Skitchin' completed in 16:18.65.
Boilerplate
- Emulator used: Gens Re-recording, v. 11a
- Genre: Racing
- Uses warps
- Uses hospitalization to save time
- Takes damage to save time
- Contains speed/entertainment tradeoffs
About the Game
Skitchin' is a real gem of a game released in 1994, way back when EA didn't completely suck. It is the spiritual successor to the Road Rash series. The goal of the game is to rollerblade to the finish line, grabbing cars to boost your speed (the titular "skitching"), performing tricks, and knocking over other racers with various weapons. In this tool-assisted speedrun, very few cars are skitched and the other racers are ignored. Gameplay is actually fairly nuanced in ways I don't care to describe here, but I highly recommend playing this game through, *cough*, legal means so you can experience it for yourself. Skitchin' isn't a great game, but I would say it's a hell of a lot more fun than it ought to be.
The first thing you'll notice about it is that it's dripping with '90s "'tude", similar to Comix Zone in that regard. I think they purposefully played it up, so I find it rather charming. There is a lot of humor (both intentional and unintentional) to be found if you keep your eyes peeled, and I've devoted a section at the bottom of this page to a taste of what this game holds.
If you want to see what gameplay looks like without acquiring the game, here's a playthrough by BirthofaNova on YouTube:
He's actually a pretty good player!
About the TAS
This is my first TAS. I've always had a soft spot for this game and I was a little surprised to see no one had so much as attempted a run of it. Even thirteen years ago, I wanted to make maps of all the levels so that I would know where to find the best weapons. Everything just fell in place: I suddenly had a lot of free time on my hands, I liked the game, it was fairly short and linear, there was no speedrun for it, and the game was entertaining enough to watch.
There are 12 levels in this game. I play 11 of them and complete 6 of them, warping out of 5 of them. The only level you will not see is San Francisco (and I can attest you aren't missing much-- it's difficult and boring).
Route Planning
Ah, route planning. The bane of any speedrunner. The prospect of route planning killed my Cool Spot TAS idea before it even got off the ground. Fortunately, Skitchin' is fairly linear, so it's relatively easy to plan. Emphasis on "relatively". I still put in a lot of effort optimizing routes.
Long-term Route Planning
Planning for the long-term was by far the easiest. By performing tricks into certain billboards, you can warp to different levels. I scoured the game for these billboards and was able to produce a map of all the warps. From this, I determined the fastest path to New York. As you'll see from the video, this is (numbers in parentheses indicate the level number):
- (1) Vancouver
- (Vancouver Bonus)
- (2) Denver, warp to
- (3) San Diego
- (4) Seattle, warp to
- (7) Washington, warp to
- (6) Los Angeles, warp to
- (8) Toronto
- (Toronto Bonus)
- (9) Detroit
- (10) Chicago, warp to
- (11) Miami
- (Miami Bonus)
- (12) New York
You'll notice I warp from Washington back to Los Angeles. I carefully tested routes with and without warping out of Washington and found that warping was faster. The rest of the route is self-evident and I could only be wrong about it if I somehow missed a warp (which I highly doubt).
Nitro Planning
Scattered throughout the levels are canisters of nitro, which look like cans of spray paint. Nitros boost your speed and are crucial to this run as using just two of them can accelerate you to maximum speed. Determining when each nitro should be used is extremely nontrivial. Sometimes the best strategy is to use a nitro right away, sometimes it should be stocked away for a future level. For almost every nitro (especially as the game progressed), I spent a lot of time determining whether I should pick it up and when I should use it.
To assist in planning, I wrote a short program in Matlab to crudely simulate the playthrough of a level. Given an initial state (position and velocity) and a goal position, this program output the number of frames until that point is reached for specified times using nitros. While the program isn't perfect, I found that the ideal timing for using nitros is fairly generous (usually to within plus-or-minus 30 frames), so I'm quite confident I used every nitro when it would do the most good.
