At last, it's finally over. After about a week of obsessive TASing (really, I didn't stopped this in the whole week except Sunday), here it is, my Wonder Boy in Monster Land movie.
This game is about a lad and his quest to save Monster Land from... well... monsters. Vicious monsters, taking orders from Meka (Mecha?) Dragon. This game is originally an arcade game, and was ported and cloned to several systems, like every Wonder Boy title (except Monster World 4). The main difference about this version and the others are the gigantic HUD in arcade/pc engine version, so big it consumes most of the screen, making the game screen itself way smaller, fewer musics and a new boss.
I love this series, so I tried to do a run of any game. And... That's it.
About the movie:
- recorded on Dega (rerecording) Version 1.15
- Abuses programming errors
- Take damage to save time
- (ab)uses luck manipulation
- contains two minor Speed/Entertainment tradeoffs.
- besides that, aims for fastest time
General comments:
About game physics
- Walking is a pain. The hero seems to always walk in slippery grounds, and it's very frustrating to make him turn as fast as possible, for example.
- Every monster have HUGE hitboxes, so most of the time you don't have much room to maneuver. At least, it's easier to hit the bosses, except the blue-flying-thing and the final boss (oh joy).
- This game contains damage boost. Although it isn't faster than level-2 boots, at least can be used as an extra jump, and its easier to pass by some enemies.
- You can't control the jump height. You can (partially) control its direction after-jump, but you can't control its height.
- There's two ways of finishing a level: opening a door locked with a key (almost always provided by the boss) or killing the boss.
- Jumping is faster than falling. What's why sometimes I land just to jump again.
About the Speed/Entertainment tradeoffs
- I fought the SMS-exclusive boss. He gives you 10 thunderbolts, a magic that can hit everyone in the screen, and causes lots of damage for some enemies (including the final boss). I'M NOT SURE if making this choice makes the movie longer.
- In some rooms, it would be faster to just walk above the ceiling, like Super Mario Bros' 1-2. It is avoided.
Equipment and items
- You have 4 kinds of gear for your hero: Armor, shield, boots and sword, with 4 or 5 different power levels. Besides the sword, you can buy (or, in some very rare ocasions, get from a enemy) in shops.
- There's a catch in the shopping system: All shops only sell 2 items per visit. To get the last one, you must buy the second one.
- I only buy/get the boots, since they make the hero's movements faster and the jumps higher. This is the reason why almost all attacks in the second half of the game cost me half my energy bar, since I didn't bought the armor.
- I also use the following items: gauntlets (gives a power boost), cloak (makes you invincible for a time) and flying shoes (makes you float).
- To get a sword, you must defeat a boss.
Luck manipulation
- I tried to get the best possible outcome from getting coins/bags of money
- The crabs, the small knights and that strange enemy that keeps himself buried can give you gauntlets, cloaks, magic and other items
- the "octopus" can give me almost everything except keys. Including the level 3 shoes =p
Programming errors
Probably unique to the SMS version, if you press left and right at the same time when you jump some wild things can happen.
It must be noted that you must jump, not fall, to make this glitch work.
- ignore collision detection from platforms/floor, making you fall as far as the edge of the screen; When you get to the bottom, depending of the stage, can make you:
- reappear at the top of the screen
- warp to the next/previous room
- Losing all your hearts at once touching an enemy
- No flinching when you get hit by an enemy projectile
- Literally ignore death; as long as you don't get hit while you got no hearts without using this glitch, you're alive.
...and that's it I believe I covered pretty much everything here. Hope you like it =)
Special Tanks:
- Xebra, for his submission. It helped me a LOT, specially with luck manipulation questions
- AngerFist and alden, for feedback
- The admins, for...administrating... stuff. And making the site go up and above.
- and you! thanks for playing!
Aaand I canceled. See the thread for details.