Final Fantasy VIII

2014-01-01 01:49:38 am

Hey Croco! Ah i see. Im trying to run solid everytime.. but heck idk.

From todays attempt once agian i didnt get a Single commander battle.

After spider i got the 3 Soldier fight and idk why. Its so weird. Sad

i hope to get another run going soon. But will have to see when that happens. Fish Fins and Cards dont like me at all.

eLmaGus-

Edit history:

eLmaGus-: 2014-01-01 03:08:12 pm

2014-01-01 02:45:58 pm

I must simply laugh.

DtChow it also matters where and how you menu (at least to my knowledge) so you might want to take a look at that too Smiley

TengEng

2014-01-01 03:07:29 pm

Whatever, just do it quickly.

nice to see this still going on... I'll have to check out the run soon.

Caracarn

2014-01-01 06:54:42 pm

make sure when you do the fire cavern menu that you open the menu while running, and start running immediately after exiting the menu. The step counter does not increment during the fade in/out.

Dtchow

Edit history:

Dtchow: 2014-01-01 08:45:39 pm

2014-01-01 08:45:06 pm

Oh i see CaraCarn. i think i do that every now and agian but probably not always.
Something i just gotta remember i guess. Gonna do some dollet only attempts in the coming days just to try it out.

And El magus! My menus was a compl,ete mess in my 9:25 and ive changed them into an overhaul matching up more with the menus from Crocogoats run. i think they are pretty much the same
Done it that way for now in just learning the run and doing it speedy. if it comes down to my menuing it willl just have to be to run the game till i know it inside out. Cheesy

FFgamer86

2014-01-02 03:02:47 pm

SDA Speedruns: 1

Dtchow, the most important thing is movement, to what I believe. There are many screens that can be ran using just d-pad that you will be surprised you thought you would have to use the analog stick.

To give you an example, lets use the Fire Cavern since that is a simple place.

Soon as you answer 10 mins for your timer hold up on your d-pad to advance to the next screen.
During the screen transition change your input to up-right on the dpad for the 1st screen in fire cavern. When you start to get around the bend hold right on the d-pad and this will push you around the last half of the bend and onto the next screen. Most times you will end up at 9:50 on your timer as it fades but it is possible if you do it perfectly to still have 9:51 showing.

2nd screen keeping hold right on d-pad til you get more than halfway around the bend before Quistis talks to you and hold up right. When Quistis talks to you and your character stops moving, hold up on the d-pad so that you get to the next screen quick as possible.

Hold up on d-pad for the rest of the dungeon. Do your menu on the 3rd screen around halfway through. Its also probably possible to do movement quicker with analog on the 4th screen but more often than not, you will wiggle too much and possibly lose a few steps. If you just hold up on d-pad and let your character get pushed by the wall. Your encounters will be fine.

On the way out its personal preference but I always do my menu after the Buel fight instead of on the screen before. I don't know if it helps but it may give me more steps after my menu to help keep my step counter on track.

I will try to be doing more individual disc runs if you want some help with navigation since I really need to work on my notes for my new route. If you feel like your battles are coming earlier and earlier, if you open the menu in an area where you can get encounters, you can push the encounters a further bit to try and keep them back in-line. You lose time doing this but can help if you want a specific encounter to be at a certain spot.

Dtchow, the most important thing is movement, to what I believe. There are many screens that can be ran using just d-pad that you will be surprised you thought you would have to use the analog stick.

To give you an example, lets use the Fire Cavern since that is a simple place.

Soon as you answer 10 mins for your timer hold up on your d-pad to advance to the next screen.
During the screen transition change your input to up-right on the dpad for the 1st screen in fire cavern. When you start to get around the bend hold right on the d-pad and this will push you around the last half of the bend and onto the next screen. Most times you will end up at 9:50 on your timer as it fades but it is possible if you do it perfectly to still have 9:51 showing.

2nd screen keeping hold right on d-pad til you get more than halfway around the bend before Quistis talks to you and hold up right. When Quistis talks to you and your character stops moving, hold up on the d-pad so that you get to the next screen quick as possible.

