SGDQ 2013 Runner and Game Information

Kiyura

Edit history:

Kiyura: 2013-07-15 05:14:12 pm

Kiyura: 2013-07-15 03:09:17 pm

Kiyura: 2013-07-15 03:09:01 pm

2013-07-15 02:53:29 pm

Wiiaboo

In an effort to make the hosting a little better, we're going to try compiling a cheat sheet of basic information for each run. If you are a runner or someone who knows something about a game, please post about it in this thread. You are free to include or leave out as much as you like. Please do not post personal information (first list below) about a runner without their approval. The first list is runner info that they are free to provide, and if they do so understand that the hosts can and will plug it on stream. The second list is game and run info that anyone can provide.

- Runner's real name (Only if you're comfortable with this being widely known)
- Runner's age (Samesies)
- Runner's country/state of origin (Yup ^) (Also, don't get more specific, except repping your city I guess)
- How long runner has been speedrunning
- Other games the runner runs or streams
- (And note that we should already be collecting your Twitch channel and Twitter to put up, so we'll have that)

- Game history and interesting trivia
- History of the run itself (if more interesting than "I came, I saw, I routed")
- Other people who run this game now, or who have run it in the past
- Interesting glitches and skips

Thread title:

In an effort to make the hosting a little better, we're going to try compiling a cheat sheet of basic information for each run. If you are a runner or someone who knows something about a game, please post about it in this thread. You are free to include or leave out as much as you like. [b]Please do not post personal information (first list below) about a runner without their approval.[/b] The first list is runner info that they are free to provide, and if they do so understand that the hosts can and will plug it on stream. The second list is game and run info that anyone can provide.

- Runner's real name [b](Only if you're comfortable with this being widely known)[/b]
- Runner's age [b](Samesies)[/b]
- Runner's country/state of origin [b](Yup ^)[/b] (Also, don't get more specific, except repping your city I guess)
- How long runner has been speedrunning
- Other games the runner runs or streams
- (And note that we should already be collecting your Twitch channel and Twitter to put up, so we'll have that)

- Game history and interesting trivia
- History of the run itself (if more interesting than "I came, I saw, I routed")
- Other people who run this game now, or who have run it in the past
- Interesting glitches and skips

Kiyura

2013-07-15 02:59:49 pm

Wiiaboo

I'm honestly not sure if we should even take down real names and ages. It might make some people feel obligated to provide them if everyone else is, even if they don't really want it out there. Maybe this thread can also be discussion about that.

TrUShade

Edit history:

TrUShade: 2013-07-17 07:35:42 am

2013-07-15 03:06:14 pm

The TrUest of Shades

Runner's Country: Canada
How long: 2 years
http://twitch.tv/trushade @TrUShadeSDA

Other games
- Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City
- Dragon Warrior Monster 2: Cobi's Story
- Kirby's Dream Land 2 (Learning)

Kirby's Dream Land is a 1992 third party developed platforming video game developed by HAL Laboratory and published by Nintendo for the Game Boy handheld video game console. By May 28, 1995 Kirby's Dream Land had sold 1.3 million copies, making it the fourth biggest Game Boy release to date.

Current WR is by mugg1991 at 11:29
Other runner include Bangerra who has the SDA submitted time of 11:50

On a side note: Please make sure to get the capitalization right in my name -_- (have seen many different capitalization of my name already)

Brossentia

Edit history:

Brossentia: 2013-07-16 01:47:14 pm

Brossentia: 2013-07-16 11:14:56 am

Brossentia: 2013-07-16 10:57:12 am

Brossentia: 2013-07-16 10:56:55 am

Brossentia: 2013-07-15 04:19:01 pm

Brossentia: 2013-07-15 03:35:54 pm

2013-07-15 03:35:12 pm

No pain, no gain

Alright! I think this is great. Also, I have no problem with giving my name and age. I think it's fine for me, but others can keep it to themselves, I guess.

--Brian Lee Cook
--27
--USA/Utah
--Speedrunning for 2 years, since SGDQ 2011.
--Current streams include FFIV, Bugs Bunny's Birthday Blowout, and Xena. Previously ran Athena, LittleBigPlanet, and Fester's Quest
--http://twitch.tv/brossentia

Final Fantasy IV
--FFIV came out as the second game in the US. This is generally called "easy type" now because the game was made considerably easier, removing many of the original's features. Even so, it's one of the most loved RPGs from the Super Nintendo era.
--I've been routing this since January of this year. Basically, I found out about a pretty major glitch, and I wanted to work it into the run. Since then, Nitrodon decided that he wanted to optimize the glitch, and with his work, another 10 or so minutes were chopped off. Because of the amount of stairs involved, we call this route DieHard%.
--Obdajr, RaneofSotN, and Crumps2 have all run FFIV in the past. Obdajr holds the record for the full game run.
--The Mist skip and the 64-floor glitch are two major highlights. This run uses underflows with both MP and inventory. Also, upt Co.

Bible Adventures
--The creators of this game were not given the Seal of Quality (for obvious reasons), but they decided to go around Nintendo and create their own cart. Bible Adventures is known for its shoddy programming, monotonous music, and--of course--throwing Baby Moses into the river.
--I wanted to run this game, but the Noah and David sections are just collecting games and, in general, are a major pain. Baby Moses, however, is endearing. I started running this game in early 2013. The route itself isn't hard, but it requires precision and patience with the game's crappy physics.
--Who the hell would run this game?
--The most notable glitch is the river clip. Other glitches are unintentional.

Alright! I think this is great. Also, I have no problem with giving my name and age. I think it's fine for me, but others can keep it to themselves, I guess.

--Brian Lee Cook
--27
--USA/Utah
--Speedrunning for 2 years, since SGDQ 2011.
--Current streams include FFIV, Bugs Bunny's Birthday Blowout, and Xena. Previously ran Athena, LittleBigPlanet, and Fester's Quest
--http://twitch.tv/brossentia

[b]Final Fantasy IV[/b]
--FFIV came out as the second game in the US. This is generally called "easy type" now because the game was made considerably easier, removing many of the original's features. Even so, it's one of the most loved RPGs from the Super Nintendo era.
--I've been routing this since January of this year. Basically, I found out about a pretty major glitch, and I wanted to work it into the run. Since then, Nitrodon decided that he wanted to optimize the glitch, and with his work, another 10 or so minutes were chopped off. Because of the amount of stairs involved, we call this route DieHard%.
--Obdajr, RaneofSotN, and Crumps2 have all run FFIV in the past. Obdajr holds the record for the full game run.
--The Mist skip and the 64-floor glitch are two major highlights. This run uses underflows with both MP and inventory. Also, upt Co.

[b]Bible Adventures[/b]
--The creators of this game were not given the Seal of Quality (for obvious reasons), but they decided to go around Nintendo and create their own cart. Bible Adventures is known for its shoddy programming, monotonous music, and--of course--throwing Baby Moses into the river.
--I wanted to run this game, but the Noah and David sections are just collecting games and, in general, are a major pain. Baby Moses, however, is endearing. I started running this game in early 2013. The route itself isn't hard, but it requires precision and patience with the game's crappy physics.
--Who the hell would run this game?
--The most notable glitch is the river clip. Other glitches are unintentional.

