Merry Christmas!
  • Emulator used: Snes9x 1.43 v13/v17
  • Aims for ingame time
  • Takes damage to save time
This is a Reverse Boss Order (RBO) TAS of Super Metroid. As the name implies, we aim to kill the four main bosses (excluding Mother Brain, who must be fought last) in reverse order as quickly as possible. This presents a unique challenge; as the varia and gravity suits are guarded by Kraid and Phantoon respectively, all of Norfair and Maridia must be traversed with Samus' standard power suit.

Crateria and Blue Brinstar

The first changes in this run come as early as Blue Brinstar; a really cool CWJ was applied to an opening door in the Morph Ball room, allowing us to keep our speed in the next room. This also gave us some extra falling speed.
We were also able to collect the Blue Brinstar energy tank extremely early with a precise, zero-momentum jump followed by a CWJ. As we were in the room anyway, we also collected the missile tank. We estimate that this saved roughly 1000 frames.
Due to using some missiles in Blue Brinstar, we collected three extra refills on the way to Bombs; one in the OMBR, one in the OTES and one in the Crateria Main Street. They are all easy to access and cost only 1-2 frames.

Green / Pink Brinstar

The extra missile tank makes this area much smoother than before, allowing us to avoid revisiting the early super missile room. We also CWJed from the last gate to reach the missile door much faster than usual.
We skip the Charge Beam until after collecting Power Bombs. It's slightly faster this way and is easily compensated by our surplus of missiles.
After acquiring Power Bombs, we immediately return to collect some necessary items for Norfair. Killing Crocomire and collecting his energy tank later allows us to completely avoid the Etecoon area.

Norfair

And thus begin the Hellruns. Energy management is pivotal here and you cannot neglect ammo management either. We had 2 things in mind here - Crocomire and Lower Norfair, and preparation had to start very early. We got some energy in our Reserve Tanks given that this was undoubtedly a good time to do so.
Hi-jump comes with some interesting properties: jumping with a speed of n.61440 instead of (n+1),0000 generally gives a higher vertical speed (I say generally because it doesnt always reset, how else would it progress to higher values), this was abused whenever it would save time.
While there is nothing new to the Hellrun, we applied a minor change to the Bubble room, by changing it from a upward CWJ to a normal CWJ. It was not only faster but also much smoother. The Skrees were fairly kind to us. Skrees have a 1% chance to drop Big Energy balls, and getting two of them was very lucky. On the way back we change it up by adding another Skree refill for just a handful of frames, which we actually desperately needed instead of waiting for another pipebug round.
We used a Power Bomb Shield to avoid additional rounds on Crocomire. The CWJ on Crocomire's dying body was just to gain enough distance to make the warp around shot open the door on the far left side of the room. And we also had just enough energy to survive it all (1 more frame spent in a heated room and we would've died).
We used the acid dive after the E-tank plus the refills from Crocomire to optimize the amount of energy we had in our Reserve Tank.
A different approach was used in the lava lake before Lower Norfair to avoid one of the pause screens (avoiding all pause screens was one of our goals while making this run).

