Submission #994: DonamerDragon's NES Super Mario Bros. 2 "warpless" in 20:14.20

This is the second version of this submission. A good deal of time that could be saved was found and with the recommendation of a few people I decided to fix this. Everything from 5-3 on is new.

Used FCE Ultra 0.98.15

Super Mario Bros. 2 was origionally Doki Doki Panic in Japan. In the US version Mario has fallen asleep and he is dreaming. To wake him you must defeat wart who apparently wants Mario to sleep forever?

This movie was very very time consuming to make. I never thought that 20 minutes of game play would take so long to perfect. I tried as hard as I could. As I went through the game I took the time to figure out exactly how much time I saved for each level.

1-1: -16[-0.267s]: The strategy is the same as past runs of this level, I just did some more frame work to try and save some time.

1-2: -11[-0.183s]: Same as 1-1

1-3: -08[-0.133s]: My most disappointing time save. I tried using toad, but in the dungeon area you need luigi to make the far jumps. I was able to save in some very minor areas.

2-1: -339[-5.560s]: The strategy was pretty much the same as Guanobowl. At the beginning I didn't slow down like he did, and I overhauled on the sand area. I think most of the time I saved was from using enemies better. When I got to the Super Star I paused only one time.

2-2: -90[-1.500s]: I once again saved a lot of time in the sand area. I also tried defeating Ostro from under the platform, but seems impossible. This game is very good about keeping solid blocks solid. I optimized the super jump, Guanobowl wasted a few frames jumping too high and too far.

2-3: -221[-3.683s]: Same as 2-1 and 2-2. While digging for the key I dug up one less sanf block and on the way back up I saved time twice with one jump, I started one layer higher, and in turn was able to jump out of the sand area for the door with more speed.

3-1: -497[-8.283s]: I used Toad instead of Luigi. I was very happy when I discovered that I could do that. Almost all of the time was saved just simply because Toad is faster then Luigi.

3-2: -50[-0.830s]: Then came the disappointment. Toadstool is soooooo slow, but she is the only character that can get through the shrtcut here. I saved my time from Ostro, I got an egg instead of a fireball and used that instead to pick her off.

3-3: -618[10.300s]: This one was a huge time saver. The biggest one was using the ladder right before the door holding the key, shooting up about 3 screens instead of jumping on each platform. I also saved time on Mouser. I had a lot of trouble with this one. When I finally figured out what I was doing wrong I ended up saving 30 frames over Guanobowls' run.

4-1: -29[-0.483s]: Same as previous runs, mostly frame work to make it faster.

4-2: -187[-3.117s]: I picked up a cherry earlier in the level to avoid having to stop later on to pick one up. After reaching the whales I was able to pick up the first enemy, allowing me to travel much faster.

4-3: -165[-2.750s]: Most of my time was saved from the boss battle. I hit all four flames with one single mushroom throw, saving about 2.5 seconds.

5-1: -124[-2.067s]: The strategy was pretty much the same as uanobowls, mpostly framework to complete the level faster.

5-2: -189[-3.15s]: I picked up a Hoopstar earlier, picking up speed and on the vines I stayed on the right one, only flying around to avoid the Hoopstar there.

5-3: -1015[16.917s]: This was my biggest time saver in the game. I delayed my foreward movement for about half a second, so that when bombing the blocks to get into the door, I didn't have to go back to get another bomb and wait for that bomb. This strategy worked by only one frame. Took me so many tries to get it. I saved more time by picking up bombs. Even though they explode, it was worth picking them up. I didn't have to power jump when the two bombs come flying at you about midway up the underground area. After submitting this movie I discovered a huge time saver that I had missed. I was able to hit clawgrip with one rock all five times! Thanks 4matsy for the trick.

6-1: -133[-2.217s]: Same as previous runs.

6-2: -86[-1.433s]: Same as previous runs.

6-3: -96[-1.600s]: Same as previous runs.

7-1: -85[-1.417s]: Same as previous runs.

7-2: -310[-5.167s]: Same as previous runs. When I first viewed this run, I thought that it was pretty well optimized, when I saw that I had saved 5 seconds, I was like "huh?". With all the new optimization, I made a minute before this level.

All in all, after redoing all that I did I ended up saving 4239 frames or about 71 seconds from the previous run. I think I will go as far as saying that I am proud of that number.

Thanks go to DeHackEd for helping me try and hex edit my run from 6-1, though in a sence I am glad it didn't work. I saved an additional 2 someodd seconds on top of the 5 I saved from clawgrip.

Again thanks to 4matsy for his trick with clawgrip.