Yes... this actually exists now... and the video provided contains subtitle commentary which is intended to aid the contents and explanation of this TAS.
Super Monkey Ball Adventure is the final Gamecube release in the series. It expands on the prior games in a number of ways, most notably through its open-world story mode, mission system, and increased lore. To achieve a 100% completion we must successfully reunite and spread all the joy we can between the kingdoms.
Game Objectives
- Emulator Used : Dolphin 5.0-14749
- 100% Completion
- Optimize Real Time
Game Version
We opt to use PAL running at 50Hz because it runs slightly faster during challenge mode stages compared to playing on 60Hz. The other differences between PAL and NTSC are extremely minor and don't affect the gameplay of the speedrun.
Out of all versions, the PSP version runs the fastest in challenge mode, and also has much quicker load times throughout story mode (roughly 10 minutes would be saved in this TAS). Unfortunately there are no emulators capable of TASing the PSP version currently, so we are stuck with the Gamecube version.
Running this game at lower clock speeds allows the monkey to roll faster in challenge mode, and on the PSP version, you can progressively lower the clock speed until stages don't even load in anymore. Unfortunately we can't do this on hardware for Gamecube, so the lowest we have available is 50Hz.
100% Overview
This run starts from a blank save file, completing every mission and defeating all Naysayer enemies necessary to achieve the 100% ending. More specifically, we need 100 joy points in all 4 worlds of the game, which are obtained in various amounts from the missions and Naysayer enemies. One of the missions requires us to collect 700 bananas throughout this run to make a banana donation to a monkey named Makmak. Due to this one mission being such a major part of the routing, total banana count is listed separately in the mission route table.
In Bulleted Terms:
- Complete every mission
- Requires collecting a total of 700 bananas to donate to Makmak at 4 different points throughout the run
- Defeat all Naysayers (not including those in Fire Automoton area)
Gameplay Basics
Movement
Most simply, holding up is the fastest form of movement in Story Mode. Continuing to hold Up on the control stick and rotating the camera is faster than changing the direction of the control stick. It's always better to hold anywhere in the range of Up-Left to Up-Right relative to the camera, so this is done whenever possible. The camera rotates on its own sometimes, and it moves at a faster speed than we can manually control it. Sometimes its more optimal to let the camera rotate itself so that we can start using Up inputs sooner than if we had rotated the camera ourselves.
In the Challenge Mode, or Puzzle Realm Stages the optimal form of movement differs from Story Mode quite a bit. Instead of holding straight Up, we opt for a more traditional play style familiar to competitive SMB players, specifically in the technique of Frame Boosting. Holding Up-Left or Up-Right at the start of each stage gives the monkey more speed compared to just holding Up. However, unlike the first 2 games in the series, we can now also perform back and forth Snaking to continually increase our speed both in the air and on the ground.
Chanting Movement
Most chants are slower than normal movement speed, and take around 4-5 seconds to enable a single one, so we use them only when necessary. However this is sometimes required and is able to provide many more benefits.
As such, chanting takes on a much larger role than the prior TAS. It was discovered in the middle of that old TAS, but techniques were fleshed out after its creation. Simply put, the chant menu can store acceleration which can then be used when exiting that menu. More will be explained in the following section, since it deserves its own section.
Chanting Overview
This part will cover specifics of each chant and how they are most optimally controlled. This also will cover some of the techniques we utilized in this TAS to make it more optimal, if possible since otherwise will be explanations of its use.
Chant Menu
The properties when we open the chant menu without the intent to use a chant are actually kind of strange. The ball is still relatively active during this menu, you can gain speed but the ball won't move and acceleration won't change. Using this we can do a few fun things, and in turn this is the most glitchy menu we utilize in this run.
Examples of this can be seen during Monkey Island Lighthouse 1, we use flowers multiple times to store speed so high that it sends us to a specific spot on the map. We also use it on its own in Air and Fire automotons to a lesser extent to accomplish faster missions.
In Fire automoton we not only store the speed, but an action as well. By stacking an action, in this case flight wings, we can enable both flight and woodball. This specific action is so particular that while useful, isn't used outside of this instance.
