My feelings on The Demon Rush
Game Page: Doesn't exist yet
'Lenophis's run
Verifier Responses
Decision: Accept
Reason: It's a good run.
'Lenophis's run
Verifier Responses
Quote:
The segments seem to be consistent (when you realise he's using two different memory cards). There aren't any cheats used in the run and the video seems to be synched.
The initial setup segments are well played, and he's quick about buying equipment. He picks his fights well throughout the run, but there a lot of random battles in a few of them. There's only one segment where this isn't easily excusable due to the encounter rate and lack of opportunity to save, and even there he only loses half a minute or so in a lengthy segment.
The route is well planned and he doesn't waste time following the wrong route. There are a fair number of missed menu options which cost a few seconds; he mentions something about a controller glitch which personally I haven't come across, but it's widely reported and doesn't cost much time, so it's not a problem.
He picks his chance to set his party up in the Ice Cave, which goes well, but there's a pretty tricky moment towards the end of the segment where the party is almost wiped out by a group of flayers, meaning he only has one character for much of the next segment. It doesn't seem to waste any time and, that late in such a long, difficult segment, it's not on its own grounds to reject the run in general.
I don't think there's any good justification for rejecting this run, so it's an accept.
The initial setup segments are well played, and he's quick about buying equipment. He picks his fights well throughout the run, but there a lot of random battles in a few of them. There's only one segment where this isn't easily excusable due to the encounter rate and lack of opportunity to save, and even there he only loses half a minute or so in a lengthy segment.
The route is well planned and he doesn't waste time following the wrong route. There are a fair number of missed menu options which cost a few seconds; he mentions something about a controller glitch which personally I haven't come across, but it's widely reported and doesn't cost much time, so it's not a problem.
He picks his chance to set his party up in the Ice Cave, which goes well, but there's a pretty tricky moment towards the end of the segment where the party is almost wiped out by a group of flayers, meaning he only has one character for much of the next segment. It doesn't seem to waste any time and, that late in such a long, difficult segment, it's not on its own grounds to reject the run in general.
I don't think there's any good justification for rejecting this run, so it's an accept.
Quote:
Segments seem consistent minus the non-recorded save game load in segment 2. Audio/video look synched, and I found no cheating.
That said, there are some segments that are really bad with random battles. I feel that some segments (8 in particular) could have used a few more runs to see if he got better random battle luck, but the run overall seems good. I think an extra tent and splitting segment 8 would have been a good idea to help with the random battles.
The route seems good. I cant find any issues with it and I actually enjoyed the near-death at the end of the Ice Cave. I think it gives the run a bit of suspense that makes it more interesting to watch.
My only issue is the controller bug mentioned. I cant seem to find any information on it, but I also think quick menu navigation is a bit of a learned skill, and doesnt really add much time to the run. That being said, if the runner could either find a new copy or a good controller and get his menu navigation down, it would make for a cleaner looking run.
Overall, I found it enjoyable to watch and everything that needed to be executed well seemed to be. Im going to give this a thumbs up and hope the runner keeps trying to improve it.
Verdict: Accept
That said, there are some segments that are really bad with random battles. I feel that some segments (8 in particular) could have used a few more runs to see if he got better random battle luck, but the run overall seems good. I think an extra tent and splitting segment 8 would have been a good idea to help with the random battles.
The route seems good. I cant find any issues with it and I actually enjoyed the near-death at the end of the Ice Cave. I think it gives the run a bit of suspense that makes it more interesting to watch.
My only issue is the controller bug mentioned. I cant seem to find any information on it, but I also think quick menu navigation is a bit of a learned skill, and doesnt really add much time to the run. That being said, if the runner could either find a new copy or a good controller and get his menu navigation down, it would make for a cleaner looking run.
Overall, I found it enjoyable to watch and everything that needed to be executed well seemed to be. Im going to give this a thumbs up and hope the runner keeps trying to improve it.
Verdict: Accept
Quote:
Comments
tl;dr version:
Pros: Substantial improvement execution wise over previous submission.
Cons: Many of the same inconsistencies exist from previous attempt (battle menu hesitation/uncertainty, some movement errors, general menu navigation), and some elements of planning I simply don't agree with, primarily where some segment breaks could have/should have been and were not (led to needless amount of random encounters in some cases).