Omnigamer

2013-07-15 03:49:48 pm

All the things

- Name: Eric Koziel
- Age: 24
- Currently in USA - MA
- Speedrunning for 1.5 years
- Suikoden II, Skyblazer, Radical Rex, Timecop, Congo's Caper, The Firemen, Zero the Kamikaze Squirrel, Metal Warriors

Nier
- Cavia's last game; loosely based on Drakengard's Ending E.
- Started routing in February 2013; segmented run completed by April, then obsoleted with real-time run. Time has dropped from 3:25 to 3:19. Recent route changes are expected to bring the time under 3:15.
- Spear jumping allows for longer and slightly higher jumps by switching weapons in the middle of a spear dive. There is also a triple jump bug that has a use in skipping some puzzles.

Hagane
-One of the most valuable games in the NTSC-US SNES library. It was released as a Blockbuster-exclusive rental-only title, so only a limited stock was ever made.
-Gained a bit more exposure when TheGameHeroes declared it to be the Hardest SNES game (worth playing) in their Top 10 video.
-Many skips from bouncing off of enemies just right; most notable skips are the Worm Skip and Ceiling Skip.
-Bosses are very tricky, but precise timing cues allow them to be taken out quickly.

- Name: Eric Koziel
- Age: 24
- Currently in USA - MA
- Speedrunning for 1.5 years
- Suikoden II, Skyblazer, Radical Rex, Timecop, Congo's Caper, The Firemen, Zero the Kamikaze Squirrel, Metal Warriors

Nier
- Cavia's last game; loosely based on Drakengard's Ending E. 
- Started routing in February 2013; segmented run completed by April, then obsoleted with real-time run. Time has dropped from 3:25 to 3:19. Recent route changes are expected to bring the time under 3:15.
- Spear jumping allows for longer and slightly higher jumps by switching weapons in the middle of a spear dive. There is also a triple jump bug that has a use in skipping some puzzles.

Hagane
-One of the most valuable games in the NTSC-US SNES library. It was released as a Blockbuster-exclusive rental-only title, so only a limited stock was ever made.
-Gained a bit more exposure when TheGameHeroes declared it to be the Hardest SNES game (worth playing) in their [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTcOH9zFCZs]Top 10 video[/url].
-Many skips from bouncing off of enemies just right; most notable skips are the Worm Skip and Ceiling Skip.
-Bosses are very tricky, but precise timing cues allow them to be taken out quickly.

Kiyura

2013-07-15 05:15:04 pm

Wiiaboo

Quote from Brossentia:

--Not sure what this question is...?

Sorry, I cleared this up a little.

PJ

Edit history:

PJ: 2013-07-17 11:11:53 am

PJ: 2013-07-17 11:11:43 am

PJ: 2013-07-16 11:21:22 am

2013-07-15 06:12:33 pm

Is PJ

- Name: PJ DiCesare
- Age: 24
- From upstate NY
- Speedrunning for ~5 years
- Has previously run: 7th Saga, ActRaiser, ActRaiser 2, Battletoads, Battletoads & Double Dragon, Battletoads in Battlemaniacs, Castlevania: Harmony of Despair, Dream TV, Lagoon, The Lawnmower Man, Mohawk & Headphone Jack, Pocky & Rocky, Rad Raygun, Robotrek, Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts, Whizz.
- http://twitch.tv/pjdicesare @TheSuperSNES

Solstice
- Lucid Faia was the only runner until very recently when Boxfat picked it up. It was added to SGDQ schedule, but when Boxfat couldn't make it PJ picked it up. He has since taken the record for both categories.
- Most of the major skips/tricks involve clever use of blocks to reach places you shouldn't be able to. It is also possible to jump off of death spikes to greatly shorten some rooms.

TMNT3
- Tom Votava has been the only runner of this game since he did the amazing SDA runs 5 years. Mecha Richter suggested running this co-op to PJ and the rest is history.
- Unlike most of the other TMNT games, all 4 turtles are viable in this. We use Leo and Dr. C because they are a really good combo; Raph is supremely useful in single player but not needed for co-op, and Mike is a bit slow.
- The special attack is abused wherever possible to quickly destroy enemies and bosses; since it drains HP, most of this run is played one hit away from death.
- Co-op has extra spawns and more boss health, but if only one player is alive while crossing the spawn triggers, the game is fooled into giving single player spawns and health.

Edit: Just a quick note that I'll basically be saying most of the above during the run itself.

- Name: PJ DiCesare
- Age: 24
- From upstate NY
- Speedrunning for ~5 years
- Has previously run: 7th Saga, ActRaiser, ActRaiser 2, Battletoads, Battletoads & Double Dragon, Battletoads in Battlemaniacs, Castlevania: Harmony of Despair, Dream TV, Lagoon, The Lawnmower Man, Mohawk & Headphone Jack, Pocky & Rocky, Rad Raygun, Robotrek, Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts, Whizz.
- http://twitch.tv/pjdicesare @TheSuperSNES

Solstice
- Lucid Faia was the only runner until very recently when Boxfat picked it up.  It was added to SGDQ schedule, but when Boxfat couldn't make it PJ picked it up.  He has since taken the record for both categories.
- Most of the major skips/tricks involve clever use of blocks to reach places you shouldn't be able to.  It is also possible to jump off of death spikes to greatly shorten some rooms.

TMNT3
- Tom Votava has been the only runner of this game since he did the amazing SDA runs 5 years.  Mecha Richter suggested running this co-op to PJ and the rest is history.
- Unlike most of the other TMNT games, all 4 turtles are viable in this.  We use Leo and Dr. C because they are a really good combo; Raph is supremely useful in single player but not needed for co-op, and Mike is a bit slow.
- The special attack is abused wherever possible to quickly destroy enemies and bosses; since it drains HP, most of this run is played one hit away from death.
- Co-op has extra spawns and more boss health, but if only one player is alive while crossing the spawn triggers, the game is fooled into giving single player spawns and health.

Edit:  Just a quick note that I'll basically be saying most of the above during the run itself.

iongravirei

2013-07-15 07:16:58 pm

Good morning!

- Name: Ryan Mcneely
- Age: 19
- USA/TX
- Speeding for: 1 Year
- Other games: Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg, Mega Man 7, Gotcha Force, 3D Dot Game Heroes

Super House of Dead Ninjas
- Tetsuo9999 and loller432 are the only other active runners that I'm aware of.
- The final boss, normally, can only be harmed when his weak point is on screen. However, wind magic, which has homing abilities, will chase his weak point off screen, making the fight much faster.
-When you have 0 uses of any of your arsenal, taking damage will give you some of your ammo back. Combining this with the above trick allows for a very quick kill of the final boss.

Naegleria

(user is banned)

Naegleria

Edit history:

Naegleria: 2013-07-16 11:17:47 am

Naegleria: 2013-07-16 11:13:10 am

2013-07-16 10:38:46 am

- Runner's real name: Yolo Johnson
- Runner's age: 23
- Runner's country/state of origin: Alberta, Canada
- How long runner has been speedrunning: Since CGDQ
- Other games the runner runs or streams: Barney's Hide and Seek Game, F-Zero GX, ChuChu Rocket!, Shadow of the Colossus, Killer7, Kolibri, Sonic 2, SkyRoads, Mario Golf (Game Boy Color), No More Heroes, Roller Coaster Tycoon

Sonic 1
- Glitches are still being discovered, the Spring Yard 3 Zip is quite new. Green Hill 3 trick has 3 frame window, Marble 2 warp is frame perfect and pixel perfect, Marble 3 wrap is frame perfect, Spring Yard 3 Zip is frame perfect and pixel perfect, Spring Yard 1 Wrap is pixel perfect, Spring Yard 2 Wrap is stupid, Scrap Brain 3 is sub-pixel based.
- Other people who run this game: TeeNTee
- Speed Cap - If you hold the direction you're moving and you're above the speed cap, the game will knock your speed back to the speed cap. This can be circumvented just by not pressing right.

