Submission #4958: WarHippy's SNES Eek! The Cat in 17:45.05

Eek! The Cat is a puzzle/adventure game based on the old cartoon series of the same name. Your goal is to kick and shove an NPC to the exit of each level while avoiding enemies and obstacles. This run is 58.42 seconds faster than my previous run thanks to new routes, new glitches, better application of old tricks, and just better optimization.

Eek! The Cat is a unanimous flop by critics. With terrible controls and a bad physics engine, 9 lives is simply not enough for the normal person. But with the help of TAS, guiding grandma back to safety has never been so smooth. This whole run was created using the TAStudio tool in BizHawk.

The only difference between Easy Mode and Hard Mode is that enemy shots and hazards do twice as much damage in hard mode. There is no gameplay difference. As per the Movie Guidelines page, this is an acceptable reason for not choosing the Hardest Difficulty. Not selecting hard mode saves 53 frames in the beginning and 17 frames in one of the later levels due being allowed some extra damage.

LEFT and RIGHT move the cat - Everything is based off of momentum in this game, so you start off slow and then build up into great speeds. If you press the opposite direction while running on the ground (while not pushing anything) you will start sliding. Your X-speed rapidly decreases and you will eventually turn around. If you go over an edge while sliding you will be stuck in a very cartoonish animation (similar to Wile E. Coyote). The direction of the character that you're pushing does not affect how fast you accelerate.

UP and DOWN have no effect unless you're in Water, in Bat form, or getting out of a handhold

B is Jump - the longer you hold it the higher you will jump. Accelerating while jumping is just as fast as acceleration on the ground

A is used to kick the NPC while you are pushing them from behind, or it will turn the character away from you if you're facing each other

Y is your attack - it's used almost exclusively to reduce Eek's momentum after running or falling off a ledge. Given enough air time the attack will bring your X-speed to zero. You cannot start moving in any direction or stop the animation in any way until you land

X switches the position of the NPC (or any movable object) and Eek - this can only be used while both characters are standing still and facing each other

The reason that this game is normally so hard is that you cannot turn around in midair. You can, however, hold the opposite direction or use your attack to reduce your momentum and the length of your jump or fall.

In all chapters there are spots where the gaps are relatively small. These are handholds. If you run over the edge of these gaps, then you will initiate a falling animation and make a bridge for the NPC to cross over. They are unmarked in Chapters 1, 3, and 5. Chapters 2 and 4 clearly mark what they look like.

NPC's will move on their own, lemmings style, when they're not supervised

There is no time limit for a level, but the NPC's health will decrease by a slight amount as they run into a wall to turn around

You get a different character to guide at the beginning of each chapter

Did not have to use time to switch to hard mode

Part 1 - 231 Frames Saved

Continued pushing granny to the right after getting out of the intro area instead of kicking her up onto the first branch

Part 2 - 4 Frames Saved

Got a faster start off of the second elevator

Part 3 -

(No Improvements)

Part 1 - 56 Frames

Got the Alien Reindeer Cow Pig-thingy moved much further along after hitting the switch. This set up better enemy movement at the end of the stage.

Part 2 - 3 Frames

Better movement in bubble. Allowed me to build up more momentum to push NPC into transporter faster

Part 3 - 267 Frames

Was able to get through the laser doorway before it closed off the first time. Left NPC to be hit by lasers so that she would be as close to the door as possible when I go back to pick her up. Much better bubble movement. The final enemy position at this point was ideal, such that I did not have to waste any frames trying to avoid it.

Part 1 - 13 Frames

Found a way to maneuver through the two stalactites at the end so that I could move the egg along faster

Part 2 - 777 Frames

Found a way to cross the lake in one cycle instead of two while taking almost no damage. Reached the egg faster after stepping on the first switch to open the door. Better optimization when kicking the egg into the middle of the stage, and I was able to leave it there for rest of the level. Reached candelabra faster by jumping much sooner and allowing gravity to pull me down through the gap faster when I got there. Better egg manipulation after retrieving it and pushing it to exit.

Part 3 - 120 Frames

Reached the clove of garlic in a much more orderly fashion. Was able to push egg past the bat before it could complete its attack. This changed the timing of the entire middle section so that the egg could be hit one less time and be much closer to the edge of the platform when I push the barrel off.

Part 4 -

(No frames saved)

Part 1 - 23 Frames

After letting the bear fall off the high ledge, I retrieved him using X to turn him around instead of jumping behind him and pushing him.

Part 2 -

Made the level look a little more accurate, but no frames saved due to having to wait for the barrel at the end of the level.

Part 3 - 676 Frames

The glitch used in this level was actually discovered during the course of my first TAS of this game. If you fall into the corner of a building or ledge at just the right angle, then you will fall through it. If the area after the edge is also solid, then you will just land inside the corner and be pushing against a wall. But if there's no solid area after the edge of the wall (like many of the buildings in the city scape, except for the dark grey ones), then you will fall right through. This is used when bringing the policeman back. It lets me skip exactly one cycle of the barrel at the end of the level.

Part 1 - 162 Frames

Kicked box onto first clothesline much quicker. Was able to move across power grid at the end of the level without having to wait.

Part 2 - 74 Frames

Gained momentum before passing under wrecking ball. Better movement and optimization in getting box to the EXIT afterwards.

Part 3 - 464 Frames

The bulldog will not bite anything while it's sliding to try and turn around. I slowed down for a couple of frames while it began the sliding animation and ran right past it, allowing me to get to the elevator on the first cycle. Let the wrecking ball boost Eek and the box forward. Used a lower route at the end which let me build up much faster movement.

Part 4 - 705 Frames

Fixed choreography at the beginning, better entertainment as well. Built up momentum and was able to kick box onto ledge faster. This changed the timing of the steam vents when I got to them; I was able to run the full length with no interruptions. Let the box get hit by the 10-ton weight as soon as possible. Waiting for the recovery on this was faster than tripping the weight and going back for the box. The combined time saved in this level let me get both characters down the elevator shaft before the platform rose to the top. Vastly improved manipulation of box in this final section. Built up a lot of momentum on the first clothesline. Skipped going to the top-right ledge on the final part and was able to get box to jump all the way to the orphanage thanks to the strange properties of the final clothesline.

On two separate occasions I accidentally triggered a partial game reset sequence (or maybe just a graphical glitch) through nothing but the use of controller inputs. The game would reset to the opening screen right after power-on, but it would freeze on that blue intro screen while still having the current level's music playing. Finding out why this happened could lead to a way to skip right to the Ending sequence instead.

The level doesn't actually end until the character you're pushing touches the floating EXIT sign. So, on some levels it's faster to kick the character up to the sign instead of waiting for it.

Collecting all of the hamburger items unlocks a bonus level. An 'All Bonus Levels' run could be done in the future.

Enemy movements and firing patterns are fixed (no luck manipulation possible)

5743, 5747, 5779

Samsara: Judgeek.

Samsara: Accepting as an improvement to the published run. Well done.

fsvgm777: Processing.