Lower Norfair

The lack of Super Missiles forced us to use some different strategies concerning the sanctuary. First of all we used a Power Bomb Shield to refill a Super Missile from a Golden Pirate. This took quite some time to achieve, since framerules and lack of knowledge when it comes to Super Metroid RNG made it hard to determine when the Super Missile would drop. In the end more lag wouldn't cut it; the Super kept dropping on the same ingame frame. We then cut back on the lag as much as possible to get the Super drop on that exact frame. This Super would then save a lot of time on the wallmonster in the sanctuary.
We also used a different strategy in the sanctuary which not only gave us an additional Power Bomb, but also saved a lot of time by not having to land on the spikes again; spiking on the first possible frame allows you to keep your speed when spiking, giving you a lot more distance. With enough speed built up you can reach the platform and still get the last Power Bomb drop.
We needed 22/10/25 for Ridley, and the rooms just prior to Ridley were the perfect place to refill. This is also a good place to show what Grapple can really do. Also note the first application of a Grapple animation cancel; holding the fire button while triggering an animation causes the Grapple to stay extended for the entire animation. Canceling Grapple into an animation also avoids the position reset that occurs when you kill an enemy. This was abused a lot, in Maridia especially, (where animations are much longer) to save single frames.
We used the rooms before Ridley again to refill in preparation for the Maridia CF during Draygon. Power Bombs are fairly rare to get in Maridia, so getting them here is optimal. In the revisit of this room it looks like we miss a refill with the Grapple Beam, while in reality we are getting the refill right under it. While Power Bombs are rare, they weren't worth the delay it took to get this particular refill.
The Kago room used the reverse crumble glitch, with some very careful Dessgeega manipulation which allowed us to avoid damage altogether. The room after that used a very nice mockball which was possible thanks to a zero-momentum jump, which ultimately saved about 9 frames. Also showcasing a very nice momentum spike morphball bombjump to gain a frame; when you first start rolling as a morphball, your momentum increases from 0.49152 to 1.32768, 2.16384, 3.00000, 3.49152 and finally receeding back to a 3.16384. Since momentum and speed is added to the morphball bombjump, catching the morphball bomb when the momentum is at 3.49152 gives the highest speed, and allows us to lay the morphball bomb a frame earlier while still clearing the ledge.
Exiting LN with 10 or less energy to be able to die from one hit by a Waver.

Norfair

Back in the Bubble Room, not only do we need energy but we also need to get rid of our reserve tank for the Draygon CF. The best solution is to trigger it during the Power Bomb explosion, since the timer for the Power Bomb still counts down during the refill sequence saving some time.

Maridia

Momentum is gained at 1/12th rate while running underwater, but it instantly maxes out when jumping. This makes optimizing underwater segments a little bit weird.
This is the place where Grapple is ment to save all the time it costs to collect it plus a lot more. Avoiding the wallcrawl with the Pincer in Mount Doom and avoiding the Underwater Walljumps before Botwoon save a ridiculous amount of time.
We managed to avoid the crouch just before the Mocktroid freeze before Botwoon. This required some very good Mocktroid positioning, who thankfally do not act differently due to RNG.
The mocktroid bridge was very tricky. Not only getting the Mocktroids in the right position, but also avoiding to fall in between them while charging the shinespark. We eventually managed to make it all align, which resulted in one of the coolest speedtricks ever. We also managed to save 1-2 frames on the shinespark itself, by unspinning 1 frame before sparking (this gives you a free pixel in vertical position) allowing us to spark a frame earlier.
Draygon was very tricky. We had trouble deciding on a strategy, most revolved around killing him with the grapple - it's undoubtedly the fastest but costs a lot of energy, which we desperately need for both Mother Brain and all the shinesparks in both Wrecked Ship and Red Brinstar before and after Kraid. We eventually went with a strategy which required very little effort and even ended up being faster than the other strategies we had in mind; instead of using Grapple we use an early CF to give us a free shinespark, which we then use to finish off Draygon which in turn gives us a bluesuit. By using the lower right turret to trigger a morph/unmorph Grapple glitch we can exit the room without being grabbed by Draygon, which saves a ton of time.
The bluesuit is used to exit the eyedoor room, since it's impossible to clear the last ledge just where the water meets the air.
The corridor leading to the Wrecked Ship elevator is a perfect place to squeeze in a lot of refills for practically no cost of time. We still need quite a lot of energy for Mother Brain and the shinesparks later on.

Wrecked Ship

We managed to freeze and collide with one of the Choots, not only does it save time, it also gives us a free refill and allows us to avoid the 80 damage you would normally take from the Choot that comes just after that.
Unlike the other bosses, Phantoon is terribly straightforward.
We skipped the shinespark during the Wrecked Ship exit which cost us 11 frames but saved around 140 energy.