Zip - A zip occurs when Sonic is stuck in a wall somehow and presses left or right. Since collision detection is designed to stop you from going into a wall in the first place, pushing left against a wall makes the game push you back to the right so you aren't embedded in it. As a result, when you're already inside a wall holding left or right causes you to travel in the opposite direction much faster than you can attain by normal play.

Wrap - This is what happens when a zip causes you to bypass the left edge of the screen. The game treats your X-coordinate in memory as a number less than 0 - but position coordinates are unsigned, so instead of a negative number it's a VERY large positive one - which correlates to the end of the stage.

Ranger X
- Game's first SDA appearance was in a tourney, Anwonu got a time on hard mode of 15:45 (over a minute faster than SMK in second place). This beat Keith Apicary's record by over 10 minutes. You can control Ex-up independant of Ranger X, and they have independant health bars.
- Other people who run this game now, or who have run it in the past: Anwonu, SMK, footbigmike
- The ranger likes to kick enemies to temporarily disarm them. This also gives the ranger a small backwards boost.
When you duck on the ground and then press up-forward, you take off. This gives you max upwards speed instantaneously and slightly higher than max sideways speed. The sideways speed quickly goes down to its standard value. Because there is also 1 frame of zero movement, the gain is not very big (4.5 pixels going right, 5 pixels going left).
The game does not properly clear ducking status between levels. This can be used to use a take-off boost even if you start a level in the air.

- Runner's real name:  Yolo Johnson
- Runner's age: 23
- Runner's country/state of origin: Alberta, Canada
- How long runner has been speedrunning:  Since CGDQ
- Other games the runner runs or streams:  Barney's Hide and Seek Game, F-Zero GX, ChuChu Rocket!, Shadow of the Colossus, Killer7, Kolibri, Sonic 2, SkyRoads,  Mario Golf (Game Boy Color), No More Heroes, Roller Coaster Tycoon

Sonic 1
- Glitches are still being discovered, the Spring Yard 3 Zip is quite new.  Green Hill 3 trick has 3 frame window, Marble 2 warp is frame perfect and pixel perfect, Marble 3 wrap is frame perfect, Spring Yard 3 Zip is frame perfect and pixel perfect, Spring Yard 1 Wrap is pixel perfect, Spring Yard 2 Wrap is stupid, Scrap Brain 3 is sub-pixel based.
- Other people who run this game:  TeeNTee
- Speed Cap - If you hold the direction you're moving and you're above the speed cap, the game will knock your speed back to the speed cap. This can be circumvented just by not pressing right.

Zip - A zip occurs when Sonic is stuck in a wall somehow and presses left or right. Since collision detection is designed to stop you from going into a wall in the first place, pushing left against a wall makes the game push you back to the right so you aren't embedded in it. As a result, when you're already inside a wall holding left or right causes you to travel in the opposite direction much faster than you can attain by normal play.

Wrap - This is what happens when a zip causes you to bypass the left edge of the screen. The game treats your X-coordinate in memory as a number less than 0 - but position coordinates are unsigned, so instead of a negative number it's a VERY large positive one - which correlates to the end of the stage.

Ranger X
- Game's first SDA appearance was in a tourney, Anwonu got a time on hard mode of 15:45 (over a minute faster than SMK in second place).  This beat Keith Apicary's record by over 10 minutes.  You can control Ex-up independant of Ranger X, and they have independant health bars.
- Other people who run this game now, or who have run it in the past:  Anwonu, SMK, footbigmike 
- The ranger likes to kick enemies to temporarily disarm them. This also gives the ranger a small backwards boost. 
When you duck on the ground and then press up-forward, you take off. This gives you max upwards speed instantaneously and slightly higher than max sideways speed. The sideways speed quickly goes down to its standard value. Because there is also 1 frame of zero movement, the gain is not very big (4.5 pixels going right, 5 pixels going left). 
The game does not properly clear ducking status between levels. This can be used to use a take-off boost even if you start a level in the air.

UraniumAnchor

2013-07-16 11:06:04 am

Not a walrus

- Benjamin Cutler
- 31
- Colorado
- First serious realtime run was late 2008/early 2009 when I did the Prince of Persia SNES IL table, dabbled with TASes before that
- Ninja Gaiden 3, Metal Storm, Shatterhand
- uraniumanchor on twitch, youtube, and twitter

Tower Of Heaven
- Game Maker/Flash game that got a bit of attention on SDA when it first popped up, but has mostly fallen off the radar by now
- Basically lifted groobo's route except for a couple of minor tweaks that probably don't make enough difference to push it much below 2:03 even on a perfect run
- groobo
- Only a couple minor skips dealing with some collision and positioning tricks

Crystalis
- One of the best NES action RPGs, known as "God Slayer" in Japan
- Route has changed recently due to some trick and grinding discoveries
- Dragondarch
- One of the event barriers in Mt Sabre north can be skipped due to a one-pixel wide gap in the trigger, and another later event trigger can be skipped due to a flying glitch when getting off the dolphin in the Angry Sea

Blaster Master
- European version, despite coming out later, is far buggier than the US/Japan version, requiring only a single boss kill (and arguably not even that, but the timing required to skip ALL bosses is probably inhuman)
- Several people on TASVideos contributed to routing out the game
- For the NTSC version, MegaFrost and Dugongue have done realtime runs, and namflow and Brother Mojo have done TAS runs, for the PAL version Lord Tom and andymac have done TAS runs
- PAL version has a velocity reset/air jump bug, as well as zips, as well as most of the NTSC bugs

- Benjamin Cutler
- 31
- Colorado
- First serious realtime run was late 2008/early 2009 when I did the Prince of Persia SNES IL table, dabbled with TASes before that
- Ninja Gaiden 3, Metal Storm, Shatterhand
- uraniumanchor on twitch, youtube, and twitter

Tower Of Heaven
- Game Maker/Flash game that got a bit of attention on SDA when it first popped up, but has mostly fallen off the radar by now
- Basically lifted groobo's route except for a couple of minor tweaks that probably don't make enough difference to push it much below 2:03 even on a perfect run
- groobo
- Only a couple minor skips dealing with some collision and positioning tricks

Crystalis
- One of the best NES action RPGs, known as "God Slayer" in Japan
- Route has changed recently due to some trick and grinding discoveries
- Dragondarch
- One of the event barriers in Mt Sabre north can be skipped due to a one-pixel wide gap in the trigger, and another later event trigger can be skipped due to a flying glitch when getting off the dolphin in the Angry Sea

