Submission #8966: Fortranm's Saturn Resident Evil "Battle Game" in 05:54.68

(Link to video)
Sega Saturn
Battle Game
Bizhawk 2.9.1
21281
60
5850
! Sram
Bio Hazard (Japan).cue
Submitted by Fortranm on 3/27/2024 7:20:35 PM
Submission Comments
An improvement was made and the embed encode has been updated accordingly. Encode of the old version for reference: https://www.youtube.com/embed/okk6mLjPKNc

Goal Choice

The Sega Saturn version of Resident Evil includes an exclusive bonus mode named Battle Game, which is effectively the precursor to similar modes in later installments in the series. To quote TCRF, "The Battle Game consists of 15 rooms, including 3 safe rooms. The player must kill all the enemies in a room before the game automatically proceeds to the next room, all while a new up-beat music plays, and is given the liberty to manage his inventory at the start of the game and in safe rooms along the way."
While this mode features a visible in-game timer and a scoring system, this movie only aims to reach the end of the game mode ASAP by the general definition. An in-game code is used to unlock the mode in question without beating the game; however, an existing save file is still required to proceed, so this movie starts from SRAM with a save file in the main game using Jill (and her version exclusive alternative costume also unlocked with in-game code in the verification movie).
The JPN version is chosen because the USA release has increased difficulty just like on PlayStation. Jill is chosen because she has access to Bazooka, a strong weapon. In other words, using Jill on the JPN version would allow fastest completion of this mode (whiling using Chris on the USA version would be the combo with the highest difficulty in a sense).

Game Mechanism

The overall strategy follows that of the current RTA WR with some changes.
The rapid fire trick involving animation cancellation is used throughout the movie. A different type of shooting animation cancellation happens when the menu is opened and closed ASAP after an enemy has taken damage from a shot; this is mostly useful when the menu is needed for weapon switching or reloading inside a room before moving around.
Just like in the main game, some enemies have randomized HP, which seems to be determined when a room is loaded. There are some enemies encountered through out the course of Battle Game that could require different numbers of shots to be taken down depending on the assigned HP. Those are manipulated to have low enough HP to be killed with the minimum number of shots possible in this movie.
The value at 0x0F532C (2 Byte, Signed, Little Endian) shows the HP of one of the enemies in the room. Luckily, this one turns out to be the one used by certain important enemies like Zombie Wesker and Tyrant in this mode. 0x0F54B8 is another address of the same nature.

Strategy

Room 1

Shotgun, Magnum, Bazooka, Magnum Rounds, and the 3 types of Bazooka rounds are retrieved from the box. Shotgun Rounds aren't needed as the 7 that come with the gun are more than enough.

Room 2

Magnum is used to kill the 3 Zombies with 1 shot each.
It's technically possible to use Shotgun to kill each with 1 shot too if all of them are manipulated to have less than 53 HP, but this would result in an extra weapon switching session for the next room.

Room 3

Magnum is used to kill the 3 Cerberus with 1 shot each.

Room 4

The Crows are killed with Shotgun in the same way as in RTA.

Room 5

4 Acid Rounds to take down Yawn, as usual.

Room 7

The remaining Acid Rounds are used to kill the 2 Web Spinners with 1 shot each. A Web Spinner can possibly has enough HP to require 2 shots of Acid Rounds so deliberate manipulation was done. There was also some randomness in whether the second Web Spinner falls from the ceiling immediately after the first shot determined when the room is loaded.

Room 8

3 Flame Rounds are used on the first phase of Plant 42 and 1 more is used on its second phase.

Room 9

The remaining Flame Rounds are used to kill the 2 Hunters with 1 shot each. A Hunter can possibly has enough HP to require 2 shots of Flame Rounds so deliberate manipulation was done.

Room 10

3 Magnum Rounds take down Black Tiger.

Room 12

Zombie Wesker's HP typically falls into the range where 3 or 4 Magnum Rounds, each dealing 120 damage, are needed. However, I miraculously got it to be 115, which allows it to be killed in just 1 shot with Magnum. 2 more Magnum shots are made to kill 2 Zombies and Shotgun is then equipped to the last one.
While it can be possible to kill 2 Zombies at once with 1 Shotgun hit like in the older iteration of this submission (https://youtu.be/okk6mLjPKNc?t=260), they happen to have too much HP for 1 hit kill with Shotgun without headshot. It might be faster to kill 2 Zombies with 1 Shotgun hit after killing Zombie Wesker in 1 hit with Magnum if someone manages to manipulate for Zombie Wesker with <120 HP and 2 Zombies with <53 HP at the same time.
Note that the Chirs RTA WR of this mode somehow manages to take out all 3 Zombies in 1 hit with Shotgun. The position of the farthest Zombie is far from a position that allows this when Shotgun is ready to be used on the other 2 Zombies in this movie, likely due to more efficient prior actions in the room. It might be possible to spend time manipulating the Zombies to align in a way to all be killed in 1 shot, but that would likely end up being slower.

Rooms 13 and 14

1 Magnum Round for each Chimera.

Room 15

Tyrant always has 700 HP. The last 2 Magnum Rounds deal 80 damage each and Bazooka is then equipped with Explosive Rounds, each dealing 100 damage, to finish it off.
Killing Tyrant with Magnum alone would require 9 Magnum Rounds left, which is possible if Explosive Rounds are used in the first 2 rooms with enemies like the earlier iteration of this submission did, but that turned out to be ~20 frames slower.
In the end, all Magnum and Bazooka ammo are used up. One advantage of the final route is that no reloading is done outside of weapon switching sessions.

Special Thanks

  • RetroBrando for the current RTA WR which the strategy of this movie is mostly based on.
  • YOU, for reading the submission text and watching the movie.

ViGadeomes: Claiming for judging.
ViGadeomes: Replacing movie file with an 118-frame improvement.
Great run to me: Optimization is on point, SRAM & settings are good, goal is standard.
Accepting.

EZGames69: Processing...
Last Edited by EZGames69 7 hours ago
Page History Latest diff List referrers