The Addams Family: Pugsley's Scavenger Hunt

Pugsley's Scavenger Hunt is a fast paced platformer for the NES. Kidnappers have imprisoned Pugsley's family members in their own spooky home. You are tasked with rescuing Gomez, Granny, Wednesday, and Fester before moving on to rescue Morticia. Strangely the SNES Pugsley game is entirely different and this game is largely similar to the SNES Addams Family game (though that game features Gomez as the main character).

Game objectives

  • Emulator used: Bizhawk 2.2.2
  • Rescue the family

Game Mechanics

Controls

  • up - enter doors. climb
  • left - move left
  • right - move right
  • down - duck
  • B - shuffle right one pixel
  • A - jump/fly
  • select - shuffle left one pixel
  • start - pause

Items

  • Speed Shoes - Increase max speed from 2 to 3. Collecting twice stacks to the maximum of 4. Speed is lost when taking damage.
  • Flying Beanie Cap - Gain the ability to fly temporarily
  • Shield - temporary invincibility
  • Sweets and Cakes - collect 25 for a one heart refill, 100 for an extra life
  • Hearts - replenish your hearts
  • 1up - extra life

Strategies

Most of the run is a straight forward platformer, but there are a few tricks that are worth describing:
  • Bouncing off of enemies: if you wish you can hold A to get a higher bounce
  • Speed adjustments: You can reduce speed without entirely slowing down by hitting the opposite directon for 2 or 3 frames and then leaving a lank frame. This is useful in some situations where very slight adjustments to speed are required.
  • Chain climbing: You can jump off of the chain as long as you aren't near the bottom. Climbing is 2 pixles per frame, but jumping starts out as 4. The most efficient way to climb was to jump until the vertical movement is reduced to 3 pixels and regrab.
  • Ceiling clip: When Pugsley is under warter you can mash A at 20 Hz and he will slowly move into the ceiling above. Once you let go the game will eject you upwards, this is used to get through the underground quickly. A youtube video of this from Piero Piemontese is how this trick came to my attention.
  • Slope jumping: In the underground you can use a small jump to jump down through a sloped platform. It turns out that solid platforms are still solid underneath so you only go down a tile, but this is pretty useful for platforms that aren't solid underneath.
  • Avoiding damage: Since you lose the speed shoes when you take damage this run avoids damage in order to keep the higher speed.

Map

RoomExit 1Exit 2Exit 3Exit 4Exit 5Exit 6Exit 7Exit 8Name
0x000x080x01 Pugsley's Den
0x010x060x050x000x0 0x020x07 Behind Stairs
0x020x01 The Hat Room
0x030x040x01 The 1 Up Room
0x040x010x03 The Cloak Room
0x050x01 Sports Hall
0x060x01 Take Heart
0x070x01 Training Shoes
0x080x000x280x4E0x0 0x0C0x3B0x2F0x48Hall of Stairs
0x090x080x0A0x0B0x2 Addams Residence
0x0A0x09 West Chimney
0x0B0x09 East Chimney
0x0C0x080x120x11 Portrait Gallery
0x0D0x120x130x10 Hall of Clocks
0x0E0x130x14 Fly, Fly, Fly
0x0F0x080x4E The Music Room
0x100x0D The Clock Drop
0x110x080x120x0C The Dark Room
0x120x0C0x0D0x16 The Armory
0x130x0D0x0E0x15 The Weaponry
0x140x0E0x1E0x17 Lower Gallery
0x150x13 The Closet
0x160x12 The Trophy Room
0x170x14 The Bear's Mouth
0x180x20 A Better Read
0x190x080x0C A Very Good Read
0x1A0x1E The Top Shelf
0x1B0x1F A Secret Panel
0x1C0x210x08 Fester's Prize
0x1D0x200x21 The Train Room
0x1E0x140x1F0x1A The Library
0x1F0x1E0x200x1B The Reading Room
0x200x1F0x1D0x18 The Big Books
0x210x1C The Witch
0x220x4C The Snowman
0x230x35 Wacky Scientist
0x240x2E A Ghastly Goblin
0x250x1C The Nasty Judge
0x260x590x5A The Fire Dragon
0x270x40 The Spider
0x280x080x29 The Old Tree
0x290x280x2A0x2C Under the Tree
0x2A0x290x2E0x2D Under Graveyard
0x2B0x090x2C The Underground
0x2C0x2B0x29 Going Down Under
0x2D0x2A Sunken Stairs
0x2E0x2A0x240x41 The Graveyard
0x2F0x080x330x31 The Games Room
0x300x330x32 Boom Boom Boom
0x310x2F0x39 The Toy Box
0x320x30 The Bonus Room
0x330x2F0x300x340x3 0x36 The Toy Tower
0x340x330x37 Conker Cage
0x350x230x08 Pugsleys Pipe
0x360x330x380x23 The Play Room
0x370x34 The Spring Room
0x380x36 The Money Box
0x390x330x3A The Rack
0x3A0x39 Rack Them Up
0x3B0x080x3D0x430x3 The Conservatory
0x3C0x3B The Plant Plot
0x3D0x3B0x3F0x3E0x4 0x41 Thorn Pass
0x3E0x3D The Money Funnel
0x3F0x3D0x27 Wormy Way
0x400x270x3D Monster Garden
0x410x460x420x2E The Long Garden
0x420x41 The Penny Falls
0x430x3B0x440x45 The Money Spider
0x440x43 The Spider's Den
0x450x430x46 The Rose Room
0x460x410x450x47 Poison Ivy
0x470x46 Secret Garden
0x480x080x4C04A The Kitchen
0x490x4A The Cookie Jar
0x4A0x480x4B0x580x4 Granny's Stove
0x4B0x4A Now That's Tasty
0x4C0x480x22 The Pantry
0x4D0x560x25 The Vault
0x4E0x080x4F0x51 The Chain Room
0x4F0x4E0x50 Don't Go Down
0x500x4E0x4F0x51 The Piranha Tank
0x510x4E0x500x52 Amazing Chains
0x520x510x570x530x5 0x50 Hall of Chains
0x530x52 Golden Chain
0x540x520x55 The Steps Down
0x550x540x560x4D Chain of Coins
0x560x55 Last Refill
0x570x520x50 Turn Back
0x580x4A0x59 The Furnace
0x590x580x26 The Grill
0x5A0x260x4A Finished Furnace