Hold up on d-pad for the rest of the dungeon. Do your menu on the 3rd screen around halfway through.  Its also probably possible to do movement quicker with analog on the 4th screen but more often than not, you will wiggle too much and possibly lose a few steps. If you just hold up on d-pad and let your character get pushed by the wall. Your encounters will be fine.

On the way out its personal preference but I always do my menu after the Buel fight instead of on the screen before. I don't know if it helps but it may give me more steps after my menu to help keep my step counter on track.

I will try to be doing more individual disc runs if you want some help with navigation since I really need to work on my notes for my new route.  If you feel like your battles are coming earlier and earlier, if you open the menu in an area where you can get encounters, you can push the encounters a further bit to try and keep them back in-line. You lose time doing this but can help if you want a specific encounter to be at a certain spot.

Dtchow

2014-01-02 10:41:46 pm

Yeah. that D-pad method is what i started to use . In my latest run and my encounters are still off ?

If you watched my video its slightly weird how the encounters are happening

For instance.. I get the first encounter (double bats) on third screen by the end just as usual.. However. with D-pad im getting my Second battle
Just as im about to fight ifrit.

Now. From using the Analog and my running being terrible perhaps?

I get Bat battle as normal. But the second battle before ifrit i get in the middle of the Ifrit platform in other words afew steps earlier.

Idk how this affects it all? Im not doing a menu after Ifrit as i have combined the Ifrit menu at Dollet instead as i found the Fish Fin exp is not really needed as ifirt reaches lvl 10 by Esthar anyway.

Does the running in Dollet matters at all during the Mission?

Cause.. in theory Bridge and later is a screen where u can get a encounter right?
But the other screens with soldiers waiting does that count to the step-count aswell?
As there is a encounter on the screen? im just curious as to that could be a reason my running is bad.
It sounds far stretched to me.. but i might just aswell ask right?

Once agian. Ty for all your help. it is appreciated. Cheesy

Yeah. that D-pad method is what i started to use . In my latest run  and my encounters are still off ?

If you watched my video its slightly weird how the encounters are happening

For instance.. I get the first encounter (double bats) on third screen by the end just as usual.. However. with D-pad im getting my Second battle
Just as im about to fight ifrit.

Now. From using the Analog and my running being terrible perhaps?

I get Bat battle as normal. But the second battle before ifrit i get in the middle of the Ifrit platform in other words afew steps earlier.

Idk how this affects it all? Im not doing a menu after Ifrit as i have combined the Ifrit menu at Dollet instead as i found the Fish Fin exp is not really needed as ifirt reaches lvl 10 by Esthar anyway.

Does the running in Dollet matters at all during the Mission?

Cause.. in theory Bridge and later is a screen where u can get a encounter right?
But the other screens with soldiers waiting does that count to the step-count aswell? 
As there is a encounter on the screen? im just curious as to that could be a reason my running is bad. 
It sounds far stretched to me.. but i might just aswell ask right?

Once agian. Ty for all your help. it is appreciated. :D

Crocogoat

2014-01-02 11:59:45 pm

Your encounters in the fire cave look pretty normal actually, same enemies also. Like I said your walking is not terrible, just that the small unoptimal moments or hesitations do increment over the whole run so that is why you got the 3-soldier encounter in the radar-building. From that point on you're encounters will seem messed up compared to other runs because each encounter comes earlier and possibly on a different screen etc. wich then gives you different enemies also.

And yes I think you're right about the general idea of encounters in Dollet (and in general). Afaik only the few screens where a true random encounter (not the scripted ones) is possible matter for the battle step-count, but it's faster to walk good everywhere Wink

Dtchow

2014-01-03 12:06:08 am

Ah i see. i guess my movements just gonna come along as i run. Its only been 4 runs so far. So i guess i shouldnt be to hard on myself hehe^^

In any case.. If i happen to not get a Commander battle.. Would it be better to kill 2 Blue soldiers in Dollet. Or take 1 Grat in training Centre with your going for Grenaldo? Cause otherwise im gonna be 2AP short for Card Mode by Timber at the Store?

