Vandal Hearts - September 15, 2025

Edit history:

SDAVerification: 2025-09-15 12:44:44 pm

2025-07-29 02:34:52 am

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

Vandal Hearts (ntscus) (psx) [Any %] [Segmented]

Decision: Accept

Congratulations to 'jerdunemycan'!

Thread title:

SDAVerification

2025-07-29 02:34:52 am

Run Information

Vandal Hearts (ntscus) (psx) [Any %] [Segmented]

Verification Files

http://v.speeddemosarchive.com/VandalHearts-20250726/

Please refer to the Verification Guidelines before posting.

Please post your opinions about the run and be certain to conclude your post with a verdict (Accept/Reject). If you wish to remain anonymous, you can also send a pm with your reply to 'sdaverification' (please state clearly in that case which run you have verified). This is not a contest where the majority wins - Each verification will be judged on its content.

LotBlind

2025-07-29 11:50:10 am

For reference, run comments are here.

LotBlind

2025-07-29 12:21:10 pm

So, this is from a conversation we had with IsraeliRD who you may be aware handles timing around here. I'm posting it here for future reference and to help any other verifiers that may show up.

Quote:

mike [Uyama] timed manually the previous run
so this run needs to be manually timed
so for segment one if we assume black screens are loading time and supposedly music fading out is where it ends (idk where, i just used audacity and randomly guessed and not accurate pin-pointing)
there are two 'black' screens which may or may not be load screens
one after battle's you win, and one after all dialogue where the menu comes up
the new run is faster in both fronts, but we're talking 0.16s for the first one and 0.27s for the second one
overall the run is still 3 seconds faster on the first segment even if we discount the 0.43s difference
the question is do we want to separate PS1 and PS2 altogether, or do we time every single black screen in both runs and compare (and ignore music running in the background, just based on visuals instead)
or do we say 'screw it' and time it start to finish in the way mike did

So it seems the first segment of the new run both gains time from faster loading of data but also is faster otherwise by around 3 seconds. Do you have any comments? Do you agree with all of this so far?

So, this is from a conversation we had with IsraeliRD who you may be aware handles timing around here. I'm posting it here for future reference and to help any other verifiers that may show up.

[quote]mike [Uyama] timed manually the previous run
so this run needs to be manually timed
so for segment one if we assume black screens are loading time and supposedly music fading out is where it ends (idk where, i just used audacity and randomly guessed and not accurate pin-pointing)
there are two 'black' screens which may or may not be load screens
one after battle's you win, and one after all dialogue where the menu comes up
the new run is faster in both fronts, but we're talking 0.16s for the first one and 0.27s for the second one
overall the run is still 3 seconds faster on the first segment even if we discount the 0.43s difference
the question is do we want to separate PS1 and PS2 altogether, or do we time every single black screen in both runs and compare (and ignore music running in the background, just based on visuals instead)
or do we say 'screw it' and time it start to finish in the way mike did[/quote]

So it seems the first segment of the new run both gains time from faster loading of data but also is faster otherwise by around 3 seconds. Do you have any comments? Do you agree with all of this so far?

jerdunemycan

2025-07-31 04:18:36 pm

I agree with everything. I trust your processes, I want my run to be compared equally to his in whatever criteria you deem is appropriate, and the result is the result. Thank you.

LotBlind

2025-08-12 01:59:51 pm

2-4 right before you do the mid-battle save, the Monk heals himself for apparently no gain (healing or exp). What's the idea? And then near the start of the next segment, you move one of the Swordsmen over one square as he's getting pelted by the Shooterimps. Why was that? Did it increase the damage he was taking?

The verification is due today, but as per expected, not quite finished here, only on 3-6. May post more questions later.

LotBlind

Edit history:

LotBlind: 2025-08-22 02:26:45 pm

2025-08-22 02:26:21 pm

I read through all your notes quite carefully thus far. Are you in the process of writing more? I see they end at 5-5. It seems most battles have some amount of randomness despite the enemy manipulation through position your guys in specific ways. Maybe for the benefit of the viewers, you could list everything up top that's the kind of RNG that's determined in real-time, such as apparently the exact damage dealt/received values.

jerdunemycan

2025-08-25 11:11:17 pm

Sorry for the delay. I've been caught up with work and fantasy football stuff.

2-4 Monk Healing - Most of the time when I ran this level, Amon would get killed by the two central shooterimps, and the northern shooterimps would attack and damage Huxley, my monk. This time, one of the central shooterimps attacked Sara instead of Amon, so Huxley never took any damage. The enemy tends to target people who have already taken damage. I want the shooterimp to attack Ash on its next move, so I leave Ash at the bottom and turn his back, and I move Huxley up and have him heal himself, only this time I didn't need to. It only wasted a couple of seconds and I was happy with how the level went up to that point.

The kind of ground that someone is standing on has a tremendous effect on how much damage they will take when they are attacked. You can see in the bottom left corner a word and a percentage. Plains is 0%, Prairie is 5%, Thicket is 15%, etc. Grog was standing on prairie which would protect him somewhat. In the video, he took 20 damage while on the prairie, and he had 83 HP, so it would take 5 attacks to kill him if he stayed on the prairie. On the plains he was taking 25 damage, so he would die in 4 attacks on the plains.

Sorry for the delay. I've been caught up with work and fantasy football stuff.

