(*Slaps hood of game* This baby can fit so many glitches)
This is an any% run of Scribblenauts, defined as clearing the final level on its speedrun.com page. Scribblenauts is a series of games about creating objects to
solve various puzzles. With this being the first game in the franchise, it's a bit... janky, to say the least. Credits go to Samsara, who was able to make some
improvements at the last minute, and SoapAgent for inspiring this TAS, as well as getting me into the more technical side of Scribblenauts to begin with.
Game objectives
- From power on, make it to either P10-11 or A10-11, and clear the stage.
- Use stages to grind for Ollars, like in RTA runs.
Technical details
- Emulator: BizHawk 2.10 (x64) (default settings)
- No BIOS used
- ROM name: Scribblenauts (USA) (En,Fr,Es,Pt)
- SHA1 hash: B8FE26BD75168DE551B52CDDF4D86A4754BD5478
- MD5 hash:70F474FD6872F7D313EC2E4035830B54
Notable stage by stage comments
University 0-1
- Maxwell's "autopilot" function was abused here to grab the Starite early, skipping two tutorial text boxes.
- This game is touch controlled; you tap where you want Maxwell to go, and he does... sometimes. Tapping an object will automatically make him go and pick it up, if he can.
University 0-3
- Maxwell's "autopilot" function was abused here again, this time to skip the need to use identification mode.
- Did I mention that there are eleven of these levels, none of which can be skipped?
University 0-4
- I exit the car at the beginning, because Maxwell's running speed is faster than when driving a car. Then I abuse the "autopilot" yet again to skip over two tutorial areas.
University 0-5
- I move Maxwell to the right at the beginning so he can collect the Starite by jumping. Samsara improved this by having him pick up the assembled painting, allowing him to drop it and collect the Starite quicker.
University 0-6
- I move Maxwell to the left at the beginning so he can collect the Starite by jumping, and an Ax was created to prevent "new object" merits from appearing later on.
University 0-7
- I move Maxwell to a particular spot at the end so he can collect the Starite by jumping.
University 0-8
- Despite what the game says, simply throwing the ball anywhere will allow you to pass the tutorial level.
University 0-9
- OJ was created to prevent "new object" merits from appearing in Gardens P1-1. The original run used an egg, but then we realised that OJ was a letter shorter and still counted as "food."
University 0-10
- An AFV was used to prevent "new object" merits from appearing later on, as well as clipping into the ground for the Starite.
The Gardens P1-2
- This is the level where I do the first bit of Ollar grinding. The RTA route uses a Collection-exclusive double-jump glitch, so this was the next best option for this TAS.
- As for the level itself, your objective is to catch a butterfly, but simply picking it up in your hands is enough. You can pick it up right at the peak of your jump, allowing a clear with no objects needed.
The Peaks A3-1
- After grinding for 6,000 Ollars, I unlock The Peaks, which has a greater Ollar multiplier for the par bonus.
- The first level was completed quickly by using the AFV to clip into the ground. The tiny icicle is actually capable of destroying the entire AFV, so it gets destroyed at the end.
- The Ax comes in again to break the Starite free from the ice, allowing a clear with no Merits.
The Peaks A3-2
- Before Samsara's help, I wasn't quite able to perform the Ollar grind here due to a misunderstanding of Maxwell's autopilot; I figured that he'd always jump off edges. So I had him jump at just the right place to clear this level and used The Peaks A3-7 to grind instead.
- However, Samsara was able to manipulate Maxwell's movement in a way such that he doesn't automatically jump off the edge in this level, and we were able to perform the Ollar grind here instead. This saved an entire minute!
Mish Mash A10-1
- I use 25,000 Ollars to unlock Mish Mash, the final world of the game. From here, it's as simple as finishing three levels to unlock the final level.
- This first level requires you to get the Starite while it falls down onto a bed of spiked balls. Normally you'd need to trip the tripwire to activate the door and release the Starite, but an AFV is used here to clip through the level instead.
Mish Mash A10-2
- Another AFV clip, but this one isn't so simple. At the bottom is a hallway with the Starite and a wall, which moves with you as you walk to the right, so there's a limited amount of space to work with here.
Mish Mash A10-4
- Choose wiser! ...and by that, I mean to pick up the x-ray goggles.
- Despite that, a glitch was used here to clip the Starite through the door because of the way Rope works, and this saved a bit of time.
Mish Mash A10-11
- It's the last level! This one's a bit of a fake-out level; it makes you think it's something ludicrously difficult, but the actual solution is to just walk up to the doors and wait for them to (slowly) open.
- But who has time for that? One final, show-stopping glitch is used to bring the Starite directly to Maxwell without needing to open the doors. And that's the game!
- Admittedly, I was wondering about using this glitch myself, but thought there was too little room to pull it off. Huge shout-out to Samsara for helping me optimise my first TAS!
Other comments
- The top three records were performed using the Collection version of the game, which has exclusive glitches that can complete the game faster.
- Glitches and intentional damage were used to complete the game.
DrD2k9: Claiming for judging.
DrD2k9: Ok. So this was an interesting situation/submission.