1 Grat = 2AP
2 Blue Soldiers = 2AP

Now im not sure how many hits a Grats needs.. but i think 2 hits total should kill it?
I might be wrong though. im not entirely sure.

FFgamer86

2014-01-03 12:52:41 am

SDA Speedruns: 1

Depends on the notes you are using. If your using caracarn's or I'm guessing Crocogoat is using same strats as Caracarn then you fight the 1 Red Soldier to get the AP Required for Card Mod. I am currently using new strats which involve fighting 3 fish battles. I can then ignore the extra fights and I get Card Mod still in same spot. This allows for more consistent runs up to the Quistis/Zell card, 5 fins almost every time. ~85%, and I use the extra fish fight to tweek some of the GF Learning ability timing and I can optimize the Menus a little bit because of it to save some time that I lose by fighting the extra fish battle. I lose 60 seconds fighting an extra battle, but save probably close to 30-40 seconds from menus/GF learning to make up for it. The net loss of 20-30 seconds is not that a big of deal to me and allows me to get more runs up to Card Luck.

One of the big advantages I get from 3 fish battles now is that I have Ifrit learn Str+20% ASAP and he actually learns it before Diablos. This allows me to refine the Blizzagas onto Squall instead of Zell which saves me a menu later switching the magic around. It also gives me Str+20% on Zell which helps me kill Diablos more consistently.

Depends on the notes you are using.  If your using caracarn's or I'm guessing Crocogoat is using same strats as Caracarn then you fight the 1 Red Soldier to get the AP Required for Card Mod.  I am currently using new strats which involve fighting 3 fish battles. I can then ignore the extra fights and I get Card Mod still in same spot. This allows for more consistent runs up to the Quistis/Zell card, 5 fins almost every time. ~85%, and I use the extra fish fight to tweek some of the GF Learning ability timing and I can optimize the Menus a little bit because of it to save some time that I lose by fighting the extra fish battle.  I lose 60 seconds fighting an extra battle, but save probably close to 30-40 seconds from menus/GF learning to make up for it.  The net loss of 20-30 seconds is not that a big of deal to me and allows me to get more runs up to Card Luck.

One of the big advantages I get from 3 fish battles now is that I have Ifrit learn Str+20% ASAP and he actually learns it before Diablos. This allows me to refine the Blizzagas onto Squall instead of Zell which saves me a menu later switching the magic around.  It also gives me Str+20% on Zell which helps me kill Diablos more consistently.

Dtchow

2014-01-03 01:23:16 am

Yeah i know theyre killing the Red soldier.

Though up to this point im not getting the Red soldier fight at all untill ive fixed my walking hence the question.

Ive seen your 3 Fish fin strat but in that case i gotta make myself own notes through the entire game which.. feels abit.. dont wanna.. Tongue

Though i do see the advantage your talking of.
Though in my case i would do it the other way around as im using Blizzaga on Gerogero for a quick kill so i would probably drop Blizzagas to selphie rather than Squall at this point. Smiley

And i dont know if i can afford the 30-40seconds loss as im already loosing like 20minutes for Sub 9. Tongue

im still working on going through my latest run.. But its a pain trying to figure out all time loss.

I know a lost 2-3minutes in Missle Base cause of being a tard.
Did a Limit break on selphie on the 3 first soldiers with 3 Thunders as i thought it was Thundaras. though they had probably not died anyway.
(instead of Rinoa Limit break / normal attacks)
Then on BGH i ended up attacking with Selphie and he started to explode which made my ATB being on wait for Rinoas Limit break to finnish it off.
it was just 1 big mess. from start to finnish.

Still working on other things. I know my menus was abit slow. but thats cause i changed where im doing them and how. So its just a slight matter of practice

Yeah i know theyre killing the Red soldier.

Though up to this point im not getting the Red soldier fight at all untill ive fixed my walking hence the question.