In-level Route Planning
As far as route planning goes, this had the greatest variety of difficulty. For some levels, it was only a matter of finding the next ramp or nitro and then jumping to it. For parts of some levels, it was a strenuous process of trial and error in an effort to avoid obstacles or set myself up for a better position down the road.
Techniques
Up+B+C Jumping
By far the most implemented technique in this run-- it's performed dozens of times in every level I don't warp out of. This is a semi-secret technique that isn't described in the game's manual, but is still well-known. By holding Up+B+C, you perform an extra high jump, kicking your legs to one side to indicate you've performed it correctly. Although this leg kick is identical to one of the tricks you can perform, the jump does not award you any money.
While performing this jump, your velocity components (both forward and lateral) are maintained. Since you decelerate rapidly on pavement and very rapidly in grass, it pays to perform this jump as much as possible. Upon landing, your lateral speed remains locked until a particular frame, at which point you can either perform another Up+B+C jump (generally preserving your lateral speed) or simply take control of the character again.
This jump cannot be performed while climbing a steep hill (you fall down before your legs straighten). It also cannot be performed while a nitro is selected (you will instead use the nitro).
(Conventional) Jumping
A poor man's Up+B+C jump. By simply pressing Up, the character performs a short jump. This jump generally takes you about 3/4 the distance of an Up+B+C jump, also preserving your velocity components. One advantage to this jump is that you can alter your lateral speed as soon as your feet touch the ground. This makes it ideal for finessing tricky areas where an Up+B+C jump would "lock in" to a particular lateral velocity. It can also be useful for "closing gaps" between short-term goals when an Up+B+C jump would carry you too far.
Like the Up+B+C jump, this cannot be performed while climbing a steep hill, although I've found that it can be performed on steeper hills than the Up+B+C jump.
Tricks
It literally pays to perform tricks in this game, but that's not why I do them. Doing tricks gives you a small boost in speed. This can be most clearly seen in the first level, Vancouver, where I pull away from a pursuing car just by performing a trick. The maximum speed in Skitchin' is 125 units and a typical stunt will add eight to ten units to your current speed. There are tons of ramps and other opportunities for tricks throughout the game, so it's very easy to increase and maintain your speed. I also try to demonstrate as much variety as possible in the tricks I perform so that the speedrun is less monotonous.
Tricks Off of Opponents
This is just a special case of a regular trick. If an opposing racer falls down, you can perform a trick off of his poor, battered body. I'm only able to do this once at the start of Miami, but future speedrunners should be aware of this technique. If you can luck manipulate other racers into falling down, I imagine a lot of time can be shaved off of the run.
Speed Canceling
Speed limit ramps are always on the right-hand side of the road. To get to them without spending too much time on the grass, you must hold Right, but in doing so, you build up lateral momentum that might carry you into the grass when you land. By holding C when you reach any ramp, this lateral speed decreases by one unit per frame, straightening your trajectory. This is extremely useful for speed limit ramps that show up just before the road turns to the right. I only discovered this technique while running Chicago, so there are many times when I could have used it but wasn't aware of it.
Item Duplication
When I picked up a nitro in Vancouver Bonus, I was surprised to find that the game awarded me two nitros. I tried to replicate this glitch, but to no avail. From what I can tell, it requires very precise initial conditions. Duplicating that nitro didn't save much time, but I've left it in as an invitation to more savvy speedrunners to figure out how it's done and obliterate my record. I can't imagine how much time would be saved with twice as many nitros available as this run.
While there isn't a whole lot to say, I have provided comments on every level. My specific comments are indexed according to the in-game timer.
WARNING Screen
You're normally forced to look at the WARNING screen for about ten seconds. However, if you input B-A-Down-A-Start-Start (BADASS), this skips the screen and allows you to enter cheats in the password menu. I enter the code as quickly as I can. It does not affect gameplay.
There isn't much to say about the menus I go through on the way to the first race.
