09-27 02:36:42 pm

seven swell

you should try and do it fast enough that when you get to disc four under 12:00:00 you recieve excalibur II

CannibalK9

Edit history:

CannibalK9: 2006-09-27 02:54:11 pm

2006-09-27 02:53:54 pm

give me your eyes!!!

I believe the estimate is somewhere in the region of eight hours... but I have no strong idea.

Whatever it is, if you can't get Excalibur II in a speedrun, how can you get it?

Will it even make enough difference to the final battles to compensate for the time required to pick it up? I never got it of course (though I did leave the game to tick over 99hrs 59mins 59secs... it goes back to 0 but the time is in red and you can't get the sword Angry

::))

Essentia

2006-09-27 03:22:36 pm

Everything's better with Magitek

I don't really have a good estimate for my final time on this (that's why I'm doing a "practice" run), but the Ultima Garden time is 7:28, so I'm hoping to get sub 8:00. I haven't decided yet whether I'll actually pick up the Excalibur II, mainly because I haven't decided who I'm going to use in the final battles. If I don't use Steiner then it definitely won't be worth it, and even if I do use him I still might not pick it up. We'll just have to see when I get there...

Quote:

Will it even make enough difference to the final battles to compensate for the time required to pick it up? I never got it of course (though I did leave the game to tick over 99hrs 59mins 59secs... it goes back to 0 but the time is in red and you can't get the sword Angry

::))

Wow, how long it take for that to happen?

CannibalK9

2006-09-27 03:53:33 pm

give me your eyes!!!

Quote:

Wow, how long it take for that to happen?

erm... surprisingly enough, 100 hours! I didn't actually play for that long, I just left it overnight a few times out of curiosity.

Essentia

2006-09-27 04:24:41 pm

Everything's better with Magitek

Quote:

erm... surprisingly enough, 100 hours! I didn't actually play for that long, I just left it overnight a few times out of curiosity.

Okay, yeah, my question was dumb! (I realized that after I posted.) I guess I just wanted to know how long you left it sitting without actually playing.

Speaking of Ultima Garden, I finally got it to translate on my computer. The final ending time on that is 7:58, and at my current save I'm 17 minutes behind their run, so many I won't be sub 8 hours. I'm gonna see if I can get anything out of their strategy. (Yay for Engrish!)

burnin_angr_inside

2006-09-28 12:36:18 am

seven swell

my friend had played it and he siad he recieved excalibur II in the area supposed to. when i asked him what time he had i believe he said somewhere around 13:00 or 14:00

gmacd

2006-09-30 06:45:19 pm

I'm glad someone picked this up. I wasn't going to be able to do it.

Paused

2006-09-30 07:58:09 pm

Quote:

Will it even make enough difference to the final battles to compensate for the time required to pick it up? I never got it of course (though I did leave the game to tick over 99hrs 59mins 59secs... it goes back to 0 but the time is in red and you can't get the sword Angry

::))

I believe it takes between 2 and 2 1/2 years for the clock to restart making the the Excalibur II available for another 12 hours .

CannibalK9

2006-09-30 08:22:03 pm

give me your eyes!!!

Quote:

I believe it takes between 2 and 2 1/2 years for the clock to restart making the the Excalibur II available for another 12 hours .

.......

where might that rumour have come from? I hope somebody managed to rip the game apart digitally somehow and somehow found some sort of code that codes for the timer and figured it out from there... the alternative is too horrible to imagine...