Decision: Accept
Reason: It's enough of an improvement to accept, but it's a borderline accept for me. I would expect a segmented run to be much cleaner in terms of movement and menu navigation. It's an RPG, nothing really changes from attempt to attempt other than what enemies do in battle and NPC movements..
Long version:
Segment 1: Very surprised you allowed that minor blunder with the chain mail buying. You spent time modifying the screen color? Really? Curiously, the g from Imzog disappears after the file is saved.
Segment 2: An absolutely amazing pirates fight makes up for some movement gaffes leading up to it.
Segment 6: I love you, runner, for splitting up trek to castle in order to make Astos deathless, this was one of my biggest complaints of your last run, there is NO REASON to allow an Astos death.
Segment 8: From the castle to the ship is about a good 1 minute 30 seconds to 2 minutes of wasted time on random battles, this should not have been allowed, in the future I would suggest planning to save in front of the witch's house and focusing on minimizing the amount of random battles between the castle and there. This is one section of the planning that I absolutely disagree with, the entire segment by itself has probably 3-4 minutes of needlessly wasted time, in the future I would suggest splitting this one up into no less than 3 segments.
Segment 12: I'm honestly shocked this segment was kept.. between the menu disaster in the battle at around 2:40 and the bad luck with status effects, this really is a pretty bad segment.
Segment 13: By this point I'm wondering if it would be better to have 2 RMs and 2 F instead of 3 F 1 RM for the extra magic charges, healing status effects seems to waste more time than if you just outright killed some of the fights that they are prevalent in, it would lead to better levels and thus higher success rates later on and with 2 RMs, you double your chances of wiping out the field before any enemies move, and it would also give you the luxury of fighting certain battles that you would otherwise run away from, also really glad that you skipped the leveling off the Bone Dragons.
Segment 15: The amount of hesitation and uncertainty during battles in this segment is at a pretty high level, also, that close call at the end was so ridiculous, I've never seen something like that before, I probably would have retried this segment some more times to see if I could get a better result, but as it is, that was just some horrible luck.
Segment 16: The airship controls always were a pain in the ass for me too.
Segment 22: I assume that resting at the Cornelia inn was due to not having enough Cottages at the end due to the accidental use of one earlier. It's not a big deal, I guess, but kind of sloppy, especially since you have so much money left over.
Segment 23: Wow.. if you were REALLY adamant about healing in battle using the Healing Staff to get your HPs back up, you really should have thought about getting at least 1 of the 2 Healing Helms. That would have saved a whole lot of time instead of using single potions. The fact that you didn't mention this as a blunder is disappointing. The Ice2 against the first set of Aquos seemed needless, as the Knights were going to OHKO them anyways. Also, since you got the Masamune, why didn't you target fire in the random battles a little more efficiently? I'm pretty sure the Masamune Knight would have one shotted pretty much anything at that point, but a few of his attacks were wasted on weakened enemies. As well, using the Excalibur Knight instead of the Masamune Knight to attack Tiamat seemed like a blunder to me. The Masamune is stronger. I also feel like a single Haste and Giant's Glove on the Excalibur Knight would have been more efficient than using Healing Staff with him. Those few extra good damage attacks probably would have ended the fight one round sooner, and those spells take up less animation time than the total frames for all the Healing Staff uses.
Overall: Let's not mince words, this run was a bumpy ride. There was some planning that I simply did not agree with (for example, segment 8 being as long as it was, needlessly), and a lot of what I was really hard on the runner about last time has persisted, ESPECIALLY the hesitation in battles. Runner, I understand this is a hard game, but you had to have redone these segments 100s of times at times. You know where every single item is in your menu, you should have a plan for every formation that you encounter. It's a segmented run, you can plan for just about every occurrence in the limited amount of things that can happen in each segment. I mean, I'm not even talking about bad luck or anything like that at this point, just straight up things that can be corrected through repetition, as well as more segment breaks to minimize the amount of random battles. A shame, this run really could have looked quite a bit cleaner. That being said, this attempt is a substantial improvement over the previous one, and thus, I accept. However, I really hope you continue to improve this.
tl;dr version:
Pros: Substantial improvement execution wise over previous submission.