Chant Columns:
- Chant: The name of the chant.
- Learned: The location we learned the chant.
- Description: Overview of the chants' functionality.
- Optimizations: What we did to optimize its use when possible.
| Chant | Learned | Description | Optimizations |
|---|---|---|---|
| Boxingball | Jungle Island Lighthouse 1 | Gain control of a boxing glove, pressing A to punch. | This allows us to punch any direction at any time so long as you punch immediately after holding a direction. |
| Scalarball | Moonhaven Entrance 1 & 3 | Press A to grow the ball, letting go will make it normal. | This allows us to use a trick of hovering with speed storage. Since we hover immediately where we fall we just store vertical velocity. The chant itself has mission specific stuff, but nothing major aside from this trick. |
| Stickyball | Zootopia Roller Coaster | Pick up objects on missions and ascend sticky walls. | The gravity can be finnicky sometimes, but since it messes with gravity it makes for some fun moments, notably in Fat Cat. Leaving a sticky wall suddenly can grant a brief moment of freefall in any direction. |
| Woodball | Moonhaven Fire Automoton | Allows your ball to be set on fire. | The only tricks with this involve flight rings, but is specific to Fire Automoton. By chanting mid flight and entering a ring, you retain your chant. Works with any chant but only this one is useful. |
| Tetherball | Monkitropolis City | During missions take monkeys by tethering onto them. | Not too much here, but most missions pair this with Invisiball, which we don't use for these missions. The chant also automatically slows us down when dragging something. |
| Speedyball | Monkitropolis Highway | This chant gets Baby near his max speed very fast | If it took less time to chant, this would be more useful, alas it's just in highway that we use it. |
| Hoverball | Kongri-la Entrance | Allows us to hover over ground and most water, and boost for extra height with the A button. | Tons of objects let us hover on top of them, notably balloons, this alone can save tons of time in certain areas. By boosting upwards then ending chant, you can gain slightly more height and accelerate a bit faster. |
| Invisiball | Zootopia Entrance 2 & 3 | Chant and the monkey turns invisible. | Good for stealth stuff, but really no point to use this unless it's absolutely necessary |
| World Warps | All Worlds | Chant the right spell to warp to the next world. | Press the A button immediately. |
Naysayer Application
Odd bit to insert in this section, but it's a bit out of place anywhere. 3 of the 4 Naysayer types require a Chant.
- Naysayer Type: The identifying property of the Naysayer.
- Chant: The chant we use to beat the specified Naysayer.
- Optimization: How we optimized defeating this specific Naysayer.
| Naysayer Type | Chant | Optimization |
|---|---|---|
| Spin | None | Start the spin ASAP, find some use of downtime. |
| Punch | Boxingball | Move carefully so he punches earlier, use recoil for bananas |
| Wind | Scalarball | Chant near inhale, maintain size to chant earlier |
| Fire | Woodball | Skip a spew by going towards them faster |
For the naysayers who require a chant, there is no alternative to using a Chant. This makes them very direct in terms of routing, since it's pretty much guaranteed to take 30ish seconds each time we have to KO one.
Route Overview
There are no explicit records for anything in story mode, so optimizing it heavily refers to the old TAS and improving on that. This will go over the route on a mission-by-mission basis to provide the overview of the route. The logic for order goes by the end of the mission, or defeat of a naysayer. Comments for each mission are provided in the Subtitle Commentary in the video.
Mission Route Columns:
- Mission Monkey: Name of the monkey for the mission.
- Type/Chant: Generalizes the mission type.
- Joy Points: The Joy Point Total after a mission.