Ive seen your 3 Fish fin strat but in that case i gotta make myself own notes through the entire game which.. feels abit.. dont wanna.. :P
Though i do see the advantage your talking of. 
Though in my case i would do it the other way around as im using Blizzaga on Gerogero for a quick kill so i would probably drop Blizzagas to selphie rather than Squall at this point. :)
And i dont know if i can afford the 30-40seconds loss as im already loosing like 20minutes for Sub 9. :P

im still working on going through my latest run.. But its a pain trying to figure out all time loss.

I know a lost 2-3minutes in Missle Base cause of being a tard.
Did a Limit break on selphie on the 3 first soldiers  with 3 Thunders as i thought it was Thundaras. though they had probably not died anyway. 
(instead of Rinoa Limit break / normal attacks)
Then on BGH i ended up attacking with Selphie and he started to explode which made my ATB being on wait for Rinoas Limit break to finnish it off.
it was just 1 big mess. from start to finnish.

Still working on other things. I know my menus was abit slow. but thats cause i changed where im doing them and how. So its just a slight matter of practice

FFgamer86

2014-01-03 02:26:41 am

SDA Speedruns: 1

The Blizzagas go on Squall because he is junctioned with the GFs from the Granaldo fight. I do a junction-switch before Gerogero so that Selphie can cast Blizzaga on the Fake President. I am going to go through my notes and finalize them before I post on here because there was some things I wanted to test/change in the later half of the run that I feel is unneccessary or more safe.

mrdiddled

Edit history:

mrdiddled: 2014-01-08 03:02:23 pm

2014-01-08 12:56:14 pm

Quote from FFgamer86:

Dtchow, the most important thing is movement, to what I believe. There are many screens that can be ran using just d-pad that you will be surprised you thought you would have to use the analog stick.

To give you an example, lets use the Fire Cavern since that is a simple place.

Soon as you answer 10 mins for your timer hold up on your d-pad to advance to the next screen.
During the screen transition change your input to up-right on the dpad for the 1st screen in fire cavern. When you start to get around the bend hold right on the d-pad and this will push you around the last half of the bend and onto the next screen. Most times you will end up at 9:50 on your timer as it fades but it is possible if you do it perfectly to still have 9:51 showing.

2nd screen keeping hold right on d-pad til you get more than halfway around the bend before Quistis talks to you and hold up right. When Quistis talks to you and your character stops moving, hold up on the d-pad so that you get to the next screen quick as possible.

Hold up on d-pad for the rest of the dungeon. Do your menu on the 3rd screen around halfway through. Its also probably possible to do movement quicker with analog on the 4th screen but more often than not, you will wiggle too much and possibly lose a few steps. If you just hold up on d-pad and let your character get pushed by the wall. Your encounters will be fine.

On the way out its personal preference but I always do my menu after the Buel fight instead of on the screen before. I don't know if it helps but it may give me more steps after my menu to help keep my step counter on track.

I will try to be doing more individual disc runs if you want some help with navigation since I really need to work on my notes for my new route. If you feel like your battles are coming earlier and earlier, if you open the menu in an area where you can get encounters, you can push the encounters a further bit to try and keep them back in-line. You lose time doing this but can help if you want a specific encounter to be at a certain spot.

I seem to be having issues with my movement. I followed the directions you gave and still seem to get into a random on the first or second screen. It throws off my count and also my time the remainder of my run. Do I analog after I leave the Garden or is using the d-pad more effective before entering the Fire Cavern?

[quote="FFgamer86"]Dtchow, the most important thing is movement, to what I believe. There are many screens that can be ran using just d-pad that you will be surprised you thought you would have to use the analog stick.

To give you an example, lets use the Fire Cavern since that is a simple place.

Soon as you answer 10 mins for your timer hold up on your d-pad to advance to the next screen.
During the screen transition change your input to up-right on the dpad for the 1st screen in fire cavern. When you start to get around the bend hold right on the d-pad and this will push you around the last half of the bend and onto the next screen. Most times you will end up at 9:50 on your timer as it fades but it is possible if you do it perfectly to still have 9:51 showing.