Blaster Master
- European version, despite coming out later, is far buggier than the US/Japan version, requiring only a single boss kill (and arguably not even that, but the timing required to skip ALL bosses is probably inhuman)
- Several people on TASVideos contributed to routing out the game
- For the NTSC version, MegaFrost and Dugongue have done realtime runs, and namflow and Brother Mojo have done TAS runs, for the PAL version Lord Tom and andymac have done TAS runs
- PAL version has a velocity reset/air jump bug, as well as zips, as well as most of the NTSC bugs

xfullmetal17

Edit history:

xfullmetal17: 2013-07-23 08:45:30 pm

xfullmetal17: 2013-07-22 09:32:28 pm

xfullmetal17: 2013-07-22 08:25:16 pm

xfullmetal17: 2013-07-16 11:25:28 am

xfullmetal17: 2013-07-16 11:09:52 am

2013-07-16 11:09:26 am

wibbly wobbly timey wimey

-Greg Wicklund
-22
-CO
-Around a year, did a few races on SRL before deciding to run Braid for SGDQ.
-Other games, none so far. Looking to start routing Bastion when the marathon ends.
-http://twitch.tv/xfullmetal17 and @xfullmetal17

-Braid was released first on XBLA in 2011, later ported to PC and PS3. Microsoft requires any XBLA game to have the start screen where you select new game, load game, etc. but made an exception for Braid.
-The run will be a mix of CyberBotX's route from AGDQ, the TAS route (bunny hops and the goomba jump in world 6. I'll point out that jump during the run)
In World 3's lair level, the TAS manages to get five hits on the boss on one chandelier, but I've found it too inconsistent in practice to get. I do between two and four on the left, then the last ones on the right. This also drops the key closer to the door, although I'm not sure if it saves an abundance of time.
-Patashu and p_why run this, and KanBan85 just did a run at ESA. Shoutouts to them and the other people in the Braid thread, it's been a great help with this run (even if I did just lurk in that thread)
-If Tim is actively manipulating time and stops (returns to normal time flow) inside a horizontal surface, usually he will be pushed either above or below it, whichever side he is closer to. In 3-8 (I think it's that) this is used to skip most of the level.
As well, on the last level, there is an alternate end to it, which CyberBotX mentioned at AGDQ. To get it you have to get to the chandelier the princess drops before it begins to re-form (as time is flowing backwards at that point). If you can jump on the chandelier you'll ride it up to the princess and trigger the alternate ending. I might not attempt this at the marathon because there's a chance Tim can fall off, making the game unwinnable, plus the timing is rather precise to get it. Normally you'd have to collect seven stars through the game, which would modify the level and make it easier to get the end.

-Greg Wicklund
-22
-CO
-Around a year, did a few races on SRL before deciding to run Braid for SGDQ.
-Other games, none so far.  Looking to start routing Bastion when the marathon ends.
-http://twitch.tv/xfullmetal17 and @xfullmetal17

-Braid was released first on XBLA in 2011, later ported to PC and PS3.  Microsoft requires any XBLA game to have the start screen where you select new game, load game, etc. but made an exception for Braid.
-The run will be a mix of CyberBotX's route from AGDQ, the TAS route (bunny hops and the goomba jump in world 6.  I'll point out that jump during the run)
 In World 3's lair level, the TAS manages to get five hits on the boss on one chandelier, but I've found it too inconsistent in practice to get.  I do between two and four on the left, then the last ones on the right.  This also drops the key closer to the door, although I'm not sure if it saves an abundance of time.
-Patashu and p_why run this, and KanBan85 just did a run at ESA. Shoutouts to them and the other people in the Braid thread, it's been a great help with this run (even if I did just lurk in that thread)
-If Tim is actively manipulating time and stops (returns to normal time flow) inside a horizontal surface, usually he will be pushed either above or below it, whichever side he is closer to.  In 3-8 (I think it's that) this is used to skip most of the level.
 As well, on the last level, there is an alternate end to it, which CyberBotX mentioned at AGDQ.  To get it you have to get to the chandelier the princess drops before it begins to re-form (as time is flowing backwards at that point).  If you can jump on the chandelier you'll ride it up to the princess and trigger the alternate ending.  I might not attempt this at the marathon because there's a chance Tim can fall off, making the game unwinnable, plus the timing is rather precise to get it.  Normally you'd have to collect seven stars through the game, which would modify the level and make it easier to get the end.

Studio

Edit history:

Studio: 2013-07-18 11:55:39 am

2013-07-16 03:20:08 pm

Chris Grant
24
Orange County, California
Speedrunning since December, 2013
I run They Bleed Pixels
I've casted League of Legends for a year and mostly been on the ESPORTS side of things
twitch.tv/sovietwaffle @LeagueOfStudio
Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath was originally released for the Xbox and saw very little play. An underground series, an unpopular console, and a concept that's not necessarily easy to sell. It was released for PC, PS3, and even mobile recently as the Oddworld series expands to modern consoles.
I started running in December, and developed a relatively glitchless route that clocked in at around 2 hours.
Coel625 had broken the original version into pieces, and after talking to him and figuring out what I did wrong, I was able to important a lot of the original XBox glitches and skips into the PC version. There's an any% category that's sub 1-hour, and all bounties which will hopefully be sub 1:30.
Coel625 would be the original runner. He has a 100% run (A HELLISH CATEGORY) on SDA.
It's pretty easy to go out of bounds and fall into nothingness at most points in the game. The game can be reduced to the point of only needing to beat 4 out of 12 "mandatory" bosses.

mikwuyma

Edit history:

mikwuyma: 2013-07-16 05:37:04 pm

2013-07-16 05:05:21 pm

My feelings on The Demon Rush

-Mike Uyama (or Whoyama according to ESA :D)
-29
-USA, DC area
-9 years on and off, that's no joke.
-The list is big but I've become a bad games addict.
-http://www.twitch.tv/mikwuyma @mikwuyma

-This is the first time I'm running nothing, an unprecedented move from me. Tongue

I'll probably write a short bio later.

I know this is for runners but I'll be on the couch doing couch commentary and I might be doing ranger-x 2man1controller run with Naegleria.

MetaSigma

Edit history:

MetaSigma: 2013-07-16 06:05:58 pm

MetaSigma: 2013-07-16 05:58:57 pm

2013-07-16 05:57:53 pm

Evermore Extrodinare ᕦ(° Д°)ᕤ

- Shane Jones
- 30 (I will be 31 on the 25th of July so 30 or 31 doesn't matter to me :P)
- USA, Montana
- 2 to 3 years (I honestly don't remember when I started lol)
- Runs - MMX, SoE. Games I stream however are very varied :9
- http://www.twitch.tv/metasigma

- Game history and interesting trivia
- Evermore started out as Saturn doing a 100% TAS of Evermore. It literally was all that was done for the game in about 5 years. People talked about running it but no one really did it. I spoke a few times with Duckfist that I was going to do this game but it wasn't until a run suddenly appeared on the site that I really took up a huge interest. Within a couple of weeks I had already completed a run with slight route and trick changes that made the Segmented run obsolete. From there so much has changed and we've gone from 2:46:xx now down to 1:19:40 and it's going to drop below sub 1:19 soon.
- Lemonsx (Current WR holder), Loveablelambchop, Vultuz, Thyias, Crawek, Bangagong, Hughmanaist (I'm sorry Hugh! D:), Panda (The dude who literally has made our lives a living hell with his crazy route ideas that are so damn good!), Everyone else in the Evermore Crew who has helped find tricks, small ideas, and everyone else who has contributed to bring this game down to where it's at now
- Duckfist will fill everyone in on all these tricks when the time comes ^^