Vancouver
When I started this speedrun, my Lua script was pretty rudimentary. As such, Vancouver is just a teensy bit sloppy. If you look at the input, you'll notice I hold Up+B+C a lot instead of pressing it at particular frames. Perhaps I'm just obsessive compulsive, but it looks crude to me. Just ignore this level. It gets better.
- 00:06 - I tried to manipulate the first car into being as fast as possible, though I'm not sure if it paid off. My reasoning was that if I'm going as fast as possible, then I will hit ramps more often, allowing me to go even faster, allowing me to hit more ramps, and so on. I accelerate to manipulate the car's speed, then skate into the grass so I can skitch it as early as possible.
- 00:57 - I think I wasted a few frames by not jumping cleanly into the grass to pick up this nitro.
- 01:29 - I skip this ramp because it would carry me far over the finish line, wasting time. In later levels, I learned to attempt to hit a pole or post or anything that could stop me suddenly. Oh well.
Vancouver Bonus
After Vancouver, Toronto, and Miami, if you complete the course quickly enough, you are awarded with a bonus level that you must speed through as quickly as possible to earn money. These three bonus levels are identical. While the other two just waste time, Vancouver's bonus gives me an opportunity to pick up some nitros. This level features the last skitching of the entire speedrun.
- 00:06 - I suppose I should have ducked or thrown punches while waiting for the cars to show up. Yawn.
- 00:09 - In the speed bonus levels, whenever you skitch a car in one lane, cars in the other lane will go much faster. Therefore, one viable strategy is to skitch and let go of cars as much as possible while alternating lanes. You'll see that strategy implemented here.
- 00:20 - I pick up the nitro... and a second nitro. I'm still scratching my head over that one. If you can consistently replicate it, enjoy obliterating my run by several minutes.
- 00:22 - At this point, the cars are going at the maximum speed so no more lane changing is necessary. You'll notice that the right lane is no longer passing the left.
- 00:34 - Woo! Collision detection!
- 00:42 - I'm not entirely sure what happened here. My best guess is that the car I'm holding onto suffered an overflow error, dropping its speed below that of the car behind it. That car hurls me across the finish line. Since I decelerate more quickly this way, I left it in.
Denver
Not much to see here, as the warp is near the start of the level.
- 00:05 - I get up to my top speed under leg power before using the nitro. Looking back, I'm not entirely sure if that was ideal or if I should have used the nitro sooner.
- 00:11 - Fancy tricks take longer to recover from, so I generally try to follow up a fancy trick with a simple one so that the recovery time is minimal. That doesn't matter here because the gap between this trick and the next is just large enough that a fancy trick tightens it up. Still, I kind of wish I'd done a simple trick here just for the sake of consistency with the rest of the run. Same goes for the following trick.
San Diego
Now the run gets a little more entertaining. I'm finally able to reach top speed using just nitros and ramps. I updated my Lua script before running this level, so you'll notice my inputs are much tighter.
- 00:01 - Whenever you use a warp, you start the following level at top speed. It therefore makes sense to use a nitro as soon as possible. You'll find that's a common theme in this run.
- 00:53 - Somehow this skater is able to completely change his angular momentum in mid-jump, performing both a forward and backflip. Perhaps he's swinging his arms so quickly that they alias into appearing relatively still... Bah, I'm a nerd.
- 00:58 - Top speed!
- 01:02 - From this point on, I try to end the levels as violently as possible. This has numerous benefits. First, it makes the run more entertaining. Second, it decelerates you more quickly. Third, it wears down your padding. More on that later...
Seattle
A rather unremarkable level. No nitros to pick up, no tricks to perform. Get up to top speed with legs, use one nitro, Up+B+C about half a dozen times, jump into billboard. Next!
Washington
Before you judge my run, please watch Washington. It's the first level to really epitomize what this TAS is about. Tricks and nitros abound in this level.
- 00:02 - A couple of close calls to start off this level. You'll notice that intersections get increasingly dangerous as this run progresses. I just manipulate the collision detection that much more.