2nd screen keeping hold right on d-pad til you get more than halfway around the bend before Quistis talks to you and hold up right. When Quistis talks to you and your character stops moving, hold up on the d-pad so that you get to the next screen quick as possible.

Hold up on d-pad for the rest of the dungeon. Do your menu on the 3rd screen around halfway through.  Its also probably possible to do movement quicker with analog on the 4th screen but more often than not, you will wiggle too much and possibly lose a few steps. If you just hold up on d-pad and let your character get pushed by the wall. Your encounters will be fine.

On the way out its personal preference but I always do my menu after the Buel fight instead of on the screen before. I don't know if it helps but it may give me more steps after my menu to help keep my step counter on track.

I will try to be doing more individual disc runs if you want some help with navigation since I really need to work on my notes for my new route.  If you feel like your battles are coming earlier and earlier, if you open the menu in an area where you can get encounters, you can push the encounters a further bit to try and keep them back in-line. You lose time doing this but can help if you want a specific encounter to be at a certain spot.
[/quote]

I seem to be having issues with my movement.  I followed the directions you gave and still seem to get into a random on the first or second screen.  It throws off my count and also my time the remainder of my run.  Do I analog after I leave the Garden or is using the d-pad more effective before entering the Fire Cavern?

Crocogoat

2014-01-08 06:31:50 pm

Do you start the game from a hard reset? (the game keeps steps in memory on soft-resets and saves) The walking before entering the cavern doesn't matter for random encounters.

mrdiddled

Edit history:

mrdiddled: 2014-01-08 07:28:27 pm

mrdiddled: 2014-01-08 07:28:12 pm

mrdiddled: 2014-01-08 06:53:46 pm

mrdiddled: 2014-01-08 06:41:31 pm

mrdiddled: 2014-01-08 06:37:27 pm

2014-01-08 06:36:35 pm

Quote from Crocogoat:

Do you start the game from a hard reset? (the game keeps steps in memory on soft-resets and saves) The walking before entering the cavern doesn't matter for random encounters.

I've been doing soft resets. That's good to know, that should alleviate some frustration. Smiley

ETA: I still get four-five encounters after the Ifrit fight. Is the second screen the optimal choice when using Menu manipulation, or to minimize the encounters out of the cave, should it be used on the third screen?

FFgamer86

Edit history:

FFgamer86: 2014-01-09 08:27:28 am

2014-01-09 08:26:20 am

SDA Speedruns: 1

World maps don't use the step counter for random encounters and work on a different algorithm altogether. As to which screen is better to do the menu is personal preference. I just try to do it on the screen with the encounter because I am hoping one day I menu at the exact frame to skip the encounter if its possible.

If your talking about the menu out of the cave. The menu going into the cave, I just do there because I like to see my timer when I do screen transitions on 1st 2 screens to see if my movement was optimal or not.

Dtchow

2014-01-11 09:17:24 am

Been practicing Dolelt Escape now for awhile. And i must say. I gotta be the most brain dead person when it comes to Walking.

no matter what i do. I cant seem to get a red-soldier fight in dollet. its crazy on how bad my running is. im gonna keep bash my head at it.
Used your "Routing" FFgamer to try and run well enough. but to no gain...

Well ! Off to practice some more i guess!

Dtchow

Edit history:

Dtchow: 2014-01-17 05:31:57 pm

2014-01-17 05:30:55 pm

New PB!

Final Time 9hours 4mintutes!

After many attempts and god forsaken bad cards i finally smah through with 3 / 2 Cards.

Each disc was generally good but some mistakes happend along the way.

Final time on each disc resulted in

Disc 1 - 3hours 12min
Disc 2 - 3hours 1min
Disc 3 - 2hours 21min
Disc 4 - 32 minutes

Some things i found out that generaly i could do better like.. Menu timing and such

My esthar menu was pretty fast apart from Diablos didnt have ST-mag somewhere along the run i forgot to put it on.
Space intro FMV lagged so lost 27 seconds to just pure "lagg".