Kraid's Lair

Kraid was very clutch. We just barely managed to make the charged shot connect in his first mouth opening. This triggered the improved Kraid fight, but with a little visual inaccuracy: it looks like Kraid's mouth is closed, but in reality it's still open. Shooting his face with a missile finishes him off.
By leaving his room with 10 Super Missile we get 80 energy from Mini-Kraid, another big step in our plan of skipping the Kraid E-tank.

Tourian

Our plan here is to get atleast 15/10/XX and 740 energy. We were a bit worried but it clearly worked out in our favor.
The Big Metroid skip is very weird. He behaves similarly to Mocktroids (touch his hitbox and he immediately changes his trajectory), but is still subject to RNG. After a ton of work we finally managed to get an excellent skip. Note that it is possible to freeze the Big Metroid with the Grapple, but it delays the fadeout by a very long time, making it worse than useless since the Big Metroid can still move during the fadeout.
Mother Brain looks fairly similar to most other runs. We tried to center the camera as much as possible after the glass phase, since the game still runs during the time it takes for the camera to center on the room.
The escape has always been awkward thanks to difference in luck. With the help of lag and transitional doorlag we changed the steam patterns to our favor.

DarkKobold: Judging.
feos: Encoded HD.

DarkKobold: Derakon's, Tub's and Hero of the Day's posts made this decision much easier. Thank you.
In short, this movie provides a different enough challenge and content from the currently published runs. This movie is much like [1868] SNES Super Mario World "no powerups, maximum exits" by PangaeaPanga in 1:18:23.22, which shows off techniques that can really only be pulled off via TASing. Thus, I am accepting this new category.
As far as obsoleting a movie, I consulted with Hero of the Day. From what he said, the any% in-game (which is currently the most similar run) will be obsoleted by the next any% real-time. Thus, for a more natural and reasonable chain of obsoletion, this movie will not obsolete any other Super Metroid category.
It will, however, obsolete Combatribes. Because seriously, F that movie.
KIDDING! KIDDING!
ledauphinbenoit:Processing the new movie file posted in the discussion thread. Someone with privileges should replace the movie file...