- 00:14 - No, jumping into the grass wasn't a mistake. I need to slow down before I hit the next ramp so that I can pick up the nitro after I land. I also intentionally did no trick off this jump. For whatever reason, not performing a trick allowed me to land sooner. Had I performed a trick, I would have missed the nitro.
- 00:45 - A few times around here, I don't do an Up+B+C jump. This is because the slope is too steep. Get used to it. The terrain only gets more hilly as the game progresses.
Los Angeles
A brief layover here. As boring as Seattle. It does feature some of my favorite music, though... not that you'll hear much of it.
- 00:01 - To the right, you'll see a speed limit ramp. After running this level, it occurred to me that I might want to hit that ramp to build up speed, then use the nitro. I tried it and it was slower.
- 00:09 - I remember jumping past these guys was a real pain.
Toronto
There's a lot of zipping around through winding roads that's self-explanatory here. Nitro planning through the following three levels (Toronto, Toronto Bonus, and Detroit) was a real pain. I'm quite confident in the strategy I chose, though.
- 00:40 - Whose bright idea was it to put speed bumps on the freeway?
- 01:01 - Using the nitro in the grass normally diminishes its effect, but since I'm already going top speed, it costs me nothing.
- 01:17 - Car T-boned while crossing the finish line, as per mmbossman's request. Looks great! (And it's not the last time you'll see it!)
Toronto Bonus
Here we go again... except this time, I start out with a nitro on hand! This means I can ditch the cars and reach the finish line faster under my own propulsion.
- 00:37 - Should've hit something instead of coasting.
Detroit
Detroit was tricky. I start the level with two nitros in stock and there are four more to be picked up in the level. Unfortunately, all four are in the first half of the level, requiring me to use at least three nitros in the first half.
- 00:08 - The only outright mistake in this run. I get up to full speed with my legs before using my two nitros. Since your acceleration is greater with nitros, it makes sense to forgo pumping your legs and using the nitros right off the starting line. I didn't catch this mistake until I was already working on Chicago, so I didn't go back to fix it. I imagine it only costs me a handful of frames at most, but I still feel embarrassed whenever I look at it.
- 00:30 - WHAM!!!
- 00:40 - Like threading a needle, I'm able to wriggle between the truck and the pylons...
- 00:41 - ...and then again, through these barriers. Now you can see why I didn't want to redo this level.
- 00:41 - My inventory is full of nitros, so I'm forced to to regular jumps until it becomes advantageous to use one of them.
- 00:59 - Don't be fooled. If you take that ramp to the left, you just run right into the truck.
- 01:07 - That speed limit ramp is at the bottom of a steep hill, so I can't pull off a trick without giving myself a makeshift face-lift.
- 01:28 - One of my favorite level conclusions. I just plop straight down to the ground.
Chicago
My favorite level! Very fast, lots of tricks, and even a little glitchy! Too bad I have to warp out of it.
- Prior to level - I have to buy new wheels since my old ones are ready to give out. This is the only equipment I buy during the course of this speedrun (only $75 spent!).
- 00:00 - See!? I learned from my mistake and started off Chicago with the nitro!
- 00:25 - Made you look! Not sure what happened there, but it sure is fun to watch!
- 00:27 - ZAP!!!
Miami
I hated Miami. I breezed through the entire speedrun up to Miami, then hit it like a lamppost in Detroit. Miami is difficult because there are seven nitros to be picked up, two pairs of which are on either side of the road near the end of the level. I thought for hours about how many of them I should pick up, which ones to pick up, and when to use them. After settling on a strategy, I second-guessed myself, so I re-recorded about one-third of the level to test an alternate strategy. It was slower by 200 frames. And hell, for all the trouble Miami caused me, it isn't even that entertaining to watch!
- 00:09 - Sucker! You can perform tricks off of fallen opponents, so this is a valuable free speed boost. A significant amount of time could be saved if you can luck manipulate other racers into tripping.
- 01:33 - Wave bye-bye to the two nitros in the grass on the right. They take too long to pick up and you can't use them without shooting past the two nitros on the left.