2-4 Monk Healing - Most of the time when I ran this level, Amon would get killed by the two central shooterimps, and the northern shooterimps would attack and damage Huxley, my monk. This time, one of the central shooterimps attacked Sara instead of Amon, so Huxley never took any damage. The enemy tends to target people who have already taken damage. I want the shooterimp to attack Ash on its next move, so I leave Ash at the bottom and turn his back, and I move Huxley up and have him heal himself, only this time I didn't need to. It only wasted a couple of seconds and I was happy with how the level went up to that point.

The kind of ground that someone is standing on has a tremendous effect on how much damage they will take when they are attacked. You can see in the bottom left corner a word and a percentage. Plains is 0%, Prairie is 5%, Thicket is 15%, etc. Grog was standing on prairie which would protect him somewhat. In the video, he took 20 damage while on the prairie, and he had 83 HP, so it would take 5 attacks to kill him if he stayed on the prairie. On the plains he was taking 25 damage, so he would die in 4 attacks on the plains.

jerdunemycan

2025-08-25 11:12:37 pm

I'll get back to posting the rest of the vids and notes in the Vandal Hearts thread. Thank you.

LotBlind

2025-09-14 03:23:51 pm

Okay, finally done here!

A/V: looks good.
Cheating: not detected.

Gameplay seems very well thought-out, with a variety of not completely obvious strategies employed throughout the campaign. Little by way of execution mistakes.

accept this!

SDAVerification

2025-09-15 12:44:46 pm

Decision posted.

jerdunemycan

2025-09-20 09:45:51 pm

Thank you LotBlind for verifying my run.

Thank you SDA. So what was the final time?

jerdunemycan

2025-09-20 10:25:33 pm

I'm working now on a condensed commentary of my run to go on the Vandal Hearts page. Very similar to what Zenic Reverie did.

Example:

1-1: Victory in 2 Turns. I only need to defeat Zoot Gach. I move towards him on the 1st turn, then let him come to you, and take him out on the 2nd turn.

1-2: Victory in 6 Turns. I only need to get Ash to the Church, so I make sure Clint and Diego get taken out to save time. I start with a precise set-up that allows Diego to take lots of damage and defeat all of the ghosts with counter-attacks on the 1st turn. I make sure Ash is in position at the end of the 3rd turn. Diego lowers the drawbridge on the 4th turn. The enemy archers take out Clint and Diego while Ash sneaks by and up to the Church on the 6th turn.

I will continue this process for all of the levels.

LotBlind

2025-09-22 01:57:05 pm

Runs are officially only timed after they've passed verification. That needs to be done only right before the update it's in is done, basically, so it could take a little while depending on how quickly IsraeliRD can manage to do it.

I don't think a condensed commentary is a terrible idea actually! I wasn't expecting you to do anything other than consolidate what you already had but I think that sounds even better.

jerdunemycan

2025-09-22 08:33:12 pm

Ok thanks. I'm curious what the final time will be, but I can wait. Thank you, I agree. I will continue to condense my commentary.

I responded to your question about categories on the Vandal Hearts thread.

jerdunemycan

2025-10-01 10:08:34 pm

I finished my write up on the levels. Its over 6 pages long and in a Google Doc. Can you explain to me how I can get that to the right person, or where I can copy/paste that somewhere?

LotBlind

2025-10-08 03:58:48 pm

Oh, poop! Sorry, totally missed this one!

So one of the things to note is that the formats that are the easiest to convert into something publishable are plain text and .htm. Is it possible for you to convert to either of those? Past that, there should be a comments edit box that you can use to submit them in the submission itself, I do believe. Can you see anything like that?

jerdunemycan

2025-10-09 11:05:10 am

Ok. I opened up the notepad feature in my laptop. I copy and pasted the text into notrpad and saved it. It is a txt file.

And then I went to the run information page. I clicked on the edit comments box and uploaded the txt file. I hope that works.

LotBlind

2025-10-10 03:18:16 am

I'm glad it was easily convertable into .txt, but sometimes people use fancy formattings and things get tricky, that's why we tend to ask them to do it themselves. I put it in place in the run entry ready for publication. Again, thanks for the effort you took to write and then rewrite them!

jerdunemycan

2025-10-27 09:10:16 pm

Any update on the verification process? I'm curious to know what the final time was.

Also, I completed a single-sitting run of the game. Its a video file with livesplit, video of me, and game footage. I cokmpleted a single-sitting run in 5 hours 55 minutes.

LotBlind

2025-11-03 04:53:23 am

Asked Israeli to comment on the timing.

Would you like anyone to give the SS (usual term is "single-segment", which does abbreviate to the same as what you used) a glance at this stage? I'm writing the update before the update where your run will be. This part demands some patience, sorry!

jerdunemycan

2025-11-04 07:05:23 pm

Thank you. I can be patient, I'm just glad things are moving along.

Yeah. I would like to upload it and have someone look at it. Considering all of the RNG in the game and the fact that there are 34 levels, I think 5h 55m is a really strong entry. The guy who had the record on speedrun.com is an accomplished gamer with runs on many games, and his best SS run was 6h 37m.

LotBlind

2025-11-08 11:51:53 am

What was your approximate attempts count for the SS run?

IsraeliRD

2025-11-09 05:14:26 am

Dragon Power Supreme

Timing should be done during this week. As the runs are on mkv I need to convert them to avi and then mp4 to be able to properly time them, and it takes a while due to the filesizes and time involved.

jerdunemycan

2025-11-09 09:10:22 am

Awesome! Thank you