Optimization is visually fine. Though I think some improvements may be possible, nothing blatantly stands out as a reason for rejection based on optimization.
The stated goal is any %, which is defined in this submission as beating the "final" stage of the game. This requires unlocking that stage by beating some other levels to earn ollers/in-game currency with which the final stages are unlocked. This definition of completion is also what the speedrun.com leaderboard (hereafter SRC) uses for any%.
However, our site does not always follow the same rules for given games as SRC. Instead of trying to keep up with all the variety of rule sets for all the different games on SRC, we have our own ruleset (that admitted evolves as time goes on) with which submissions must abide.
Beating stage A10-11 of Scribblenauts with the method in this TAS does not trigger any type of end-game cutscene or credits. The game does have credits, which do trigger automatically after beating all the stages (based on the fact that the credits roll in the human WR run of the "All Levels" category). I don't know if beating all stages (which includes both action type and puzzle type stages) is the only way to trigger the credits or if simply beating all action or puzzle stages is all that is necessary to trigger the credits. I’ve been informed that it does require beating all 220 stages to trigger the credits.
The way I see it, this submission is effectively the fastest way to unlock and then beat the highest numbered stage, but it isn't really beating the game per-se.
For our site, we generally require getting to an endgame/credits sequence of some sort to consider a game beaten (though there are exceptions for endless games and games without endings).
Specifically, the movie rules state:
The movie must be complete
The movie must be complete
- Your submission must play the game from the beginning, and must finish the game, or reach the most suitable endpoint the game allows. Level selects, single-level movies, or otherwise incomplete movies are not allowed. Examples of suitable endpoints are:
- A definitive ending, such as a credits sequence.
- A kill screen, assuming it is impossible to complete even when TASed.
- If there's no clear ending, end after completing the first full game loop...
- For non-standard goals, in addition to any of the above, the movie can also be ended at some logical or artistic stopping point that makes sense.
As mentioned earlier, this submission does not reach a definitive ending/credits sequence. It doesn't reach a kill screen. It does have a clear ending (that being reaching the credits), so the third case of "no clear ending" doesn't apply. Which only leaves us with the last possiblity on which to judge this submission. Since that last endpoint option is explicitly for non-standard goals, we cannot consider this run as a valid any% completion for our Standard class publication. So we must turn to Alternative class consideration.
In the not terribly distant past, we typically would have required a game to still be "beaten" via getting to an endgame/credits of some sort, even for most alternative goals; but that has been loosened in more recent times as we've expanded the goals allowed in Alternative class to only require endpoints that make sense, even if a game isn't completely beaten (especially once entertainment was dropped as a requirement for Alternative publication).
Further; as part of our expansion of Alternative goals, we have become more open to the idea that many (if not most) SRC goals make sense to some degree--even goals that would never have been acceptable based on our site's former rule sets. Think about it this way: If enough people consider a particular speedrun goal as worthwhile to attempt competitively, there's some validity to the argument that those goals must make some degree of sense; and thus a TAS of that goal likely holds some value as demonstrating the theoretical ideal/best way to play that particular goal. Yet, even acknowledging that SRC categories generally make some degree of sense, this doesn't mean that all SRC categories will warrant a TAS published on our site.
Back to the case at hand: Does the ending point of this particular submission make sense? Yes... as far as being based on the defined SRC any % goal for this game (which seems to be a reasonable goal endpoint even if we can't define it the same way for our site as it is on SRC).
So, does that mean it makes sense for us to publish the run as submitted? Yes... if we consider the goal of the movie to be simply beating the highest numbered level and not consider the run as beating/completing the game.
As such, I'm accepting this run for Alternative class publication and adding a branch name. For now, I'll use "clear highest level", but this name may change depending on if/how the publishing team wants to categorize it differently.
FWIW, here's a list of branches I see as options for this game (this may not be an exhaustive list):
- Beating all the stages for a standard any% run.
-
If there's a way to trigger the credits through gameplay without beating all the stages, that would meet our standard definition of any % and an "all stages" run would be it's own Alternative branch (Alt because simply completing all stages wouldn't meet full completion criteria). -
If all of either the Puzzle stages or the Action stages triggered the credits, "puzzle stages" and/or "action stages" branch would probably be valid for Standard class as different game modes.while doing all puzzle stages or all action stages might be publishable in Alternative class, such a run would be likely obsoleted by the standard “all stages/any %” run.
-
- A 100% branch (using similar definition to SRC)
- This would most likely qualify for Standard class under full completion criteria
NOTE TO PUBLISHER: Feel free to change the branch name however the publication teem deems necessary, so long as a branch name remains to differentiate this run from what we would normally consider a baseline any % run for our site (see explanation above).
DrD2k9: Updating movie file with a roughly 1 minute improvement over the original sumission and adding Samsara as co-author. While I anticipated some improvement was possible, I was suprised that it was nearly a minute's worth of potential; nice work Samsara! I'd probably enjoy watching a 100% branch of the game even though it might be quite lengthy. This game just strikes me as one that oozes potential for unanticipated strategies that are perfect for TAS exploitation.
Obviously, this is still accepted.
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