Created in Dolphin v5.0 with an unpatched version of the game, with the default dsp_.bin files. This is the NTSC-U version of the game.
Namco Museum Megamix features a collection of games. The "main" game that is exclusive to NMM is Pac 'n Roll Remix which is based off of the DS version with the same name. The goal for Any% is to beat Pac 'n Roll Remix and reach the end credits by completing as little of the game as possible. Exiting to a different game is not allowed but other skips and glitches are allowed.
Some basic movement strategies used-
Shaking the Wii remote will give Pacman a very large boost in the direction that the nunchuck is pointing. Additionally, it will cancel any momentum that pacman originally had. By pressing the B button, you can brake on the ground which will slow him down and reduce his jump height if used after rolling off a ramp. Normally you are commited to the full boost that shaking the remote gives you but you can cancel it at anytime by braking. This means that it is possible to boost in a direction, brake for exactly 1 frame and then start boosting the next frame (which halts all previous momentum). This gives boosting the necessary mobility to be useful in almost all situations over simply moving around.
Advanced movement-
Ramp clip-boost:
By moving parallel to the bottom of certain ramps and then tapping towards the ramp, you can clip into it and propel yourself forward slightly. (Faster than just holding straight in a direction). By itself, it is barely noticeable, but it provides over a second of timesave in 4-4 from clip-boosting alone.
Sticky floors:
This isn’t a particular action on its own but rather the behavior of some surfaces when boosted into. When Pacman is boosting onto a ramp, Pacman will usually continue flying off the ramp in the speed he was traveling at before becoming airborne. However, in some scenarios, if Pacman dashes into the ramp and boosts while near another surface, Pacman may boost on the new surface and cancel all previous momentum. This has been the source of a lot of grief when TASing this game since doing this trick saves a lot of time in areas but whether Pacman will stick to the other surface sometimes requires a really precise alignment. Other surfaces will never stick no matter how you align. Note that this can happen both ways and with upward and downward facing ramps (you can boost from ground directly onto a downward facing ramp, this is most relevant in 4-boss)
Levels worth mentioning-
1-1: It’s worth going on top of the box since you can boost off the ground sooner (you could cancel the dash sooner, but you wouldn’t go as far, and in this case actually lose time)
2-1: Knight pac is needed to go under the water deep enough to reach the wing powerup (Pacman will not sink by himself). You can dash off the ramp near the powerup to submerge yourself part of the way but all attempts at reaching the powerup this way have failed. Getting the powerup this way could save about 2-3 seconds. The wing powerup is required to make the jump to the Golvis gate.
2-Boss: Power pellet order is optimized for TAS. You want to end up getting the 3rd power pellet as close to the boss as you can. Since TAS ends up moving really fast, it’s the power pellet that is closest to him where he spawns.
3-4: Dying preserves the Pac-dots that you previously collected. This means that you can die in the autoscroller and go back to the last collected checkpoint to skip a large portion of waiting.
4-4: It isn’t possible to skip to a lower level by falling towards it. There are death barriers everywhere.
5-1: Really precise movement allows the skip to the goal to be done without acquiring the wing powerup that you would normally have to collect. This skip cuts the level by around 20 seconds in TAS and is the shortest level in the game at 2.43 seconds.
5-2: The way that the game determines if you die by falling too far is weird. The simplest way to explain it is that if you progress a certain amount through the level without being “in-bounds”, the game kills you immediately. This means it is actually possible to die a single frame before touching the ground in both cases where I fall to a lower part of the level.
5-3: Same as 5-2, but the “in-bounds” part is "really" sketchy. Honestly, I’m not too sure what mechanism the game uses to kill you but moving too far to the right while falling will result in you dying before you land.
5-6: For the final boss in the game, 3 ghosts with power pellets are spawned (and avoided) throughout the fight until the final hit. As soon as the Golvis icon turns normal, you can collect power pellets to start damaging him. By collecting 3 power pellets before he spawns, his spawning animation is skipped by his death animation. Time ends on the final dash which is why it is done so far away from Golvis.
slamo: Really good job on this one; it must have been a lot of work to optimize this run, and it paid off. All known individual level records were completely demolished.
The category is fine here since it's an independent game in a collection and has a pretty obvious ending. The remixed version of Pac'n Roll (different enough from the original due to the addition of the gates) was only released in Namco collections, so this is the only way to TAS it.
Feedback was positive overall. I personally enjoyed the hectic rolling and dashing a lot and I also appreciated the skips. Accepting to Moons.
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