- Banana Count: Current Banana Total immediately after a mission.
| Mission Monkey | Type/Chant | Joy Points | Banana Count |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jungle Island Village 1 | |||
| Dada & Toottoot | Bumping | 7 | 11 |
| Owow | Gather Bees | 14 | 18 |
| Popo | Message Balloon | 21 | 32 |
| Sisi | Picture | 26 | 33 |
| Jungle Island Lighthouse 1 | |||
| Mermer & Perper | Message Balloon | 31 | 35 |
| Sisi | Picture | 36 | 37 |
| Cawcaw | Rescue | 43 | 63 |
| Jungle Island Tree 1 | |||
| Sisi | Picture | 48 | 68 |
| Gargar | Gongs | 53 | 78 |
| Naysayer (1/2) | Spin | 53 | 82 |
| Naysayer (2/2) | Spin | 57 | 143 |
| Dugdug | Guarding | 62 | 151 |
| Jungle Island Palace 1 | |||
| Queen JenJen | Bumping | 70 | 160 |
| Moonhaven Entrance 1 | |||
| Puzzles | Level Gate | 0 | 187 |
| Naysayer (1/1) | Wind | 3 | 188 |
| Zootopia Entrance 1 | |||
| Cre d'Pee | Bumping | 5 | 190 |
| Zootopia Roller Coaster | |||
| Sumsum | Rescue | 10 | 202 |
| Whe d'Whe | Rescue | 15 | 207 |
| Sisi | Picture | 20 | 207 |
| Boomboom | Race | 25 | 212 |
| Makmak | Donation (200) | 30 | 12 |
| Zootopia Fat Cat | |||
| Naysayer (1/2) | Wind | 30 | 31 |
| Naysayer (2/2) | Punch | 35 | 33 |
| Puzzles | Level Gate | 35 | 90 |
| Fat Cat | Fat Cat | 55 | 92 |
| Moonhaven Entrance 2 | |||
| Bo'bo | Switches | 9 | 104 |
| Mo d'Mo | Litter | 15 | 117 |
| Moonhaven Air Automoton | |||
| Sisi | Picture | 20 | 118 |
| Ch'Chi | Pipes | 25 | 119 |
| Eee'nee | Patching | 30 | 132 |
| Bo'bo | Switches | 35 | 133 |
| Moonhaven Fire Automoton | |||
| Bo'bo | Gather Balloon | 40 | 152 |
| Eee'nee | Lighting | 45 | 159 |
| Captain Si'mian | Gather Balloons | 50 | 203 |
| Flam'lam | Lighting | 58 | 207 |
| Popo | Message Balloon | 63 | 214 |
| Zootopia Entrance 2 | |||
| Po d'Pow | Game | 60 | 216 |
| Monkitropolis City 1 | |||
| NikNIK | Gathering | 5 | 223 |
| Sisi | Picture | 8 | 224 |
| NeeNAW | Gather Prisoners | 13 | 224 |
| Monkitropolis Highway 1 | |||
| NeeNAW | Race | 18 | 231 |
| Bran'ran | Location | 23 | 233 |
| Throne Room 1 | |||
| Queen FeeFEE | Gathering | 23 | 233 |
| Kongri-la Entrance | |||
| Bran'ran | Robochimp Launch | 27 | 234 |
| Guard | Bumping | 31 | 275 |
| Jeck-jeck | Rescue | 35 | 281 |
| Digdig | Deliver Balloons | 39 | 282 |
| Kongri-la First Dome | |||
| Naysayer (1/3) | Wind | 39 | 282 |
| Naysayer (2/3) | Fire | 39 | 283 |
| Jeck-jeck | Mirrors | 43 | 296 |
| Digdig | Gather Crabs | 47 | 306 |
| Naysayer (3/3) | Punch | 50 | 306 |
| Popo | Message Balloon | 53 | 306 |
| Kongri-la Second Dome | |||
| Makmak | Donation (250) | 56 | 63 |
| Sisi | Picture | 59 | 80 |
| Jeck-jeck | Patching | 63 | 86 |
| Throne Room 2 | |||
| Puzzle | Story Trigger | 63 | 96 |
| Monkitropolis Highway 2 | |||
| Pospos | Message Balloon | 66 | 96 |
| King MonMON | Bumping | 81 | 101 |
| NikNIK | Litter | 85 | 106 |
| Zootopia Entrance 3 | |||
| Ko d'Ko | Rescue | 65 | 111 |
| Duv d'Duv | Magic Act | 75 | 112 |
| Zootopia Maze | |||
| Popo | Message Balloon | 80 | 114 |
| Jo d'Jo | Litter | 84 | 127 |
| Naysayer (1/4) | Punch | 84 | 128 |
| Naysayer (2/4) | Spin | 84 | 130 |
