Submission #4829: Archanfel's Genesis The Flintstones in 17:05.99

Yabba-dabba-doo! This is improvement of 4649 frames (or 1 minute and 17 seconds) over the khv-user's submission.

The Flintstones a classic 2D platform video game based on the famous Flintstones animated series from 1960s. Developed by Taito Corporation released in 1993, exclusively for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis. There are six levels, in each one Fred must to complete a small quests: to retrieve a lost necklace for his wife, to item find his daughter lost in desert, liberate pterodactyls race from the yoke of the evil witch and etc. The gameplay involves mostly jumping and hitting the enemies on the heads with a heavy cudgel. During the game Fred will find many useful items, some of them that will increase his health or increase speed of power charging his cudgel, besides he can meet with friendly pterodactyls egg which will follow him everywhere until hatching or death. In the end of in all but one levels there is a boss battle. Changing the difficulty to hard increase Bosses HP, no sense to prolonged boss battles => so normal mode is the best choose for speed and for entertainment purposes.

[1] JPN version have advantages over USA. Some frames were lost because of USA/JPN difference.

The Flintstones probably one of laggiest games in observed universe. So significant part of improvements came from lag reduction. Some other tricks/changes/optimisation i will describe briefly below.

At waterfall screen jump up during egg-pterodactyls-transformation, besides use different timbers to climb up, + intensive lag reduction during pterodactyl flight. Hit the big pink dino-rhinoceros to force him destroy the wall earlier. At boss fight manipulate Kermit the Frog to drop necklace righter to the exit.

Take a big breath. Physics of swimming with long acceleration/deceleration cruelly to optimise in some places, especially with lags. Besides general optimisation everywhere, in 2-4 manipulate second column to open at the same time with first and skip sweet piece of waiting. Manipulate boss to avoid using whirls type of attack, allow him to use only falling shells.

Autoscroller, nothing special to say. At screen with trampolines preferred lower path and reduce several of lags. Unlike all others levels it almost have no lags, actually now only single lag is left. Damage «car» just for fun.

Another autoscroller... sorry about it. But there is sweet trick - use deaths at checkpoints to break autoscroll limit: after resurrection Fred appear in the middle of screen, so the right boundary of train became farther than it should. Keep second egg until Boss fight, well, egg have lot of additional lags as unpleasant side-effects, but nevertheless in total it is faster. Jumping rocks damage have 4-HP, so they should never be used to harm bird, only the most powerful 5-HP attacks.

Intensive lag reduction during pterodactyl flight. At 5-3 -> 5-4 transition used bonus level as small shortcut. Just before boss there giant bones which are drowning in lava (not confuse with falling bones), by one tricky jump Fred avoid triggering start of their drowning, as you already guessed - it saved lots of lags. Collected three Power Ups to get the most powerful heavy cudgel ever possessed by man in stone age era. Help to the last fire-breathing dragon to extinct. Last hip while dragon stand on the ground so fall down less distance while dying (very classic trick from Darkwing Duck or/and Chip and Dale TASes).

Almost nothing special about level itself, just small optimisations here and there. Only final boss is tricky, because of all Power Up are disappear. So it's time to use head instead of brute force. Three "long" 5-HP charging are obviously during which transformation. And also one during lightning phase phase. 60= 5+4+4+4+4+5+4+4+4+5+5+4+4+4. Last hit in point to be able finish input earlier and get hat without extra input.

Someday, maybe Fred will win the fight
Then the cat will stay out for the night
When you’re with the Flintstones
Have a yabba dabba doo time

In Fire Rock level try to keep egg to far as you can. It can turn to be surprisingly fun/tricky.

2858, 4611, 13731, 16935, 20628, 24566, 37296, 43491, 45577, 49829, 56814, 60685.

ars4326: Judging!

ars4326: Hi, Archanfel. Very good time savings made over khv-user's past submissions! The efforts made in lag reduction, especially, made a difference. And even though the auto-scroll stages were slower paced, they ended up having some entertaining moments here and there (e.g. getting nudged out-of-bounds, Fred Flintstone's movement choreography). Overall, nice job on improving this one!

Accepting for publication to the Vault!

feos: publishing