In this black sheep of the Sonic family, our hero is thrown into a giant pinball game, mainly because he spends a lot of time in ball form. It's a good thing too, because Sonic's running and walking in this game is a travesty compared to the more "traditional" Sonic games. Here is my updated run to Zer0's movie from 2004, completed 3329 frames faster.
This movie has been on my list of projects for a while. I recently decided to actually put some work into it, and was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to work with. There is a large portion of the game where you have no control over Sonic's movements, which leads to big sections of game being completed rather rapidly. It is also very helpful that Sonic is able to maneuver somewhat while in the air, so shots from flippers need not be perfectly precise. Although this defies the laws of physics, we're talking about a hedgehog that spindashes in a giant pinball machine, so just suspend your disbelief for the entirety of this movie.
I used a few tricks and glitches while making this movie. First, roughly two thirds of the improvement came from a trick that Zer0 didn't know about. During the boring bonus scenes, where Sonic takes a break from being a pinball to play a game of pinball, you can press the A,B, and C buttons together at the same time, causing the machine to "tilt". This allows the player to provide some rudimentary control over the otherwise physics-obeying ball. Most of the other time saved came from refined movements, and avoiding having Sonic hang on ledges or walk any more than needed. I also used a couple glitches. In the first level, it is possible to get stuck in between a worm and the wall as the worm appears. Since the worm likes his space, he pushes Sonic into, and if the positioning is right, through, the wall. This was present in Zer0s run once, but because it is faster than having Sonic grab onto the lip of the floor and swing up through the door (another glitch), I sneak it in twice. I also found a glitch in level 3 on the 4th emerald, where I was able to grab the emerald without having the rotating cage in the right spot. However, because I was not able to stay inside the cage, it only ends up saving about 65 frames.
Here's my rundown of improvements:
| Section | Frames Saved | Section | Frames Saved |
|---|---|---|---|
| Level 1 | 162 | Bonus 1 | 802 |
| Level 2 | 517 | Bonus 2 | 831 |
| Level 3 | 304 | Bonus 3 | 500 |
| Level 4 | 206 | Intro | 7 |
The game is played on hardest difficulty, abuses programming oversights, and aims for fastest time. Score is not important (although my final score ends up being 91,141,000). I hope you find it entertaining and a worthwhile watch.
mmbossman: Hi! I'm the author and didn't like any of NESvideoagent's automatic screenshots, so I took some of my own!
adelikat: Accepting for publication as an improvement to the published movie.
adelikat: Claimed for Encoding