- Shane Jones
- 30 (I will be 31 on the 25th of July so 30 or 31 doesn't matter to me :P)
- USA, Montana
- 2 to 3 years (I honestly don't remember when I started lol)
- Runs - MMX, SoE. Games I stream however are very varied :9
- http://www.twitch.tv/metasigma

- Game history and interesting trivia
- Evermore started out as Saturn doing a 100% TAS of Evermore. It literally was all that was done for the game in about 5 years. People talked about running it but no one really did it. I spoke a few times with Duckfist that I was going to do this game but it wasn't until a run suddenly appeared on the site that I really took up a huge interest. Within a couple of weeks I had already completed a run with slight route and trick changes that made the Segmented run obsolete. From there so much has changed and we've gone from 2:46:xx now down to 1:19:40 and it's going to drop below sub 1:19 soon.
- Lemonsx (Current WR holder), Loveablelambchop, Vultuz, Thyias, Crawek, Bangagong, Hughmanaist (I'm sorry Hugh! D:), Panda (The dude who literally has made our lives a living hell with his crazy route ideas that are so damn good!), Everyone else in the Evermore Crew who has helped find tricks, small ideas, and everyone else who has contributed to bring this game down to where it's at now
- Duckfist will fill everyone in on all these tricks when the time comes ^^

johannhowitzer

2013-07-16 06:43:38 pm

Viking it up

Jonathan Howie
age 29
Indiana, USA
Speedrunner for 8 months, this is my first serious project
www.twitch.tv/johannhowitzer
twitter: @johannhowitzer

The Addams Familiy: Pugsley's Scavenger Hunt for SNES
- Sprites based on the Addams Family cartoon
- Well-crafted SNES platformer that unfortunately got very little attention
- Run in the past by ColonelFatso
- Route took a lot of tips from the TAS, available on tasvideos.org
- Glitches:
Only one - wall jumping. Not built into the game, but results from 1. buffering a second jump in the air, then 2. using a shoulder button to glitch one pixel into a wall, tricking the game into thinking Pugsley has landed. Creates a lot of opportunities for minor skips. So far no large chunks of the game are skippable against the designers' intent.

UberGoose

2013-07-17 01:14:46 am

-Aidan O'Connor
-19 years old
-USA (Illinois)
-7 months (winter 2012)
-VVVVVV recently, actively seeking new games
-http://www.twitch.tv/ubergoos @UberGooseUS

Dark Souls:
-Released to PC because of a community petition
-Speedrunning community is almost exclusively PC, first real runners were japanese and on PS3
-Santzo84: current record holder for both main categories, Vviking: mostly all bosses runner, Aihel: japanese runner who routed the majority of everything
-Duke skip: skips the game's only mandatory death, Ceaseless Skip: skips a boss by rolling through lava repeatedly, Kiln Glitch: the patched out and no longer run glitch allowing the runner to skip the latter half of the game

puwexil

Edit history:

puwexil: 2013-07-19 05:31:47 pm

2013-07-17 09:28:37 am

Professional Second Banana

Name: Adam Dunn
Age: 32
From: Midwestern USA (Iowa/Wisconsin)
Speedrunning for: 3 1/2 years
Games: Final Fantasy 5/6/7/9, Kingdom Hearts 2, Illusion of Gaia - also want to run FF4/8, Soul Blazer, and Terranigma
http://www.twitch.tv/puwexil, https://twitter.com/puwexil, http://www.youtube.com/puwexil608

Final Fantasy V:
-Released in Japan in 1992 for the Super Famicom, and never officially released in English until the PlayStation port in 1999 (North America) and 2002 (Europe).
-Fan translation by RPGe was completed in 1997, making FF5 one of the first Japanese games to receive a complete English fan translation.
-Translated SFC version is being played for the marathon as the loading times are much faster than the PSX version (about 25-30 minutes over a full run), and the GBA version removes 2 glitches useful for speedrunning (one allows for infinite money through item duplication and the other allows any enemy in the game to be berzerked, including the final boss).
-FF5 is quite popular for speedrunning in the Japanese Nicovideo RTA community (current record on the Japanese SFC version with turbo controller is 3:50 by Su Nyao), along with FF4 and 6 (some runners do marathons of all 3 games back-to-back). There isn't currently much of a Western speedrun scene; but the game has gotten somewhat popular for other types of challenge runs such as the FF5 Four Job Fiesta (complete the game using only 1 randomly-chosen job from each crystal), which had over 2500 players this year.

Name: Adam Dunn
Age: 32
From: Midwestern USA (Iowa/Wisconsin)
Speedrunning for: 3 1/2 years
Games: Final Fantasy 5/6/7/9, Kingdom Hearts 2, Illusion of Gaia - also want to run FF4/8, Soul Blazer, and Terranigma
http://www.twitch.tv/puwexil, https://twitter.com/puwexil, http://www.youtube.com/puwexil608

Final Fantasy V:
-Released in Japan in 1992 for the Super Famicom, and never officially released in English until the PlayStation port in 1999 (North America) and 2002 (Europe).
-Fan translation by RPGe was completed in 1997, making FF5 one of the first Japanese games to receive a complete English fan translation.
-Translated SFC version is being played for the marathon as the loading times are much faster than the PSX version (about 25-30 minutes over a full run), and the GBA version removes 2 glitches useful for speedrunning (one allows for infinite money through item duplication and the other allows any enemy in the game to be berzerked, including the final boss).
-FF5 is quite popular for speedrunning in the Japanese Nicovideo RTA community (current record on the Japanese SFC version with turbo controller is 3:50 by Su Nyao), along with FF4 and 6 (some runners do marathons of all 3 games back-to-back).  There isn't currently much of a Western speedrun scene; but the game has gotten somewhat popular for other types of challenge runs such as the FF5 Four Job Fiesta (complete the game using only 1 randomly-chosen job from each crystal), which had over 2500 players this year.

spikevegeta

2013-07-17 11:05:07 am

I love YaBB 1G - SP1!

Asa Tims
25
United States, Arkansas
7 Years
Kingdom Hearts 1/2, Rayman, Final Fantasy 9

Donkey Kong Country Returns:
2010 Wii release from Retro Studios, company behind Metroid Prime Series. Widely positive reviews, known as one of the more difficult games on the Wii, and known for having a really solid OST, despite David Wise not being present. Interesting piece of Trivia: the final jingle before the credits is from Nick Arcade.
History: The game has been pretty popular to run since it's release, mainly because of IL Time Attacks. Shiny Golds( basically S Rank) Are actually very difficult to achieve, and most people playing casually we're turned off by how hard it is to reach those time ranks even in the early levels. The most notable early runner of the game is Packattack, who owns nearly every IL WR for this game, and all of those runs can be found on SDA currently. Since then, in the last year or so, many runners have started running the game any% SS, including SMK, Ecko65, Partystar, spikevegeta, and the current WR holder, JXD. JXD's current WR, 1:30:15, can be found on his Youtube page, however, he is still trying to lower that time and eliminate all deaths. Currently, no one has ever been able to produce a deathless run of this game.
The game is pretty devoid of glitches, however there are tons of really cool time savers and mini-skips, including a few I can hopefully pull off in this marathon.

