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Game Page: http://speeddemosarchive.com/SolomonsKey.html

Solomon's Key (Any %) (Single Segment) (ntscus) (nes) [Best Ending]

Verifier Responses

Quote from Boxfat:
A/V is good, no cheating detected. Control gained at 12 seconds into the video, and control lost at 29:15. So the time should be around 29:03. I'm assuming control gained as Dana first gains the ability to move, and control lost as soon as soon as Dana strikes the book since that triggers the ending.

ANYWAY, what else is there to say other than to point out that Ktwo is a beast at these sorts of games? Much like the previous submission, this run pushes everything to the limit. Dana is constantly right up inside of enemies and brushing up against them just for the sake of saving time.

An awesome example of this is floor 8, where Dana breezes right by as he falls towards the door. Dana might as well be snuggling with the monsters in floor 19, too. This pretty much continues throughout the entire run, but it never gets any less exciting to watch. I know the fast health drain after the first pickup in 34 that leads to low health at the end of the stage always gets me.

As the author details in the comments, there are some small mistakes. They all appear to be accounted for in the comments, and don't add up to too much time lost.

Even though I'm pretty much spoiling the ending by accepting this, it's certainly worth living the suspense yourself! Do yourself a favor and watch this run; it's quite a treat.


Quote:
I think this game and its speedrun is one of the best on the site.

Tight control of the hitboxes of Dana and the enemies are a treat to see.  Pixel perfect execution to get Dana to create blocks on the right tiles is another subtle perfection that many viewers may miss.

First general thought:  how much time does an hourglass save on a countdown?  Would it be worth it to hunt other hourglasses?

Still gonna make my comment of losing time to safety blocks on the two block jumps with a block above Dana's head at the start.  Precision jumping, but the rest of the run kinda shows the runner is capable of this.  There was one jump early in the run that I think should have done it.  Later in the run is more understandable.  Room 27 has one of those jumps since it'd be a lot more time if a safety block was made.

Level 20 mistake was more noticeable than anything in the first submission file.

Watching a room like 30 reminds me why I like this run so much.

Same with 40.

I love the jump blocking in 46.

Nerve wracking falls in 47.  I think the original file had an issue in 47 that wasn't in this one.  Okay, took a look, and yeah, missed the second fall in the original file.  That's a 13 second mistake.  So yeah, the mistake in 20 is more noticeable, but it's not the length of the original one in 47.

My thoughts on the run critically do mirror the runner's ending comments.  I watched the original submission first, and it looks a lot cleaner than the improved run, just without the 13 second error.  I'd almost rather see the original one than the submitted one.  No reason to deny either run, though, as the quality is pretty obvious to anyone, even if he/she hasn't played this game.


Quote from Dragondarch:
This just in: ktwo is a beast.

This is the 4th(?) run of Solomon's Key I've verified and ktwo always manages to impress me with all the close calls and precision movement.

There were a few mistakes, but none that cost more than a few seconds (and the runner notes each of them in his comments).

Easy ACCEPT.


Decision: Accept

Congratulations to 'ktwo'!
Thread title:  
HELLO!
There is no Dana. There is only ktwo.
Smörgåsbord
Congrats ktwo! It have been a blast watching your attempts on this! Most awesome work!
Thanks for the encouragements!

In case it's not clear for those reading the comments above, I improved the run during the verification.

@Verifier 2. Every 80 on the timer adds one frame of countdown. Picking up the (orange) hourglass resets the timer to 5000. So if you pick up the hourglass when the timer is at, let's say, 9000, you save 50 frames (4000/80) of countdown. That's a time gain of less than a second. Since Dana is pretty slow-moving, you can't venture very far off the set path before more time is spent than what is gained.

I had to stop making attempts because of private stuff. I'm slowly getting back at it now though. Hopefully I'll be able to improve this by a few more seconds. The routes are still to the best of my knowledge and I won't add any more "edge jumps", so it's just a matter of cleaner execution. However, I'm far from in the same shape as when I got this run, so there is some work ahead.