Cons: Many of the same inconsistencies exist from previous attempt (battle menu hesitation/uncertainty, some movement errors, general menu navigation), and some elements of planning I simply don't agree with, primarily where some segment breaks could have/should have been and were not (led to needless amount of random encounters in some cases).
Decision: Accept
Reason: It's enough of an improvement to accept, but it's a borderline accept for me. I would expect a segmented run to be much cleaner in terms of movement and menu navigation. It's an RPG, nothing really changes from attempt to attempt other than what enemies do in battle and NPC movements..
Long version:
Segment 1: Very surprised you allowed that minor blunder with the chain mail buying. You spent time modifying the screen color? Really? Curiously, the g from Imzog disappears after the file is saved.
Segment 2: An absolutely amazing pirates fight makes up for some movement gaffes leading up to it.
Segment 6: I love you, runner, for splitting up trek to castle in order to make Astos deathless, this was one of my biggest complaints of your last run, there is NO REASON to allow an Astos death.
Segment 8: From the castle to the ship is about a good 1 minute 30 seconds to 2 minutes of wasted time on random battles, this should not have been allowed, in the future I would suggest planning to save in front of the witch's house and focusing on minimizing the amount of random battles between the castle and there. This is one section of the planning that I absolutely disagree with, the entire segment by itself has probably 3-4 minutes of needlessly wasted time, in the future I would suggest splitting this one up into no less than 3 segments.
Segment 12: I'm honestly shocked this segment was kept.. between the menu disaster in the battle at around 2:40 and the bad luck with status effects, this really is a pretty bad segment.
Segment 13: By this point I'm wondering if it would be better to have 2 RMs and 2 F instead of 3 F 1 RM for the extra magic charges, healing status effects seems to waste more time than if you just outright killed some of the fights that they are prevalent in, it would lead to better levels and thus higher success rates later on and with 2 RMs, you double your chances of wiping out the field before any enemies move, and it would also give you the luxury of fighting certain battles that you would otherwise run away from, also really glad that you skipped the leveling off the Bone Dragons.
Segment 15: The amount of hesitation and uncertainty during battles in this segment is at a pretty high level, also, that close call at the end was so ridiculous, I've never seen something like that before, I probably would have retried this segment some more times to see if I could get a better result, but as it is, that was just some horrible luck.
Segment 16: The airship controls always were a pain in the ass for me too.
Segment 22: I assume that resting at the Cornelia inn was due to not having enough Cottages at the end due to the accidental use of one earlier. It's not a big deal, I guess, but kind of sloppy, especially since you have so much money left over.
Segment 23: Wow.. if you were REALLY adamant about healing in battle using the Healing Staff to get your HPs back up, you really should have thought about getting at least 1 of the 2 Healing Helms. That would have saved a whole lot of time instead of using single potions. The fact that you didn't mention this as a blunder is disappointing. The Ice2 against the first set of Aquos seemed needless, as the Knights were going to OHKO them anyways. Also, since you got the Masamune, why didn't you target fire in the random battles a little more efficiently? I'm pretty sure the Masamune Knight would have one shotted pretty much anything at that point, but a few of his attacks were wasted on weakened enemies. As well, using the Excalibur Knight instead of the Masamune Knight to attack Tiamat seemed like a blunder to me. The Masamune is stronger. I also feel like a single Haste and Giant's Glove on the Excalibur Knight would have been more efficient than using Healing Staff with him. Those few extra good damage attacks probably would have ended the fight one round sooner, and those spells take up less animation time than the total frames for all the Healing Staff uses.
Overall: Let's not mince words, this run was a bumpy ride. There was some planning that I simply did not agree with (for example, segment 8 being as long as it was, needlessly), and a lot of what I was really hard on the runner about last time has persisted, ESPECIALLY the hesitation in battles. Runner, I understand this is a hard game, but you had to have redone these segments 100s of times at times. You know where every single item is in your menu, you should have a plan for every formation that you encounter. It's a segmented run, you can plan for just about every occurrence in the limited amount of things that can happen in each segment. I mean, I'm not even talking about bad luck or anything like that at this point, just straight up things that can be corrected through repetition, as well as more segment breaks to minimize the amount of random battles. A shame, this run really could have looked quite a bit cleaner. That being said, this attempt is a substantial improvement over the previous one, and thus, I accept. However, I really hope you continue to improve this.
Decision: Accept
Reason: It's a good run.
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