Rayman Origins:
Released for pretty much every console out there, including Wii, PS3, 360, 3DS, Vita, and PC. This game marks the return of Michael Ancel, the man who brought creation to the Rayman Series. The Game had overwelmingly positive reviews and in particular was noted for it's music, and multiplayer.

History: Game started it's community with TheEnglishman starting the topic shortly after it's release, quickly seeing how good the game is for speed running. spikevegeta came along and decided to route it, however because routing a full run, and learning it was pretty complicated, it took until only recently that more runners have started to jump on to running it, mainly on the PC version, which because of load times is over 8 minutes faster then the Wii version. Current WR is held by Twyn_0, at 1:59:xx. spikevegeta owns the Wii record at 2:10:00, but hopes to lower this time soon after SGDQ to hopeully get around a 2:06 or so. Other runners include Red_Buddha, Crypticjackknife(primarily known for IL's), and even packattack for a few IL's.

The game has some minor glitches, but the main one is the 2 minute time saver commonly known as "Dance Skip" Which skips the 2 mechanical re-fights and the Disco Cutscene in the final level. Shoutouts to Spire7 for brining this glitch to the communities attention shortly after AGDQ 2013.

Asa Tims
25
United States, Arkansas
7 Years
Kingdom Hearts 1/2, Rayman, Final Fantasy 9

Donkey Kong Country Returns:
2010 Wii release from Retro Studios, company behind Metroid Prime Series. Widely positive reviews, known as one of the more difficult games on the Wii, and known for having a really solid OST, despite David Wise not being present. Interesting piece of Trivia: the final jingle before the credits is from Nick Arcade.
History: The game has been pretty popular to run since it's release, mainly because of IL Time Attacks. Shiny Golds( basically S Rank) Are actually very difficult to achieve, and most people playing casually we're turned off by how hard it is to reach those time ranks even in the early levels. The most notable early runner of the game is Packattack, who owns nearly every IL WR for this game, and all of those runs can be found on SDA currently. Since then, in the last year or so, many runners have started running the game any% SS, including SMK, Ecko65, Partystar, spikevegeta, and the current WR holder, JXD. JXD's current WR, 1:30:15, can be found on his Youtube page, however, he is still trying to lower that time and eliminate all deaths. Currently, no one has ever been able to produce a deathless run of this game.
The game is pretty devoid of glitches, however there are tons of really cool time savers and mini-skips, including a few I can hopefully pull off in this marathon.

Rayman Origins:
Released for pretty much every console out there, including Wii, PS3, 360, 3DS, Vita, and PC. This game marks the return of Michael Ancel, the man who brought creation to the Rayman Series. The Game had overwelmingly positive reviews and in particular was noted for it's music, and multiplayer.

History: Game started it's community with TheEnglishman starting the topic shortly after it's release, quickly seeing how good the game is for speed running. spikevegeta came along and decided to route it, however because routing a full run, and learning it was pretty complicated, it took until only recently that more runners have started to jump on to running it, mainly on the PC version, which because of load times is over 8 minutes faster then the Wii version. Current WR is held by Twyn_0, at 1:59:xx. spikevegeta owns the Wii record at 2:10:00, but hopes to lower this time soon after SGDQ to hopeully get around a 2:06 or so. Other runners include Red_Buddha, Crypticjackknife(primarily known for IL's), and even packattack for a few IL's.

The game has some minor glitches, but the main one is the 2 minute time saver commonly known as "Dance Skip" Which skips the 2 mechanical re-fights and the Disco Cutscene in the final level. Shoutouts to Spire7 for brining this glitch to the communities attention shortly after AGDQ 2013.

neskamikaze

2013-07-17 12:15:38 pm

Kevin LaLonde
22
Houston, TX
Running for 6 years
My stream is no more, so blank

Marche_Fighter_Paladin

2013-07-17 10:32:20 pm

Claimh Happy

-Nick Chaput
-18
-USA/Massachusetts
-Speedrunning for 7 years
-Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land, Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow, Future Cop, Portal, Antichamber, Sonic Adventure 2: Battle

Sonic Adventure DX
-Gamecube port of the 1998 Dream Cast game. Sonic's first appearance in a fully 3d game. This game sees the debut of Big the Cat (whose gameplay is essentially a ripoff of Sega Bass Fishing) as well as Amy's first appearance with her current design.
-Much of the routing in this game was done by members of the Sonic Center, before I picked up the game. THC, Gamepr0, and I have somewhat recently refined those routes based on newer discoveries and higher standards.
-Other runners include Gamepr0 (runs the XBLA version, arguably has the highest quality run of this game to date), THC (former runner, currently working on a Tool-assisted run), and BrokenArthritis (has the fastest known RTA on the PC version).
-Interesting Glitches: Standing on platforms. Despite the best efforts of the developers, it is still possible to stand on solid ground in some portions of the game.

Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance
-2002 GBA title which attempted to ride Symphony of the Night's popularity while fixing problems from the previous title Circle of the Moon. This game was later re-released on a Two-in-One Pak with Aria of Sorrow.
-The routes for Maxim were mostly developed in a Tool-Assisted setting, due to high speeds and complex paths which ignore the castle's natural borders. The current route is more or less a blend of human-friendly tricks from these old TASes.
-Sethcharleon, kainblox, and ozzy__88 are other active runners. cantdrown and skypeguy420 used to run the game.
-Interesting Tricks: There's this neat trick you can do that makes you move fast, and when you move fast you can go inside walls, and when you go inside walls you can leave rooms in directions you aren't supposed to, letting you warp around the castle. There's also a glitch that allows your attacks to deal damage for every frame it remains in contact with an enemy.

Dustforce
-2012 indie game by Hitbox. 2d platformer (unofficially called a "precision platformer") often compared to Super Meat Boy for requiring the player to successfully execute series after series of challenging jumps in order to progress. The objective of the game is to clean up dust.
-The overworld route was initially developed by krankdud and marksel, then later refined by Dicetherice and myself. The routes for each level developed from the contributions of everyone who played the game, thanks to its built-in leaderboard system complete with replays of every run on every level from every player (as long as it took less than 1000 seconds).
-Krankdud and Dicetherice currently run the game's 100% category. Denferok holds the any% record and marksel is currently preparing for his own any% runs.
-Two Important tricks: First is spike jumping. If spike are facing upwards at a 45 degree angle, you can hold down and jump to buffer a jump on them. This sees more use in any%, but where it does get used, it's very important for making that particular strategy work. Second is called Ground Boosting. If you land with the right speed and dash when you land, you can get a significant speedboost.

-Nick Chaput
-18
-USA/Massachusetts
-Speedrunning for 7 years
-Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land, Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow, Future Cop, Portal, Antichamber, Sonic Adventure 2: Battle

Sonic Adventure DX
-Gamecube port of the 1998 Dream Cast game. Sonic's first appearance in a fully 3d game. This game sees the debut of Big the Cat (whose gameplay is essentially a ripoff of Sega Bass Fishing) as well as Amy's first appearance with her current design.
-Much of the routing in this game was done by members of the Sonic Center, before I picked up the game. THC, Gamepr0, and I have somewhat recently refined those routes based on newer discoveries and higher standards.
-Other runners include Gamepr0 (runs the XBLA version, arguably has the highest quality run of this game to date), THC (former runner, currently working on a Tool-assisted run), and BrokenArthritis (has the fastest known RTA on the PC version).
-Interesting Glitches: Standing on platforms. Despite the best efforts of the developers, it is still possible to stand on solid ground in some portions of the game.

Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance
-2002 GBA title which attempted to ride Symphony of the Night's popularity while fixing problems from the previous title Circle of the Moon. This game was later re-released on a Two-in-One Pak with Aria of Sorrow.
-The routes for Maxim were mostly developed in a Tool-Assisted setting, due to high speeds and complex paths which ignore the castle's natural borders. The current route is more or less a blend of human-friendly tricks from these old TASes.
-Sethcharleon, kainblox, and ozzy__88 are other active runners. cantdrown and skypeguy420 used to run the game.
-Interesting Tricks: There's this neat trick you can do that makes you move fast, and when you move fast you can go inside walls, and when you go inside walls you can leave rooms in directions you aren't supposed to, letting you warp around the castle. There's also a glitch that allows your attacks to deal damage for every frame it remains in contact with an enemy.

Dustforce
-2012 indie game by Hitbox. 2d platformer (unofficially called a "precision platformer") often compared to Super Meat Boy for requiring the player to successfully execute series after series of challenging jumps in order to progress. The objective of the game is to clean up dust.
-The overworld route was initially developed by krankdud and marksel, then later refined by Dicetherice and myself. The routes for each level developed from the contributions of everyone who played the game, thanks to its built-in leaderboard system complete with replays of every run on every level from every player (as long as it took less than 1000 seconds).
-Krankdud and Dicetherice currently run the game's 100% category. Denferok holds the any% record and marksel is currently preparing for his own any% runs.
-Two Important tricks: First is spike jumping. If spike are facing upwards at a 45 degree angle, you can hold down and jump to buffer a jump on them. This sees more use in any%, but where it does get used, it's very important for making that particular strategy work. Second is called Ground Boosting. If you land with the right speed and dash when you land, you can get a significant speedboost.

Countdown42

Edit history:

Countdown42: 2013-07-18 10:02:50 am

2013-07-18 09:51:37 am

Alex Dolan (yes like the memes)
23
USA, Washington DC hype
Speedrunning since January
Mega Man X 100%, Plok any% with warps, Kirby's Dreamland 3 100%, Tiny Toon Adventures
Learning X2 low% and Diddy Kong Racing 100%
www.twitch.tv/countdown69

Plok is a really bad game for the SNES that nobody played because of its unremarkable aesthetic and high difficulty. The soundtrack is amazing. I had played it as a kid and after seeing mecha doing sub 40 any% attempts I had to pick it up. Mecha wasn't serious into practicing it but got a 36:47 which held for a while until I broke it in May. YoshiPro101 had watched me practice and flesh out old and new strats and addendums to the route and when I was in France for 10 days he took the record shortly after I had beaten mecha richter's. Mecha had a godlike run when practicing for the marathon and came within 2 minutes of the TAS which is really impressive. The run will be hard to beat. Plok hype.

Countdown42

Edit history:

Countdown42: 2013-07-18 10:00:24 am

2013-07-18 09:59:03 am

Some small strat explaination: sliding down hills gives Plok a gradual boost in momentum allowing him to jump higher and farther, as well as moving right faster. Shooting away Plok's limbs and sliding on his torso grants more momentum. Since shooting away your limbs has them instantly come back to you if they hit something, that mechanic is abused to slide down smaller hills and damage boost off of enemies for speed gains.

Death Warps: in this game completing a level without dying gives you a letter of PLOK. Completing the name gives you a continue. Another way to get letters is to find them hidden in levels. In two instances during the route we are circumstanced with PLO and a pickup letter at the beginning of the stage. Getting a pickup letter that completes the name grants you a continue, and because the game thinks you got a letter in that level it must mean you beat it without dying. So getting the continue then killing yourself until game over allows you to skip the entire stage. This is done twice in the any% warps route and in total it saves about 6-7 minutes of gameplay

Some small strat explaination: sliding down hills gives Plok a gradual boost in momentum allowing him to jump higher and farther, as well as moving right faster. Shooting away Plok's limbs and sliding on his torso grants more momentum. Since shooting away your limbs has them instantly come back to you if they hit something, that mechanic is abused to slide down smaller hills and damage boost off of enemies for speed gains.

Death Warps: in this game completing a level without dying gives you a letter of PLOK. Completing the name gives you a continue. Another way to get letters is to find them hidden in levels. In two instances during the route we are circumstanced with PLO and a pickup letter at the beginning of the stage. Getting a pickup letter that completes the name grants you a continue, and because the game thinks you got a letter in that level it must mean you beat it without dying. So getting the continue then killing yourself until game over allows you to skip the entire stage. This is done twice in the any% warps route and in total it saves about 6-7 minutes of gameplay

scintilliaSD

Edit history:

scintilliaSD: 2016-08-01 09:16:26 pm

2013-07-18 10:46:04 am

[ deleted ]

Jadin

Edit history:

Jadin: 2013-07-18 03:17:50 pm

2013-07-18 02:57:30 pm

hi
sorry if this is too much info lol. I don't mind if host wants to skip some or most of it, whatever you need

-Name: Jadin

-How long runner has been speedrunning:
Played a link to the past for a little over a year, but split up like 7 months in 2010 and since February in 2013 here.

-Other games the runner runs or streams:
Super Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (but only a few months, starting this year). I don't have a lot of experience with speedruns outside of a link to the past :x

-Game history and interesting trivia:
The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past was made in 1991. It's a good game.

-History of the run itself (if more interesting than "I came, I saw, I routed"):
Before I started playing, Tompa already had finished the major TAS of this game. Krystal and I started playing alttp January 2010. She got WR in like May or something, and I quit around July 2010 and picked it up again Feb 2013. I bought JP cart then with the intention of getting sub 1:30 and quitting again. But thanks to new strats while I was gone and some practice I lowered my ~1:33:00 time to 1:26:17ish this year. Krystal beat her WR recently again down to 1:24:15. I would be happy with a 1:25 and might submit it and another category to SDA, later this year if I can.
Due to the large differences in gameplay between TAS and realtime, most of the realtime strats haven't been really finalized until now. In early 2013? JP runner Yuzuhara found the bombjump to the hammer item in Dark Palace (saves 35-42 seconds - we tried to do it in 2010 and failed), which probably helped to spark interest to nail down the rest of the game, blending in some strats from Tompa's TAS and other runs. Since it is a popular game to speedrun, strat contributions really came from more than just the people I mentioned (people like Acmlm, jeanclaude, and various english and JP runners have helped improve the run too)

-Other people who run this game now, or who have run it in the past:
Lots! http://zeldaspeedruns.com/leaderboards/alttp/no-oob for english leaderboard (times are in SRL, which is ~27.3 seconds longer than SDA timing due to the intro being counted)
http://www40.atwiki.jp/niconamarta/pages/36.html for JP leaderboard (nico timing is ~29.3 seconds longer than SDA)

- Interesting glitches and skips: (I just copied some stuff from my twitch page)

Most runners use the first version released (JP 1.0) which has faster text by a minute, and various tricks save anywhere from a few frames to ~8 seconds each, mostly from itemdashing and the fake flippers.