| Naysayer (3/4) | Spin | 84 | 143 |
| Ale'wat | Gather Balloons | 88 | 150 |
| Naysayer (4/4) | Punch | 92 | 151 |
| Ko d'Ko | Punching | 96 | 151 |
| Sisi | Picture | 100 | 157 |
| Monkitropolis Entrance 2 | |||
| Officer | Bumping | 100 | 160 |
| Moonhaven Entrance 3 | |||
| Wu'wu | Deliver Balloons | 69 | 174 |
| Ru'fus | Deliver Engineers | 79 | 174 |
| Moonhaven Water Automoton | |||
| Wu'wu | Thawing Ice | 87 | 181 |
| Makmak | Donation (150) | 92 | 31 |
| Bo'bo | Guarding | 100 | 92 |
| Jungle Island Village 2 | |||
| Papa | Punching | 77 | 96 |
| Jungle Island Lighthouse 2 | |||
| Naysayer (1/1) | Punch | 79 | 97 |
| Keikei | Lighting | 87 | 99 |
| Jungle Island Tree 2 | |||
| Makmak | Donation (100) | 92 | 0 |
| Jungle Island Palace 2 | |||
| Bongbong | Pipes | 100 | 1 |
World Columns:
- World: The World in context of the moment.
- Area: Specific section within the World.
- Joy Points: Specifically the amount of joy points we finish with in an Area.
- Visit#: The number of times visiting that specific Area.
- Comment: Relevant information for that Area.
| World | Area | Joy Points | Visit# | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jungle Island | Village | 26 | 1 | Missing Boxingball for now |
| Jungle Island | Lighthouse | 43 | 1 | Missing Woodball for now |
| Jungle Island | Tree | 62 | 1 | |
| Jungle Island | Palace | 70 | 1 | |
| Moonhaven | Entrance | 3 | 1 | Getting Scalarball for Zootopia |
| Zootopia | Entrance | 5 | 1 | |
| Zootopia | Roller Coaster | 30 | 1 | Getting Stickyball for Moonhaven |
| Zootopia | Fat Cat | 55 | 1 | Needed Scalarball here |
| Moonhaven | Entrance | 15 | 2 | Needed Stickyball here |
| Moonhaven | Air Automoton | 35 | 1 | |
| Moonhaven | Fire Automoton | 63 | 1 | Reached 60 Joy Points here |
| Zootopia | Entrance | 60 | 2 | Got the warp to Monkitropolis |
| Monkitropolis | City | 13 | 1 | |
| Monkitropolis | Highway | 23 | 1 | |
| Monkitropolis/Kongri-la | Throne Room | 23 | 1 | Room connects the Kingdoms |
| Kongri-la | Entrance | 39 | 1 | Got Hoverball |
| Kongri-la | First Dome | 53 | 1 | |
| Kongri-la | Second Dome | 63 | 1 | No Revisits needed in Kongri-la |
| Monkitropolis/Kongri-la | Throne Room | 63 | 2 | Slipknot is required here |
| Monkitropolis | Highway | 85 | 2 | |
| Zootopia | Entrance | 75 | 3 | Last revisit to this area |
| Zootopia | Maze | 100 | 1 | Made sure to have hoverball here |
| Monkitropolis | City | 100 | 2 | Last post-Slipknot mission |
| Moonhaven | Entrance | 79 | 3 | Last revisit to this area |
| Moonhaven | Water Automoton | 100 | 1 | Per Bananas, visiting now is good |
| Jungle Island | Village | 77 | 2 | |
| Jungle Island | Lighthouse | 87 | 2 | |
| Jungle Island | Tree | 92 | 2 | Perfect Banana route, Shortest area |
| Jungle Island | Palace | 100 | 2 |
Dual Missions
Twice in this run we opt to do 2 missions at once. Taking place first in Zootopia Roller Coaster and second in Moonhaven Entrance 3. The setup for this is super specific, such that we need a chant monkey, and at least 2 missions. This can only be done once per area, and the missions need to line up together well.