- 1:43 - Unfortunately, this part is uphill, so I can't jump back onto the road. I'm stuck here until a gap in the barrier opens up. Because of this, I started thinking that the first pair of nitros might be easier to get. I was wrong.
- 1:52 - I vent my frustrations with this level by ending it with my most spectacular crash. Ouch!
Miami Bonus
Faced with the prospect of completing the same stupid bonus level for a third time, I skate over to the nearest lamppost and crack my skull open against it so that an ambulance can take me away from this level. Sorry, this is the fastest way to exit the level. The level would have ended sooner if my pads were more worn. I should have run into more crap at the ends of levels. That's 30 seconds of your life you'll never get back.
New York
The last level, and it's a doozie. There are eight nitros in this level, seven of which I pick up. There are also about 20 viable ramps. Reaching top speed and maintaining it is a piece of cake, although I had to carefully plan when to use nitros and when to use ramps.
- Prior to level - My pads are gone! Safety gear is for chumps!
- 00:07 - This nitro is optimized so that it runs out just in time to pick up the next nitro.
- 01:29 - I'm able to hit this heap and the next one without skating on the grass. It's harder than it looks!
- 01:53 - Could it have ended any other way?
Possible Improvements
I tried to make this TAS as fast as possible, but it isn't perfect. The two biggest changes I would make would be running into more things at the ends of levels, thus allowing me to get out of Miami's bonus stage sooner, and using two nitros at the start of Detroit. In addition to that, there are tiny optimizations to be made along the existing route-- using nitros or jumping at slightly different times, changing your trajectory sooner, and other miscellaneous changes. Finally, there are some techniques that I only picked up on as I played, so they aren't implemented in earlier levels. I estimate that by further optimizing the current route (assuming no tradeoffs with the luck that I had), roughly ten seconds could be saved. I'm confident my route is optimal, but I estimate that if there is a better route through each stage, no more than about thirty additional seconds could be saved. That sounds like a lot, but I'm trying to be generous with my estimates. If you think you can do better, by all means, give it a shot. I think you'll find it quite difficult to improve.
FractalFusion brought up a good point in the submission topic. It is about one second faster to suicide out of Toronto Bonus (by running into the first pole) than this submission. It saves seven seconds on Toronto Bonus plus three seconds on Miami Bonus because it would only take seven hits to destroy your skates. It costs about six seconds in Detroit (according to my Matlab program) and about three additional seconds to buy new skates. The amount of time saved may differ substantially from this estimate, mostly depending on how much time is lost in Detroit.
Acknowledgments
I'd like to extend my thanks to
adelikat for not only spearheading tool-assisted speedruns, but also for giving his thumbs-up after watching my WIP. His approval indicated to me that this movie would have a real chance of getting published. I'd also like to thank
maTO,
mmbossman, arflech, and djchilxxn, who all provided encouragement along the way.
Billboards
Skitchin' has an odd sense of humor and, from what I can tell, an anti-consumerism bent. Since the game's amusing billboards whizz past too quickly to appreciate them, I thought I'd close out this submission text by sharing the unusual advertisements in the game:
- Tap Water
- Don't drink and skitch
- Bingo
- Eat wax! (Yum!)
- Buy things!
- 24 hour brunch
- Roche Motel
- Car
- Visit the Moon
- Clown Shoes
- Bathe in Corn
Epilogue
Suggested screenshot: frame 40383
Notes to encoders: The movie should end at or around frame 63600 when the TV snow wipes to black. The credits that follow are shown at the start of the game (though you can include them if you really want). Also, be sure to disable "PSG High Quality" under the sound menu-- it does funky things to Vancouver's music and probably doesn't help the other tracks in the game. Having it disabled sounds better and more authentic.
FractalFusion: Somehow I liked this one. The pace really picked up a few minutes in. Responses in the thread were similar. The only issue was the suiciding, but other than that, it's good. Accepting for publication.
Velitha: Picture hunting and processing...