Itemdash (hookdash/canedash/boomdash etc.): JP 1.0 only. Activated by pressing A and Y (dash and item) on the same frame. Usually used only to shorten some animation times, but some uses can save some seconds - like hammerdashing through the pegs on the dark world bridge, or using hookshot and dash from a ladder, which lets you walk around at the speed the hookshot would pull you (fast).

Fake Flippers: JP 1.0 only. When you land in the water without flippers, the game lets you move one frame before spitting you back onto dry land. If you use that frame to activate the screen transition, then the game never checks to see if you have flippers in your inventory. If you get hit while swimming around without flippers, the screen will scroll forever and you have to reset.

Torch glitch: Works in all versions except JP 1.2. During the ganon fight, if you light the left torch before the right torch goes out, then the right torch will never go out.

Mirror block erase: Again JP 1.0, maybe in 1.1 as well? Just use the mirror while a block is moving in a non-dungeon and the block gets erased.

Due to the game engine, pumping directions can give you a small boost in speed if you are going north or west. Not as fast as dashing, so it is used less after getting the boots. With turbo on a direction you can move much more quickly in some areas.

hi
sorry if this is too much info lol. I don't mind if host wants to skip some or most of it, whatever you need

-Name: Jadin

-How long runner has been speedrunning: 
   Played a link to the past for a little over a year, but split up like 7 months in 2010 and since February in 2013 here.

-Other games the runner runs or streams: 
   Super Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (but only a few months, starting this year). I don't have a lot of experience with speedruns outside of a link to the past :x

-Game history and interesting trivia: 
   The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past was made in 1991. It's a good game.

-History of the run itself (if more interesting than "I came, I saw, I routed"):  
    Before I started playing, Tompa already had finished the major TAS of this game. Krystal and I started playing alttp January 2010. She got WR in like May or something, and I quit around July 2010 and picked it up again Feb 2013.  I bought JP cart then with the intention of getting sub 1:30 and quitting again. But thanks to new strats while I was gone and some practice I lowered my ~1:33:00 time to 1:26:17ish this year. Krystal beat her WR recently again down to 1:24:15. I would be happy with a 1:25 and might submit it and another category to SDA, later this year if I can.
    Due to the large differences in gameplay between TAS and realtime, most of the realtime strats haven't been really finalized until now.    In early 2013? JP runner Yuzuhara found the bombjump to the hammer item in Dark Palace (saves 35-42 seconds - we tried to do it in 2010 and failed), which probably helped to spark interest to nail down the rest of the game, blending in some strats from Tompa's TAS and other runs. Since it is a popular game to speedrun, strat contributions really came from more than just the people I mentioned (people like Acmlm, jeanclaude, and various english and JP runners have helped improve the run too)

-Other people who run this game now, or who have run it in the past: 
   Lots! http://zeldaspeedruns.com/leaderboards/alttp/no-oob for english leaderboard (times are in SRL, which is ~27.3 seconds longer than SDA timing due to the intro being counted)
   http://www40.atwiki.jp/niconamarta/pages/36.html for JP leaderboard (nico timing is ~29.3 seconds longer than SDA)

- Interesting glitches and skips: (I just copied some stuff from my twitch page)
   
Most runners use the first version released (JP 1.0) which has faster text by a minute, and various tricks save anywhere from a few frames to ~8 seconds each, mostly from itemdashing and the fake flippers.

Itemdash (hookdash/canedash/boomdash etc.): JP 1.0 only. Activated by pressing A and Y (dash and item) on the same frame. Usually used only to shorten some animation times, but some uses can save some seconds - like hammerdashing through the pegs on the dark world bridge, or using hookshot and dash from a ladder, which lets you walk around at the speed the hookshot would pull you (fast).

Fake Flippers: JP 1.0 only. When you land in the water without flippers, the game lets you move one frame before spitting you back onto dry land. If you use that frame to activate the screen transition, then the game never checks to see if you have flippers in your inventory. If you get hit while swimming around without flippers, the screen will scroll forever and you have to reset.

Torch glitch: Works in all versions except JP 1.2. During the ganon fight, if you light the left torch before the right torch goes out, then the right torch will never go out.

Mirror block erase: Again JP 1.0, maybe in 1.1 as well? Just use the mirror while a block is moving in a non-dungeon and the block gets erased.

Due to the game engine, pumping directions can give you a small boost in speed if you are going north or west. Not as fast as dashing, so it is used less after getting the boots. With turbo on a direction you can move much more quickly in some areas.

neskamikaze

2013-07-18 07:10:03 pm

Oh I kinda forgot to put game info. Since I will most likely not be saying a word during Dr. Mario race I wrote up a little bit on what is going through my strategy since I'm not sure how much Denton/Brossentia know about the game.

Basically the entire game is played on instinct, which is really helpful for a game where you need to make decisions so quickly. There are a few things that I have in mind in developing instincts to get better at the game. The most important thing is to make all decisions as quick as possible. It's impossible to see every single best decision possible for an entire run but as long as you act immediately it doesn't cause a big problem since you can a couple correct bad choices without too much of time loss.
Minimizing drop distance is a key factor in making choices. A falling pill fragment moves much slower than I can move my own pills so I want these drops to be as few and small distance as possible. This may explain dropping a double color on a virus that only needs one more to clear: having no drops is ideal and may be worth wasting one pill-half.
Another thing I will aim for obviously is killing multiple viruses with a single break, such as horizontally or putting the pill in between two that are a couple spaces apart.
I also always need to keep in mind whether or not if there is a good place on the board for each pill combination: red/yellow, red/blue, and blue/yellow. If there isn't a place for one of them (especially if one of the three colors isn't available to drop on at all) then I may go out of my way to clear something so that this space becomes available. Similarly in managaing colors is using a pill where it is needed most. Say it's near the end of a board and there are four yellow pills and one red pill left, if I get a red/yellow then I should be placing it on the yellow because I need more of them to finish the level.

Oh I kinda forgot to put game info. Since I will most likely not be saying a word during Dr. Mario race I wrote up a little bit on what is going through my strategy since I'm not sure how much Denton/Brossentia know about the game.

Basically the entire game is played on instinct, which is really helpful for a game where you need to make decisions so quickly. There are a few things that I have in mind in developing instincts to get better at the game. The most important thing is to make all decisions as quick as possible. It's impossible to see every single best decision possible for an entire run but as long as you act immediately it doesn't cause a big problem since you can a couple correct bad choices without too much of time loss.
Minimizing drop distance is a key factor in making choices. A falling pill fragment moves much slower than I can move my own pills so I want these drops to be as few and small distance as possible. This may explain dropping a double color on a virus that only needs one more to clear: having no drops is ideal and may be worth wasting one pill-half.
Another thing I will aim for obviously is killing multiple viruses with a single break, such as horizontally or putting the pill in between two that are a couple spaces apart.
I also always need to keep in mind whether or not if there is a good place on the board for each pill combination: red/yellow, red/blue, and blue/yellow. If there isn't a place for one of them (especially if one of the three colors isn't available to drop on at all) then I may go out of my way to clear something so that this space becomes available. Similarly in managaing colors is using a pill where it is needed most. Say it's near the end of a board and there are four yellow pills and one red pill left, if I get a red/yellow then I should be placing it on the yellow because I need more of them to finish the level.