To perform it, we talk to the chant monkey, then roll near the first mission. We perform the chant to learn it, then between the forced textbox of learning we initiate another text box. The forced textbox comes up first as normal, then the initiated one comes up without any option to clear it. This initiated text box is now stored, so any future textbox will automatically accept the text when closing it.
By accepting another mission we then enable two missions at once. This can be finnicky since one condition is being close enough in proximity to talk after the chant monkey text. Another is to make sure the input order is correct, such that you initate the textbox before the forced one comes up. In a simple sense, the game gets confused on the order and beings up a text box incorrectly, that text box then gets stored for later stuff.
RAM Watching Attempts
Given that this is a Super Monkey Ball game, visiting into RAM doesn't usually prove very helpful. There were a few attempts made at trying this, but given the limited knowledge everyone had on this topic working on it, no real progress was made.
In a purely hypothetical instance, it is actually possible to enable and control multiple chants at once. Even if this were possible without explicitly entering RAM values, it has marginal use in the form of these examples:
- For Po d'Pow's Zootopia Entrance mission, if enabling Stickyball AND Scalarball you won't have to stop during the mission to chant again.
- For Multiple Litter missions enabling Stickyball AND Speedyball, makes it go way faster.
- For General Movement enabling Speedyball AND Hoverball.
The time it would take to chant also plays a role in this dual chant or more scenario, but could be useful if actually possible. Given this game, it is a possibility but just not for this instance.
There were other attempts to better figure out NeeNAW's Highway Race, to no avail. For some reason trying to figure out what is keeping track of lap counts isn't really that straightforward in this game. Given our limitations of not being able to fall out, and no Hoverball at the time to better test things, we pushed forward with more optimal movement.
Miscellaneous
- This TAS is faster than the old TAS at its most comparable moment, at the end of Kongrila Entrance. Below is a tab containing a comparison video up til this point.
- This does include a bit of extra information on some of the games' mechanics that aren't relevant to this category.
While not mentioned much here since it doesn't matter for this route. At this point we still need to finish Ru'fus's mission in Moonhaven Entrance since it is the Final Mission in the world, all of these must be completed to allow the game to end. Despite this extra bit it still remains overall faster than the prior TAS, by approximately 40 seconds.
Going into a bit more detail on this, this is some information on what is needed to beat this game on an any% basis.
- 60 Joy Points in every World
- All final missions Completed (in the order we complete them in this TAS)
- Queen Jenjen in Jungle Island's Palace
- Fat Cat in Zootopia's Fat Cat
- Puzzle Stage Slipknot in Monkitropolis/Kongri-la's Throne Room
- Ru'fus in Moonhaven's Entrance
- Complete BongBong's mission in Jungle Island's Palace.
- Unlocked after clearing Slipknot, which is blocked by a big monkey until you have 60 joy points in Monkitropolis/Kongri-la.
- Captain Simian is the only currently known Error in this TAS, by about 0:01, but the mission itself is still faster than the prior TAS.
- Latter half of this TAS includes much more of the new interesting bits.
- The controller used for making inputs consistently didn't reach the edges (causing frustration), so they were set to a multiplier of 1.05 to ensure this (in Moonhaven Entrance 2). No analogue stick value exceeded what was possible with TASinput via dolphin (coordinates from 0,0 to 255,255).
- During the 100% Ending sequence (bit after the normal cutscene, but before the one with Future Aiai, where the chant button appears) you can actually chant and warp to another world and Save the game. This actually softlocks the game because every mission is completed, and there is no mission left to trigger the final cutscenes.
- This game claims to have 5 worlds, which is stated in the boxart and manual. This is because Monkitropolis and Kongri-la are counted separately, despite being accessible from the same world warp.
- Special Thanks to MeowMix_Fan and IkeSMB for help with this TAS, and thanks to Silverboxer for helping revise some of this submission text.
- Suggested Screenshot: 41011
nymx: Claiming for judging.
nymx I'm not able to find all the material I need to complete this judgement. I'm dropping out for another to take over.
CasualPokePlayer: Claiming for judging.
CasualPokePlayer: Amazing TAS, and wonderful commentary to boot! I can confirm sync, so with that, accepting.
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