No irvine first 3 on Ultimecia sucked but i did get Squall and limit breaked my way to second form
and from there i had irvine.

My previous PB was 9:17 and so i removed 13 minutes of my PB. So all in all im happy since its only my 5th completed run!
And hopefully next time its gonna be that Sub 9 Cheesy

Deathtome

Edit history:

Deathtome: 2014-01-25 07:52:21 pm

2014-01-25 07:51:00 pm

Hello guys!

I have been doing runs of this game for two months now. I finally got a VERY nice run going! A single-segment on the PC (Steam Version). 7:56:28. I wonder... is it worth submitting (3/2 cards - Irvine 1st party Ultimecia)? I did NOT change the audio pack (Original version, no mods)

I did record it to the hard drive as well, so I have a recorded version if needed. The Twitch one should have good enough quality (720p).

If anyone is interested, have a look. Smiley

I still haven't gotten a time on the Console, but I'm estimating to be at least below 8:50 on a Single-Segment on my first attempt. As soon as I get a run going (cards..) I'm only interested in SS, though.

http://www.twitch.tv/deathtome/c/3610663

puwexil

2014-01-27 09:22:17 am

Professional Second Banana

That Twitch recording cannot be submitted due to having audio commentary; but if you have a local recording with original game audio then go for it if you think the time's good (I don't know enough about PC FF8 to say personally).

Also, if you haven't already I'd recommend posting a sample recording on our tech support forum (https://forum.speeddemosarchive.com/board/tech_support.html) to make sure everything's OK with your recording setup, and check out our PC capture KB at https://kb.speeddemosarchive.com/Digital_Capture.

Deathtome

2014-01-27 08:59:04 pm

Thanks for the info Puwexil!

I see... I only have the Twitch thing recorded with commentary, but with higher quality. That's good to know until the next.

It's difficult to know how good the time is when there is no one to compare with. Either way, I am done with the PC version now.

Thanks for the links. I'll make sure to use it next time I am planning on doing a recorded run. Smiley

Wypy

Edit history:

Wypy: 2014-01-28 04:33:58 am

Wypy: 2014-01-28 04:33:48 am

Wypy: 2014-01-28 04:33:32 am

2014-01-28 04:33:20 am

Deal with it!

Jester1610 on twitch who has a 7:52:44 on FF8 PC RTA. He also goes for SS as well and was on sub 7:50 pace the past days.
Maybe ~7:45 is a realistic goal (for now) to look at for RTA and add ~90 seconds for SS.

DuckTalesGuru29

2014-02-10 05:27:40 pm

Howdy everyone. I currently have the best time on DuckTales Remastered for the Wii U leaderboards. I played through Final Fantasy 8 several years ago, but have never attempted to speed run. To just compare and contrast, Ducktales Remastered can be beaten around 35 minutes, whereas FF8 takes 7.5 + just to go through one run. I have to say that it must take lots of commitment and perseverance to perfect runs on that game. I feel sorry for the player that gets through 6 or 7 hours and has an untimely death that ruins the run and starts you over. In any case up, keep up the good work. One last question: where are the top times listed for this game and other games for that matter? I'd be curious.

Crocogoat

2014-03-06 11:56:20 pm

First of all congrats to Caracarn for getting 8:38:26!

Second about times, I might as well put this in this thread: http://finalfantasyspeedruns.wikidot.com/

As far as I'm aware there is no such thing yet? anyway you can consider this a placeholder until someone makes a real good one or something else better comes along.

I've been working on this for a day or so. At first I thought of just making it for myself in some html-file but after finding a wiki that I could "lock down"
I thought why not. This is quite far from finished, and will try stay very simple, just an easy thing people can use to look up quickly.

It's inspired by http://www.pokemonspeedruns.com , but I'm not going to add strategy stuff and all that.

AzStrocyte

2014-04-10 03:47:04 pm

Congratulations for your new WR RTA crocogoat ^^

I wonder why you don't make distinction between RTA and SS on the leaderboard psx? I mean, noone is playing SS anymore ?