Route and Room comments

The first four rescues are really interchaneable, but the order was just done to avoid backtracking in the hall of stairs as much as possible. The boss fights are all pretty straight forward, make each hit as soon as possible without taking damage.
The manual talks about taking the other family members to a music room to unlock the final area. The room is in the SNES version and is actually in this game, but there is no way to get to it. If you cheat your way in Lurch is there playing piano, but presumably something didn't work correctly and it was cut. Presumably they just locked the door in the hall of stairs and made it take you to the final area instead of the music room.

Start

  • 0x09 Addams Residence
  • 0x08 Hall of Stairs
  • 0x00 Pugsley's Den - Nearest shoes. It was faster to go behind the stairs than it was to go back to the hall of stairs
  • 0x01 Behind Stairs
  • 0x00 Pugsley's Den
  • 0x08 Hall of Stairs

Granny

  • 0x48 The Kitchen
  • 0x4A Granny's Stove - the fall back around to the furnace entrance is really tight
  • 0x58 The Furnace
  • 0x59 The Grill - had to start this room a little slow to be able to hit the switch without taking damage
  • 0x26 The Fire Dragon
  • 0x5A Finished Furnace
  • 0x4A Granny's Stove
  • 0x48 The Kitchen
  • 0x08 Hall of Stairs

Gomez

  • 0x2F The Games Room - the first pendulum here required very slight speed reduction
  • 0x31 The Toy Box
  • 0x39 The Rack
  • 0x33 The Toy Tower
  • 0x36 The Play Room
  • 0x23 Wacky Scientist
  • 0x35 Pugsleys Pipe
  • 0x08 Hall of Stairs

Fester

  • 0x0C Portrait Gallery
  • 0x12 The Armory - if you're crouched under a low ceiling on a moving block you can continue shuffling way off the edge of the block, unfortunately it isn't usful because you'll fall as soon as you stand and there is no opportunity to jump out of it
  • 0x0D Hall of Clocks - nice string of enemy bounces here
  • 0x13 The Weaponry
  • 0x0E Fly, Fly, Fly - I initially tried to avoid the beanie here, but there were gaps i couldn't cross
  • 0x14 Lower Gallery - the wall of enemies here are in really bad positions and I had to slow down more than I would have liked to avoid taking damage
  • 0x1E The Library
  • 0x1F The Reading Room
  • 0x20 The Big Books
  • 0x1D The Train Room - Playing with trains. An alternate route would be to jump off the train way early and dboost. This actually saves some time initially because it allows for a quick death to get iframes and get an early hit on the witch. In the end though the time it takes to go get the shoes again makes it slower overall.
  • 0x21 The Witch - you bounce off of fester here. you can let him run into you, he doesn't act like an enemy even though he looks like he might
  • 0x1C Fester's Prize
  • 0x08 Hall of Stairs

Wednesday

  • 0x28 The Old Tree
  • 0x29 Under the Tree - jumping through the slopes
  • 0x2A Under Graveyard - ceiling clip
  • 0x2E The Graveyard
  • 0x24 A Ghastly Goblin
  • 0x2E The Graveyard - The RTA run manages health/lives and takes a game over here. Since we kept the speed and avoided damage it is faster to backtrack, at least when you consider that you have to go get the shoes twice again or lose too much time in the chain rooms.
  • 0x2A Under Graveyard
  • 0x29 Under the Tree
  • 0x28 The Old Tree
  • 0x08 Hall of Stairs