TASVideoAgent
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Wow. Merry Christmas indeed!
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Holy crap! This run was amazing! Not only is this run my favorite run style of my favorite game, but it's a run by some of my favorite TASers too! I really hope this gets published, it's probably my favorite run of 2011. Yes vote!
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Will try to encode.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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Voted yes. I liked a lot of the new strategies used in rooms that's normally not possible in a normal run, and the method of scaling out of Draygon's room without the X-Ray Scanner (tuck and stretch swimming!). I also liked the stylistic approach in some areas, like how Mother Brain was finished off.
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feos wrote:
Will try to encode.
I'm currently encoding the primary and the 10bit444.
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_SAMUS REVERSES
BOSSES SEQUENCE
This is mesmerizing, this silken tapestry of heroic style. Yes vote, 100%
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turska wrote:
feos wrote:
Will try to encode.
I'm currently encoding the primary and the 10bit444.
I only do HD.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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Amazing run! My favorite trick was the entry to Draygon, you just don't see tricks like that in a normal run.
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Aww guys, you shouldn't have! (weeps happily) Mewwy Cwishmash to youuuu!
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Just Awesome! highlights for me is Maridia. Usually it's a boring area for me, in an RBO due to the fact that Samus moves slow, but this RBO is different. I think the mocktroids bridge could be a good screenshot. Congratulations! Btw, Runs for Super Metroid should always be done by a team! Now there's only the 100% run left, unless somebody would improve the low% ice beam route run.
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I'm just wondering - can you get away with not collecting the reserve tank? Seemed like you only had to dip into it the once, and your health management was excellent all the way through.
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Highlights of the run for me: Using Mocktroids to create a lane with which to acquire sprinting speed and charge a Shinespark. Using the Crystal Flash-Shinespark glitch to kill Draygon. Escaping Draygon's room. (How the hell did that work?) This is a fantastic run, and I was entertained by almost the entire thing. (Sorry guys, there's just nothing ANYONE can do to make Ceres Station entertaining anymore.) Voting Yes, and I'd like to propose a solution to our woes with so-called "arbitrary" restrictions: Add an "Unconventional Goals" tag to the publication system. Of course, I'm not proposing that we accept EVERY movie with a nonstandard goal, but I think it's a good solution for runs that otherwise wouldn't have a place on the site. EDIT: I'd also like to go on the record as thinking that the Judge guideline of "minimum branches per game" is a pretty bad restriction. In my opinion, if a movie offers something new as compared to other movies of the same game, and is up to our standards, there's no reason not to publish it.
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That was a beautiful run! Greatly enjoyed it. Maridia was clearly my favorite. And as Boct mentioned, that Mocktroids shinespark was really clever and nice. Obvious yes vote.
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The Mocktroid bridge was the silliest most awesome thing I've seen in a long time. Everything else was cool too. Yes.
Agare Bagare Kopparslagare
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It's surprising how fast you can go through the underwater section. You're barely losing time there! As I said this march,
FWIW, I think this site needs a good RBO and a good SM Redesign run to suitably cover everything SM related.
Here's the RBO, yes for publishing! Oh, and would anyone mind telling me what happened during the draygon fight?
m00
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Here is (or will soon be, when youtube finishes processing) a comparison of this run with the only previous RBO I could find, by Namespoofer: Link to video The new TAS is more than 12000 in-game frames faster than Namespoofer's old run.
Samsara
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Refraining from voting. I don't think another Super Metroid run should be published unless the publication of this run obsoletes one of the others, though I would heavily favor this over either the in-game time run or the real-time run since there's not much variety between those two runs.
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amaurea wrote:
Here is (or will soon be, when youtube finishes processing) a comparison of this run with the only previous RBO I could find, by Namespoofer: Link to video The new TAS is more than 12000 in-game frames faster than Namespoofer's old run.
video died.
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amaurea wrote:
Here is (or will soon be, when youtube finishes processing) a comparison of this run with the only previous RBO I could find, by Namespoofer: Link to video The new TAS is more than 12000 in-game frames faster than Namespoofer's old run.
awesome, by the way, did you use a script to automatically remove the cutscenes or did you removed them manually ?
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rex4 wrote:
awesome, by the way, did you use a script to automatically remove the cutscenes or did you removed them manually ?
I did it with a script. Doing it manually would be both horribly boring and inaccurate. The numbers and other samus were also overlaid by a script.
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where is it ? I searched, I saw a lot of posts about it but not the script itself.
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rex4 wrote:
where is it ? I searched, I saw a lot of posts about it but not the script itself.
There's a link to the script right in the video description (I've noticed that a seemingly large fraction of youtube watchers don't seem to read the description), but anyway, you can find the script and a description here.
creaothceann
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Still watching, though I can't imagine not voting yes. We've had the "this game has too many runs" argument so many times. I don't see any reason to have it again. I do believe it should be published as a new category but that's the judges' call in the end and there is strong resistance to giving this game multiple categories, as people who are not passionate fans of it have trouble appreciating the distinctions between any%, 100%, low%, no glitch any%, NBMB, RBO, etc. and I can't really blame them for not loving each category like individual children.
Toothache wrote:
I'm just wondering - can you get away with not collecting the reserve tank? Seemed like you only had to dip into it the once, and your health management was excellent all the way through.
IIRC, damage on the elevator continues even though it doesn't show until Samus stops moving. So having 04 health when Samus enters the elevator to lower Norfair means she'd be dead as soon as it stops moving. Even at 50+ health, I believe she would die instantly. Getting on the elevator with a sliver of health and using the reserve tank allows Samus to avoid a lot of normally unavoidable damage (as you'd need at least one more e-tank, maybe more, to survive that elevator ride without the reserve tank kicking in). The second use of it before Ridley is just faster since they already have the tank.
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