Morticia

  • 0x4E The Chain Room
  • 0x51 Amazing Chains - there is an easy route where you climb the first chain, but it is slower
  • 0x52 Hall of Chains
  • 0x54 The Steps Down
  • 0x55 Chain of Coins
  • 0x4D The Vault
  • 0x25 The Nasty Judge

Improvements

  • Nothing major comes to mind, but it is hard to rule out small optimizations. I suppose it is possible that something more game breaking could be done with the ceiling clip, but the game seems to handle it pretty well.

Thanks to:

  • WhiteHat94 for his RTA runs and interest in the project
  • my Twitch chat for the ideas and encouragement
  • The TASMania team

Screenshots:

232, 644, 13947, 20220, 22462, 25072, 30387, 31212

feos: Judging...
feos: Nicely done, looks especially cool compared to the RTA "record". I found it insanely boring due to the lack of music, but the feedback was quite good too. Accepting to Moons.
fsvgm777: Processing.


TASVideoAgent
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MESHUGGAH
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Can't watch video yet, probably being uploaded. Keep up the good work link_7777! :)
PhD in TASing 🎓 speedrun enthusiast ❤🚷🔥 white hat hacker ▓ black box tester ░ censorships and rules...
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I'm pretty sure I tried to click the 'publish' button, but apparently it didn't take. Should be live now.
EZGames69
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This game looks more like a Bootleg of the addams family on snes than an actual licensed game. I do wish there was some music to go along with the run. Regardless, it was still fast pace and fun to watch, yes vote.
[14:15] <feos> WinDOES what DOSn't 12:33:44 PM <Mothrayas> "I got an oof with my game!" Mothrayas Today at 12:22: <Colin> thank you for supporting noble causes such as my feet MemoryTAS Today at 11:55 AM: you wouldn't know beauty if it slapped you in the face with a giant fish [Today at 4:51 PM] Mothrayas: although if you like your own tweets that's the online equivalent of sniffing your own farts and probably tells a lot about you as a person MemoryTAS Today at 7:01 PM: But I exert big staff energy honestly lol Samsara Today at 1:20 PM: wouldn't ACE in a real life TAS just stand for Actually Cease Existing
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Congrats! This was an entertaining run to watch. The double speedshoe mechanic is so cool for tases.
Challenger
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This game looks like unfinished for me, but this run is well executed enough to a Yes vote.
My homepage --Currently not much motived for TASing as before...-- But I'm still working.
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Thanks for this, link_7777! Yes vote!
nymx
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Good action with a lot of precision jumping/avoidance. Love the ceiling clip. When you get into clipping, I really start to get interested. Great job. Yes vote.
I recently discovered that if you haven't reached a level of frustration with TASing any game, then you haven't done your due diligence. ---- SOYZA: Are you playing a game? NYMX: I'm not playing a game, I'm TASing. SOYZA: Oh...so its not a game...Its for real? ---- Anybody got a Quantum computer I can borrow for 20 minutes? Nevermind...eien's 64 core machine will do. :) ---- BOTing will be the end of all games. --NYMX
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So why is there no music? It's present in one of the RTA runs: https://www.speedrun.com/The_Addams_Family_Pugsleys_Scavenger_Hunt_NES/run/z0elke8m
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
EZGames69
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feos wrote:
So why is there no music? It's present in one of the RTA runs: https://www.speedrun.com/The_Addams_Family_Pugsleys_Scavenger_Hunt_NES/run/z0elke8m
There is no music, notice when the Runner resets the game the music doesn’t get cut off. That’s just background music the runner put in. Even when the Game Grumps play it there’s no music present. They even commented on the lack of music. https://youtu.be/6v_nkksmYUg
[14:15] <feos> WinDOES what DOSn't 12:33:44 PM <Mothrayas> "I got an oof with my game!" Mothrayas Today at 12:22: <Colin> thank you for supporting noble causes such as my feet MemoryTAS Today at 11:55 AM: you wouldn't know beauty if it slapped you in the face with a giant fish [Today at 4:51 PM] Mothrayas: although if you like your own tweets that's the online equivalent of sniffing your own farts and probably tells a lot about you as a person MemoryTAS Today at 7:01 PM: But I exert big staff energy honestly lol Samsara Today at 1:20 PM: wouldn't ACE in a real life TAS just stand for Actually Cease Existing
Post subject: Movie published
TASVideoAgent
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This movie has been published. The posts before this message apply to the submission, and posts after this message apply to the published movie. ---- [3748] NES The Addams Family: Pugsley's Scavenger Hunt by link_7777 in 08:37.60